I remember being raised in Wisconsin towns full of church folks for whom Lent was a time of sombre self-denial to commemorate the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness. I remember a few talks with my friends in school who would tell, with obvious forethought, what they were “giving up” for Lent. I almost always ended up feeling rather left out in all that because, being a Baptist, we didn’t observe Lent in that way, or really very much at all. I felt as if I didn’t even know what a “good thing” to give up at Lent might… Continue reading →

Thursday, we took part of the day off and drove to Eau Claire to celebrate my brother-in-law’s 90th birthday. Davis has been in our family as long as I can remember. He married my sister in 1952 and I have memories of his visits to our house for Sunday services followed by dinners at the parsonage of First Baptist Church of Eau Claire before that. Although we haven’t lived in close proximity for but a few of the 65 years of their marriage, I have watched the movement of his life from a young energetic lawyer and Wisconsin state senator… Continue reading →

Today is the first Sunday of Lent in which we prepare for the remembrance of Jesus’ Passion, Death, and, beyond that, Resurrection at Easter. In Lent, we have an opportunity to consider where we are as pilgrims through our particular barren lands. I have had colleagues who have said that Lent is their favourite time of the church year. That’s not true for me, which is probably a function of my past where Lent has often been a time when we were encouraged to do little but feel bad about what sinners we are. This was, sometimes, unfortunately, linked to… Continue reading →

The last Sunday of Epiphany is called Transfiguration Sunday. Epiphany is the season of Light in which we have thought about how Jesus, the baby of Bethlehem, is also the Light and Life of the world. It’s easy to see why this Gospel story is a good one to climax Epiphany. Here we have Jesus as the Light, clearly and plainly (even if only revealed to the three chief disciples). It may be hard to see the Light of the World in the baby or toddler worshiped by the Magi, but witnesses of the Transfiguration, couldn’t miss God’s glory revealed.… Continue reading →

The first words of the Gospel Lesson are: “You have heard that it was it said of old…but I say to you.” The last words are: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” Jesus, in this section of the Sermon on the Mount has been teaching about how to read, understand, and live based on the scriptures. He has contrasted those who would simply carve the Bible’s words, and certain interpretations of them, in stone forever, with those who follow what he is teaching and “fill these words full” of contemporary meaning with God’s guidance. He’s said he had no… Continue reading →

Soon it’s Valentine’s Day. This day takes a hit as being invented by the greeting card industry to sell its wares. But, in spite of all that, it is a day that celebrates love and if churches can’t do that (albeit with our own spin on it), then we’re in sad shape. The Bible uses the word love quite a bit in both testaments, and the love it celebrates in many ways is not primarily a feeling (as you know), but describes an action that people take to embrace, affirm, nurture, and identify themselves with the needs and values of… Continue reading →

It was good to see the sun for a couple of days last week (and again today). Although winter came late, since it did, we’ve had a long patch of cold, snowy, icy, weather. I like the four seasons, including winter, but somewhere in the month of February each year, I begin to get ready to transition into something gentler and calmer. I could say the same thing about the headlines of late. I know that we are divided in how we might feel about what’s going on, but I, for one, don’t see that we have much better relations… Continue reading →

As I have said, I abandoned the lectionary texts of the morning, which were good ones by the way, after I was well along in the preparation process. I did it because today is our annual meeting, and it is an annual meeting in which we are facing some pretty big changes brought about by my retirement from the seminary. Our proposed budget, for example, is less than 72% of what it has been for over a decade. We have known, down deep of course, since we first started the seminary project that this day would come. And it is… Continue reading →

I would guess that most of you know that the sermon title is just part of a line from a Gospel Song called “He Lives,” written by the evangelist Alfred H. Ackley in 1933. It’s in our hymnal, in the Easter section. As I say, I have borrowed this half- or quarter-line of poetry as a title, not only to refer to the risen Jesus as alive, but as alive in the lives of disciples who are “…in the world today.” You probably will have noticed over the years that, however much I speak of God or Jesus, I want… Continue reading →

Last week I introduced the season of Epiphany by saying that this season of the year celebrates the revelation of God in the human being Jesus. It celebrates the universal – God’s love and plan and mission for the whole world – in one specific human person – Jesus of Nazareth. Christians, at our best, have faith in Jesus, who, as he is portrayed in the Gospels especially, is the one who brings concrete humanity to who God is and what God values. The season of Epiphany seeks to help us with that as well. It’s saying to us that… Continue reading →