Pentecost 8A2023 Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 A member of Grace Lutheran Church where I formerly served, I’ll call him Paul, always worked full time and very hard, but he could never get ahead. For short periods, he would find housing but …
Pentecost 7A2023 Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23 Today, the only thing Jesus commands the crowds to do is LISTEN. He tells a parable about a sower who accidentally drops seeds on the path, on rocky soil, and among thorns—all seeds that never …
Pentecost 6A2023 Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 Typically, when I hear the word “yoke,” I think of oxen, the wooden piece laid across the shoulders of two oxen, meant to keep them together in order to accomplish farm work. But in first …
Pentecost 5A2023 Matthew 10:40-42 A family in the first congregation I served owned an elevator company. Somehow, the owners of the elevator company heard about a school for children with disabilities in a village along the side of a volcano …
Pentecost 4A2023 Matthew 10:24-39 Today, Jesus commands the disciples to follow him, to take up their cross, to love him more than their mother or father. The hardest of all? I guess it’s not really a command so much as …
Pentecost 3A2023 Matthew 9:35-10:35 At age 23, I was about to marry Ben. We had met at a Lutheran Bible camp in Wisconsin where we were both working for the summer. When it came time to ask a pastor to …
Pentecost 2A2023 Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26 This is a story about a table. My parents’ table has always been an open one. Especially on Thanksgiving and Christmas and Easter, our table in my growing up years included not just our family …
Pentecost A2023 Acts 2:1-21, 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 Pentecost makes me giggle. As Lutherans, we come into the worship space, pleasant and chatting with our neighbors and nicely dressed. When the prelude music concludes and I stand, the room obediently hushes. …