Monday, February 19, 2018
I’m not a fan of fishing: threading a worm on the hook, swatting mosquitos, watching for the bob of a line. Then—if you’re lucky—there’s clutching the fish with one hand and maneuvering the hook from its mouth, followed by gutting and scaling. Yuck. It makes me...
Monday, February 19, 2018
The post Promise and Salvation appeared first on d365 Daily Devotionals. This post appeared here first: Promise and Salvation [D365 Daily Devotions]
Sunday, February 18, 2018
Many years ago, in a small Episcopal mission church, we celebrated Shrove Tuesday with pancakes, fresh deep fried donuts, games, and general silliness, until about a minute before midnight. The Vicar stood up, and we all got quiet. “The Lord be with you.” And we...
Sunday, February 18, 2018
In journalistic writing, there’s a convention known as a “nut graph.” This is reporter/editor slang for the heart of the story—the essence. For me, these two verses from Luke are the nut graph of the whole gospel. Jesus has come to bring good news to the poor,...
Saturday, February 17, 2018
Psalm 31 Whether you are facing life or death, there is something here for you. Either way, it is the path of surrender. Some of you are old enough to remember the gospel-pop song written by Gene MacLellan called Put Your Hand In The Hand. It was...
Saturday, February 17, 2018
Not everyone believes in Satan. But I do. Satan is at work whenever and wherever hopelessness abounds, when weeping and weariness appear to have no end. And sometimes, Satan puts on a full-court press, repeatedly attacking a group or community. ….(View this...
Friday, February 16, 2018
O God, whose Son the Good Shepherd laid down his life for the sheep: We give you thanks for your faithful shepherd, Janani Luwum, who after his Savior’s example gave up his life for the people of Uganda. Grant us to be so inspired by his witness that we make no peace...
Friday, February 16, 2018
Readings for the feast day of Charles Todd Quintard, Bishop of Tennessee: Psalm 94:2-15 Sirach 34:14-19 Romans 14:10-13 Luke 14:15-24 Charles Todd Quintard is, at best, a complicated character in the pages of the history of the Episcopal Church, and it gets...
Friday, February 16, 2018
Back in the prologue, Luke tells us that his words will reveal truth. His attention to detail and commitment to the full story of our Savior roots Jesus in a fully human identity, recalling his lineage from Joseph, all the way back to Adam, and to God the Father and...
Thursday, February 15, 2018
John is no shrinking violet, mincer of words, or sufferer of fools. He calls the people coming to be baptized a “brood of vipers.” Definitely not the Carnegie method of winning friends and influencing people. Despite John’s strange ways—and make no mistake, even...
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
John 17:1-8 “And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” – John 17:3 When I think about what it means to know the only true God, I think of Brother Lawrence, the kitchen monk, who practiced the Presence of...
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Read: Luke 1-2:52 “Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us…I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write an orderly account for you…” The...
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Can you imagine how Mary and Joseph must have fretted, looking everywhere for their son? I bet Luke didn’t record the full conversation between Jesus and his parents after they found him. They probably dragged him out of the temple by his ear and gave him a...
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
We have again arrived at Ash Wednesday and the penitential season called Lent, when some in the Christian tradition focus on sin. Others, especially post-Christians harboring a gripe with the faith, characterize Lent as a time for flagellating ourselves while...
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
You have probably heard these words dozens of times. Perhaps you were a shepherd clad in an ill-fitting sheet or a young Mary holding a burlap-wrapped baby doll. Maybe, propped on elbows on the family room floor, you watched an earnest Linus tell Charlie Brown—and...
