Preaching the Scriptures

  The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Genesis 12:1-9   Go   The momentum had stalled.   The first eleven chapters of Genesis, and, by extension, of the Bible, begin with a tremendous explosion of life.   In the beginning, God created.   And in the context of that wildly productive expression, God made all of these diverse and vibrant perpetuating lifeforms.   God intended that the spark of life, spoken forth by a divine word, would grow and spread, be fruitful and multiply.   But instead, it stalled.   The author of Genesis, before telling the story of Abram and Sarai, leads us into a surprisingly barren land, a world in which death and desolation had taken hold, a world in which hope had hit the wall.     The teeming possibility of Eden’s Garden had withered.   No longer in those paradisal bounds, the story is set now in Haran.   And there was no hope in Haran.   In the final verses of the previous chapter, we...

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Psalm 121   Pilgrim Psalm   The journey was dangerous.   And the way was not safe.   So common and pervasive was the peril that it served as the backdrop for the well-known Parable of the Good Samaritan.   That story, told by Jesus in Luke’s Gospel, begins with an unnamed traveler being stripped and beaten by robbers.   The man is left for dead on the side of the road, the road that leads to Jerusalem.   Psalm 121 is one of the best known psalms in the entire poetic collection.   It has for centuries lived in the hearts and souls of the people of God.   It is a song that instills comfort and confidence.   For centuries it has been prayed in moments of anxiety and insecurity and has been a remarkably effective conveyor of peace and tranquility.   The psalm is one of fifteen psalms grouped and categorized as Songs of Ascent, part of a collection within the larger collection.   These ...

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson John 3:1-17 Nicodemus This meeting wasn’t exactly planned.   It was more the direct result of a head full of thoughts – the kind of thoughts that present unresolvable problems.   The kind of impossible dilemmas that seem only to emerge once the bustle of the day is put to bed.   And so, on that rather ordinary night, at the end of a rather ordinary day, Nicodemus tossed and turned in his bed, and so did his mind. It was Jesus: Jesus was the impossible quandary, the stone in Nicodemus’ brain sandal.   His was the voice this local leader could not turn off.   And so, though it was dark, though the night was suggesting sleep and quiet, Nicodemus needed some answers to quell this particular case of insomnia.   Given that Jesus was the problem, he reasoned, Jesus must also be the answer. Some scholars suggest that Nicodemus came to Jesus under the cover of night to avoid the watchful eyes of his peers.   And ...

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Matthew 2:1-12 The Journey I don’t really like the journey.   Don’t get me wrong: I like traveling, but I like traveling because I love the destination – arriving and exploring, seeing new places, immersing myself in the experience.   I love all of that stuff.   I just do not enjoy the getting there.   I don’t really enjoy driving.   I don’t really like air travel – especially having to arrive early and wait around at the airport.   My wife talked me into taking a train trip to New York once when we lived in Toledo; it was pretty, in parts, but a lot of the scenery was boring and overall that train was just too slow for my taste.   I don’t enjoy the journey – which I realize is one of the least Episcopalian things I could ever say.   We’re always talking about how it is all about the journey.   And, spiritually, I totally agree; practically, though, I’m all about checking off those boxes.   I make...

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson Matthew 2:1-12 I Wonder… It’s all very mysterious really, this story of these visitors from the east.   Mystery: mystery writes its story in the inspired imaginations of wondering readers who, across the centuries, have found their hearts captured by this tale.   We have inherited these inspired imaginations, these wonderings.   Because, you see, there is actually, if you read the story carefully, very little detail included in the Gospel telling according to Matthew – the only one of the four Gospels to include this story at all.   Over the years this story has grown and changed.   Over the years names have been bestowed upon these visitors; but the Gospel writer mentions nothing of names. Over the years the number of visitors has been fixed at three in the Western world – no doubt because three gifts are listed; but the Gospel writer gives us no count or census.   The gifts were expensive; perhaps there...