ephesians on Yoke

Almighty and everlasting God, who has restored all things in your well-beloved Son, the King and Lord of all: Mercifully grant that all peoples and nations, divided and wounded by sin, may be brought ...

The Missing “Advent” Text A lectionary preacher moving from the fifth to the sixth Sunday after Pentecost in Year A will notice that a familiar chunk is missing, sent back in time to the third Sunday...

Preaching Commentary The Missing “Advent” Text A lectionary preacher moving from the fifth to the sixth Sunday after Pentecost in Year A will notice that a familiar chunk is missing, sent back in t...

What, then, does the author intend to communicate in verses 1-4? He proclaims that an authoritative and authentic high priest must both identify with and be distinct from those to whom he ministers. ...

The hope is held out [in Genesis] that one day the Son would be a second Adam, born to answer the first. . . . And this second Adam would give us a second family to belong to—God’s.

You shall love your crooked neighbor with all your crooked heart.

What Paul does is transform the master-slave relationship by insisting that both masters and slaves have the same heavenly Lord and are accountable to him. The emphasis is on mutual responsibility und...

When a musical instrument’s strings go loose, it sounds awful. But you can also overtighten the strings, breaking them or creating discord. There’s a perfect tension to grace and truth, which makes th...

There were two important steps to a Jewish marriage: the betrothal (the promised agreement to marry) and the actual wedding ceremony. These two events were often separated by an extended period of tim...

Your torture puts hostility to death Your broken body breaks down every dividing wall Your blood makes us blood What wondrous truth What dazzling grace Bring us near again, Jesus Help us remember an...

Context I had a Bible professor in college who liked to say, “All Scripture is cultural!” He didn’t mean that the truth of who God is changes in different cultures. What he meant was that our God ch...

Every cross adorning a church is in itself a sermon—a sermon proclaiming that if Christ can transform the Roman instrument of execution into a thing of beauty, there is hope that in Christ all things ...

Context I had a Bible professor in college who liked to say, “All Scripture is cultural!” He didn’t mean that the truth of who God is changes in different cultures. What he meant was that our God ch...

The strong bond that unites the vine and the branches has to do with the sap that flows through them. Jesus does not here use the word “sap,” but nonetheless gives a lengthy excursus on love in a way ...

There are two wonderful Greek words that the early church theologians used to describe the Trinity: kenōsis and perichōrēsis. Kenosis is the act of self-giving for the good of another. It is found in ...

Hope orients all thought, action, and relationships to God’s ultimate redemption of the creation and to the ultimate communion with the triune God...hope is the steady orientation to God’s making all ...

Do unto those downstream as you would have those upstream do unto you.

In 1988, I (Randy) moved with my wife and two sons (ages two and eight weeks) from Texas to Sulawesi, an island north of Australia and south of the Philippines. We served as missionaries to a cluster ...

The piling on of grace upon grace is incredible. God had given us his Son. We killed him. In response God says, “I want to forgive you and offer another ‘family member,’ so to speak.” It was a case of...

Preaching Commentary Lamenting a Living Son This is God’s own lament: a brokenhearted father mourning the loss of a still-living son.  Throughout the book, God has led Hosea to draw from moments of...

God put the body together in such a way that those who experience honor in this life and those who do not are to astound the world by their unity and their concern for one another.

To accept this [Jesus' self-humiliation in washing the disciples' feet] is to be converted. And nothing can be added to this. If you imagine that you can add something to what is given in the ...

Have you ever noticed how closely the words longing and belonging are connected? I’m not sure of their exact etymology, but I do believe that our deepest longing in life is to be-...

Our bond, which you resent, consists in mutual love, for we know not how to hate; we call ourselves ‘brethren’ to which you object, as members of one family in God, as partners in one faith, as joint ...

The Lord is our Shepherd. He is aware of our wanton hearts. He has rooted out our sin and reversed its dire consequences upon His cross. The tree of life has become the cross of Christ. Although we ha...

As we gather, we come together as people of the cross and resurrection. We come as children of the Father Reconciled by grace through the Son And filled with God’s love through the Spirit

Summary of the Text Our lectionary text can be fairly easily broken into two major sections, with verses 29-34 concerned with John the Baptist testifying to Jesus’ ministry and verses 35-42 dealing w...

Leader: Arise! Shine! Christ’s Church has assembled. People: We are one body, with Christ as our head. Leader: What kind of body is this? People: The Body of Christ, brought together not by huma...

Throughout the Old Testament this was always the idea of a sin-offering - that of a perfect victim; without offense on its own account, taking the place of the offender; the transference of the offend...

Pastor: Eternal Father, it is amazing love, that you sent your Son to suffer in my place, that you have given me your Holy Spirit to teach, comfort, and guide me. Because of Jesus’ death in my place, ...