As some of you know from Facebook, as some of you may have guessed through my recent silence, my dad passed away last week. On Thursday, March 7. In a hospice room at St. Francis hospital in Wichita. With the sun shining and the Hallelujah Chorus playing on my brother’s ipad. Facing his bride of…
Friends, I am posting this as I sit in my father’s ICU room, grateful that he is getting some much needed rest. Grateful for medical technology and medical staff; grateful for caring friends and hospitable strangers; grateful for ancient words that ring notes of truth and comfort in my heart. I am also scared. Scared…
In Luke 13, Jesus tells a parable about a barren fig tree. The tree is planted in a vineyard, and the owner is unhappy because the tree is not bearing fruit. “Cut it down,” he says. But the vintner says, “I’ll dig around it, fertilize it. Let’s give it one more year.” And the vast…
Our preacher this week is using both of the lament over Jerusalem texts from Luke: 13:31-35 and 19:41-44. Here is the call to worship I wrote. (You can find our Lenten offertory prayer here.) Jesus weeps for us, because we do not know the things that make for peace. The Holy Spirit blows among us,…
Our gospel reading for this week is really a rather odd bit of scripture. Only five verses and still we have two distinct parts. In the first, Jesus is warned—by the Pharisees no less—that Herod is out to kill him. Jesus responds by calling Herod a “fox” and saying he will go to Jerusalem anyway.…
Below is the introduction and conclusion from last Sunday’s sermon on Luke 4:1-13. Have you ever played “peek-a-boo” with a baby? Hide your face behind a baby blanket or your hands, wait a beat, and . . . “Peek-a-boo!” The baby’s squeals of delight are enough to make you repeat the move over and over…
“I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre, The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness.” ~T.S. Eliot The primary images of…
What can I say? Wednesday was Ash Wednesday. So the Wednesday Worship Pieces got moved to Friday. And that’s how life goes sometimes. Both of these pieces will work well with general Lenten themes, I think. So they wouldn’t necessarily have to be used this first week of Lent. First, an offertory prayer: God of…
I am involved with a new blog project called Practicing Families. One or two Mondays each month, you’ll find my weekly prayer practice in the form of a family liturgy over on that blog. And never fear, I will always link you over. For my personal prayer practice this morning, I did a visual lectio…
This call to worship is based on Isaiah 61:1-3. This is our Old Testament reading this coming Sunday paired with our final beatitude of the series: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” (Oh yeah, it’s communion Sunday for us too.) You who are poor, why have you come? To hear good…
Spacious Faith 