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Revelation 1:17-2:7 “I also know that you are enduring patiently and bearing up for the sake of my name, and that you have not grown weary. But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember then from what you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first.” (Revelation 1:3-5a) Unsurprisingly, most of the readings for Advent focus on patience. That’s because Advent is the season in which the church remembers how to wait patiently on our God. We do...

2 Peter 3:1-10 “First of all you must understand this, that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and indulging their own lusts and saying, ‘Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since our ancestors died, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation!’” (2 Peter 3:3-4) Sadly, but inevitably, right now some moderate-to-well-known pastor or some religious person is doing something that will raise a scandal whenever that thing is discovered. Living in an era where...

1 Peter 2:1-10 “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2:9) If you’ve paid attention to my preaching over the last 2.5 years, you will have undoubtedly heard me reference Peter’s description of the church – “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people.” In fact, I referenced this on multiple occasions as...

Ezra 10:1-17 “Shecaniah son of Jehiel, of the descendants of Elam, addressed Ezra, saying, ‘We have broken faith with our God and have married foreign women from the peoples of the land, but even now there is hope for Israel in spite of this. So now let us make a covenant with our God to send away all these wives and their children, according to the counsel of my lord and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God; and let it be done according to the law. Take action, for it is your...

Revelation 18:21-24 “Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, "With such violence Babylon the great city will be thrown down, and will be found no more” (Revelation 18:21) I’ll confess that I never know what to do with the violent imagery in the New Testament. Some of it is easily understood once a little cultural background is provided. For example, Jesus’ “whip” with which He clears the Temple was likely less physically harmful than a snap...

Matthew 13:53-58 “And he did not do many deeds of power there, because of their unbelief” (Matthew 13:58) A prophet is not accepted in his hometown is just another way of expressing the old adage that “familiarity breeds contempt.” It is a reminder that one of the greatest challenges is learning how to continue to love people even after you’ve discovered they’re not perfect and/or they’re not going to do everything in their power to make your life perfect. Every form of relationship faces this...

Revelation 5:1-10 “Then I saw between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders a Lamb standing as if it had been slaughtered, having seven horns and seven eyes” (Revelation 5:6) On Halloween Eve, I cannot imagine a more frightening image from the Bible than Revelation 5:6. (Though, bonus points if you find an even scarier one. In fact, those who send in “scary images from scripture” selections will be officially enrolled in a contest to win a free lunch with the...

“Trust” and “faith” are functionally the same thing throughout scripture. We may, in our times, delineate the two, but not typically to our benefit. Today, we might talk about trust as both a feeling and an action, whereas we most frequently speak of faith as mere feeling alone. Collapsing this distinction is important if we’re to understand the joyful complexity of this opening line from Psalm 125.

Objectively, the claim that we are to be people who trust/have faith in God and that this will make us like a mountain makes sense. We often (rightly) admire the faith of those whose convictions make them a bulwark against every sin, calamity, and challenge. We see their faith as unmovable against situations and conditions that we know, down deep, would bring us to our knees.

Every week, you are asked to stand up in worship and give an “Affirmation of Faith.” To an outsider, such a practice very clearly resembles brain-washing. To an addict in recovery, such a practice looks like a communal step in individual healing. For the Church, though, it is merely the public practice of acknowledging Jesus before others in the sure hope that we will one day be acknowledged by Jesus before God.

I remember learning long ago (we’re talking grade school, maybe junior high, here) that there were certain tribes of Native Americans in the western part of what is now the United States (but was, at that time, just wilderness) who tamed wild horses. They would pursue these horses in a pack of men who would chase the horse, taking care to essentially make it run in circles. They would take turns running this wild beast until it could run no more. Naturally, a horse can outrun a man any day – both in terms of speed and longevity – so they needed to work in a group, each man taking a turn to run the horse in a long circle before the next, rested man tagged in. Again, I have no idea about the historical veracity of this “knowledge.” It may very well be a thing my junior high track coach told us to keep us running in circles.