[RCL] Isaiah 49:1-7; Psalm 40:1-12; 1 Corinthians 1:1-9; John 1:29-42 “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of…

[RCL]: Isaiah 49:1-7; Psalm 40:1-12; 1 Corinthians 1:1-9; John 1:29-42 Don’t you find it remarkable that we know anything at all? If you think about it, we don’t know much of anything unless we have been taught it by another person. Engaging in a website or a film or a book privately is being taught…

Winston Churchill once called his political opponent “a sheep in sheep’s clothing.” At least for much of the 19th Century popular art, hymnody and poetry tended to portray Jesus as “gentle Jesus, meek and mild.” Part of the problem would seem to be that we confuse love with sentimentality. Social media, for all its wonders, seems…

This doesn’t happen very often with our new lectionary, but today there’s one theme that can be found in all four of our readings from scripture. It’s the notion of being called. The readings from Isaiah and from Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians both begin with words about being called, about being set apart…

So very often, the gospel passage appointed for a given Sunday contains one major theme, or one simple story. Not today. Today’s gospel is chock full of proclamation, imagery, and narrative. Let’s review the major themes in these dozen verses of scripture: • John the Baptist sees Jesus coming toward him and proclaims, “Here is…

In both Testament lessons and in the gospel of this second Sunday in Epiphany we sense a strong line running through them, like a rope that pulls us up to the realization that God calls us. We surface to the light of Epiphany and pray that this light will assist us in understanding the meaning…

Last Sunday’s readings talked about baptism and identity, and included that wonderful sentence from Isaiah, where God says to Israel, to Israel’s servant, and to us, three things: God says, “I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the…

Last Sunday we commemorated the Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ. We heard from St. Matthew’s Gospel how John the Baptist saw God’s Spirit alight upon Jesus, and a voice from heaven identify him as “my Son, the Beloved.” Today our lesson comes from the Gospel of St. John and the scenario of Christ’s baptism…

Jesus was born into a troubled time, in a troubled place. The land of Israel, with all its proud history, was a subject nation, property of the Roman Empire. Rome’s only real interest in this holy land — which the elegant and eminent Romans considered a benighted backwater — was how much tax could be…