RoboPreacher

for someone in need of a tourniquet   The Gospel this Sunday is certainly a difficult one. Sort of. Really it depends upon your context. For instance, I have never married and right now that isn't a priority in my life, so it is hard to get all the fuss. Admittedly, that is a minority perspective. There are folks who are divorced who will hear these words of Jesus. There are people who are holding out for an ideal relationship so they won't have to encounter these tough words of Jesus. There will be people sticking-out a miserable marriage because of these words. There will be that are happily married, and that have experienced struggles and joys together hearing these words. For the preacher then, there are a certain number of sensitivities. The most obvious land-mine is offending people who are divorced (presumably divorced for a good reason). That doesn't exhaust the list of land-mines, though. There are those who engage in a more subtle form of adultery ...

i keep waiting forever. ( Editor's Note : This post is only tangentially related to the Advent-project. This is a reflection I gave on 12/12 at Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg , during the chapel-service. This reflection discusses the intersection of theology and practice, as we wait for God's reign of justice. For those who are unfamiliar, or uninterested, in Lutheran theological categories this post will be "most unsatisfactory." Mea culpa!) Luke 3:7-18 : I had enough. I was tired of it. No, that morning I would not be waking up early. That morning I would not be running in the cold before class. No. I didn’t need to, I had already secured my position on the varsity team. Nope, I was not going to run that morning. Upon retrospect I can see I was throwing a tantrum. Petty fit or not, feeling arrogant that morning, I decided I would not go to cross-country practice. And I didn’t... … And I also had to run with the underclassmen for a week after...