January 31, 2016 4th Sunday of Epiphany

Luke 4:33-37 (The Message) 

33-34 In the meeting place that day there was a man demonically disturbed. He screamed, “Ho! What business do you have here with us, Jesus? Nazarene! I know what you’re up to. You’re the Holy One of God and you’ve come to destroy us!”
35 Jesus shut him up: “Quiet! Get out of him!” The demonic spirit threw the man down in front of them all and left. The demon didn’t hurt him.
36-37 That set everyone back on their heels, whispering and wondering, “What’s going on here? Someone whose words make things happen? Someone who orders demonic spirits to get out and they go?” Jesus was the talk of the town.

There are two places do see ourselves in this text:  With the people who were amazed or with the man possessed by an evil spirit, who experienced the power of Jesus Words.

We probably see ourselves with the first choice - for we are not demon possessed!  Yet it is the demonic who goes home with something.  So what might it mean if we stood with him?

It would mean we have our own demons which need to be recognized and confessed.  Obvious ones: alcohol, drugs, tobacco, caffeine, money,; less obvious: greed, pride, selfishness, dishonesty, lust for power and prestige.  We need to be exorcised, cleansed, changed if we are to “put on the new nature”, that is, if we are to put on “compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and patience, for bearing one another, and forgiving each other, ...putting on love…”  Ephesians. 3:12-14

When we confess our demons 
and seek healing, they can be 
“cast out”. And not hurt us anymore.  
Then we are free to become loving, 
caring people.

Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me too see my demons and with your help,
cast them out.  So I can care and love, much.”

January 24, 2016 Third Sunday After Epiphany

Luke 4:22-30 (The Message)

22 All who were there, watching and listening, were surprised at how well he (Jesus) spoke.  But they also said, “Isn’t this Joseph’s son, the one we’ve known since he was a youngster?”

23-27 He answered, “I suppose you’re going to quote the proverb, ‘Doctor, go heal yourself.  Do here in your hometown what we heard you did in Capernaum.’  Well, let me tell you something:  No prophet is ever welcomed in his hometown.  Isn’t it a fact that there were many widows in Israel at the time of Elijah during that three and a half years of drought when famine devastated the land, but the only widow to whom Elijah was sent was in Sarepta in Sidon?  And there were many lepers in Israel at the time of the prophet Elisha but the only one cleansed was Naaman the Syrian.”

28-30 That set everyone in the meeting place seething with anger.  They threw him out, banishing him from the village, then took him to a mountain cliff at the edge of the village to throw him to his doom, but he gave them the slip and was on his way.

This is Jesus' first trip home following his baptism and 40 days in the wilderness.  It is the beginning of his ministry.  He is announcing who he is and why he has come.  And he is going it in his home synagogue.

Jesus should have stopped before he hot himself thrown out of town.  But he didn’t.  He went on to say what they didn’t want to hear.  That God used outsiders – Sarepta and Naaman – to do what the insiders wouldn’t do.  For with God there are no outsiders!  Jesus began his ministry with this clear message, and we still find it hard to swallow.

“Jesus was a reject who

rejected rejection”

            Virgilio Eliizando

Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me remember that you do not reject those I reject.  Your love is beyond my understanding or control!”

Jan 17, 2016. Second Sunday After Epiphany

John 2:1-11 (The Message)

1-3 Three days later there was a wedding in the village of Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there. Jesus and his disciples were guests also. When they started running low on wine at the wedding banquet, Jesus’ mother told him, “They’re just about out of wine.”
4 Jesus said, “Is that any of our business, Mother—yours or mine? This isn’t my time. Don’t push me.”
5 She went ahead anyway, telling the servants, “Whatever he tells you, do it.”
6-7 Six stoneware water pots were there, used by the Jews for ritual washings. Each held twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus ordered the servants, “Fill the pots with water.” And they filled them tto the brim.
8 “Now fill your pitchers and take them to the host,” Jesus said, and they did.
9-10 When the host tasted the water that had become wine (he didn’t know what had just happened but the servants, of course, knew), he called out to the bridegroom, “Everybody I know begins with their finest wines and after the guests have had their fill brings in the cheap stuff. But you’ve saved the best till now!”
11 This act in Cana of Galilee was the first sign Jesus gave, the first glimpse of his glory. And his disciples believed in him.

This miracle tells us what Jesus is all about.  Gospel not law, grace not demands, love not wrath, laughter not somberness.  The God Jesus came to reveal was not a God hung up on shoulds, oughts, or musts, but a God hung up on love, grace and forgiveness.

Turning the water into wine was a delightful opportunity of grace for Jesus.  It set the stage for what he was all about and what we are to be all about - to love and laugh our way into the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven and let its grace flow through us into virtually everything.

"The God of Jesus is a God so deeply in love
with his creatures that if humans should behave
the same way, they would be deemed crazy."
Andrew Greeley

Prayer thought for the week:  "Lord, help me be a bit crazy in and with your grace."

Jan 10, 2016 Baptism of Our Lord Sunday

Luke 3:15-22  (The Message)

21-22 After all the people were baptized, Jesus was baptized. As he was praying, the sky opened up and the Holy Spirit, like a dove descending, came down on him. And along with the Spirit, a voice: “You are my Son, chosen and marked by my love, pride of my life.”

Jesus baptism was a powerful moment for him.  He needed this moment, this experience, this voice, this assurance to even dare begin to walk this earth as the Son of God.

There was struggle for Jesus in knowing his divine call.  For he was going to have to walk as a stranger among his own kin and an outsider among his own people.  He would be hated, despised, rejected, “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”.  Yet as one in whom God delights.  He was to bring a new brand of justice which was directed by compassion.

Regarding this justice, Rabbi Abraham Heschel in “The Prophets” makes this bold statement:
“There is a point at which strict justice is unjust.”  Then speaking of biblical justice he says, “Justice was not equal justice, but a bias in favor of the poor…







“for beyond all justice
is God’s compassion.”
           Rabbi Heschel









Prayer thought for the week: “ Lord help me to remember that Your compassion is greater than even justice.  And help me be more compassion in all that I do.”

Jan. 3, 2016 Second Sunday of Christmas

Luke 2:41-52  (The Message)

41-45 Every year Jesus’ parents traveled to Jerusalem for the Feast of Passover. When he was twelve years old, they went up as they always did for the Feast. When it was over and they left for home, the child Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents didn’t know it. Thinking he was somewhere in the company of pilgrims, they journeyed for a whole day and then began looking for him among relatives and neighbors. When they didn’t find him, they went back to Jerusalem looking for him.
46-48 The next day they found him in the Temple seated among the teachers, listening to them and asking questions. The teachers were all quite taken with him, impressed with the sharpness of his answers. But his parents were not impressed; they were upset and hurt.
His mother said, “Young man, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been half out of our minds looking for you.”
49-50 He said, “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know that I had to be here, dealing with the things of my Father?” But they had no idea what he was talking about.
51-52 So he went back to Nazareth with them, and lived obediently with them. His mother held these things dearly, deep within herself. And Jesus matured, growing up in both body and spirit, blessed by both God and people.

Jesus wasn’t the perfect child if we think of being perfect as always obedient, always predictable, always meeting his parents expectations.

He gave them some anxious moments, fearful moments, bewildering moments.  Something burned within Jesus which he may not have understood as a child of 12 but which led him in ways which left his family anxious.  He had to find out who he was and what he was here for.  (Don’t we all!)

No one can do this for us - we have to each do it for ourselves and it will create anxious moments for those who love us.

To parent is to love when we are anxious and let our children grow up “in both body and spirit”.  Even Jesus had to do this!


“There are times when we get caught up
in things which scare our parents,
not because they are wrong,
but because there is danger as well as
 beauty in what we are doing.”
Anonymous












Prayer thought for the week:  "Lord, help me remember that raising children is always a
struggle between anxiety and healthy risk.  And that life is always caught between the two,
even when we grow older."

Dec. 27, 2015 Christmas I

John 1:14

14 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.

 Christmas is past; and the celebration which begins earlier each year, will soon be over.  Yet Christmas is never over.  It never ends.  It is hidden in every day, every word, every deed of our lives.

As we celebrate the Word which became flesh and lived among us, we also celebrate the Word becoming flesh - our flesh - and living still in our midst.

We are to live our words and live The Word so that even our flesh becomes a presence of the God who became human and dwelt among us in Jesus.

For God’s living word - God’s best word to us - is seen before it is heard. felt before it is known, experienced before it is understood, lived before it can be spoken.
God became flesh and lived among us so we could best know God in the most human way possible.   And that is also how we share God - by living God’s word of love.

 “The most important question for me is not, ‘How do I touch people?’  but, ‘How do I live the word I am speaking?”  Henri Nouwen:

Indeed, Christmas is not just once a year.  It is never over.  It is yesterday, today, and forever, as the Word becomes flesh - in us -  and lives among us.
Indeed, Christmas is every day!












Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me keep Christmas all year long, with joy and thankfulness.”

Dec 20, 2015 Advent 4

Luke 1: 39-45

    39 At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, 40 where she entered Zechariah's home and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. 45 Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!"

Mary is called “blessed” because she allowed herself to be used as a blessing.  She humbly believed what the Lord said to her and let it be accomplished.

God needed Mary to do God’s will.  God couldn’t have done it, at that time, in that way, without Mary.

God needs us to do God’s will in our world.  As unbelievable as it sounds, there are some things God can not do at this time without us.  To follow God’s lead is to discover God’s blessing.  It comes in the doing, for blessing is a serendipity.  Something which happens in the process of surrendering to God’s will.  There will always be a blessing in doing God’s will.

“And Mary said:
 ‘My soul glorifies the Lord
 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
 for he has been mindful
 of the humble state of his servant.
 From now on all generations
will call me blessed,’”  Luke 1:46-48





Prayer thought for the day:  “Lord, what is it you cannot do without me?
Bless me that I might be a blessing and do what only I can do.”