RoboPreacher

buddy, i'm your oyster  a sermon on paul's more excellent sermon that rhymes :  This is the beating center of Saint Paul’s epistle to First Lutheran in Philippi. All that's preceded this has been building to it. And everything that follows is the consequence thereof. But here, at the heart , Paul burst out into this absolutely lovely lyrical praise.   Praise that is indeed songlike. Recite these words to yourself. You’ll find they have a rhythm to them. A cadence that helps these words stick .   But that isn’t all! This praise is also quite sophisticated , too! In these metered phrases, Paul charts out what transpired by Christ’s incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension! With these words, Paul peels back the curtain to offer a glimpse of how the structure of reality itself changed when God Thyself stepped into it in the person of Jesus of Nazareth! Now, in case you can’t tell, this is my very favorite kind of theology. I love it when Chris...

nothing else left to impart: A sermon on the prayers of Peter and Cornelius : We’re not told why , exactly, Peter went out onto the roof to pray that noon. Are we? However, we can guess. And if you haven’t already, let me just ask, when do you pray?   And I mean really pray, too. Like, skipping lunch to pray. Like, clamber out onto a roof to pray! When do you pray like that ? Because I’d be willing to bet you don’t pray like that for fun . Do you? No, you only pray like that when you’re at your wit’s end !   That sweet hour of prayer may sound like a nice IDEA. But it’s only that! Isn’t it? It’s just a NICE idea .   Real prayer, on the other hand, isn’t an IDEA, nice or otherwise. No , prayer, real prayer, is born where all our nice IDEAS are laid to rest ! REAL prayer is a messy affair. Real prayer is a matter of flesh and blood . And I bet you KNOW exactly what I mean. Don’t you? It’s nice to think Peter climbed out on that roof to pray over lunch out of pie...

if i could I would no longer be barren The Holy Gospel according to St. John ! January is a hard month, isn’t it? So, if you’re having a rough go of it. If everyone at work seems to be at each other’s throats. If getting through the day is a slough come noon; know you’re not alone. January is hard because there’s the hangover from the holidays. The miserable whether. And probably worst of all, no end in sight… January is a month even the best of us feel a little run ragged, a little empty … Kind of like those stone jars at the reception of the wedding in Cana… After three days of partying, all that was left was the letdown. The wine gave out… Jesus’ mom, who this isn’t her first rodeo, sees the disaster coming.   * And isn’t that how it always goes ? The more experience you accumulate, the sooner you see the disappointment coming . Well, anyway, before the disaster can make a muck of everything, Jesus’ mom intervenes and engineers a soluti...