Daily Liturgy and Scripture

This is the worst opening act ever for the King of the Universe. Born to common people? Surrounded by shepherds? Nobody even brought a single gift? This is certainly a sign of things to come. The Son of God came not to be served, but to serve. He started at the bottom and never left until he went to be seated at the right hand of the Father.

The life of John the Baptist is anything but boring. His father was unable to speak until his naming, his parents (like Abraham and Sarah) conceived in their old age, and his very naming caused a stir among his community. All this, and the kid hasn’t even learned to talk yet. From his very beginning, John shone the way for things to be different because God said they needed to be, and his sermons...

The prayer that Mary prays, traditionally labeled as the Magnificat, it an excellent short-from overview of God’s story with his people. It’s also an interesting pairing with the words of Balaam from Numbers today. God’s faithfulness to his people defines both himself and them, and helps us understand God’s nature event today. He is loyal to his covenant, and goes to any measure necessary to prese...

Luke, who was a doctor, indicates in his greeting that out generation certainly isn’t the first to question the fantastic stories of the Bible. If you’ve been listening to the podcast this week, we’ve had a talking donkey and a man rising from the dead. Luke certainly lived right at the start of this new Kingdom Jesus had brought, and it’s not wonder than something that big took some effort to wra...

It’s not small miracle that the early church came together at all. Jesus appeared to people, and those people went to his apostles to tell them that he was alive. Despite the fact that he had told them what was going to happen, they refused to believe the eyewitnesses. It wasn’t just Thomas, but being hard-headed seems to be a pretty common trait among them. Still, Jesus built his church on this r...

Today is the Feast of Mark on the church calendar, a man certainly worth remembering. His gospel is thought by many to be the first one written, and he was central to the life of Paul. In today’s reading from Acts, we read of Peter going to Mark’s family home as soon as he escaped prison. This is a pretty clear indication that Mark’s family was known to the apostles, and that Peter considered thei...

Peter denied, but Judas betrayed. What’s the difference? Between these two, it seems to be redemption. Judas did not get any. He handed Jesus over, separating himself from the Savior. Peter, on the other hand, did not remain separated. Judas sought out Jesus’ enemies and allied himself to them. Peter found himself among strangers and denied that he was a disciple. What could have come of Judas if...

In the scene with the disciples falling asleep, Jesus tells them to stay awake, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. I have often interpreted that as simple meaning that they need to try harder to stay awake. But what if it’s linked to what happens with the high priest’s servant? What if Peter (who isn’t named here, but is probably the one swinging the sword) needed to be fully awake so he...

We should be careful not to define things only by their usefulness or perceived worth. That certainly wasn’t Jesus’s method. He refused to be ruled by urgency, and realigns the apostles’ zeal for selling everything to give money to the poor. (Remember the story of the rich young man? Selling everything all the time isn’t a universal rule for following Jesus.) In the case of the woman with the jar...

This passage from Mark is a bit heavy. It's easy to get mired up in all the imagery, the desecration and the people fleeing for their lives. (Augustine thought that the nursing mother was symbolism for those who cling to the world instead of keeping their focus on the Kingdom, so there's definitely some possibility for metaphor running throughout.) The thing that we can definitely take away is thi...

Jesus clearly saw that bad things were coming, but he didn't give his disciples a detailed timeline or even specific events. His vagueness in this area should be a lesson to us: while the last things matter, they shouldn't be our entire focus. Jesus taught his disciples what life looks like and that's what he wanted them to teach others. Preaching the Kingdom, living with our fellow citizens and w...

God is the god of the living, and not the dead. This is true in the illustration of the offering, the connection to the patriarchs, and in the summary by the man whom Jesus said was not far from the Kingdom of Heaven. Giving money is not big deal if our heart is set in the Kingdom where the living God dwells; we are merely giving the things of the world back to the world. Nothing else compares to...

There’s an interesting thread of the prophetic running through today’s readings, both Numbers and Mark. While many of them see the events of the future coming, they aren’t sideshow fortune tellers. A prophet’s job is to see a better future (and sometimes a worse future) and portray it to the people. What God is capable of doing, the prophet sees first. So as Caleb and Joshua see what God is able t...

What’s going on with this fig tree? Seems kind of weird, Jesus walking up to it when it’s not supposed to be growing figs anyway, cursing it and telling it to never produce fruit again. The next morning the tree is dead from the roots up? Certainly this is an object lesson. There’s a big different between a fig tree’s leaves and its fruit. While it’s possible to eat the leaves, the fruit is really...

Jesus certainly has made believers of his followers, they are convinced of his lordship. James and John are so fired up, they’re already trying to plan out the throne room. But they’ve missed the point. Jesus is heading to a throne, but he won’t rise to power by stepping on the backs of others. His ascent is backwards: he will lower himself, suffer humiliation, and die. Only then will be be elevat...

“Humanly speaking, it is impossible. But not with God. Everything is possible with God.” I don’t think Jesus commenting on how hard it is for the rich to get into Heaven is an indictment of having money, because he also sought to relieve the burdens of the poor. The words he had for the rich young man were just for him. There is something that stands between all of us and the Kingdom. This is why...

Things are really different when kids are around. We change the way we say things, sometimes we don't say things at all. When Jesus plops a child down in the midst of the disciples who are debating over who should be captain of the team, it forces them to rethink their line of thought. "Be like that," he said. But then the kid sticks around. Jesus says, "if you cause one of these little ones to fa...

Jesus left us with no greater gift than prayer. Of course it was a part of the lives of Jews and God-fearers before Jesus, but it plays out in so many critical places in his life, we really should consider nothing of higher importance in our life in the Spirit. In this story, a spirit that was possessing a boy was impossible to cast out without prayer. No further details are given between the pray...

The blind man isn’t the only one who needs Jesus to be patient with him so that he can learn to see fully. The Pharisees and the disciples both need the same patience. In the case of the Pharisees, they can’t see the value of the Kingdom through their need for a good healing miracle, or maybe some other kind of trick. The disciples are on board after the miracles, but they can’t accept the sufferi...

Come on, disciples! You guys know this stuff! You have seen him do it before, you should know what he’s going to do! (Isn’t this what you want to say to them?) The feeding of these 4,000 people follows the same pattern as before: people are hungry, disciples think they shouldn’t be running a food service, Jesus asks them to find the food, and he multiplies it. Maybe they thought the first time was...

Reading this long passage of law from Leviticus and then hearing Jesus debate the Pharisees might be a bit confusing. It almost seems like Jesus is just debating law, which might also seem to validate the law as the best and only way. First of all, remember that Jesus didn’t come to destroy the law. He came to fulfill it. He came to give life to the law. In this case, though, he isn’t among a frie...

Spending time with God is extremely important. Jesus is part of the Trinity, and even he needed to find time to get away and be with his Father. We are certainly no exception. In Jesus’ case, he is so focused on that experience that he goes back to have this time even after being prompted into a last-minute healing session. What was the outcome? He walked on the water. Even that didn’t seem to be...

Being a prophet is no picnic. Jesus was the greatest prophet, and couldn’t even get respect from the people in his own hometown. John the Baptist was as well, and not even the respect of the king could save him from shameful murder. Reading the Old Testament prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah, you really have to wonder if any of them even had friends. What’s the point of being one? Because the peop...

There are several times in Jesus' ministry where it seems like he loses focus. This is one of those stories: someone important comes to him, and the situation is urgent. He starts off to help the man and his daughter, but then he encounters someone else, someone who wasn't part of the plan. The woman with the bleeding problem immediately becomes the center of his attention. That's all well and goo...

The disciples really had a wild life. First Jesus sleeps through a storm, then he wakes up and rebukes the storm. Then he rebukes them. When they reach land, he is greeted by a demon-possessed man and proceeds to drown and entire herd of pigs. To top if all off, the people who live in the area told them to get out. What a day. It should give us pause if we think following Jesus is always just abou...