Daily Liturgy and Scripture

Jesus has said before that he did not come to destroy the law, but today there is a group of religious leaders who want to use the law to destroy him. They pull out an absolute, and ask Jesus to make an absolute decision. What he does is tell them how their absolute has worked out in life. Certainly, God did not intend for anything but the purity of his standard. Concessions were made. This doesn'...

It's not easy being a Christian. So often, the new nature we have received from Christ grates up against our old nature, rearing its ugly head at the worst times. It's easy to forget that we have been forgiven much, but this is central to our identity in Christ. We are forgiven, and it is the nature of Christ to pass along that forgiveness to others. 

When Jesus challenges us to have faith like little children, I think he assigns the other parts of this discourse to us if we do that. Just like the Israelites in the wilderness, he provides for us. Like Peter and the temple tax, he provides the resources. If our faith is like that of a little child, we can put our faith in him to provide the rest. Judgement on those who lead them away. God's rele...

Why was this moment where Jesus talked to the prophets of old so necessary? This could be a really long writing if we're going to answer all of that question. Here's one piece of that picture: because Moses and Elijah represented to law and the prophets, and Jesus represented the fulfillment of both. When the apostles look up after being knocked to the ground, they see only him. This didn't mean t...

Poor Peter. He gets things so right, and then turns around to get things so wrong. At one time, he confesses the Messiah. In the next scene, he is reprimanding Jesus for getting so morbid and talking about the cross. These two things probably didn't happen at the same time, but it's a really great snapshot of what it must mean to be an apostle. Like Peter, we certainly must remember the Lordship o...

So much conflict over bread. Jesus has a good point, though. These guys had literally picked up the leftovers of Jesus' bread miracles, so it's reasonable that they should start catching on at some point. What is the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees? We're fortunate to have the Passover section in today's reading from Exodus, that gives us a little extra insight into the Hebrew view of yeast....

Jesus seems harsh in his responses to this woman from the region of Tyre and Sidon. Why would he say such things? To come to that conclusion, though, we have to assume that those scathing comments are aimed at her. I don't think they are. I think they're aimed at the knuckleheads who had the gall to criticize her for, "all her begging." Remember that Jesus wasn't just there to perform miracles, hi...

A bit of imagination today. This isn't suggested by the text, it's a pure stretch of imagination. Picture the hillside, filled with people. Thousands of people. Is it really possible that, out of thousands of people who had been walking a great distance to meet Jesus, only one child brought food? It's possible. Or is it the case that, out of those thousands, everyone refused to share until Jesus b...

Jesus wasn't popular everywhere. His message was often divisive, and he claimed no less. But this instance in his own hometown shows that people are at one moment impressed, and at the next moment demystified because they figure out he's just the carpenter's son. You can almost hear the grind of their voices, trying to tear him back down to a size where the person they see makes sense in the conte...

The parable of the wheat and the weeds is a call to some pretty incredible trust in God. When we see evil, it may become our first reaction to judge it ourselves. While we want to pull out the weeds, Jesus says that doing so can cause harm to the seeds of the Kingdom that are also growing. Final judgement is the Lord's, and that's the way it should be. 

The parable of the seeds and the sower is a call for looking within. Are we receptive? Are we planted in good soil? If we look closely, we have probably been all of these seed types at different times. If our faith withered, we are still invited to put ourselves back in the soil and allow ourselves to be grown again. If we flourished and grew, then we ought to start showing some fruit.

Once more, Jesus is asked to prove his authority by doing tricks. Once more, he refuses to be defined by his miracles. Then he goes further: he commends the people of Ninevah and the Queen of Sheba, two stories from the Hebrew scriptures that commend those outside the chosen people of Israel for their faith. This must have stung, but it was appropriate. Ninevah showed repentance, and the queen sho...

Don't go to far with Jesus contradicting the letter of the law with eating and healing. Remember that he said he did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. So what was missing in the law that only he could bring? There have been a lot of answers to that question, but I have one that might not be the common response: life. Life was missing. His life. A life that showed how law, grace, and...

When we're looking for a sign for God to prove himself, we might be wise to remember this passage. Jesus had peformed miracles in the cities and towns around him, but the miracles weren't the point. They were supposed to be signposts pointing to something greater, a Kingdom that was breaking through. To receive such direct proof of its existence and still turn away brought rebuke from Jesus. Often...

Our connection to our Savior is deep. He asks much, we cannot love other things more than we love him. He wants our allegiance. But what do we get in return? His own status. What is done to his followers is done to him, with no layers in between. Coming close to Jesus is costly, but it's a bond from which we can never be separated.

As we remember Matthias, the man who replaced Judas Iscariot, we also have a passage from Matthew that shows how difficult it must have been to follow Jesus. Pack for a trip? Nope. Pack NOTHING for a trip is more like it. He sent them out not to exercise power, but to be dependent on those to whom they went. This really works well as a preview of the moment at the Last Supper where Jesus again set...

The spiritual nature of Jesus healing was impossible to miss. Not only did he drive out demons, but he asked questions like, "do you believe I can make you see?" By doing this, he wasn't only healing bodies. He was planting a seed of faith in each person. Perhaps this is why it was necessary for the religious leaders to try and discredit him. Wild faith is impossible to predict, and it doesn't fol...

It must have been a constant struggle for Jesus to be around the religious leaders of his area. He was always under the microscope, and most of them were so busy criticizing him that they couldn't hear the message of the Kingdom in his words. The calling of Matthew must have really wound them up. Not only did he call a man who would have been despised by his countrymen, he went to Matthew's house...

It's easy to cast snap judgement on the people who came in contact with Jesus. How could the apostles be surprised when he calmed the storm? Didn't they know him? It must have been a really wild ride, following Jesus for 3 years. Indeed it was. What he wasn't doing wasn't a magic show, it was a pushing back of the darkness to make way for a new Kingdom. When something that big happens, it doesn't...

Jesus came to bring wholeness and healing. No wonder there was so much of it going on when he talked about the Kingdom of God. He was creating that Kingdom among them, and certainly that is a preview of what it will be like. It wasn't limited only to those where were part of Abraham's promise, because Abraham's promise was put in place to bless all nations. In this scene, Jesus shows a little glim...

Probably my favorite part of this ending of the Sermon on the Mount is when Jesus says, basically, "You know how to give good gifts. You think God doesn't?" I remember a preacher I knew growing up who once said, "Think of the best person you know. God is even better." Certainly God is. Amidst all of our imagination of God's power and majesty, he is still greater than all of those. It also remains...

Today starts the season of Lent, which brings us into Easter in a little over a month. It's worth thinking about the masters we serve as we enter into this season. Jesus calls out money, because that's an obvious rival to God. It's certainly not the only master we choose. As we approach our Savior's sacrifice, let us examine our own lives to see what might lie between us and him, what might be ste...

Ash Wednesday is about humbling ourselves. Whether you're going to a church today and receiving ashes on your forehead or not, it's a good time to commit to being open before God, allowing him to purify us by the Spirit. As our Savior humbled himself to death on a cross at Easter (and Ash Wednesday starts the season leading up to that remembrance), so we should follow his example and be humble as...

It's kind of funny that Jesus had to say early on in the Sermon on the Mount (what Matt. 5-7 is generally called) that he didn't come to abolish the law. The opposite seems to be true. Doesn't it almost seem that he is making the law... worse? Every time he says, "you have heard it said... but I say," he is making the law seem so much more impossible to keep. But that's the point. The law is impos...

It's tempting to see the "God blesses this kind of people" list (called the Beatitudes) as some kind of checklist. We may think, "if I'm more humble or merciful or pure, I'm hitting it." Be careful, because that's what the rich young ruler was trying to say. Certainly, it's a list of good traits (incluiding mourning... how do you make that happen on purpose?), but it's not a checklist. This list i...