Monthly Archives: January 2020

Networking

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Epiphany 3A
January 26, 2020

Isaiah 9:1-4 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.
1 Corinthians 1:10-18 I appeal to you…that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you.
Matthew 4:12-23 Follow me, and I will make you fish for people….Immediately they left.

Merciful and generous God, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

I want to begin by acknowledging that our lesson from Isaiah this morning sounds like it is teeing up the Gospel lesson. It sounds like Isaiah was anticipating Jesus. But Isaiah wasn’t anticipating Jesus any more than Isaiah or Jesus were anticipating what George Frederic Handel might do with this beautiful poetry. Actually, it is exactly the other way around. Matthew was living and growing in the stories of Jesus, at least two generations after Jesus’ death. Matthew was retelling those stories toward the end of the first century of the common era and thinking, “these stories sound so much like the stories that Isaiah told eight hundred years ago!” Isaiah was delivering an oracle of hope to the people of Judah who were in deep distress, danger, and despair.

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Lambs of God

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Epiphany 2A
January 19, 2020

Isaiah 49:1-7 I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.
1 Corinthians 1:1-9 God is faithful.
John 1:29-41 Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

O God,manifest in us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Since the beginning of Advent, our Sunday Gospel readings have been from Matthew, and we will return to Matthew next week. But this morning it is as if the lectionary announces, “we interrupt our serial reading of the Gospel of Matthew to bring you this Good News from the Gospel of John. Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. John the Baptist has testified to it.” Our lectionary has decided to call witnesses!

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Just Mercy

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The Baptism of our Lord (A)
January 12, 2020

Isaiah 42:1-9 I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand.
Acts 10:34-43 Anyone who…does what is right is acceptable to [God].
Matthew 3:13-17 The Beloved.

O God, manifest in us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Today is the day in the church liturgical calendar called “The Baptism of our Lord.” In the early church, the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord was far more important a celebration than the Feast of the Birth of Our Lord (which we call Christmas). Traditionally, Christians celebrated three feasts of light: Epiphany, which was the story of people wise enough to seek after and find Jesus and then go home by another way; The Baptism of Our Lord by the incredulous John at the River Jordan; and the Wedding Feast at Cana where the story goes that Jesus brightened up a very gloomy situation by changing water into some really good wine. These feasts of light were understood to illuminate the nature of God. They were manifestations or revelations initiated by God and noticed by people. These three feasts demonstrated to Christians who observed them, not only what God is like, but also Who (God) wishes us to be in community – in relationship to one another.

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