Preaching the Scriptures

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson John 6:1-21   More than Enough   There are no bad ideas: this is something people actually say – often desperate people who find themselves leading all-too-quiet brainstorming sessions.   And everybody knows, it’s not true.   St. Andrew knows.   He realizes it just as his bad idea escapes his mouth.   Once it’s out there, you can’t put it back.   And so he tries to cover.   “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish.”   You can practically hear Andrew’s thoughts fill the space between the sentences: “why did I say that?   That was so stupid…”   And so he smoothly adds, “But what are they among so many people?”   Well, the answer is, and Andrew knows it: not much.   Perhaps a decent meal for the boy who packed it.   But in a crowd of 5000 people – 5000 hungry people – it was so little, it was insignificant.   The truth was: they did not have enoug...

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Amos 7:7-15   Amos   Cows and trees: that is what Amos did.   Perhaps not terribly glamorous, but it was a living.   He, by his own admission, was a simple herdsman.   He patrolled the Judean fields, looked after his cattle.   He dressed his sycamore trees, ensured the fruit was healthy and the predatory wasps kept at bay.   And finally, he had a flock; a flock that he followed.   Amos doesn’t specify in today’s text what type of flock he followed but I suspect it was not a flock of birds; because bird are pretty fast and it would be extremely difficult to follow them.   So more likely we’re talking about some sheep or goats, in addition to his herd of cattle.   The man was a farmer, a rancher, an agriculturalist.   He was, no doubt, a busy man, an honest, hard-working man.   And, though this is a little surprising since this book is the called the book of the prophet Amos, what he ...

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Deuteronomy 10:17-21   True Story   I have a family story, as do you.   I suspect mine is neither better nor worse than your own.   Because my family story, like all family stories, is one of riches and poverty.   It is a story of both sorrow and beauty, of shame and pride, of love and pain.   I, at times, embrace this rugged history; and then, just as intensely, try to distance myself from the most dismal of its chapters.   But what I cannot deny is that the story is mine; it marks my soul in the best and worst ways.   It shapes me even as I hope to shape its destiny into something of which my children and my children’s children can be proud.   There is always a temptation to tell an edited version of our stories, to hide away the darkest and most devastating chapters.   But the power of a family story is found in our willingness to tell it as a true story – as painful and, at times, as embarra...