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"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.” Because of that designation, the Psalter reading in all three years of the Revised Common Lectionary cycle is the beloved Twenty-third. And while the New Testament readings do change in each year of the triennial cycle, the Gospel lesson for the Fourth Sunday of Easter is always one of John’s “shepherd” passages. This year (Year…

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. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord [John 20:19-20]. Years ago, when the committee that crafted the Revised Common Lectionary considered what might be the most appropriate Gospel lesson for the Second Sunday of Easter (i.e., the Sunday that follows Easter) in each year of the three-year cycle, it did something unusual: it…

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 in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher) [John 20:15-16]. I wonder what went through the mind of Death as it shook away the cobwebs on that first Easter morning. It likely had a strange, uneasy feeling that now somehow, something was different. Death had, after all, held sway for such a long time—a time so long…

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 here …” [Mark 11:1-2, NIV]. For virtually all of us here in Durham, there will be no procession into our church sanctuaries this Sunday. There will be no communal waving of palm branches. Our congregations won’t join together in “All Glory, Laud, and Honor,” although I’ve bookmarked a splendid 2013 Youtube performance by the choir…

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” [King James Version]. As it was for the unnamed Greeks whom the gospel writer described as approaching Philip and Andrew during the last week of Jesus’ life, and who desired a private audience with the One who had raised Lazarus from the dead, who’d much earlier turned water to wine, healed the lame, cured the…

“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 profited from nor enjoyed our “Bible Verse” races. For those of you who are uninitiated to such thrills, these were generally time “fillers.” The teacher would glance at her watch, realize that while she had finished the lesson for the day, five minutes remained before the buzzer would sound to tell us kids that it…

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 engaged in some good-natured “religious” banter. He wasn’t a particularly close friend, but we had enjoyed quite a few conversations over the years on a broad range of topics, including Christianity. Like me, he saw himself as a “thinker.” In both of our cases, I’m not sure that assessment was/is justified. On this particular occasion,…

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 the Second Sunday in Lent, Year B, RCL, NIV]. Abram was 75 years old when Yahweh told him that from him would spring forth a great nation that would bless all the peoples on earth [Genesis 12:1-3]. Of course, that seemed absolutely impossible to Abram. While he and his wife, Sarai, almost ten years Abram’s…

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, the beginning of Lent. We begin our Lenten Sunday readings in just a few days. While the reading appointed in the Lectionary for the First Sunday in Lent rotates each year among the three Synoptic gospels, the story line is always the same: Following Jesus’ baptism in the River Jordan, he is filled with the…

Then a cloud appeared and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him” [Mark 9:7, NIV]. We’re approaching the tenth anniversary of the untimely death of the Reverend Dr. Peter Gomes, a distinguished preacher and Harvard Divinity School professor, and a former visiting professor at our own Duke Divinity School. Only 68 when he died on February 28, 2011, Gomes had, for a number of years, participated in an unusual annual “pulpit swap.” One Sunday each year, Gomes would come to Duke to preach in the Chapel. Will Willimon, then Dean of Duke Chapel, would travel to Cambridge to…