RoboPreacher

Amid the cold of winter A sermon on Isaiah's superb sermon on the rough places It’s always true, but it’s especially true this time of the year. There are a lot of voices clamoring for your attention. Aren’t there? There are all the demands , invitations, offers, updates, requests, questions, suggestions, solicitations, pleas, and general inquiries, too.   And that’s barely scratching the surface. Isn’t it? Those are just the indiscriminate voices! There’s also the voices of your dear friends and families. There’s the voices of those people who have the frustrating knack of getting underneath your skin. And that’s not to say anything of all the other voices constantly sounding off in your own head, too! Yes , it’s true . There are a lot of voices clamoring for your attention. And it’s especially true this time of the year. However . However, there is only ONE voice that speaks to your wilderness . Yes, you heard me right, your wilderness .   We all have them, to...

i can learn to be easy The holy Gospel according to St. Luke the 3rd chapter ! Bypassing all the usual lackeys, the Word of God goes right up the line. Past the governor, and finally even over the head of the Emperor himself! In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius the word of God comes to not a single one of those men in power …   Neither , though, does the word of God come to the High Priest in the temple . Instead , the word of God comes to John .   John, the son of a priest. John, who apparently has nothing to do with the priesthood, though . John who’s doing ministry outside the temple, in the wilderness .   Yet, it is him , of all people, that the word of God comes! And the word of God comes to him, no less, while he’s out there in the wilderness .   Whatever else it is, the wilderness is the opposite of civilization . The wilderness is what lies on the other side of our tamed world. And it is there that the word of God comes every time. J...

The Holy Gospel according to St. Mark! Lent; that time of the year when we contend with all the evil within us and the evil out there in the world.  It can be a pretty harrowing thing, all in all… Because I don’t know about you, but when I face up to this daunting task, I get the strong suspicion I’m no match for these forces of evil.  After only a few moments of examining my motives, I’m ready to throw in the towel; ready to join St. Paul in crying out ‘oh, who will save me from this body of death.’ And it takes even less time of scanning the newspaper to give up this lenten discipline. It was just this week that another young man was shot, for seemingly little motive.  Honestly, it appears that those forces of evil all around us are just too great for humans like us to contend with… We’ve got a problem, though.  Or, more accurately, as your preacher, I’ve got a problem. For as formidable as those forces we are to contend against duri...

i hope you're coming with me   The Holy Gospel according toSt. Luke, the third chapter! One Emperor, four rulers and two priests all could not conjure up the Word of God. Instead, God's Word shows up in the wilderness to the son of a barren woman. This work of God is unexpected, unparalleled, and ultimately unlikely. Yet that is exactly what happens. And it is a good thing, too...   John, son of Zechariah, while in the wilderness, receives the Word of God. It is a good thing that God decides to send God's word into the Wilderness. It is a good thing because we all know a thing or two about the wilderness, don't we? We've known that feeling of being lost.   Do any of you watch Modern Family? It is quite good. If you don't watch it, consider it. Anyway, there is an episode where the family goes on a vacation to a dude-ranch. Two of the characters, Haley and Dylan, are high-school age. They have been dating for the entire ...