Many sternly ordered Bartimaeus, son of Timaeus, to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” Many tried to hush him up, but he yelled even louder. Throughout history, the lame and the blind who have been obliged to beg for their food have sought to benefit from the generosity of people. On the steps of medieval cathedrals, as at the gates of
Sermons
In his book Jesus Among Other Gods, Ravi Zacharias relays a story that Sir Isaac Newton, the great scientist and mathematician, had a dog that he loved very much. Wherever Newton went, the dog went with him. One time he had worked for months on a theory about the nature of the universe, working late into the night by candlelight. His worktable was covered with papers, which were in turn covered
Today’s Gospel reading is radical: a rich, young man asks Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” In response, Jesus tells him that he is lacking in one thing, and instructs him to go and sell what he has and give to the poor. I mean, this is a pretty radical thing to do. Just think about what you own. Maybe a house? A car? A bed? And that’s just the beginning! How about your
Every once in a while, I enjoy preaching a sermon that isn’t me talking through how I view the readings, but rather about asking questions that I found myself asking after the readings. These sermons are intentionally structured to ask a question and then to provide some time to give you an opportunity to ponder and answer for yourself. You aren’t required to answer these questions out loud
I wanted to start today with this story: Jesus and Satan were having an on-going argument about who was better on the computer. They had been going at it for days, and frankly God was tired of hearing all the bickering. Finally fed up, God said, “That’s it. I have had enough. I am going to set up a test that will run for two hours, and from those results, I will judge who does the better