Preaching the Scriptures

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Luke 2:1-20   Small God   The mystery of Christmas is found in the packaging.   I don’t mean white paper boxes and whimsical gift wrap – although anyone who has ever tried to wrap a basketball or a bicycle knows that gift wrapping can be one of the world’s great mysteries.   I mean instead the mystery of how a very big God can be wrapped up in the soft skin of a tiny baby.   The God who inhabited the formless void of the universe, who danced in space before the planets were set in their courses, Stretched out in the close confines of a young womb.   The God whose voice said, “Let there be light,” Struggled to squawk out a primal, wordless cry.   The very hands that pulled humanity from the dust of the earth, Small enough to wrap a fist around Joseph’s rough finger.   The lips that kissed life into Adam, Suckled furiously at Mary’s tender breasts.   The feet that walked in the Garden of Eden in the days before history,

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Matthew 11:2-11   John the Unsure   John was born to be a prophet.   Heaven chose his vocation long before his birth, long before the angel Gabriel struck his old dad dumb.   That is what the miraculous conception meant: that he was no accident; he was destiny - a miracle born to do the miraculous.   The song that broke his father’s silence, the song that interrupted John’s bris, was all about how John was the promised prophet of the Most High.   John’s future was scripted before he could even smile, before he realized he had fingers.   His was a dramatic introduction to the world.   And folks in the village never forgot.   People glanced his way when the stories of Elijah were read in synagogue.   He wore the outsized expectations like a mantle.     And he grew into those expectations.   John looked the part.   He dressed the part.   He said prophetic things.   Folks say not to believe your own press, but John never really had a choice; ang

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Romans 15:4-13   A Welcome Church   The wolf shall live with the lamb; the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.   It is a pastel vision fit for a nursey wall.   It is also unrealistic in a way that hurts, that stirs up a kind of desperate unfulfilled longing most often reserved for prayers we dare not say out loud.   It is the kind of vision that makes one homesick for a place we’ve never known.   Isaiah always finds a way to set our best dreams to poetry.   His poetic visions are so fiercely beautiful that I named my son after him.   Because I want my son, my Isaiah, to dream these impossible dreams and hope for a future that is entirely unreasonable.   I want him to be the little child whose feet are firmly planted in the coming kingdom of God.   I love poetry – for all the ways in which is stirs the soul and ignites the imagination.   I love the way poetry

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Isaiah 2:1-5   Hope. In these times.   If I had to describe hope, I might say that it is like a ghost. Caught in glances but never really caught And that it appears much more fragile than everything around it And that when I most need to hold it tight against my soul Against my body My arms feel emptier than I wish they would.   It always feels like there is less of it than there should be. But especially this week. When a news report about our shooting Is interrupted by a news report about a city in Virginia A shooting in Virginia That, in time, will be interrupted by another shooting and another Wounds upon wounds More dead.   Too many. Tremors of grief and the terrible aftershocks that threaten to throw the world off its axis. This world haunted by violence. And despair. And death. But not hope.   What will come of this Advent? This new season? What will it bring?   What I fear it will bring i

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Luke 23:33-43   The Jesus with us   This morning, before getting into the shower, I checked my phone.   A number of my friends, my Colorado Springs friends, had marked themselves safe on facebook.   And that is how I found out about the shooting at Club Q last night.   Another mass shooting in a state with a devastating history.   Another mass shooting in our city.   Another terrible act of violence against the LGBTQ+ community.   It is this tragedy that greeted us on Christ the King Sunday.   And here this morning, the Gospel is Jesus on the cross.   And on a day like today it is easy to understand the emotions of the crowd.   They want Jesus to get down from that cross.   To do something.   To make the bad untrue.   To stop the violence.   And yet our king hangs, and dies, on a cross.     And everyone is confused and frustrated.   Because this isn’t how these stories are supposed to go.   This isn’t where is a king is supposed to be.  

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Luke 6:20-31   Remembering Peg   Every summer, just before my boys go back to school, our family navigates the mountain passes between here and Breckenridge for a week of rest before the Fall swings full.   It has become a treasured tradition.   We hike paths now familiar.   We eat at restaurants that have become vacation favorites.   The adults wait as patiently as possible while the indecisive young ones try to decide on their annual souvenir.   We play Uno – the Simpsons variety.   And when clear skies allow it, we ride the gondola, higher up and further into the mountains.   This year, as we were riding the gondola, my phone vibrated that pulse that tells me I have an incoming call.   I didn’t recognize the number.   In my life, and because of my work, I am typically very plugged in, perhaps too plugged in, and so during that week away I try to screen my calls and ignore my bursting email inbox.   And so I didn’t answer.   I let the call