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Paul’s greeting in his letter to the Romans (1:1–7) immediately focusses the audience’s attention on what is of ultimate significance: the gospel of God (verse 1), which is the good news that Jesus Christ is (...)

There are many striking features of Romans 15:4–13 that might stimulate a preacher’s imagination. It begins and ends with God-given hope (verse 4, 12–13). It is filled with exhortations to glorify God because of God’s (...)

In Romans 13:11–14, Paul exhorts believers to live fully into the new identity given to them through Christ’s death and resurrection. This new life is a divine gift that is both a present reality and (...)

Most will know that scholars dispute Paul’s authorship of 2 Thessalonians. We should also note that, with few exceptions, decisions about authorship seem to have little impact on the interpretation of specific texts. For homiletical (...)

We move headlong into the Passion Narrative in this third week in Lent.  Note some preliminary matters before moving into the text. The first is the relationship of John to the Synoptic Gospels. To this (...)

When Jesus goes into the desert for forty days and nights, he comes face-to-face with the tempter who asks him three questions. Each question challenges Jesus to prove his identity (“If you are the Son (...)

This passage is all about hope. But when Paul speaks about hope, he has something very specific in mind—the hope linked with the new age that the Messiah Jesus’ suffering and death has ushered in. (...)

Epiphany falls on the twelfth day after Christmas, January 6 each year on most western churches’ calendars. It’s a day set apart to mark the arrival of the magi from the east: when Jesus was (...)

Daniel 12:1–3 has become one of the touchstones of the Christian doctrine of the resurrection. To begin on any other note would probably ignore the interests of readers of a Christian lectionary commentary. In some (...)

When I was in seminary there was a joke circulating about a children’s sermon. A pastor was telling the kids a story about a squirrel. Before she could get to the main point, one child (...)