Blogging Towards Sunday, December 4^th

Mark 4:35-41 | Isaiah 40:1-11 | Mark 1:1-8

Today’s passage of Mark follows the Jesus’ teaching about how God works in the world with several parables. Beginning with the Sower and the Seed (Mark 4:1-20) the parables portray the mysterious aspect of the dominion of God which starts slow, unexpectedly in ways that we overlook as human beings, yet it grows – despite us – and emerges to completely transform the universe. Mark tells us that Jesus repeatedly told stories in parable form, untying the confusing knots that people seemed to have tied themselves up into as they sought to understand God.

Blogging Towards Sunday, November 27^th

Mark 4:21-34 | Isaiah 64:1-9 | Mark 13:24-37

Today’s passage of Mark continues the teaching of Jesus in parables. Undoubtedly, since Mark is a good writer, it is directly connected to the parable of the Sower and the Seed (Mark 4:1-20).  In that parable we learn of God’s abundant and amazing grace similar to seeds scattered on diverse and different types of soil.  God gives the gift of faith and then grows it as we respond.  We’re not just passive observers, but also actively involved.

lamps | measures | seeds oh my!

The first parable of the lamp and the bushel remind me of my childhood and the song we often sang in Sunday School, “hide it under a bushel? No!  I’m gonna let it shine!”  But that’s from Matthew 5.  It’s not what Jesus is talking about here.  What is Jesus talking about with the hidden and made manifest?  A light is meant to illuminate the room.  Why then do we need ears to hear?  Isn’t it obvious?  Not to me! 

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Questions for going deeper with the Scriptures for today, November 20^th

Mark 4:1-20

Today’s passage of Mark contains the first major teaching passage included in the gospel.  Several times Mark has emphasized Jesus’ teaching prowess and the way in which his teaching has an authority that many have never yet witnessed (examples include Mark 1:21-22; 1:39, 2:1-3).  Jesus tells a parable in response to the concluding verse (35) of chapter 3.  “Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”  So how do we know what’s God will is?

structure of the text – what’s in a parable?

The first teaching narrative is a parable.  It’s a Greek word that has taken on a new meaning because of the gospel and is used in most modern languages.  So what is a parable?

 Blogging Towards Sunday, November 13

Mark 3:20-35

Today’s passage of Mark begins following the description of the 12^th of the 12 disciples as the one who will betray Jesus (3.19) and then continues describing those who oppose Jesus who range from the Jerusalem scribes – or religious experts – to include even his own nuclear family.  What role does family play in our lives? How do we understand family today?

Occupy Oakland

There's been much brouhaha about Occupy Oakland for the past days, in particular since the police intervention last week and the general strike yesterday.  I am quite progressive and believe that the Occupy movement can bring about good for our society.  So either I'm objective or subjective, as we each can only start our thought process from our own individual point of view.  Today I've heard on the radio and read in media and notes that Oakland has sunk into violence and that the occupy movement is a shame and a sham.

I spent most of the afternoon yesterday in downtown Oakland at the occupy general strike headquarters with my 9 and 7 year old children.  We heard music and speakers.  We saw signs, posters, educational murals and a candle ridden station for peace.  We inhaled marijuana that was smoked by some.  We heard prayers offered at the inter-religious tent.  We saw babies in strollers and carriers on the parents' backs.  We saw grandparents with their grandchildren.  We saw school groups in matching t-shirts.  We saw teachers, urban professionals, homeless, students, diverse clergy and random working class folks all milling around together peacefully.  It seemed much more like a music festival or neighborhood festival than a riot or chaotic gathering of looters.  Never was I afraid - for myself or my children.

Blogging Towards Sunday, November 6^th     

Mark 3:7-19

Today’s passage of Mark tells of the increasing power of the ministry of Jesus and this of his choice to name a group of twelve disciples who will be his inner circle and constant companions. 

the spreading impact of jesus among the people | Mark 3:7-12

The people are overwhelmed with gratitude for Jesus.  His words, presence and healing actions seem to touch a need, to connect with a deep common longing for something unknown, promised and dreamed of.  Mark describes the crowd as if they are going to crush Jesus, as they press upon him and exert pressure upon him to respond to their needs and desires.   Interestingly enough the entire narrative is structured around the actions of Jesus.  He is not passive, but active, setting the tone, changing the conversation, challenging the status quo (v. 7, 9 12 are his actions which frame the story).

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Blogging Towards , Sunday, October 30^th    

Mark 2:23-3:6

How do you decide what is right?  How can we agree on what is morally and ethically good?  Isn't it just a question of subjective point of view and our own particular context at any given moment?  Today’s passage of Mark contains the last 2 conflicts in a series of encounters between Jesus and the Pharisees begun back in 2:13.  Both stories have obvious parallels and contrasts: they deal with the Sabbath and one concerns the actions of Jesus and one his disciples.  Both stories invite deeper reflection upon the meaning, purpose and scope of the Sabbath as a spiritual practice and religious law in light of Jesus’ comment in 2:22 “No!  One pours new wine into new wineskins.”

 Blogging Towards Sunday, October 23^rd    

Mark 2:18-22

¹⁸ Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting; and people came and said to him, ‘Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees take on the discipline of fasting, but yours do not?’ ¹⁹Jesus said to them, ‘When you're celebrating a wedding, you don't skimp on the cake and wine. You feast. Later you may need to pull in your belt, but not now. As long as the bride and groom are with you, you have a good time. No one throws cold water on a friendly bonfire.

²⁰The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast on that day.

²¹ ‘No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the patch pulls away [rips: in Greek schism] from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made.

²²And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.’

Comments and Questions

Today’s selection from Mark is the third, or the center, of a 5 series structures of stories that NT scholar Joel Marcus calls “The Opposition Asserts Itself” for it presents the reaction of the religious establishment to the new word and religious event experienced in this Jesus of Nazareth.  After a chapter detailing Jesus’ explosion onto the speaking circuit of ancient Palestine, and his rapidly emerging fame, he’s challenged by the establishment, the Pharisees, Scribes, Sadducees, those that are at the top of the religious pyramid in his society. the second and third confrontation of Jesus with the Pharisees. 

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Blogging Towards Sunday, October 16, 2011

Mark 2:13-2:17 | purity

I've been offline with some computer problems for the past few weeks, but am not back online.  In the silence I've started a new series, working my way through Mark's version of the Jesus story.  I'll post the back posts next week.  Come and participate in the sermon on this passage this coming Sunday at 10:30 at College Ave Presbyterian Church.

Today’s selection from Mark includes the second and third confrontation of Jesus with the Pharisees.  We often overlook or are unaware of the diversity that existed in the Jewish community of Jesus’ day.  Occupied by the Roman Empire, faced with the pagan influences of Greek culture and Gentile religions the Jews were forced to either withdraw from society, reinforce their faith through fundamentalistic approaches, conform and change to the expanding global environment or reinterpret their tradition for a new day.  All of these approaches were taken.  The Essenes: those who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls withdrew to the desert to remain pure.  The Scribes were those that reinterpreted.  The Sadducees were those that conformed or collaborated. The Pharisees were those that we might call “fundamentalists” who lived out the letter of the law in all aspects.

Blogging Towards Sunday, September 18^th  

1 Kings 19:1-15

Bob Brylawski is preaching this week on this text which challenges the ways in which we expect God to communicate with us.  The common expression spoken when people do something wrong is that they might get hit by a bolt of lighting.  It articulates a vision of God’s power, righteousness and activity in the world.  So here in this passage we see the great prophet Elijah, the only one remaining faithful to the Lord in his day, seek God’s voice.  Or do we?  If you look closer at the whole 19^th chapter of 1 Kings 19 you see that Elijah is on the run: running from all his adversaries in particular the queen Jezebel who wants to get her revenge by killing the prophet that just won’t stop challenging her example.

Church Retreat - CHANGE

"It's Hell in the Hallway"

http://vimeo.com/28693892

Blogging Towards Sunday, September 11^th 

10 years since the events of 9/11

Psalm 46 | Colossians 3:17

Terror.  What is it ?  For many of us we remember the events of 10 years ago today with terror.  Yet it’s also called a day in which violent acts reigned down terror and then resulted in other terror.  So what is it a noun, an adjective, a verb?  We often focus on how that day changed us, but for many of us – I think of my children – they were born afterwards, they’ve never known anything else?  Wether we’re hawks or doves, on the left or on the right, tea or coffee partiers, we are shaped in part by this memory: fear, confusion, surprise, the reality of pluralism in the 21^st century, a different experience of how some see us as the US. 

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Blogging Towards  Sunday, September 2^nd 

The Question of Guilt

Leviticus 5:14-19; 7:1-6 | Isaiah 53:10-11 |
 Galatians 5:15-21

GUILT.  It’s an ugly word.  A feeling that often overwhelms us.  Those that critic Christianity from  Friedrich Nietzsche to modern atheist writer Christopher Hitchens, lift up the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth as something that causes guilt based on unrealistic and inhuman morality.  In Hebrew the word for guilt and that for sin are used interchangeably.  In Leviticus 5 & 7 we hear of the proscribed sacrifices to make restitution for sin or guilt, whether it be consciously or unconsciously committed.  The Law seems to provide a way to remove guilt, to make the one who offers the sacrifice clear, to empower them to experience a before and an after, to continue with the certitude of being no longer guilty.  The twist is that it can happen again, no matter how many rams of the flock are sacrifices on an altar.

Blogging Towards Sunday, August 28^th

Mark 8:31-35 | Mark 11:22-25 | Philippians 4:10-13 | Ephesians 3:14-21 & Galatians 2:20

The Gospel according to Mark begins with a radical affirmation: “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” [1:1].  In the original language of the book, Koiné Greek, the word for gospel, euanggelion, also means “good news”.  It means good news as in headlines of a paper, an blessed event like a birth or marriage, a joyous pronouncement like VE-Day at the end of WW II, or a military report of victory.

Louise Hirschman asks, “if we actually believe the good news of the gospel, why don’t our lives show it in wild, crazy, amazing expressions of joy?  If we believed it, we could do anything, knowing that Jesus the Christ has our back!”  So what holds us back?  - holds you back?

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Blogging Towards Sunday, August 7, 2011

Colossians 1:1-23

Chosen by Anne Marie Adams, this  scripture lifts of the awesomeness of who Jesus is.  He is the “visible image of the invisible God”.  WOW!  That says a lot, and potentially nothing (for our secular world today).  The passage points back to the beginning of who Jesus is, spelling it out ontologically (regarding being) and epistemologically (regarding the origin of knowledge).  Yet the passage isn’t just about the past, it moves from this universal proclamation of what has been and what is, to a description of where we’re headed, what the world is becoming alongside, because of, in and through this Jesus.