Think And Let Think

Psalm 133 & John 20.10-31 The story of Thomas seemingly ends with his triumphant and faithful declaration: "My Lord and My God!" But John isn’t quite finished. For he actually concludes with a strange note about how “Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book.” But, John continues, “These are written so that you may come to believe, to trust, that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through faith you may have life.” Do you see? Faith is a gift given to people like us. And it makes people like us exactly what Thomas insisted he required to belief. This wondrous church, this body of Christ, wounded and weary, bold and beautiful, we are what the world beholds and knows that Jesus is the something more they’ve been looking for.

Unexpected by Taylor Mertins

Matthew 26.17-30 Music has this almost magic quality to it. It can bring forth emotions we did not know we had, or that we did not know we needed to feel. God uses the songs we sing to remind us who we are and whose we are. And the same happens here at the table. We do this in remembrance not only because we are commanded to, but also because, in so doing, we become Jesus’ memory for the world. The Eucharist is the feast that makes Christ’s time the time in which we live. A time meant for singing. And so, it is here in this ferocious fellowship of differents God says, “Behold what you are! And become what you receive.”

Matthew 21.1-10 One of the craziest parts of what is already one of the craziest parts of the Bible, is the fact that, on Palm Sunday, Jesus doesn’t say anything. Have you ever noticed that before? It’s a bit odd coming from the one who has lots to say in his Sermon on the Mount, the one who parades out parables every chance he gets. Jesus doesn’t say anything while the crowds say everything. And when Jesus doesn’t meet their exceptions, when he doesn’t meet our expectations, the result is the cross...

Matthew 6.25-34 It is to a people obsessed with themselves, with too much and too little, that Jesus speaks this powerful word: Why are you so worried about what you eat and drink? About what you wear and how you look? Look at the birds of the air. They are not terrified of these things. Can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? Consider the lilies of the field! They neither toil nor spin and they are more gorgeous than anything you have in the closet. You need not worry about these things because your worry is eating you alive. Your heavenly Father knows what you need, and it is to you that the kingdom is given. The proclamation of the Gospel is that we need not worry, like the birds or the lilies, because God provides. But our desire to live lives without fear cannot but help create a world of fear because we are told, and often believe, there is never enough. Which is perhaps why, for millennia, the church has insisted on reminding people of these words from Jesus. The songs w

Matthew 26.14-16 A rich man comes up to Jesus and he says, “Teacher, I follow all of the commands of God. What more must I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus, looking on the man with compassion, says, “Because I love you, how about you try selling everything you have, give the proceeds to the poor, and then you can follow me” The man walks away from Jesus, grieving, because he has many possessions. As far as I can tell, this is the only time in the strange new world of the Bible that Jesus invites someone into discipleship and they turn it down. The story doesn’t end there, of course. Jesus goes on to talk about how difficult it is for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of heaven. As difficult, in fact, as it would be for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. What a wondrous moment in the Gospel! It is quick to makes us squirm sufficiently in our seats. It is an uncomfortable word to hear because we, compared to the rest of the world, are rich beyond imagining, and then Jesus drops this

Matthew 26.36-46 “Thy will be done” is the enemy of sloth. It’s the recognition that though we might not have eyes to see any new possibilities, we worship the God of impossible possibility, who makes all things new. “Thy will be done” sets us on an adventure in which we never quite know what the future holds, but we do know who holds the future. Perhaps that’s why Jesus is forever telling parables about those who fall asleep, and why he is forever commanding the disciples to wake up. When it comes to the Gospel, the only thing we have to do is wake up to God’s new possibilities, God’s new day, God’s new way. “Thy will be done.”

Matthew 21.12-17 Contrary to the witness of John Mayer, we don’t have to wait on the world to change. We can pray for it. But we shouldn’t be surprised if, while praying for the world to change, God starts the work by changing us.

Matthew 20.1-16 Grace, when it is so freely offered to any and all comers, without any regard to merit, seems downright irresponsible. Even when the truth of the matter is that grace being offered to me is no more or less miraculous that it is to someone who walks through the door at the last second. Grace is only grace because it is given to those who don’t deserve it. Which, in the end, includes each and every one of us. Envy, on the other hand, is all about keeping score, holding on to the ledger book in our minds, noticing who did what and for how long. Whereas Jesus’ story, and every other parable for that matter, is the proclamation that God has gotten out of the score-keeping business forever.

Mark 6.1-6 The rest of the world, uninformed of the story that gives meaning to our stories, considers Pride to be an essential characteristic for living. We, on the other hand, are taught to be suspicious of pride. For pride often leads to us to believe that we are better than everyone else. Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them, Jesus warns. He continues by ripping apart the religious practices of those who pray in public for public praise, and those who show off their fasting for prideful gain. All that Jesus lists falls into the category of self-justification, self! It’s like the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable who does all the right things so well that he’s wrong. “Well, at least I’m not like that degenerate over there” is merely a projection of our self-inflated righteousness and a denial of our sinful truthfulness. Lent, for better and worse, is a season of accusation. It is a time for us to hear who we really are. And it begins with ashes. Ashes, of course, are a s

Revelation 21.1-6 Notice: it is not just a new heaven that John sees, but a whole new earth. Revelation, then, is the final declaration that matter matters. Remember, whenever Jesus waxes lyrical about the kingdom of heaven, he does so with earthy and earthly terms. The kingdom is like a mustard seed, it is like yeast mixed with flour, it is like a party with food and wine and dancing. Remember, when Jesus is resurrected on Easter, he returns to the displaces embodied, sharing food and drink, the incarnated Good News. Remember, when the church grows during the Acts of the Apostles, it’s not because they were pining after the pie in the sky after they die, but it grows because Christians took seriously the material world and how the sharing of goods could make life better for others. On earth as it is in heaven. Do you see? Revelation reminds us that the new heaven and the new earth isn’t just something that will happen, it is something that happens right now. We have access to how beautiful the world

Acts 2.1-4 & Romans 16.25-27 The Bible is, as Barth loved to say, the strange new world of God. With every page we discover more and more about the wild and wondrous God we worship. And in no place is this more evident than the Acts of the Apostles, and the various epistles. For, the eruption of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost sends reverberations through the church that we are still feeling today. God is on the loose!

Mark 1.1 & Mark 16.1-8 “When the church stops talking about Jesus, it has nothing left to say.” - Sam Wells

Genesis 12.1-3 & Malachi 3.1-2 The Good News of the Gospel for each and every single one of us, is that God meets us in the midst of our sins, not our successes. God meets us where we are, not where we ought to be. Israel’s story, both the person and the people, reminds us that God comes to us in our weariness and our woundedness. God delights in keeping up the covenant even when we fail to do our part. Ultimately we are as helpless as Israel, hobbling around with our hips out of joint. We can run away as far as we can for as long as we can, but one day God will catch up with us. God will grab hold of us. And God will tell us who we are...

Genesis 1.1-5 Imagine, one day, you receive a strange delivery. A trunk. It’s heavy and you can feel and hear all manner of objects inside tossing about as you drag it inside. You open it and discover a great cacophony of items. Inventories. Diaries. Poems. Creative writing assignments. Blueprints. Photographs. Letters. Various genealogical records. Drawings. And on top of it all is a note from your great-great grandfather. All it says is, “This is who I am.” The Bible is like that treasure trove of a trunk, given to us by God, in order that we might know more about the One in whom we live and move and have our being.

Luke 2.1-14 Christmas is not just about remembering an event in the distant past. Christmas is the celebration of a miracle in our midst. Christmas isn’t just where we come from, Christmas is who we are, here and now. Yes, it is finished, as Jesus says from the cross. Easter is the exclamation point on a sentence that begins long before the Incarnation of Christmas. But our knowledge of this power, our knowledge of salvation, our faith in the grace made flesh is Jesus in a miracle that has meaning for us in this very moment. As Martin Luther preacher in many of his own Christmas sermons, “The nativity of our Lord happens again and again everywhere the Gospel strikes at the heart of a person.” In other words, despite what the Grinch might realize by the end of his story, Christmas is actually about the presents, or at least the present of this present moment.

Titus 2.11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all.

Luke 1.67-80 The scriptures, the sermons, the songs, they are all about getting us to catch a hint of God’s more, a glimpse of the light that shines in the darkness. Dr. Seuss got it right - Maybe Christmas, the Grinch thought, doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas… perhaps… means a little bit more.

Luke 1.46-55 The incarnation is not God’s last minute hail Mary (pun intended) to fix the world. It is, was, and always will be God’s decision to dwell with us. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God. God was always going to dwell with us because God always dwells with us and God will always dwell with us. And yet, Mary's song threatens those in the positions and places of power because it calls into question their power. Long before the cross stands on the horizon, Mary’s song reminds those with ears to hear that her Son’s kingdom is not of this world. Things are getting flipped upside down. Which sounds like Good News when you’re on the bottom, but bad news when you’re on the top...

Luke 1.26-38 The One born to Mary comes to embody a peaceful way of being that transcends all of what we think or know because Jesus takes us from where we are to where we can be. Mary, in receiving the visit of Gabriel and the promise he holds, goes from nobody to somebody, blessed, fortunate, given a job to do in the story of salvation. Even in her ordinariness, her youth, her singleness, perhaps her embarrassment and consternation, she is called by God anyway, singled out to bear the savior of the world into the world. This is why Mary is often referred to as the first disciple. She is the first to be called by God to take part in the good news-ing of the world. And she is the first, when called by God in this way, to say, "Let thy will be done." Notably, she prays that prayer long before her Son does. Mary has faith. Perhaps therein lies the Good News for all of us today. We don’t need the perfect holy resume, we don’t have to come from the right family, or have the right job, or the right income.