“Adam and Eve ate the first recorded meal in rebellion, which is to say, they rebelled against God by eating what was forbidden. And because of their actions, their sin; rebellion and sin have pervaded every relationship, event, thought, and part of creation since. So when we go from looking at humanity’s first meal to what has been called Jesus’ last supper, we again see our rebellion full strength. Adam and Judas share this in common; they betrayed their relationship with God, believing in their hearts that their way, their interpretation, their will was better than Almighty God’s…”
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
“The goal of this whole passage is quite simple and clear, although it has unfortunately also been the source of a great deal of end times speculation that is quite unrelated to Paul’s own interests. Paul’s expressed goal is ‘that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope,’ or to state it positively, that our hope would be so grounded in the resurrection of Jesus, that our whole understanding of death, the future and the fate of all believers would be profoundly different from the world that does not have Christ.”
Mark 14:1-11
“Today we enter into the Passion of Jesus Christ. In our common English use, the word passion means intense desire, or an uncontrolled or barely controlled emotion, but in its original Latin, the root ‘passio’ means to suffer or to endure, therefore Christ’s Passion refers to his suffering rather than any impassioned desire…”
Mark 13:24-37
“Much has been said about the seeming contradiction put forward here: that only the father knows when he will send the son. Is Jesus not fully God? How then could he not know what he, in fact, does know? The false teaching of kenosis asserts that Jesus gave up his divine powers when he came to earth as helpless babe. That he emptied himself of his glory and omniscience and might. Taking Philippians 2:6-7 to a grotesque extreme. (Philippians 2:6-7 [Jesus] who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.)…The truth is, these verses show how Jesus was willing to be emptied of his very life, in total obedience to the Father through the power of the Holy Spirit. But they never deny his full humanity nor his full deity. Some translations say he laid aside his might and glory through the incarnation. But remember the might of his miracles and how he did reveal his glory in specific moments such as the transfiguration or when he raised Lazarus from the dead…”
1 Thessalonians 4:9-12
“It should be clear, both from the commands and example of Christ and his apostles, that living quietly and minding our own business does not mean that the church is to tone down its proclamation of the gospel. On the contrary, Paul consistently encouraged boldness in this regard. The church was not to live so quietly that they failed to function as witnesses of Christ both in word and deed. It is, rather, (as we often say here) that the only offense should be the gospel. Christians were not to become social revolutionaries. In fact, the apostles denied such charges several times when they were leveled against them. It was not Paul’s intent that the church disrupt society or overthrow governments. Rather, he encouraged Christians to be good citizens and exemplary members of their families and of their society but to do so in a manner consistent with the teachings of Christ. Only in this sense was the Gospel intended to change society. It set out to change the individuals who made up society while awaiting that climactic event when the power of God would truly change the world forever…”
Matthew 6:5-14
“What comes to mind when we think of the word hypocrisy? I go to the dentist once or twice a year, and there is one part of that visit that I really dislike.: that’s when my dentist starts asking me pointed questions about my flossing habits. I can see him typing on his keyboard, so he remembers what I said last time. I try to tell him that I’m doing my best, and he’s like ‘I don’t think you’re doing your best. I think you can do better’…and so we have this exchange every time. No imagine, after all these visits, if I found out that my dentist never flosses. I’d be like ‘You, hypocrite!’. Right? This is what we think about hypocrisy. Someone who is teaching but then isn’t doing it…Believe it or not that’s not what Jesus is talking about. He is using this word a little bit different this morning. When Jesus is talking about a hypocrite in Matthew 6, he’s talking about someone who is doing ‘the stuff’, he’s doing all the right things, but they’re doing those things for the wrong reasons. They have bad motives…”
1 Thessalonians 4:1-8
“I’ll try to summarize points at the end, but so that you don’t miss it, there is no appeal here to cultural norms, no argument on the basis of what is ‘healthy’ or ‘will make you happy,’ the call to sexual morality is on the basis of God’s own character and his will for us. For the believer, it doesn’t matter what our Lord commands of us, he is our Master and we his slaves. Whatever it costs, I must take up that cross daily if I am to follow Jesus…”
1 Thessalonians 3:11-13
“It is God’s work among us that creates sanctification, that makes us obey. But at the same time, moral effort is in no way antithetical to faith. It is, rather, the outworking and expression of true faith. In response to God’s gift and initiative, believers have a responsibility to let the power of Grace come to expression in our lives. Full dependence on God is wholly compatible with human exertions. The Christian is not passive, but fully cooperates with God for achieving his divine purpose…this is how God has willed that it will take place: your sanctification will take place as you strive.”
1 Thessalonians 2:17-3:10
“Today, there is a tendency to fall into one of two ditches when it comes to understanding the work of Satan: either we fail to recognize at all that we have an adversary who is constantly seeking to destroy us, or we give him far too much credit and assume he has far more power than is attributed to him in the Bible—as directly responsible for everything that goes wrong in our lives…The truth lies somewhere between these poles. Paul seldom attributes human fallenness to the work of Satan, while on the other hand, he is quite ready to see Satan at work in the kind of persecution that would thwart the furtherance of the gospel. The plain reality, which Paul knew well, was that the Thessalonian believers were being constantly harassed by their ‘fellow citizens’ (2:14). But from another perspective this harassment was being directed by Satan himself. Paul simply assumed that such ‘trials’ or affliction for the sake of Jesus and the gospel would be part of the common experience of Christians.”
1 Corinthians 15 (Resurrection Sunday 2025)
“This life is not all that there is. There is a life to come through Jesus, and in this is bound up all of the power, all of the endurance, and all of the joy and hope of the Christian life…If we have joined Christ in his death and shared in his suffering, then we know we will also join him in his resurrection to new life!”