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The week’s reading from Amos contains two different units: a prose vision report in Amos 8:1-3 and a poetic announcement of judgment in Amos 8:4-12. (The second unit continues to the end of the chapter, (...)

On the wall of the bedroom that my younger brother and I shared was a painting of a young boy standing at the wheel of a ship, piloting it through stormy weather. In the background, (...)

With a wonderful mixed metaphor, our passage captures the dynamics of Christian discipleship. “As you, therefore, have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him (...)

This week’s first lesson moves the narrative from a divine encounter under the terebinths at Mamre to the road to Sodom. As the narrative makes this shift, keep in mind the Lord’s question to Abraham (...)

The lectionary-driven preacher is rarely invited to deliver a sermon based on a text from Proverbs. Only a half dozen texts from that book appear in the Revised Common Lectionary. The Lutheran lectionary has even (...)

Hebrews 13 can read like a list of rules — do this and don’t do that — but it also includes some vital and enduring theological truths. The instructions and the grounds for those instructions (...)

The preacher who chooses to preach this passage has no easy task. Walter Brueggemann calls it a “dangerous poem,” and rightly so.1 It portrays a people without sense and a world without order, overcome by (...)

If it seems to you that the passage from Isaiah has cropped up recently, you are correct. Besides this day, Isaiah 65:17-25 was an alternate lection for Easter Sunday last March. The chances are good (...)

In the Gospel for the previous Sunday (Matthew 3:1-12), we heard the stirring words of John the Baptist at the Jordan River concerning the one who is to come. The Messiah, he said, will baptize (...)

As I write, fall is already upon me, summer is long past, and winter is rapidly approaching. With the exception of Alaska, I live in one of the furthest northern states in the US, which (...)