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After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands [Revelation 7:9, a portion of the First Reading For All Saints Day, Revelation 7:9-17, RCL, Year A]. When it comes to the final book in the Bible, I follow the lead of John Calvin, the important theologian in the second generation of the Protestant Reformation. Like Calvin, I avoid it. Calvin wrote a commentary on every book in the New Testament except the last. And while I set…

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying: “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy…. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD… [Leviticus 19:1-2, 18, NRSV]. Several years ago, a preacher friend shared a joke with me. He asked, “Why did YHWH give us Leviticus as the third book in the Bible?” I admitted that I had no idea. He retorted, “To discourage us from trying to read the entire Holy Text from cover…

But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin used for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. Then he said to them, “Whose head is this, and whose title?” They answered, “The emperor’s.” Then he said to them, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” When they heard this, they were amazed; and they left him and went away [Matthew 22:18-22]. You’ve likely heard this, but W.C. Fields, the hard-living vaudevillian, was caught one day reading a Bible in his dressing room. When asked…

And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever [Isaiah 25:7]. Since I heard the initial reports of the hateful, evil attacks by Hamas on Israel this past weekend, I’ve felt as if a shroud or pall has been cast over us. As our Holy Text laments, “Death and Destruction lie open before the Lord—how much more do human hearts!” [Proverbs 15:11, NIV]. How can such irrational hatred of a people exist? Was 6 million murdered Jews during the Holocaust not enough for the anti-Semites? How can privileged students at…

You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it; it took deep root and filled the land. Why then have you broken down its walls, so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit? Turn again, O God of hosts; look down from heaven, and see; have regard for this vine, the stock that your right hand planted. [Psalm 80:7-9, 12, 14-15, NRSV]. The Psalm that we number 80, from which this week’s Psalter reading is extracted, Psalm 80-7-15 [Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A], is in the form of a communal lament. The noted…

He called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?” [Exodus 17:7, NRSV] In my younger days, I struggled with a teleological issue regarding the exodus of the Israelites from their captivity in Egypt: If YHWH’s intent was to lead them to a land of milk and honey—to a land of promise and plenty—why did YHWH require that they wander around in the desert for 40 years? Why not just make a beeline for Zion? Why postpone the inevitable fulfillment? Then, still a number of years ago, as I read and reread the exodus narrative, while at…

… When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, “Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.” When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received the usual daily wage. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received the usual daily wage. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, “These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.” But he replied to one of…

Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times” [Matt. 18:21-22]. As we come to the Gospel reading appointed for this upcoming Sunday, Matthew 18:21-35 [the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A], we find that we are in the midst of the fourth of five discourses of Jesus. This week’s reading centers on mercy and forgiveness. Jesus has been talking about forgiveness. Almost so, almost immediately, Peter—he’s so much like many of us, isn’t he?—wants to know the…

Son of man, I have made a watchman for the people of Israel, so hear the word that I speak and give them warning from me [Ezekiel 33:7, New International Version, a portion of the alternate OT reading appointed for this upcoming Sunday, the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A]. I vividly remember an “encounter” that Todd—my twin—Jeff—two years our junior—and I had with our father when I was about 10 (at 16-years-old, Terry was exempt from this unpleasantness). I don’t remember specifically how we had misbehaved, only that we had. I suspect that whatever our transgression, it was not that transgression’s first appearance. In any event, our father…

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it [Matthew 16:24-25, a portion of the Gospel reading assigned for the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A]. The 29-year-old drove west along U.S. Hwy. 74. He was in no hurry; he’d allowed two hours for the trip from Gastonia that took just over one. Forest City lay 10 miles behind him. He had about 10 more miles before he’d reach Columbus, the…