Faith Scribbling

Posts

Why Are You Weeping? (Easter Sermon)

Easter Sunday - March 31, 2024 Scripture: John 20:1-18 “Why Are You Weeping?” “Why are you weeping?" Mary Magdalene, left alone at the tomb by Peter and John, is asked this question twice in quick succession this Resurrection Sunday morning. Without doubt, Mary Magdalene loved Jesus and might even have been putting herself in harm’s way to visit that tomb. We are told that Mary went there alone while it was still dark. What she planned to do at the tomb is anyone’s guess, but the most likely explanation is the best. She knew that a large stone had been rolled across the entrance, and she was surely not going to move it. Mary was going there to mourn. That was all she could do. Jesus was dead. She was in the depths of despair, not yet 48 hours past Jesus’s death on the cross. In her grief, the reality of the situation might not yet have set in. Christ died on the cross on Friday, the day of preparation, and his body had been hastily moved into the new tomb provided by Nicod

Quiet Consideration

March 24 – Palm Sunday Focus Scripture: Mark 11:1-11 Quiet Consideration Hosanna! Hosanna! Hosanna in the highest! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! What must it have been like to be there so long ago? Jesus, who had spent years healing, teaching, and preaching, both in the gentile and Jewish regions, was making his way into Jerusalem. Those who knew their scriptures, the words of the prophets, saw that prophecy was being fulfilled. The prophet Zechariah, in verse 9:9, described this exact scene. “See, your King comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” This Jesus was no threat, no harm, just salvation, righteousness, and peace. This is the Jesus the Bible describes: our Savior who loves us and wants only for us to love God in return. God is our God, and we are God’s people. And for this brief time on a Sunday before Passover, it was so. The people threw down their cloaks and their c

Thunderclap or Angel Shout?

March 17 – Fifth Sunday of Lent Focus Scripture: John 12:20-33 Thunderclap or Angel Shout? Ignaz Semmelweis was a Hungarian physician of German descent who lived in the 19 th century. Dr. Semmelweis worked during a time before our modern era when common practices of our time had not yet been adopted. Dr. Semmelweis had a hypothesis that childbed fever, an illness that killed many women, could be reduced. Through his observations, he thought that maternal mortality could be reduced with doctors simply washing their hands. Today, especially after what we experienced and were told to do to slow the spread of COVID, it seems almost impossible to believe that the value of handwashing would be debatable. Today we understand a lot more about germs and how diseases spread. This was not the case in the mid-19 th century. Not only was the idea not understood, it was widely ridiculed. The grim truth is that doctors would move from examining corpses directly to treating women in chil

March 3, 3024 – Third Sunday of Lent Focus Scripture: John 2:13-22 The Work of Worship “Zeal for your house will consume me.” The people selling livestock and birds set up shop in the wrong place. The money changers, too, did not see this coming: Jesus, Son of God, literally turning the tables on them. Even the disciples were likely surprised by Jesus’s behavior. After all, they had seen this commerce before and would surely have seen it as normal. Until that day. There are several takeaways from this Gospel lesson, all of which we can and should apply in today’s context. Let’s look at four. First, God takes this concept of God’s house seriously. We need look no further than the detailed direction given to the Israelites starting in Exodus 25. The wandering in the desert stopped for a time so all the skilled craftspeople could come together to create the tabernacle. In that context, God told Moses in verses 8 and 9 of that chapter that this would be a “sanctuary” for G

Covenants of Life

February 25, 2024 – Second Sunday of Lent Focus Scriptures: Romans 4:13-25 and Mark 8:31-38 Covenants of Life Our faith, active trust in God, is central to our lives as Christians. When we have faith in God and faith that Jesus Christ is who he said he is – the son of God, The Way, The Truth, and The Life – we are entering into a sacred covenant of life that makes us understand why Jesus Christ came into the world in the first place. There are five central covenants on which our faith is built, covenants in the Bible going back to the covenant with Noah that we discussed with the children last week. From there, we move to the covenant we heard about this morning, God’s covenant with Abraham, a covenant that said he would be the father of many nations due to his faithfulness. From there we move to the Mosaic covenant. God gave the Israelites the law in the desert after leading them out of Egypt. God said, “I will be your God, and you will be my people.” And from this law, we s

Wilderness and Wild Beasts

February 18, 2024 - First Sunday of Lent Focus Scripture: Mark 1:9-15 Wilderness and Wild Beasts “And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for 40 days, tested by Satan, and he was with the wild beasts, and the angels waited on him.” These two sentences from the briefest of the gospels tell us much. They describe the relationship among the persons of God, they show and foreshadow sacrifice, and they hint at the challenges that our Lord and Savior endured to do his work, that which we will observe and celebrate six weeks from today. These two sentences and their images also give us an idea of how God is with us and works in us today. Let’s first take a moment to consider the contrast of events in this passage. Jesus is baptized by John in the Jordan. Then God speaks saying, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” Then, in the very next sentence, we are told that the Holy Sprit immediately compelled Jesus – drove J