John 1:29-42 

A Sermon for the Second Sunday of Epiphany

Have you heard of “The Nutshell Library”? It’s a collection of four miniature books, published in 1962, by Maurice Sendak. They are tiny pocket-sized books, perfect for small hands.

I was once given a pocket-sized New Testament, but the print was so small it was difficult to read, and I missed the Old Testament.

In the Bible there are, however, certain verses that are like the whole Bible in a nutshell. Our gospel text today has one such sentence, John 1:29: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

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Matthew 2:1-12

A sermon for Epiphany

We in the West celebrate Christmas from Christmas Day to Epiphany, January 6th, and then we say the Twelve Days of Christmas are over. But in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, they celebrate Christmas on January 6th, last Tuesday, what we call Epiphany.

In the Western Church this means that we forget about Epiphany, and that is really too bad because it is a major festival. The word itself means “shining forth,” and it is celebrated at this time because the days are growing longer. The light is coming back. We’re celebrating the fact that we are no longer in darkness. You know the great place in Isaiah 9:2 that we use at Christmas: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.” Over against the darkness, we celebrate the light.

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John 1:1-18

A Sermon for the Second Sunday after Christmas

In this remarkable prologue, the first 18 verses of the Gospel of John, one of the key points is something we call “grace.” What is grace? It can mean many things. “Grace” is a women’s name. When we watch Olympic ice-skaters, we are awed by their “grace.” When we say someone was “gracious” to us, we mean they were kind and thoughtful.

Perhaps the most well-known hymn is “Amazing Grace.” Despite the hymn’s popularity, it’s really quite vague about what grace is and is not.

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Matthew 11:2-11

A Sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent

Here in Matthew 11, we again have John the Baptist.

It’s really something that there comes a question, not only from the disciples of John the Baptist, but from the Baptist himself: “Who are you, Jesus? Are you another one of the prophets? Or are you the one promised who is to come?”

The answer comes by quoting this place in Isaiah 35, also Isaiah 61, where it says there are these signs. We talk about signs in the sun, moon, and stars. That’s found in Luke 21:25-27.

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A Sermon for the Second Sunday in Advent

The big event is getting nearer and so: Who was John the Baptist? In Mark 1:4 (also 6:14, 6:24) he is called “John the baptizer” (Mark 1:1-8, 6:14-29) because he baptized people in the River Jordan, called crowds to repent.

If you go to Israel today, you can buy a bottle of water from the River Jordan and bring it home and use that water to baptize a child or grandchildren.  In fact, you don’t even have to go to Israel. You can buy a bottle of water from the River Jordan online and have it shipped anywhere.

Who was John the Baptist? He was Jesus’ cousin (Luke 1:13-15). He was a Nazirite, that is, one separated from the rest and consecrated to the Lord (Numbers 6:1-21). The Nazirites took the following vows: 1) You are not to eat anything produced by the grapevine; 2) You are to let your hair grow long, and 3) You are not to touch a human corpse.

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