Dear Partner in Preaching, I’ve always found this passage both inspiring and vexing. I find it inspiring because of the decisiveness and immediacy of the response of the four disciples mentioned in today’s reading. But I also find it a tad vexing because it seems to set the bar so high. Leave everything…to follow an itinerant preacher into an unknown future…immediately. To be honest, I find it hard to imagine doing as these four did, and I wonder if our folks might feel the same. And that might not be a bad place to start: asking our folks if they can imagine picking up and leaving everything to follow Jesus. If you do that, make...

Dear Partner in Preaching, Come and see. Think, for a moment, about the effect of those words might have on you were you to hear them in an everyday context. Would they generate a certain sense of excitement about whatever it might be you were being invited to witness? Perhaps curiosity? Or maybe gratitude that someone thought to include you? Come and see. The words are both simple and warm, issuing an invitation not only to see something, but also to join a community. To come along and be part of something. Come and see. These words, this invitation, form the heart not simply of this opening scene but much of John’s Gospel. John’s story...

Dear Partner in Preaching, I want to start with a question: how often do you think about your baptism? Perhaps your family reminded you of its importance by celebrating the anniversary of your baptism each year and so baptism has always been important to you. Or maybe you learned to appreciate it later, at confirmation or sometime as an adult. Or maybe your appreciation of baptism was deepened during your study at seminary and now you think of it every time you wash. Or maybe you know the theological significance of baptism but, truth be told, don’t think of it all that often. (Don’t worry, I’m not judging, just asking.) Now I want you...

Dear Partner in Preaching, There are so many themes worth exploring in the Prologue to the Gospel of John that it can be difficult to decide just where to land for a sermon. Do we make the connection between the first verse of John and that of Genesis, calling attention to John’s audacious claim to be writing a new Genesis? Do we let our gaze settle instead on the fourteenth verse, John’s Christmas story and the heart of the doctrine of the Incarnation? Either of these elements of John’s magnificent “hymn to the Word” would make for a fine sermon on this second Sunday of Christmas. But I’m going to suggest two other verses, not...

Quick Note: This a letter relating to the First Sunday in Christmas, Dec. 28. I’ve posted on the Christmas Eve and Day readings here. Dear Partner in Preaching, Sometimes, all we can do is sing. This past fall we observed the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. And so there were the requisite reviews in the news media of the events leading up to, surrounding, and following that remarkable and largely unforeseen event. One of the items that was routinely left out of those reviews, however, was the weeks of peaceful protests by the citizens of Leipzig that led up to the fall. Gathering on Monday evenings by candlelight...

Dear Partner in Preaching, I am going to share brief reflections on both the Luke text we often hear on Christmas Eve and the John text that is usually appointed for Christmas Day. Actually, though, it’s not two reflections but rather one thing that struck me as present in both gospels. And, for what it’s worth, it’s the one thing I need to hear as we approach this Christmas, so I hope it is helpful to you as you lean toward preaching either the Christmas Eve or Day readings or, perchance, both. I’ll start with a confession: for some reason, the world seems a little darker this year. It might be the pall that seems to have hung over...