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Why is this Child who was born so important? Why gather to celebrate His coming? Is it because He is God? Is that what makes this Child so important? I hardly think that is it, for God is most surely important for the simple reason that He is God. God, by definition and necessity, is important, or else He is not God. So why is this Child so important? Why gather? Why sing? Why dress our sanctuary in white? Why? We will have benefited little from our celebrations without that answer. Continue reading “More than God”

St. Stephen
Acts 7
December 26^th

Why did they stone St. Stephen? Was it because of a mob mentality? Did he offend them? Did he attack the core of their religion? What it because he spoke the truth? We could answer yes to all of these questions. Continue reading “St. Stephen’s Day”

Galatians 4:4-7

What’s your inheritance? What does that question make you think of? Maybe what you’ll receive when a relative dies. Maybe what you’ll leave behind to your relatives when you die: a house, car, jewelry, furniture, heirlooms, etc. Inheritances are important things. Even at a young age we may already scope out some of the things we will get. Maybe we even feel guilty for looking forward to inheriting them. I know when my Grandpa passed away, I was excited to inherit all I had asked to inherit: his Bible. I was even more excited to find it worn, tattered, and marked up. Continue reading “A Christmas Inheritance”

For about as long as there’s been Christmas, there’s been people trying to use it and this Child. This has manifested itself in a variety of ways, but in the end it’s all the same thing: law or lawlessness (which is really more law). Today the festival draws near. With the sunset we sing some of the Christian Church’s most solemn, moving, beautiful hymns. We read the poetry of the incarnation. We hear the prophets and evangelists call us. All of this, too, is to one end: God is here, in flesh, for us! Continue reading “Stop It Already, It’s Christmas”

Isaiah 52:7-10

When most of us think of beautiful feet, we think about size, proportion, grooming and painting. Isaiah could care less about any of that. The feet in our text are beautiful because of what they bring: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news.” St. Paul quotes these words in Romans (10:13-15): “‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!’” Continue reading “Beautiful Feet”

Luke 1:39-55

How many of us when we get something new or accomplish something even rather insignificant can’t help but prance like the peacock with feathers in full regalia? How often aren’t pastors like myself a little too concerned with the number of “nice sermons” we get after the service? How often don’t we as a church body look for glory in numbers, good press, or some other visible sign? We all want to be members of the body of Christ, but who here seeks to be the parts that go unseen and lack glory? Mop the hall, mow the lawn, stuff the mailbox—I won’t get in Forward in Christ or the bulletin for that, give me something a little more visible and worthy of my talent. We are by nature arrogant, superficial, hams for attention. It didn’t take long for any of my preacher’s kids when they wer little to figure out they’d rather shake hands with me after church than sit unseen or unheard. Continue reading “Blessed Is the Fruit of Her Womb”