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Tag Archives: Moses
Sermon: Knowing and being known
Our hope may be that we will see our Pilot face to face when we have crossed the bar. But in the meantime, while we cannot fully know God, we are already, as Paul reminds the Corinthians, fully known. And we are known by a God who names himself, ‘I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy,’ even when most angry and disappointed with people who decided to worship a false god made of gold. The Lord ends the story of the golden calf by renewing the covenant that the Israelites broke, giving them a fresh start and repeating for them the Ten Commandments that they will need to live as God’s people in God’s land. (Exodus 34) Continue reading
Sermon: Not quite the God we know
Their relationship with this God was so intimate and immediate that they could imagine God sending them quails to eat in the evening and bread in the morning (Exodus 16:13-16); they could imagine the Lord being so hurt by their rejection that God needed to be talked out of killing them. As I have said so many times this year, the religion created by the Jewish followers of Jesus is an inclusive Israel gathered from all the nations of the world. The character of the Lord in today’s story is not identical with the God we worship, but this sense of intimacy between God and God’s people is ours too. Continue reading
Posted in Sermons
Tagged Aaron, Book of Exodus, commandments, Exodus, Exodus 32:1-14,, God the character, inclusive Israel, Israelites, Moses, Ten Commandments, the Law, Torah, Year of Matthew
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Sermon: Being whole and seeing wholeness
We are not saints, and the world’s light and dark call forth in us now our light, now our dark. We struggle to see the wholeness of God’s love behind the fragments of the world that confront us. Sometimes the world shatters us into fragments. But the prophets, and the apostles, and the saints, and the mystics, and Jesus himself, speak with one voice and tell us that God created the universe out of love, and so the world is holy, even if we struggle to see it that way. And God created us out of that same love, and so we are holy, too, even if we struggle to see ourselves that way. Continue reading
Posted in Books, Sermons
Tagged bronze serpent, crucifixion, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Ephesians 2:1-10, Frederick Buechner, John 3:14-21, Julian of Norwich, love, Moses, Year of Mark
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Sermon: There is always enough
Pharoah’s world was one of scarcity, in which the people of Israel had to work without ceasing and make bricks without straw. The Lord’s world is one of abundance, in which everyone has enough, and rest is an essential part of life. Continue reading
Posted in Sermons
Tagged Book of Exodus, Exodus, Exodus 16:2-15, generosity, giving, manna, Matthew 20:1-16, Moses, Year of Matthew
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Sermon: Our God doesn’t murder children!
Christians believe that in Jesus the God who is on the side of the poor and oppressed became one of the poor and oppressed, and was executed by an occupying power in solidarity with all those tortured and killed by military dictatorships. The God who freed the slaves and led them from Egypt is the God who raised Jesus from the dead in the world’s most pointed act of civil disobedience. Continue reading
Posted in Sermons
Tagged belief, doubt, Exodus, Exodus 12:1-14, faith, liberation, Moses, slavery
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Sermon: Righteous Outlaws
Together, the Hebrew midwives, Pharaoh’s daughter, the daughter of Levi who is Moses’ mother, and the girl who is the baby’s sister and his mother’s daughter, have disobeyed Pharaoh and saved Moses from death. Because of their actions, Moses will grow up to become the liberator of his people and their great lawgiver. If the Pharaoh had really wanted to destroy the Hebrews he should not have overlooked the women, because it is their acts of civil disobedience that change history. Continue reading
Sermon: How is Jesus like a bronze serpent?
The cross turns our ways of seeing the world upside down. God becomes powerless to defeat death; human suffering is taken up into the life of God. Continue reading
Posted in Sermons
Tagged crucifixion, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, John 3:14-21, Jurgen Moltmann, Martin Luther, Moses, Numbers 21:4-9, snakes, The Crucified God
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Sermon: Wait on the Lord
Ultimately, this is a story of God’s care for God’s people – which comes in God’s own good time. Continue reading
Posted in Sermons
Tagged Aaron, Exodus 32:1-14, idolatry, leadership, Moses, patience
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