…there’s a lot more going on behind this conversation than we’re likely to hear or read with modern ears. When the Pharisees stop to ask Jesus about divorce, they aren’t simply focused on the challenges that arise between two people. They’re questioning the foundational structures of society, openly wondering whether the desire or whim of an individual should take precedent over the needs of an entire village, town, or even a country.

Faithfulness isn’t found in a single action, moment of agreement, or emotional decision. The work of being a Christian spans all our days. It’s a continual choice: the choice to walk in the path and pattern of Jesus. It’s the training of oneself, moment by moment and opportunity by opportunity, to follow the Way of Love, to offer kindness, dignity, and respect to everyone we encounter.

Although it’s central to our understanding of God, the word “trinity” doesn’t actually appear anywhere in the Bible. And it’s a weird concept, to be honest. It took several hundred years—and few major heretical movements—for ancient Church leadership to really hammer out the details of what the term even meant.

The Ascension is one of those “huh” events in the Bible. Although the early Church clearly thought it was important enough to pass on to later generations, from a modern worldview, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Flying people are something from dreams and movies, not real life.

…“abide”….is a word of intention and commitment, associated more with military occupation or settling a frontier. It carries the idea of standing your ground or struggling to maintain a position, not simply dwelling somewhere in tranquility. In the context of looming betrayal and disruption of their group, it suggests something more like “stick with” than “abide in:” “You all stick with me, and I’ll stick with you.”

Even if we know it wasn’t good, the past at least looks stable from here, so it’s easy to desire a return to older times. But trying to recreate the past, itself broken in many ways, only leads to disappointment and failure.

If you were to ask most American Christians why Easter is important, you’ll probably hear an answer that mentions the resurrection but continues to place its primary emphasis on death, saying that Jesus was crucified for one of two reasons: (1) to pay the debt for our sins or (2) as the perfect sacrifice to appease God’s wrath—chances are you’ll hear a mixture of the two.

What is it with God and blood? What is it with Jesus and suffering? Blood speaks of violence. Blood speaks of pain. Blood speaks of death. Likewise, the cross speaks of the same violence, the same pain, and the same death. If God is supposed to be a God of life and love, what is this obsession with blood? How can the Apostle Paul claim that God is “pleased to reconcile” all things in heaven and on earth, “making peace through the blood of [Jesus’] cross”?

Sometimes I think that repentance as active change is hard not just because of the difficulties of unlearning old habits and implementing new ones but because on some level, we identify ourselves with the way we’ve been living. Our private and public failures come to define who we are, so in moving past them, we feel like we’re losing parts of ourselves. And some of that is true: we are choosing to leave portions of our past behind.

Unfortunately, a lot of Christians spend their entire lives in a similar state of fear—paranoia, really—one connected to two little words in today’s epistle reading: “the world.”

…what if this story isn’t necessarily about divine judgment? What if God didn’t send the flood? What if we read this as God simply giving humanity the very thing it proved itself to have most desired?

A lot of people, even within the Church, aren’t particularly fond of the Apostle Paul. Frankly, it isn’t all that hard to see why. He’s confusing. He can be harsh. And he often sounds pretty full of himself. When you add the enshrining of some Roman-era cultural norms into what eventually became a sacred text, he comes across as pretty legalistic, too.

So, well beyond the visuals we imagine and applications we often take from the phrase “fishers of men,” Jesus proves himself a masterful poet, uniting the ideas of overcoming chaos with the work of life and resurrection in a single word.

…I look around, and honestly, I don’t know how to fix any of this. I don’t know how to help people I’ve known most of my life, much less the rest of the country. I’m neither Jesus nor any other kind of miracle worker. I don’t have the skill to make the blind see. I can’t restore hearing to those who have gouged out their own ears.

Advent is like Lent in that it’s a time of preparation, hence the traditional purple color. But Advent is Lent’s reflection. Because of its subtle but significant differences, churches have decided it’s important to distinguish it with blue.

So between the slave marching up with a litany of accusations and then not even having made an effort with the ruler’s money, it’s pretty easy to understand why someone would get so angry in response.

If they’re angry at all.

“People. Only people.” is rewiring a lot about what I’ve understood Jesus to say, too. Statements I always viewed as a little bit hyperbolic or needlessly expository have taken on a completely new significance.

The things we long and live for—the things we even steal or kill for—hold no importance whatsoever. What we view as common is where God puts the most attention. What we ignore, misuse, or treat as expendable is what God views as precious. You don’t have to mine, mint, or print the currency of God’s kingdom.

…we’ll need to deal with at least two questions today. First, what is the greater context of this parable? And second, what was it about the last being first and the first being last that our scripture writers hoped would help people faithfully live out the Gospel?

In the traditional rendering of today’s Gospel, Jesus says, “you cannot serve God and Mammon.” Mammon was an ancient personification of the economy or wealth. But frankly, Mammon isn’t the only god Jesus would want to warn us about.