Author: trob

When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to burst [Luke 5:4-6]. As we turn to the Gospel lesson appointed for this upcoming Sunday [Luke 5:1-11, the Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, RCL, Year C], we see that a crowd has assembled on the shores of Lake Gennesaret. They want to hear Jesus teach. The pressing…

Now the word of the LORD came to me saying,”Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.” Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy” [Jeremiah 1:4-6]. “If you don’t have a call, then you better get one.” This seminary humor circulates endlessly in divinity schools. Its persistence speaks to a universal truth about the nature of calling. The joke’s irony lies in suggesting we can manufacture what only God can initiate. The tension between human agency and divine calling…

All the people gathered together into the square before the Water Gate… They told the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses …. He read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and women and those who could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law …. And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was standing above all the people; and when he opened it, all the people stood up … and they bowed their heads and worshiped…

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding [John 2:1-2, a portion of the Gospel reading assigned for this Sunday, the Second Sunday after the Epiphany, RCL, Year C]. In John’s Gospel, the first glimpse we have of Jesus’ public ministry doesn’t arrive with heavenly fanfare. No angels sing. No star guides magi from the East. After the Gospel writer’s soaring prologue about the Word becoming flesh, after John the Baptizer’s testimony and those first curious disciples beginning to follow, after Jesus’ enigmatic promise to Nathanael about “seeing…

Now when all the people were baptized and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased” [Luke 3:21-22]. Last weekend, as I sat with the lectionary readings for this Sunday's celebration of the Baptism of our Lord [First Sunday after the Epiphany, Luke 3:15-17, 21-22, RCL, Year C], a detail in Luke’s gospel caught my eye, one that I'd somehow missed in all my years of reading this familiar text. Describing the scene when…

Hear the word of the LORD, O nations, and declare it in the coastlands far away; say, “He who scattered Israel will gather him and will keep him as a shepherd does a flock” [Jeremiah 31:10]. The Word became flesh and lived among us [John 1:14]. In the wake of Jerusalem’s destruction by Babylonian forces in 587 BCE, the prophet Jeremiah—who had long warned of impending judgment—turns to words of consolation. The scattered people will be gathered from “the farthest parts of the earth” (31:8). God will lead them “by brooks of water, in a straight path in which they shall not stumble’ (31:9). “Then shall the young women rejoice…

The LORD has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all nations [Isaiah 52:10] These words from Isaiah [see Isaiah 52:7-10, the Old Testament reading for Christmas Day, RCL, Year C] originally fell on weary ears. Decades into exile, the people of Judah had heard it all before—promises of restoration, visions of return, declarations that God would act decisively on their behalf. Yet their once-mighty Jerusalem still lay in ruins, its walls crumbled, its temple destroyed. Some blamed themselves, seeing in their exile the fruits of their own rebellion. Others wondered if God had simply abandoned them. Most had probably stopped listening to prophets altogether. Yet here was Isaiah,…

But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days [Micah 5:2]. In the 8th century before Christ, as powerful Assyrian armies threatened the southern kingdom of Judah, people looked anxiously for signs of YHWH’s presence and deliverance. Many turned their eyes to Jerusalem, the great city with its magnificent temple, the obvious place to look for divine intervention. After all, wasn’t this where kings ruled and priests offered sacrifices? Wasn’t this where YHWH’s presence dwelt in the Holy of Holies? But…

The LORD has set aside your judgments, removed your enemy. The King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst. You need no longer fear evil. On that day shall it be said to Jerusalem: Do not fear, O Zion, let not your hands fall slack. The LORD your God is in your midst, a rescuing warrior. He delights over you with glad song [Zephaniah 3:15-16, The Hebrew Bible, tr. by Robert Alter]. Some of you may recall Bette Midler’s 1990 very successful cover of the Nanci Griffith original, “From a Distance.” It reached number one on the US Billboard Adult Contemporary chart and number two on the Billboard Hot…

See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like washers’ soap; … [Malachi 3:1-2]. In our front hallway hangs a family treasure—a quilt crafted by Jane’s great-grandmother, Bessie Walker, around 1895. Within its carefully preserved squares lie fragments of Jane’s family story: a scrap bearing the name “Mineola,” remembering Bessie’s daughter taken too…