The Riverside Gathering Posts

A meditation for Good Friday He wasn’t at the table. He didn’t kneel for the washing. He didn’t hear the words, “This is my body, broken for you.” While Jesus served the bread and passed the cup, Barabbas was still in chains. By dawn, everything had changed. He stood blinking in sunlight, the iron loosened from his wrists, his sentence lifted—no explanation. And Jesus, silent, stood in his place. No upper room. No garden agony. No lashes, no trial for Barabbas. Just freedom. Freedom he didn’t ask for, purchased by a man he’d never met. And then, the hammer. The cries. The cross. Barabbas wasn’t there to carry it, but…

A Holy Saturday Meditation on Job 14:1–14, the Old Testament reading appointed in Year C, Revised Common Lectionary Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble.He springs up like a flower and withers away;like a fleeting shadow, he does not endure [Job 14:1–2]. The Frailty of Life Holy Saturday holds a strange place in our faith. It sits between the drama of Good Friday and the triumph of Easter morning—a day of silence, of absence, of waiting. It is perhaps the most honest day in our calendar, the one that most resembles the lives that we actually live: caught between what we’ve lost and what we…

It is like when you throw a stone into a pool, and the concentric waves spread out further and further. Who knows where it will end? [George MacDonald in The Great Divorce]. In our recent journey through C.S. Lewis’s masterwork, we’ve encountered one of the most poignant scenes in all his writing: the meeting between Sara Smith and her former husband, Frank—or what remains of him. On the surface, this encounter represents a failed reconciliation. But beneath that narrative lies an earnest meditation on the nature of love itself. The Hidden Saint Sara Smith, Lewis tells us, was “no one of importance” during her earthly life. She held no prestigious…

As we enter into Holy Week, we find ourselves caught between two realities: the triumphant entry of Palm Sunday and the gathering shadows of the Passion. In these days that bridge both celebration and sorrow, we encounter Jesus not only preparing himself for what lies ahead but also preparing his disciples for their own journey through darkness. In the Upper Room, as the Last Supper draws to a close, with Jerusalem’s tensions rising and betrayal looming, Jesus turns to his closest follower with words both sobering and hopeful: “Simon, Simon, listen! Satan has demanded to sift all of you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your own…

I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth; do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert [Isaiah 43:19]. What if the God we long for is already moving—just not in the way we expected? This Sunday’s Old Testament reading, Isaiah 43:16-21 (Fifth Sunday in Lent, RCL, Year C) finds the people of Israel in exile—uprooted, disoriented, and uncertain. Forcibly removed from their homeland after Jerusalem’s destruction in 587 BCE, these displaced people have spent decades in a foreign land under foreign rule. The prophet addresses a community caught between memory and hope—remembering God’s mighty acts in…

<blockquote> <p>The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away from you the disgrace of Egypt.” And so that place is called Gilgal to this day. While the Israelites were camped in Gilgal they kept the Passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the month in the plains of Jericho. On the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land, and the Israelites no longer had manna; they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year [Joshua 5:9–12].</p> </blockquote> <p>This…

O God, you are my God; I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water [Psalm 63:1]. Jane and I have a dear friend who has spent the better part of two years confined to his bed. His back pain, persistent and unyielding, has created boundaries around his life that few of us can truly comprehend. His world has narrowed to the dimensions of his bedroom and the adjoining den, the daily landscape unchanged except for the shifting of light across the ceiling. The slow rotation of an overhead fan marks time, whispering through…

Abram’s Journey of Faith After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” (Genesis 15:1) Why Abram? The question lingers whenever I reflect on the Genesis 15 text—the Old Testament lesson for this Sunday, the Second Sunday in Lent, Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18 [RCL, Year C]. Why would YHWH choose a childless, aging nomad to become the father of nations? To be sure, throughout Scripture, YHWH’s choices often confound human wisdom—the youngest son [David—1 Samuel 16:11-13); the forgotten shepherd [Moses—Exodus 3:1-10]; barren women [Sarah—Genesis 18:1-15; Hannah—1 Samuel 1; Elizabeth—Luke 1:5-25]; and…

As we enter the season of Lent, our liturgical journey takes us from the mountaintop of last Sunday’s Transfiguration directly into the stark wilderness where Jesus faces testing. In Luke’s account, which serves as the Gospel reading appointed for this Sunday [Luke 4:1-13, RCL, Year C], we read that Jesus, “full of the Holy Spirit,” is led by that same Spirit into the wilderness for forty days. What unfolds there is often framed as a battle between good and evil—Jesus versus the devil, each wielding scripture. Jesus answers with words from Deuteronomy [8:3]; the tempter counters with a passage from Psalm 91. To me, what’s interesting isn’t just that both…

Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray [Luke 9:28]. In all three annual cycles of the Revised Common Lectionary, the Gospel reading for the last Sunday before Ash Wednesday is the Transfiguration story. This year, Year C, gives us Luke’s version [Luke 9:28-36, (37-43a). More or less consistent with the versions found in Mark and Matthew, Peter, John, and James witness Jesus transformed in glory. They see Him speaking with Moses and Elijah and, peculiar to Luke’s version, they hear the very voice of God affirming Jesus as beloved Son. It’s a moment…