Author: trob

As they were going along the road, they came to some water; and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?" [Acts 8:36]. One of the interesting dynamics of the scripture readings appointed for the Sundays between Easter and Pentecost in all three years of the scriptural cycle…

"I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep” [John 10:14-15]. In some portions of the church, this upcoming Sunday, the Fourth Sunday of Easter, is known as “Shepherd Sunday.”…

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side….

Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him…

As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it…

Almost 35 years ago, two presumptuous “professionals,” each in his mid-to-late 30s—let’s call them Jim and Tom—entered Duke Divinity School from totally different directions, yet sharing a common question that is echoed in the Gospel reading appointed for this upcoming Sunday, the fifth Sunday in Lent [John 12:20-33, RCL, Year B]: “We would see Jesus”…

“Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him” [John 3:14-15]. In spite of the best efforts of several Sunday school teachers at Olney Presbyterian Church in the late 1950s and early 1960s, I neither…

The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” [John 2:18-19]. A decade or so ago (I’m trying to be obtuse here, so as not to give away too much), a friend and I…

Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?” And Abraham said to God, “If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!” [Genesis 17:17-18, the verses that follow the Old Testament reading for…

And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him [Mark 1:12-13, a portion of the Gospel reading for the First Sunday in Lent, Year B, RCL, NRSV]. Today is Ash Wednesday,…