Proper 13 | Ordinary Time 18 - A
David Kalas
Early in the cherished 1965 movie, The Sound of Music, we see the sisters at the
abbey wondering about their whimsical novice, Maria. At the moment, no one can find
her, and one of the sisters dutifully reports to the Reverend Mother that she has looked in
all the usual places. "Considering that it's Maria," responds the wise, old woman,
"perhaps you should look someplace unusual."
We do have a natural tendency, of course, to look in "usual" places. When we have searched high and low for something that is missing, we'll finally sigh, "I've looked everywhere and I can't find it." Clearly, of course, the latter statement belies the former, for if we had in fact looked everywhere, literally, then we would have found the item. But we so naturally limit our...
We do have a natural tendency, of course, to look in "usual" places. When we have searched high and low for something that is missing, we'll finally sigh, "I've looked everywhere and I can't find it." Clearly, of course, the latter statement belies the former, for if we had in fact looked everywhere, literally, then we would have found the item. But we so naturally limit our...
We all love stories of courage among those who wrestle with daunting difficulties in life and actually pull out a win:
* Francis Parkman suffered from both arthritic muscles and poor eyesight. He could work only five minutes at a time, scrawling huge letters on his manuscript, yet he managed to complete a massive twenty-volume historical masterpiece.
* Thomas Edison labored virtually non-stop in his attempts to find a way to develop two-way transmissions on a single telephone line. Suffering from exhaustion, he was ready to give up. Yet, persistence won out and on the twenty-second day he found a solution that gave birth to modern telephone communication.
* Michael Blake left home at seventeen to make his mark in the literary and cinematic world. He...
* Francis Parkman suffered from both arthritic muscles and poor eyesight. He could work only five minutes at a time, scrawling huge letters on his manuscript, yet he managed to complete a massive twenty-volume historical masterpiece.
* Thomas Edison labored virtually non-stop in his attempts to find a way to develop two-way transmissions on a single telephone line. Suffering from exhaustion, he was ready to give up. Yet, persistence won out and on the twenty-second day he found a solution that gave birth to modern telephone communication.
* Michael Blake left home at seventeen to make his mark in the literary and cinematic world. He...
Frank Ramirez
This is really happening. No, really. This is really happening. In these three scriptures, a crisis that has been brewing comes to a head. The die is cast. God’s response is new life, new possibilities, and abundance.
Jacob has been putting off a day of reckoning for twenty years, ever since he cheated his brother out of his inheritance, but now, face to face with God, Jacob appears wounded but reconciliation, forgiveness, and new life awaits.
Paul is wrestling with the heartbreaking news that God’s plan of blessing all nations has been bottlenecked by what he perceives as the stiff-necked response of his own people — but the result of this loss will become gain for people everywhere, with the result that the promise to Abraham that all nations will bless...
Jacob has been putting off a day of reckoning for twenty years, ever since he cheated his brother out of his inheritance, but now, face to face with God, Jacob appears wounded but reconciliation, forgiveness, and new life awaits.
Paul is wrestling with the heartbreaking news that God’s plan of blessing all nations has been bottlenecked by what he perceives as the stiff-necked response of his own people — but the result of this loss will become gain for people everywhere, with the result that the promise to Abraham that all nations will bless...
David Coffin
A recently widowed woman in her early seventies is returning to the church where she raised her children. Her recently deceased husband had required much home health care, which she attended to throughout the years. Now she is returning to the church they attended before his illness. She arrived at a modern looking, erected metal fabricated building, with outdoor live streaming words on electric screen with modern architecture. Upon entry, she saw the entire interior of the church had a new makeover! There were movable chairs instead of pews. The sanctuary also had basketball hoops and markings on the floor for sports events. There was a portable stage for an altar with a praise band of guitars, keyboards, drums, and ladies with tambourines! The overhead ceiling lights were bright. This...
Schuyler Rhodes
It has happened more than once that I have been counseling a young couple who are planning to get married, and the discussion has come around to the subject of fighting, arguing, and conflict. It's a standard point I raise in various ways in premarital counseling, wanting to get the issue of conflict on the table and look at how it happens in their relationship. And it has happened that the couple looks at me and says something to the effect of, "Oh, no, pastor, we're too much in love to argue." Implied in what they say is the idea that they will always be so much in love that they won't ever fight. What is most extraordinary about it is that they really seem to believe it. Admittedly, when I have run into this it has been with naive and very young couples, and it is also a phenomenon...
It has happened more than once that I have been counseling a young couple who are planning to get married, and the discussion has come around to the subject of fighting, arguing, and conflict. It's a standard point I raise in various ways in premarital counseling, wanting to get the issue of conflict on the table and look at how it happens in their relationship. And it has happened that the couple looks at me and says something to the effect, "Oh, no, pastor, we're too much in love to argue." Implied in what they say is the idea that they will always be so much in love that they won't ever fight. And what is most extraordinary about it is that they really seem to believe it. Admittedly, when I have run into this it has been with naive and very young couples, and it is also a phenomenon...
We have become suspicious of the offer that demands our attention on the marquis outside the chain restaurants: "Kids eat free!" We are realistic enough to know that the cost of the meal for children is hidden in there somewhere, most often in the cost of the adults' meals. Our informed pessimism leads us to respond to such an offer with the claim that "there's no such thing as a free lunch." Or breakfast and dinner either!
Yet our lessons for this Sunday offer precisely that. A free meal. A meal without cost or price. Now that should be worth checking out, especially when there are so many "kids" in the family.
Isaiah 55:1-5
According to Isaiah 41:27 and 49:14, the problem that Second Isaiah encountered was the people's feeling of being forgotten...
Yet our lessons for this Sunday offer precisely that. A free meal. A meal without cost or price. Now that should be worth checking out, especially when there are so many "kids" in the family.
Isaiah 55:1-5
According to Isaiah 41:27 and 49:14, the problem that Second Isaiah encountered was the people's feeling of being forgotten...
The desert hardly looks like a place of abundance. Reading about the spartan life of "the desert fathers" in their remote caves from the comfort of our heated, book-lined studies hardly makes us want to rush off to embrace a life of solitude. But that is only because we are tempted to think that blessings always come in the form of abundance and comfort. What the desert fathers teach us is that somewhere in the depth of solitude, quietness, and even darkness there is a spring of hope.
In all three lessons for this Sunday there is this same thought -- that the dark, deserted place is more often than not the very temple of God's presence and the place where we meet God most intimately.
In all three lessons for this Sunday there is this same thought -- that the dark, deserted place is more often than not the very temple of God's presence and the place where we meet God most intimately.
Some great philosopher declared, "I think, therefore I am." He might well have said, I think, therefore I am what I think I am."
All of the lessons for this Sunday, in one way or another, point to a dimension about us that is determinative when we begin to make choices and decisions. If we think small and see ourselves as alone, we expect small results from what we do. If we take the short view of life, we limit our plans to the expected threescore and ten and we lose much. If we think our new life comes after the great resurrection, rather than beginning in the here and now, we are likely to become stagnant and not make much of what God has entrusted to our keeping.
All of the lessons for this Sunday, in one way or another, point to a dimension about us that is determinative when we begin to make choices and decisions. If we think small and see ourselves as alone, we expect small results from what we do. If we take the short view of life, we limit our plans to the expected threescore and ten and we lose much. If we think our new life comes after the great resurrection, rather than beginning in the here and now, we are likely to become stagnant and not make much of what God has entrusted to our keeping.
Today's selections could not have been better chosen for their ability to reveal something of the breadth and depth of the love of God. He cares for kings. He cares for foreigners. He hears the prayers of all.
Here is the opportunity to contrast the contentions of the universalists, those who declare him as Lord of all, and the exclusivists, those who maintain that he cares only for a chosen people. Turn to Isaiah 42, for instance, and check out verses 1-7.
Check out Psalm 103 which focuses our attention on the magnanimity of this God.
Reread Esther and listen to the shrill voices on both sides of the aisle who read each other out of God's care and concern.
Check out Jonah and be sure to focus attention on the last verses which drill home the...
Here is the opportunity to contrast the contentions of the universalists, those who declare him as Lord of all, and the exclusivists, those who maintain that he cares only for a chosen people. Turn to Isaiah 42, for instance, and check out verses 1-7.
Check out Psalm 103 which focuses our attention on the magnanimity of this God.
Reread Esther and listen to the shrill voices on both sides of the aisle who read each other out of God's care and concern.
Check out Jonah and be sure to focus attention on the last verses which drill home the...
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