Aug 26, 2018 14th Sunday After Pentecost

Mark 7:1-8 (The Message)

1 The Pharisees, along with some religion scholars who had come from Jerusalem, gathered around him. 2 They noticed that some of his disciples weren't being careful with ritual washings before meals. 3 The Pharisees - Jews in general, in fact - would never eat a meal without going through the motions of a ritual hand-washing, 4 with an especially vigorous scrubbing if they had just come from the market (to say nothing of the scourings they'd give jugs and pots and pans). 5 The Pharisees and religion scholars asked, "Why do your disciples flout the rules, showing up at meals without washing their hands?" 6 Jesus answered, "Isaiah was right about frauds like you, hit the bull's-eye in fact: These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their heart isn't in it. 7 They act like they are worshiping me, but they don't mean it. They just use me as a cover for teaching whatever suits their fancy, 8 Ditching God's command and taking up the latest fads."

“The most apparent meaning of this (text) could be summarized as a criticism of surface things and a call for deep things.” (Source unknown)

Religion is not meant to be something we play at; it is not meant to be superficial, mechanical, ritualistic. It is meant to be something which comes from the heart - a heart touched by the love and grace of God.
Observing the traditions of the elders is not what is important.
Living as one who has been touched by the love of God is.



"We have enough religion
to make us hate,
but not enough to make
us love one another."
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745)



Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me to not be so heavenly minded (religious) that I am no earthly good.  Help me to love, even when it flies against my religious certainties.”

August 19 2018 13th Sunday After Pentecost

John 6:51-58  (The Message)

51 I am the Bread - living Bread! - who came down out of heaven. Anyone who eats this Bread will live - and forever! The Bread that I present to the world so that it can eat and live is myself, this flesh-and-blood self." 52 At this, the Jews started fighting among themselves: "How can this man serve up his flesh for a meal?" 53 But Jesus didn't give an inch. "Only insofar as you eat and drink flesh and blood, the flesh and blood of the Son of Man, do you have life within you. 54 The one who brings a hearty appetite to this eating and drinking has eternal life and will be fit and ready for the Final Day. 55 My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. 56 By eating my flesh and drinking my blood you enter into me and I into you. 57 In the same way that the fully alive Father sent me here and I live because of him, so the one who makes a meal of me lives because of me. 58 This is the Bread from heaven. Your ancestors ate bread and later died. Whoever eats this Bread will live always."

This is a troublesome text.  As one theologian said of it -
“The language in this text is raw and probably ought to shock our sensibilities.”

What ever we do with these words, we dare not take them literal - for then we will miss the point of what Jesus is saying - as is often the case when the Bible is take literally.  We end up with a distorted, disconnected message which leads to distorted and disconnected living.

So what is it Jesus is trying to say to us today?

Robert Kyser, a Biblical scholar of today makes a good point as to what Jesus might be getting at here, in his book “Preaching John”.  He suggests that Jesus is telling the hearers that they literally need to take Jesus into themselves, make him “part of their essence”

Too which another theologian, adds:  “No arm’s-length relationship here, no safe distance between us.  As (those) who long for the abundant life, we have no other way to such a life except by taking Jesus in, having him become so intermingled with our own being that we cannot separate one from the other. “  Adele Resmer

Then we will no longer be able to live indifferent to the urging of the spirit to place faith, hope, and love at the center of our living and let nothing push in aside.







Faith is  “a power and passion in authority
among the powers and passions of life”
P.T. Forsythe,













Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me to be passionate about faith and life, empowered by your love to do good no matter what.”

August 12, 2018 12th Sunday After Pentecost

John 6:35,36,41,42 (The Message)

35 Jesus said, "I am the Bread of Life. The person who aligns with me hungers no more and thirsts no more, ever. 36 I have told you this explicitly because even though you have seen me in action, you don't really believe me…. 41 At this, because he said, "I am the Bread that came down from heaven," the Jews started arguing over him: 42 "Isn't this the son of Joseph? Don't we know his father? Don't we know his mother? How can he now say, 'I came down out of heaven' and expect anyone to believe him?"

Jesus was too human for the people of his day.  He was Joseph’s son who lived in their midst.  He was too human, too real, too common for them to believe he was God’s Son.

We also struggle with things of God being too human.  The truth is, the most spiritual (God like) things we can do are often the most human.  We dare not be afraid to be human for that is the essence of what it means to be spiritual (eat of the Bread of Life).

Every time we touch intimately, lovingly, compassionately in the midst of the pain and joy of being human, God is there with life giving bread to impart eternal life.  This is how human God is!






”To be human is to be spiritual;
to be spiritual is to be human.”
Ron Hinrichs











Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, you created me ‘human’, with your spark of life
in me.  Help me to discover the joy of being human.  And discover how spiritual it is
to lovingly bring joy to others in our human journey. “

Aug. 5, 2018 11th Sunday After Pentecost

John 6:26,27  (The Message)

26 Jesus answered, "You've come looking for me not because you saw God in my actions but because I fed you, filled your stomachs - and for free. 27 "Don't waste your energy striving for perishable food like that. Work for the food that sticks with you, food that nourishes your lasting life, food the Son of Man provides. He and what he does are guaranteed by God the Father to last."


The people in our text were looking for the easy way out.  They had a free meal (the feeding of the 5000) and they wanted a free meal;  a life without difficulty, pain, suffering.  They came to Jesus for the wrong thing.

They wanted Jesus “not because (they) saw signs, but because (they) ate their fill of the loaves.”

They wanted Jesus for the wrong reason - and so often do we.
We come not because we want to be “renewed in our spirit”.    We come because we want to have our bases covered. We want Jesus as an insurance policy against bad things happening to us.

But this is not how it is with Jesus.  God did not send Jesus to dwell among us so life could be a bed of roses.  God sent Jesus to dwell among us so that life could be different - strangely, powerfully, eternally different!  For strange as it may sound it is true:  “The person who aligns with me hungers no more and thirsts no more, ever.”







“I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE.”
                         Jesus






Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, feed me with your eternal love so I hunger or thirst no more, ever.”

July 29, 2018 10th Sunday After Pentecost

Mark 6:53-56  (The Message)

53 They beached the boat at Gennesaret and tied up at the landing. 54 As soon as they got out of the boat, word got around fast. 55 People ran this way and that, bringing their sick on stretchers to where they heard he was. 56 Wherever he went, village or town or country crossroads, they brought their sick to the marketplace and begged him to let them touch the edge of his coat - that's all. And whoever touched him became well.

Jesus did heal.  Miracles did and do happen.  But they are not always obvious, because some times they happen in a different way.

“A miraculous healing of a physical illness is wonderful. But even more impressive … is the way God's grace gives some people the courage to live creatively, and even joyously, within their suffering. The profound faith of those who live with crippling affliction or disease-ridden bodies does not look spectacular to many. But their confidence in God and love for others are as beautiful a miracle as any physical one you're apt to ever see.”
Peter W. Marty







"There are two ways to live:
you can live as if nothing is
a miracle; you can live as if
everything is a miracle."
            Albert Einstein









Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, sometimes it seems that miracles never happen.  Help me to see the miracles that do happen, even though they seem hidden.”

July 22, 2018 9
th Sunday After Pentecost

Mark 6:30-32  (The Message)

30 The apostles then rendezvoused with Jesus and reported on all that they had done and taught. 31 Jesus said, "Come off by yourselves; let's take a break and get a little rest." For there was constant coming and going. They didn't even have time to eat. 32 So they got in the boat and went off to a remote place by themselves.

We need to spend time alone so we can truly be with others in compassion.
Alone time feeds our souls; energizes us; fills us; renews us.
If I don’t take time for myself; I don’t have much to give you either.

For as Henri Nouwen writes in “The Way Of The Heart”,

“Compassion is the fruit of solitude and the basis of all ministry. …(for)
solitude molds self-righteous persons into gentle, caring, forgiving persons who are so deeply convinced of their own sinfulness and so fully aware of God's even greater mercy that their whole lives become ministry.”
pp. 20,22




“Compassion is the fruit of
solitude…”  Henri  Nouwen








Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, help me to find some “time alone” in my busy week,  so I can hear your “still small voice” and be more loving when busy.”

July 15, 2018  8th Sunday After Pentecost
Mark 6:14-29

(Because of the length of this message I ask you to dig out your Bible and read this story - it is the beheading of John the Baptist.  And because I have never preached on it in 35 years, I turn to a current Associate Professor of Preaching at Luther Seminary Karoline Lewis for her take on this powerful text. )

“It would be all too easy to pass over this incident as simply an historical marker in the life of Jesus. This is what happened to John the Baptist. That’s unfortunate. But we act out such dismissal at our own peril. In doing so, we pardon ourselves from our own culpability in brushing under the table the risks of the Gospel. Risks that challenge the powers that be are certain to result in risks to your own survival.

Because here is a story that reveals just how dysfunctional and distorted perceived power can be. It’s an important warning at this point in the Gospel. … that what Jesus has come to challenge, upend, question, is those persons and those empires who rule by and uphold values completely antithetical to the in-breaking of God’s kingdom in Jesus.

It’s a critical warning.

And yet, we are witnesses to a daily unfolding of excuses for distortions and misappropriations of power. Propping up potentates for the sake of preserving supremacy. Overlooking the most observable, most obvious fallacies and fallacious acts as acceptable and as actual acts of accountability for the sake of…of…what? A crucial element of John’s beheading is the way in which it calls out an utter void of responsibility. Power, institutions, systems, including the church, that do not acknowledge accountability and responsibility for their actions, that are incapable of justifying and validating theologically and biblically their decisions, should expect to be notified by someone like Mark.

Do not let this pericope pass you by without asking yourself, … does my ministry (faith) ever warrant my head on a platter? Or, do I avoid any kind of proclamation that might lead to my own beheading, metaphorical or otherwise?”

Karoline Lewis

Pope Benedict XVI












Prayer thought for the week:  “Lord, forgive me my fear of having to pay a price for following you.  Give me strength to speak the truth in love.”