Matthew 28:16-20 Dear Partner in Preaching, Ever notice that the close of Matthew’s Gospel, a passage we usually refer to as “the Great Commission,” ends with a promise? I think I sometimes get so caught up in the grandeur and import of the Great Commission that I overlook what I now think of as “the Great Promise” – “And I am with you always, to the end of the age.” I suspect this isn’t an accident. That is, I suspect that our only hope of fulfilling the great commission – sharing the good news of God’s grace in Christ with the world through word and deed and welcoming all into fellowship through Baptism – is by...

  John 20:19-23, Acts 2:1-21, I Corinthians 12:3b-13 Dear Partner in Preaching, Have you ever noticed that the arrival of the Holy Spirit doesn’t remove the disciples from challenges and hardships, but rather equips them to persevere, even flourish, amid them? And that this seems to be the unified witness across the New Testament about the Spirit’s work? In John, for instance, the disciples are hiding in the upper room out of fear that those who crucified Jesus may come after them. And what does Jesus do as he breathes the Holy Spirit upon them? He doesn’t take them away from Jerusalem or fortify the room in which they’re...

John 17:1-11 Acts 1:6-14 Dear Partner in Preaching, I don’t often try to preach on more than one passage at a time. I like diving a little deeper into a single story and worry about forcing associations between texts. But from time to time, the passages or context entice me to pull together themes from a couple of the readings, and this is one of those weeks. This time, it’s both the passages (John 17 and Acts 1) and the context (Memorial Day weekend). Here’s what I’ve been thinking: Both passages describe an interlude – a period of waiting and transition. In John, it’s the waiting between all Jesus has done up to now (across...

John 14:15-21 Dear Partner in Preaching, You have an advocate! Someone who is looking out for you. Someone who is on your side. Someone who encourages you and supports you. Someone who speaks up for you and is willing to hang in there with you through thick and thin. So, before going forward, take a moment and think about what it feels like to hear that – that someone has your back, that someone is invested in your future, that someone will not give up on you…no matter what. It feels good. More than that, it feels like a relief, especially when you feel like your back is up against the wall. Even more than that, it feels empowering, like...

John 14:1-14 Dear Partner in Preaching, The first line of this familiar passage is so out of kilter with the rest of the passage that it’s almost comical. But if so, it is a poignant, ironic, almost sorrowful humor. Jesus, after all, is preparing his disciples, his friends, for his departure. He knows this will be incredibly challenging for them and so begins with words intended to bring comfort – “do not let your hearts be troubled” – but that seem to fall short of the mark. The disciples’ hearts are troubled, very troubled. And so they ask questions. Have you ever noticed that? That when we are struggling to make sense of...

Dear Partner in Preaching, I’m late, really late, with this post and apologize. In light of this, I’ll keep my thoughts brief. There’s a lot in this passage that is suggestive, even provocative. But what struck me most forcibly this time around is the simple, start, and ridiculously important distinction between the thief who comes to kill and destroy and Jesus, the One who comes to give life. And here’s the thing: I think that as stark as that contrast seems, it gets really blurry really fast. Do you know what I mean? Take email as a rather small example: I still remember when email was hailed as a time-saver – “we won’t have...

Luke 24:13-35 Dear Partner in Preaching, Notice that it’s a road. Not an upper room or garden or mountain top or any of the other places we expect revelation to take place. It’s a road. And it’s not a pronouncement or discourse, but a conversation. I think these details are important. Sometimes, it’s enough just to see Jesus, or to hear of his resurrection, or to be promised his presence. And sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it takes longer. Sometimes the move from doubt, fear, and grief to faith, hope, and love takes both the time it takes to walk from one town to another and the opportunity for an open and honest conversation. Can...

John 20:19-31 Dear Partner in Preaching, Have you ever noticed how long it takes John to get around to telling us what he’s up to? John the Fourth Evangelist, that is. Twenty-some chapters and finally he comes clean. Sort of. So here’s what I mean. There are two elements of this week’s very familiar story – one of the few in Scripture that is read in each cycle of our lectionary – that grabbed my attention. The first is what I’d call the culmination and climax of the “plot dynamic” of John; that is, how John arranges the scenes of the story he tells together and to what end. In short, after introducing us to Jesus...

Matthew 28:1-10 Dear Partner in Preaching, Here we are again: the climax and conclusion of Lent and Holy Week, the pinnacle of the Christian year, the very peak of the Christian story and, we confess, world history itself. And here’s the thing: while I believe that each of those statements is true, I also believe each is insufficient. Too often, I think, we see Easter as a conclusion, when I suspect that in the Gospels and, for that matter, in the early Christian community, the resurrection of Jesus was meant to be only the beginning. The very fact that we have Matthew’s scene of the resurrection supports that assertion. Assuming with...

Matthew 21:1-11 Matthew 27:11-54 (shorter reading of the Passion) Dear Partner in Preaching, As you well know, Palm/Passion Sunday is one of the more cluttered and confusing liturgical days of the church year. When most of us were growing up, it was simply Palm Sunday, and the invitation to march around the sanctuary with palms in hand made it probably my favorite Sunday of the year as a kid. Sometime in the 80s or 90s – earlier, no doubt, in Roman Catholic circles where most of the important liturgical renewal began, but it took longer to seep into the liturgically middle-of-the-road Lutheran congregations in which I grew up – it was...