Words of Welcome

  Revelation 1:1-8 The Easter baskets and candy quickly went on sale this past Monday morning if not before so the stores can get ready for the next big holiday. Though the stores prepare for Mother’s Day and Memorial Day, the season of Easter is still with us. Eastertide reminds us that Jesus spent time with his followers after his resurrection, encouraging them for the journey ahead. Besides, in the Eastern Churches, today is Easter Sunday, what they call Pascha.   This morning’s reading from the Gospel of John takes us to a locked room somewhere in Jerusalem on the evening of Jesus’ resurrection. While Jesus’ followers listened to Mary Magdalene once again give her account of meeting Jesus in the Garden, Jesus himself appears in their midst. When he appeared, he showed them his hands and feet, and his pierced side. Then as his followers rejoiced at seeing him alive, he commissioned them. He told them “as the Father has sent me, so I send you. Then he breathed on th...

  Isaiah 65:17-25, Luke 24:1-12 “Christ is risen! Shout Hosanna! Celebrate this day of days.” [Brian Wren, Glory to God, 248 ].  Death had its say on Friday, but death’s victory was short-lived. We gather this morning to celebrate the good news that life has triumphed over death. We shout “Christ is risen!” because death has lost its sting.    The word we heard from Isaiah 65 was spoken to exiles returning from Babylon. The prophet speaks to their grief at the devastation they found in Jerusalem by telling them that God “is about to create new heavens and a new earth.” So forget about the past and embrace the future. Yes, “be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating.” This is a good word, especially the promise that no one will be hurt or destroyed on God’s holy mountain (Is. 65:25). We hear this word from Isaiah, this Easter morning, knowing that there is war in Ukraine that is destroying lives and communities. There is the continued threat of COVID, whi...

  Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29   The time has come to join Jesus in the festal procession to Jerusalem. Let us wave our palm branches and sing “All glory, laud, and honor, to you, Redeemer, King, to whom the lips of children made sweet hosannas ring!” Yes, “You are a child of Israel, Great David’s greater son; you ride in lowly triumph, Messiah, blessed one!”  [ Glory to God, 196] If we take the 118th Psalm as our guide, our parade of palms serves to welcome Jesus not only into Zion but also into our lives. As we do this, we can give thanks to God who is good and whose steadfast love endures forever. The reading from the Gospel of John tells us that a crowd greeted Jesus as he approached Jerusalem. They waved palm branches and shouted out “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord the King of Israel!” ( Jn 12:12-16 ) When Jesus rode into the city that day mounted on a donkey, many in the crowd believed that Jesus was the one who would throw out the Romans and l...

  Psalm 126 Once upon a time, the nineteenth-century “singing evangelist” Knowles Shaw wrote a gospel song titled “Bringing in the Sheaves.” While it isn’t in our hymnals, it regularly pops up in popular culture. You might have heard versions of it in episodes of The Andy Griffith Show, Batman , and especially the Simpsons . For some reason, it appeals to the popular mind, even if Mainline Protestants rarely sing it. Shaw found his inspiration for the song in the King James Version of the sixth verse of Psalm 126: “He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.”  And so we sing: Bringing in the sheaves,  bringing in the sheaves, We shall come rejoicing,  bringing in the sheaves. If we’re going to bring in the sheaves, what’s a sheave? The answer: It’s a bundle of grain. Since  Shaw was the son of a farmer from Ohio, he knew what a sheave was. The same was true of t...

Psalm 32 Are you happy? Do you feel blessed by God? Then you must be forgiven. While none of us is sinless, the good news is we can be free from that nagging joy-killing sense of guilt that comes with sin. Therefore, let the recipients of God’s grace and mercy “be glad in the Lord.”  During our Lenten journey, we’ve heard the Psalmist declare that God is our refuge and strength. Indeed, God’s steadfast love surrounds us when life proves challenging. Today’s reading from Psalm 32 begins with a pair of beatitudes that assure us that God forgives our transgressions so we can experience God’s peace.  The Psalmist speaks of his transgressions weighing down on him. When it comes to our transgressions, our sins, they come in different forms, but each form is corrosive. Sin eats at our being. It disrupts our relationship with God, with each other, and with the world itself. There is good news, however. The Psalmist tells us that if we acknowledge and confess our sins and transgr...

  Psalm 27 Angelic and divine visitations in the biblical story often begin with the words: “Be not afraid.” That’s because heavenly visitations don’t happen every day, so they take us by surprise. The word we hear in Psalm 27 offers us a word of assurance in difficult times. The psalmist proclaims that God is our light and salvation. Therefore, “whom shall I fear?” Now, if we’re honest, aren’t we afraid of at least a few things? It might be spiders or snakes or heights, but fear is part of life. The question is, what do we do with our fears?   In my Christmas Eve meditation, I mentioned the story of Charlie Brown who pays a visit to Lucy’s psychiatrist booth because he’s feeling a bit depressed and doesn’t know why.  Lucy tries to diagnose Charlie Brown’s problem by naming a series of phobias that range from a fear of cats to climbing stairs. Finally, Lucy leans across the counter and asks Charlie Brown: “Do you have pantophobia ?” After she defines, “ pantophobia...

  Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16 Last Sunday we accompanied Jesus up the mountain so he could pray. This Sunday we join Jesus as he goes into the wilderness to fast and pray. During his time in the wilderness, Jesus faces three temptations. Each time he says no to the tempter.  Jesus’ forty-day sojourn in the wilderness serves as the foundation for our Lenten journey. During this season we have the opportunity to look inward and reflect on our relationship with God and one another. I’m drawing my Lenten sermons from the Psalms, which provide us with prayers and songs that speak to our deepest concerns and greatest joys. So whether it’s a song of praise or lament, the Psalms invite us to sing to God from the heart. With this in mind Walter Brueggemann speaks of why we sing as the people of God:   We sing because life is God-given, God-sustained, and God-claimed. Our singing is our glad assent to that God-givenness and refusal to have our lives be less than, more than, or ot...