Advertise on podcast: Lectionary Lab Live

A note on the calendar coincidence: November 1 is All Saints’ Day, which falls on a Sunday this year. Congregations observing All Saints with its own propers will use those readings. This guide covers Proper 26, the ordinary Year A readings for the Sunday, which the lectionary continues to track regardless of festival overlays. If your congregation is observing All Saints and you need materials for that observance, those can be found in our tentative new service (launching officially for Advent — we hope) at this link: Pericope Pro. The Gospel opens Matthew 23 — Jesus’s long and difficult address about the scribes and Pharisees. Our passage is the setup, closing before the Seven Woes begin. Jesus grants the scribes and Pharisees their teaching authority but exposes the gap between what they teach and what they do. They love honor, titles, best seats, and the burdens they lay on others. Jesus closes with the characteristic reversal: the greatest will be the servant; those who exalt themselves will be humbled. Track One brings us Israel crossing the Jordan under Joshua’s leadership. Track Two brings us Micah’s furious judgment against false prophets, rulers who hate good, and priests who teach for a price — the direct prophetic line Jesus is standing in when he confronts the scribes and Pharisees. The Epistle gives us Paul’s continued recollection of his ministry among the Thessalonians, where the gospel was received not as a human word but as the word of God. For preachers continuing a series: last week Jesus bound the two great commandments as inseparable, and the Pharisees dared ask no more questions. This week Jesus turns from them to the crowds and his disciples, and tells them exactly what was wrong with the religious leadership they had been watching. The Matthew arc is now very close to the end of the public teaching. The next scenes will be the full Seven Woes, the Olivet Discourse, and the beginning of the passion narrative. The Readings Joshua 3:7–17 First Reading (Track One) — Crossing the Jordan Summary God tells Joshua: today I will begin to exalt you in the sight of all Israel, so that they may know that I will be with you as I was with Moses. The priests are instructed to carry the ark of the covenant into the Jordan. When the soles of their feet touch the waters, the waters will stop flowing. The priests obey. The waters pile up in a heap. Israel crosses on dry ground. The priests stand with the ark in the middle of the Jordan until the whole nation has passed over. The passage is a deliberate echo of the parting of the Red Sea — a new generation, a new crossing, a new entry into what God has promised. Key Ideas for Preaching * God’s word to Joshua is that his exaltation is for the sake of the people — “so that they may know that I will be with you.” The authority is not for Joshua’s benefit. It is for the people’s assurance that God is still with them. Where in your congregation might leadership have been imagined as a reward for the leader rather than as an assurance for the community? * The priests stand in the middle of the Jordan with the ark while the whole nation passes over. That is a specific pastoral image — the leaders hold the position of difficulty until everyone else has crossed safely. What might your sermon do with a picture of leadership that stays in the hard place until the people have been brought through? * The crossing is deliberately an echo of the Red Sea. The new generation receives its own version of the old deliverance. God’s past faithfulness becomes the ground of God’s present faithfulness. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that what God did before is what God does now, in a new form, for a new generation? Significant Cautions * The conquest narratives that follow this passage are deeply difficult — texts that describe the destruction of Canaanite peoples with divine sanction. Preachers who preach the Jordan crossing without any awareness of what comes next hand the congregation a sanitized version of the story. You do not have to resolve the conquest problem in this sermon, but at least do not pretend it is not there. * “I will exalt you in the sight of all Israel” has sometimes been used by religious leaders to claim personal honor. The passage is explicit that the exaltation is for the people’s confidence, not the leader’s. Do not let it drift the other way. Psalm 107:1–7, 33–37 The Psalm (Track One) — Give Thanks to the Lord Summary “Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.” The psalm celebrates God’s rescuing of the redeemed from various troubles. The selected verses focus on wanderers in desert wastes who found no city, who were hungry and thirsty and whose soul fainted, and whom God led by a straight way to a city to live in. The second selection speaks of God’s power to turn rivers into desert and desert into pools of water — and to turn the hungry into a settled community. Key Ideas for Preaching * “His steadfast love endures forever” is the psalm’s refrain. Every rescue the psalm describes comes back to this one constant. What might your sermon do with the specific practice of returning again and again to the fixed point of God’s steadfast love when the particulars of our lives keep shifting? * The psalm pays close attention to specific kinds of trouble — wandering, hunger, thirst, fainting, exile. God’s rescue is not generic. It meets the specific need. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that God’s help is not vague but specific to the trouble they are actually in? Significant Cautions * The psalm’s pattern of distress leading to rescue has sometimes been preached in a way that implies every faithful cry will be answered as the psalm describes. Many people cry and are not rescued in this life. Keep the psalm’s hope without making it a formula. Micah 3:5–12 First Reading (Track Two) — Zion Shall Be Plowed as a Field Summary Micah’s judgment against the leaders of Israel. The prophets cry “Peace” when they have something to eat, and declare “war” against those who put nothing in their mouths. The sun will go down upon the prophets. The rulers of the house of Jacob abhor justice and pervert all equity. They build Zion with blood. The heads of Jerusalem give judgment for a bribe, the priests teach for a price, the prophets divine for money. And yet they all lean on the Lord, saying “Is not the Lord in the midst of us? No disaster shall come upon us.” Therefore, Micah thunders, because of you, Zion shall be plowed as a field; Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins; and the mountain of the house a wooded height. Key Ideas for Preaching * Micah is a prophet standing within Israel, speaking Israel’s hard truth to Israel’s own leadership. Jesus in today’s Gospel is doing exactly the same thing. The two prophetic voices stand in one line. Where might your sermon help a congregation see that prophetic critique has always come from within the tradition, not from outside it? * The specific indictment is that the prophets, rulers, and priests are all for sale — they cry peace to those who pay them, judge for bribes, teach for a price, divine for money. The corruption Micah names is specifically the monetization of religious authority. Where in your congregation might this ancient indictment land uncomfortably in a contemporary religious landscape that also knows what happens when ministry is tied to money? * The leaders who are being judged are described as leaning on the Lord and saying “No disaster shall come upon us.” Their very confidence in God’s presence has become part of their corruption — a shield against hearing the prophetic word. What might your sermon do with a picture of religious confidence that has quietly become religious complacency? Significant Cautions * Micah’s judgment is harsh — Zion plowed as a field, Jerusalem a heap of ruins. These images have historically been used by Christian preachers to describe actual later destructions of Jerusalem as divine punishment of Jewish people. That reading is a distortion. Micah is calling his own people to return, not predicting their rejection. * “Prophets cry peace when they have something to eat” has been used in modern discourse to dismiss any preacher who disagrees with the critic. The specific target is leaders whose message bends to who is paying them, not leaders whose message happens not to please the preacher of the day. Psalm 43 The Psalm (Track Two) — Send Out Your Light and Your Truth Summary A short psalm of lament and hope. “Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against an ungodly people.” The psalmist asks why God has cast him off, why he must walk about mournfully because of the oppression of the enemy. He pleads: “O send out your light and your truth; let them lead me; let them bring me to your holy hill.” The psalm closes with the refrain also found in Psalm 42: “Why are you cast down, O my soul… Hope in God; for I shall again praise him.” Key Ideas for Preaching * “Send out your light and your truth; let them lead me.” The psalmist asks not for rescue first but for guidance — for God’s light and truth to be the two things that lead him forward. What might it look like to preach a prayer that asks for the right companions on the road rather than for the removal of the road? * “Why are you cast down, O my soul?” The psalmist addresses his own soul directly, as if his soul were a conversation partner. That practice of talking to one’s own soul has a long devotional history. Where in your congregation might people be helped by learning this specific spiritual practice — of addressing their own interior condition in prayer rather than being passively ruled by it? Significant Cautions * “Defend my cause against an ungodly people” has b

Jed Clampett, head of the fictional clan, The Beverly Hillbillies (sorry if you’re too young for the reference — or too old?) was quoted as saying, “Welll, doggies!” when faced with an unusually challenging or inspiring event. You’ll have to decide which of those the texts for this week are! The Gospel contains what may be the most famous passage in all the Gospels — the great commandment. A lawyer asks Jesus which commandment is the greatest, and Jesus answers by linking two scattered commandments from the Hebrew Bible into one inseparable teaching: love God with everything, love neighbor as yourself. All the law and the prophets hang on these. The passage includes a second scene often skipped by preachers — Jesus’s own counter-question about the Messiah being David’s son. The combined effect: by the end of the passage, no one dares ask Jesus any more questions. The temple controversies are over. Matthew’s next move will be the woes and the apocalyptic discourse. Track One brings us Moses on Mount Nebo, seeing the promised land but not entering it. Track Two brings us the direct source of Jesus’s second commandment: Leviticus 19 and its call to love the neighbor. The Epistle gives us Paul’s tender description of his ministry among the Thessalonians — “like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children.” For preachers continuing a series: last week Jesus turned the Caesar question into a deeper question about whose image we bear. This week he turns the “which commandment” question into a synthesis that will shape the ethics of two thousand years of Christian life. The Matthew arc is now closing out the public ministry. Next week brings All Saints. The Readings Deuteronomy 34:1–12 First Reading (Track One) — The Death of Moses Summary Moses climbs Mount Nebo. God shows him the whole promised land — from Gilead to Dan to the sea, from the Plain to Zoar. “This is the land I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over.” Moses dies there in Moab. God buries him in a valley; no one knows his grave to this day. Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died, but his sight was unimpaired and his vigor had not abated. Israel wept for Moses in Moab thirty days. The passage closes with one of the great tributes in Scripture: “Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face.” Key Ideas for Preaching * Moses sees the land but does not enter it. That is a devastating pastoral image. Where in your congregation might people be living with their own version of this — having worked and prayed and waited for something they will not get to enter themselves? What might your sermon do to honor that experience without pretending it is not loss? * The passage says God buried Moses. Not Joshua. Not the people. God. The great prophet is laid to rest by the hand of the one he served. What might your sermon do with a picture of death held in the specific tenderness of God’s own hand? * “The LORD knew him face to face.” That is the final word on Moses. Not his miracles. Not his leadership. Not his legacy. Knowledge. Mutual recognition. Where might your sermon help a congregation see that the deepest measure of a life is not what we accomplished but who knew us? Significant Cautions * “He did not enter the land” has sometimes been preached as Moses’s punishment for his earlier impatience. The passage does not say this. Preach what the text says, not what the broader narrative implies. * “Never since has there arisen a prophet like Moses” is a text often cited to say every subsequent leader was lesser. The passage is honoring one specific prophet; it is not demeaning the others who would follow. Psalm 90:1–6, 13–17 The Psalm (Track One) — Teach Us to Count Our Days Summary Attributed to Moses. “Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.” Our days are swept away like a dream, like grass that flourishes in the morning and withers by evening. “So teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart.” The psalm closes with a prayer for God to satisfy us in the morning with steadfast love, and to prosper the work of our hands. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart.” Not count hours. Not count accomplishments. Count days. That specific accounting leads not to anxiety but to wisdom. Where in your congregation might people be measuring the wrong things, and how might this psalm invite them into a different reckoning? * “Prosper the work of our hands” is the prayer that closes the psalm. The psalmist asks God not to prosper our status, our success, or our reputation, but the work of our hands. What might it look like to preach this specific prayer in a culture that is often more interested in reputation than in hands? Significant Cautions * “Our days are seventy, or by strength eighty” has been used to produce anxiety about aging. Keep the psalm’s larger frame: God has been our dwelling place. Leviticus 19:1–2, 15–18 First Reading (Track Two) — Love Your Neighbor as Yourself Summary From the holiness code. “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.” The selected verses then move to very practical commands. Do not render judgment with partiality. Do not slander your neighbor. Do not profit by your neighbor’s blood. Do not hate your kin in your heart. Reprove your neighbor rather than letting resentment fester. Do not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your own people. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.” This is the direct source Jesus quotes in today’s Gospel. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Love your neighbor as yourself” is not an isolated gentle maxim. It sits in the middle of a list of very concrete commandments about not slandering, not holding grudges, not showing partiality in court. Love of neighbor, in Leviticus, is a specific set of practices, not an abstract feeling. What might your sermon do to recover the concreteness of this famous verse? * “Reprove your neighbor” is in this same passage, right next to “love your neighbor.” Reproof — honest, caring correction — is itself an act of love in this text. Where in your congregation might love and honest truth-telling have been imagined as opposites, when Leviticus imagines them as the same thing? * “I am the LORD” closes the passage. The reason you love your neighbor is not sentimentality or civic virtue. It is because God is God, and God is holy, and you belong to this God. What might it look like to preach a love of neighbor grounded not in moral feeling but in divine command? Significant Cautions * “Love your neighbor as yourself” has sometimes been preached in ways that presuppose we already love ourselves. For many people, that assumption does not hold. Handle with pastoral care. * The holiness code includes many commandments that preachers across the centuries have selectively applied. Be honest about this. Do not pull out the loving-your-neighbor verse while hiding the rest of the chapter. Psalm 1 The Psalm (Track Two) — Trees Planted by Water Summary The classic two-ways psalm. The happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked but delight in the law of the LORD. They are like trees planted by streams of water, yielding fruit in season. The wicked are like chaff that the wind drives away. “The LORD watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The righteous are “like trees planted by streams of water.” Not like oak trees that grew up through sheer determination. Planted. Someone put them where the water is. What might your sermon do with a picture of the faithful life that includes being planted — having been placed by God in the place where you can bear fruit? * “Yielding its fruit in its season” names something many of us resist: fruit comes in seasons. There are years without visible fruit. The psalm does not panic about those years. What might it look like to preach a faith that trusts the seasonal rhythm of fruitfulness rather than demanding fruit every month? Significant Cautions * “The way of the wicked will perish” has been used to generate confidence about who is in and who is out. The psalm is not giving us a diagnostic tool for sorting others. 1 Thessalonians 2:1–8 The Epistle — Like a Nurse Tenderly Caring Summary Paul recalls his ministry among the Thessalonians. He had been through suffering and mistreatment in Philippi before coming to them. His coming was not in vain. He speaks “not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts.” He was not a flatterer. He was not greedy. He did not seek human praise. He did not demand importance as an apostle. Instead, “we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children.” He was willing to share not only the gospel but his own self with them, because they had become very dear to him. Key Ideas for Preaching * The image is startling: an apostle “like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children.” Paul uses maternal imagery to describe his ministry. What might your sermon do with a picture of pastoral leadership that is less about authority and more about tender care? * “We were willing to share not only the gospel but our own selves.” The gospel and the self are both offered. Not just the content; the person. Where in your congregation might ministry have been reduced to delivering content, when Paul’s picture includes offering the one who does the delivering? * Paul lists three specific things he refused to do: flatter, seek praise, demand importance. Those three refusals describe a pastoral posture. What might it look like to name them explicitly as practices for anyone in your congregation who leads anything? Significant Cautions * The m

Some days, it’s better late than never! Just a reminder that your humble Bubbas are also working pastors and that — as you know so well — a few extra hospital visits and a funeral or two can really work on your schedule as planned. Let’s press on! The Gospel is one of the most quoted and most misused passages in all of Scripture. The Pharisees try to trap Jesus with a question about taxes to Caesar, and Jesus responds with a line — “give to the emperor what is the emperor’s, and to God what is God’s” — that has been pressed into service for just about every imaginable political arrangement in Christian history. Preachers who want to actually honor what Jesus said will need to resist the easy readings. Photo by Peter Barrett Bryan on Unsplash Track One brings us Moses in dialogue with God after the golden calf — the audacious request to see God’s glory, and the tender compromise of God’s hand in the cleft of the rock. Track Two brings us one of the most startling passages in Isaiah: God addresses Cyrus the Persian emperor — a foreign, non-believing ruler — as “my anointed.” The Epistle gives us Paul’s warm opening to the Thessalonians, naming their faith, love, and hope — and their turning from idols. For preachers continuing a series: last week the wedding banquet raised questions about accepting the garment with the invitation. This week the famous Caesar passage raises questions about the deeper allegiance that governs every other allegiance. The Matthew arc keeps pressing toward Jerusalem and Holy Week. The Readings Exodus 33:12–23 First Reading (Track One) — Show Me Your Glory Summary After the golden calf, Moses is in dialogue with God. He asks for assurance of God’s presence: “If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here.” God answers: “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” Then Moses makes an audacious request: “Show me your glory.” God answers that God’s goodness will pass before him, but God’s face cannot be seen — “no one shall see me and live.” God places Moses in the cleft of a rock and covers him with God’s hand as God passes by. Moses sees God’s back. The face remains hidden. Key Ideas for Preaching * Moses’s request — “show me your glory” — is one of the boldest prayers in the Bible. He is not asking for anything God has promised. He is asking for more. And God does not scold him. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that it is faithful to ask God for more than has been given, as long as we trust what God chooses to give? * God’s response is intimate: “I will make all my goodness pass before you.” God will not show glory in abstract power, but in goodness. What might your sermon do with a picture of God’s glory that looks, in the end, more like goodness than like force? * The image of God’s hand covering Moses in the cleft is remarkable. God protects Moses from what Moses asked to see. God’s care includes limiting what we can bear. Where in your congregation might people be exhausted from wanting to see more than they can hold, and how might God’s covering hand be the gift they need? Significant Cautions * “No one shall see me and live” has been used to make God sound distant and unknowable. The passage actually describes a God remarkably close to Moses — just more mystery than any one person can hold. * The “back of God” imagery has been overread theologically. Keep its narrative strangeness; do not systematize it. Psalm 99 The Psalm (Track One) — The Lord Is King Summary A psalm celebrating God as king. “The Lord is king; let the peoples tremble!” The psalm names Moses, Aaron, and Samuel as those who called on God’s name and received answer. God forgave them while also punishing their wrongdoings. The call to “extol the Lord our God” closes the psalm. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm names Moses, Aaron, and Samuel — imperfect leaders, all three. God “answered them” and “forgave them” and also held them accountable. What might your sermon do with a picture of God’s relationship with leaders that includes real forgiveness and real accountability in the same sentence? * “The Lord is king” is a political claim as much as a religious one. In context, saying God is king meant other claimants to kingship were secondary. Where might this psalm press against our tendency to treat religious claims as merely private? Significant Cautions * Do not use this psalm to prop up Christian nationalism. “The Lord is king” is precisely the claim that relativizes every other kingdom, not the one that sanctifies one of them. Isaiah 45:1–7 First Reading (Track Two) — Cyrus, My Anointed Summary A startling passage. God addresses Cyrus — the Persian emperor who will shortly conquer Babylon and allow the exiled Jews to return home — as “my anointed.” That is a Hebrew word usually translated “messiah.” God is applying it to a foreign, non-believing emperor. God calls Cyrus by name even though “you do not know me.” God is using Cyrus to accomplish God’s purposes — so that all peoples may know that there is no god but the Lord. The passage ends with one of the most theologically challenging verses in the Hebrew Bible: “I form light and create darkness, I make weal and create woe; I the Lord do all these things.” Key Ideas for Preaching * “My anointed” applied to Cyrus is stunning. The prophet is naming a non-Jewish, non-believing emperor as God’s chosen instrument. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that God works through people who do not know God, and that God’s purposes are not limited to the people who identify as God’s? * “I call you by name, though you do not know me.” That line has pastoral depth. There are people in your pews whom God knows by name even if they are not sure they know God. Where might this verse speak to the quietly uncertain in your congregation? * “I form light and create darkness.” That is the hardest verse in the passage, and preachers often skip it. The prophet is not making a philosophical argument about theodicy; he is insisting on God’s sovereignty over everything that happens, in a way our neat theology struggles to hold. What might it look like to preach a verse like this without domesticating it? Significant Cautions * Do not use the “God used Cyrus” image to bless any contemporary political figure as “God’s anointed.” Cyrus is named prophetically for a specific liberation of a specific people from exile. The imitators who have claimed this title for themselves have always been false. * The “I create woe” verse should not be preached as if God is the author of evil. The verse is naming God’s sovereignty over outcomes, not God’s moral endorsement of them. Psalm 96:1–9, (10–13) The Psalm (Track Two) — Sing to the Lord a New Song Summary A psalm of praise. “O sing to the Lord a new song.” The psalm declares God’s glory among the nations, calling all peoples to ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. The optional verses declare God’s coming to judge the earth with righteousness and the peoples with truth. The whole earth is called to tremble before God. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Sing to the Lord a new song” assumes we have been singing old songs long enough. The new song is specific — it praises God’s reign and names God’s works among the nations. Where in your congregation might the songs be growing stale, and how might this psalm invite freshness without discarding what has been held? * The psalm invites “all the earth” and “all the peoples” to join. Praise, in this psalm, is not provincial. It is as wide as the globe. What might it mean to preach a worship that sees itself as part of a global and even cosmic song? Significant Cautions * “Judge the earth with righteousness” has been used to generate fear rather than hope. In context, God’s judgment is the correction of injustice — good news to those who have been suffering under it. 1 Thessalonians 1:1–10 The Epistle — Faith, Love, and Hope Summary The opening of Paul’s letter — one of his earliest, possibly the earliest book of the New Testament. Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy write to a young church. “We give thanks to God always for all of you… remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.” Paul remembers how they received the word in persecution, with joy. They became an example to believers across Macedonia and Achaia. “The word of the Lord has sounded forth from you… in every place your faith in God has become known.” They turned from idols to serve a living and true God, waiting for his Son from heaven. Key Ideas for Preaching * Paul’s famous triad — faith, love, hope — is here in one of its earliest forms, bundled with real verbs. “Work of faith. Labor of love. Steadfastness of hope.” These are not abstract virtues; they are things being done. What might your sermon do with a Christian spirituality that lives primarily in verbs rather than nouns? * The Thessalonians’ faith is becoming known elsewhere. Paul does not have to tell people about them; others are already talking. There is a specific kind of witness that happens when a congregation’s life becomes something strangers can see. Where in your congregation might faithfulness be more visible than you realize? * “You turned to God from idols, to serve a living and true God.” That line pairs beautifully with today’s Gospel. The Thessalonians had been worshipers of Caesar’s gods; they had turned. The parable about Caesar’s coin is about the same turning. What might your sermon do to make this connection concrete for a congregation that has its own idols to turn from? Significant Cautions * “Waiting for his Son from heaven” has been

And the hits just keep on coming! The Gospel for this week is another difficult parable in Matthew’s temple sequence. The parable of the wedding banquet includes a king who destroys those who refuse the invitation, an indiscriminate welcome of “both good and bad,” and a jarring ending about a guest thrown out for not wearing a wedding robe. Preachers who approach it honestly will have to handle its difficulties rather than smoothing them over. Track One brings us the golden calf — one of the most emotionally honest passages in the Pentateuch. The people grow impatient, Aaron caves, and Moses becomes the great intercessor. Track Two brings us Isaiah’s eschatological feast on the mountain — God’s victory over death and the wiping away of all tears. The Epistle gives us Paul’s famous call to rejoice and the peace that surpasses understanding. A small liturgical pleasure worth naming: Psalm 23 on Proper 23. The number is coincidence, but the pairing of the psalm’s table-in-the-presence-of-enemies with the Gospel’s wedding banquet is worth preaching toward. For preachers continuing a series: last week the wicked tenants exposed those who forgot they were tenants. This week the wedding banquet raises questions about who accepts the invitation and how they respond when they do. The Matthew arc keeps challenging the shape of our response. The Readings Exodus 32:1–14 First Reading (Track One) — The Golden Calf and Moses’s Intercession Summary Moses has been on the mountain forty days. The people grow impatient and come to Aaron: “Make us gods who will go before us.” Aaron takes their gold earrings and casts an image — a golden calf. He builds an altar and declares, “Tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord!” The people offer sacrifices and feast. God tells Moses, “Go down at once! Your people have acted perversely.” God threatens to consume them and start again with Moses. But Moses intercedes — not for himself but for the people. He appeals to God’s reputation, to God’s covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The text records a striking turn: “And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The people’s impatience is the trigger. Moses had been gone forty days, and they could not stand the waiting. The golden calf is what we make when we cannot bear to wait for the real God any longer. Where in your congregation might people be making golden calves of various kinds because waiting has become unbearable? * Aaron’s role is uncomfortable. He does not refuse. He does not even hesitate publicly. He collects the gold. He shapes the image. He builds the altar. He declares a festival. And he is not punished for it in this passage. What might your sermon do with a picture of institutional leadership that caved to pressure — not with villainy, but with convenience? * Moses becomes an intercessor. God has just said “your people” to disown them; Moses throws the phrase back and says “your people, whom you brought out of Egypt.” He stands in the gap. He argues with God. He appeals to God’s own promises. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that genuine intercession is not polite agreement with God but an argument on behalf of someone God is angry with? * “The Lord changed his mind.” That is a striking theological statement. Not that God is capricious, but that God is in genuine relationship. The intercession matters. What might it look like to preach a God who actually responds to the prayer of a persistent intercessor? Significant Cautions * “God changed his mind” has been used in theological controversies about divine immutability. Do not fight those debates from the pulpit. Preach the narrative; let the theology take care of itself. * Aaron’s lack of punishment here can be preached in a way that excuses institutional complicity. Do not. His failure is real; the passage simply does not resolve it here. * The golden calf has been reduced to a metaphor for “idolatry” generally. Keep the specific context — impatience with waiting — rather than letting it dissolve into generic preaching about idols. Psalm 106:1–6, 19–23 The Psalm (Track One) — Standing in the Breach Summary A recital of Israel’s history of sin and God’s mercy. The selected verses praise God’s goodness, confess that “we have sinned like our ancestors,” reference the golden calf incident at Horeb — “they exchanged the glory of God for the image of an ox that eats grass” — and name Moses’s role as intercessor, “standing in the breach before him, to turn his wrath away from destroying them.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm’s refrain of identification — “we have sinned like our ancestors” — refuses the easy move of distancing ourselves from those who failed before us. Where in your congregation has distance from historical sin been imagined as moral progress, when the psalm imagines solidarity? * “Standing in the breach” names Moses’s intercession with a specific architectural image — a human body in the gap where the wall has fallen. What might your sermon do with a picture of intercession as literal body-in-the-gap work rather than polite prayer at a distance? Significant Cautions * “Like our ancestors” has been used to minimize distinct historical responsibilities. The psalm names solidarity, not equivalence. Isaiah 25:1–9 First Reading (Track Two) — The Feast on the Mountain Summary A hymn celebrating God’s eschatological victory. The strong city of enemies lies in ruins. On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. God will destroy the shroud cast over all peoples, the sheet spread over all nations. God will swallow up death forever. The Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces. “This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The feast is for all peoples. Not for the deserving. Not for the religious. All peoples. On God’s mountain. What might it look like to preach an eschatology that is as wide as Isaiah’s vision — a feast where every nation sits down together? * “He will swallow up death forever.” That is one of the most audacious lines in Scripture. The prophet names what God will do to death itself. Where in your congregation are people who need to hear that death — not merely their sins, but death — is what God promises to end? * “This is the Lord for whom we have waited.” The passage names waiting as the posture of faith — not passive waiting, but expectant waiting for a specific feast. What might your sermon do to help a congregation feel the specific thing they are waiting for? Significant Cautions * “Swallow up death” has been used to minimize the grief of those currently mourning. The promise is future and does not erase present pain. * “All peoples” has been used to flatten particularity. The feast is for all peoples as peoples — not for one global, generic humanity. Psalm 23 The Psalm (Track Two) — You Prepare a Table Summary The most beloved psalm. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” Green pastures, still waters, right paths. Through the valley of the shadow of death, “I will fear no evil, for you are with me.” The table prepared in the presence of enemies. The cup overflowing. “Goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Key Ideas for Preaching * “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.” The psalm’s table is not safe. The enemies are still there. God’s provision happens in the middle of what is still difficult. Where in your congregation have people been assuming God’s blessing requires the end of their troubles, when the psalm imagines blessing in the middle of them? * “You are with me.” That is the center of the psalm. The shepherd’s presence, not the shepherd’s protection from all difficulty, is what the psalmist celebrates. What might your sermon do with the distinction between a God who removes difficulty and a God who is with us in it? Significant Cautions * Psalm 23 has been used so often at funerals that its weight at other times can be lost. Preaching it on Proper 23 (notice the number) is a chance to let it carry fresh freight. Philippians 4:1–9 The Epistle — Rejoice; the Peace of God Summary Paul begins by naming two women in the Philippian church — Euodia and Syntyche — who have been disagreeing. He asks them to be of the same mind in the Lord, and he asks the community to help them. Then he moves into some of the most quoted lines in his letters. “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything; by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, think about whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent, worthy of praise. Key Ideas for Preaching * The passage opens with specific names — Euodia and Syntyche — who are not getting along. Paul does not pretend community life is seamless. He names the conflict and asks the congregation to help. Interestingly, given the conclusion he offers in vv. 8-9, then two names mean “sweet or pleasing aroma” and “fortunate”. Hmmm…. What might your sermon do with a picture of Christian community that includes real conflict, named by name, held by the whole community? * “The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding.” That is not peace we achieve. It is peace that comes to us, that guards hearts and minds, that defies explanation. Where in

Hold on to your pulpits this week, preachers! The Gospel is one of the hardest parables in Matthew — and one with the most difficult history in Christian preaching. The parable of the wicked tenants has been used, throughout Christian history, to justify the church’s replacement of Israel and to fuel centuries of anti-Jewish violence, from medieval pogroms through Nazi propaganda. Preachers must handle it with unusual care. Track One brings us the Ten Commandments at Sinai. Track Two brings us Isaiah’s song of the vineyard — the direct source material for the Gospel parable. The Epistle gives us Paul’s autobiographical turn: whatever gains I had, I count as loss for Christ. For preachers continuing a series: last week’s parable of the two sons exposed the yes that did not go. This week’s parable of the wicked tenants exposes what happens when tenants forget they are tenants. The Matthew arc keeps sharpening toward the passion. The Readings Exodus 20:1–4, 7–9, 12–20 First Reading (Track One) — The Ten Commandments Summary God speaks to Moses at Sinai. “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” Then the commandments: no other gods. No idols. No misusing God’s name. Remember the sabbath and rest. Honor your father and mother. Do not murder. Do not commit adultery. Do not steal. Do not bear false witness. Do not covet what belongs to your neighbor. When the people see the thunder, the lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they tremble and stand at a distance. They tell Moses: “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.” Moses reassures them: God has come to test you, so that the fear of God may be with you and keep you from sinning. Key Ideas for Preaching * The commandments begin with a verb about God, not a demand of the people. “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out.” Deliverance comes first; then the shape of life among the delivered. What might your sermon do with the specific order — grace before command — that most preachers know but many congregations have never actually heard? * The commandments protect people. Do not murder protects human life. Do not steal protects property. Do not bear false witness protects reputation and truth. Do not covet protects the heart from unrest. These are not arbitrary rules; they are the shape of a community where life can flourish. Where in your congregation have the commandments been imagined as arbitrary restrictions when they are actually protections? * “You speak to us, but do not let God speak to us” — the people’s request captures a real spiritual pattern. We often prefer mediated religion to direct encounter. What might it look like to preach a God who is willing to be heard directly, and to name the tender fear that keeps us at a distance? Significant Cautions * Do not preach the commandments as if the whole ethical life of the church can be reduced to ten rules. Jesus himself will summarize them in two. * The lectionary omits verses 5–6 (the “jealous God” verses). Preachers should know what has been omitted and decide honestly whether to preach the whole passage or just the assigned selection. * The commandments have often been misused as a checklist for civic religion. Handle their communal, covenantal context carefully. Psalm 19 The Psalm (Track One) — The Heavens Are Telling Summary “The heavens are telling the glory of God.” The psalm begins with creation’s silent praise — day pours out speech to day — and moves to the law: perfect, reviving the soul; sure, making wise the simple. The psalm closes with a prayer against hidden faults and presumption, and the famous closing petition: let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm links creation and law in the same song. The heavens declare God’s glory; God’s word revives the soul. Both are revelation. Where has your congregation imagined creation and Scripture as competing sources of knowing God, when the psalm holds them together? * “Clear me from hidden faults” — the psalmist prays not for the sins he can see but for the ones he cannot. What might your sermon do with a spiritual practice that includes asking God to name what we are not yet aware of? Significant Cautions * “The heavens declare the glory of God” has been misused in the culture wars around science. The psalm is not a scientific claim; it is doxology. Isaiah 5:1–7 First Reading (Track Two) — The Song of the Vineyard Summary The prophet sings a love song about his beloved’s vineyard. God did everything for the vineyard — dug it, cleared it of stones, planted choice vines, built a watchtower, hewed a wine vat. And expected grapes. But the vineyard yielded wild grapes. So God will remove its hedge, break down its wall, make it a waste. The song ends with the interpretation: “The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the people of Judah are his pleasant planting; he expected justice, but saw bloodshed; righteousness, but heard a cry!” Key Ideas for Preaching * The prophet’s judgment on Israel is Israel’s own prophet speaking within Israel’s tradition. This is not an outside voice condemning God’s people. This is Isaiah’s love for his people speaking hard truth. What might it look like to preach a prophetic word that comes from love rather than distance? * The wordplay in Hebrew is untranslatable but worth naming. God expected mishpat (justice) but saw mispach (bloodshed); God expected tsedaqah (righteousness) but heard tse’aqah (a cry). Justice and bloodshed sound alike. Righteousness and outcry sound alike. Only one letter apart. What might your sermon do with the closeness of what God wanted and what God got? * Isaiah 5 is the direct source for today’s Gospel parable of the tenants. Jesus is not inventing a new critique; he is quoting Israel’s own prophet. Where in your congregation might people be helped by hearing that Jesus’s hardest words about religious leadership are drawn from Israel’s own tradition of self-critique? Significant Cautions * This passage should not be read as evidence that God has rejected Israel. Isaiah’s critique is a call to return, not a decree of replacement. * “He expected justice but saw bloodshed” has been quoted in ways that reduce injustice to individual sin. Isaiah is naming systemic failure of leadership, not simply personal wrongdoing. Psalm 80:7–15 The Psalm (Track Two) — The Vine You Brought Out of Egypt Summary Another vineyard psalm. God brought a vine out of Egypt, drove out the nations, and planted it. It sent out its branches to the sea, its shoots to the river. But now its walls are broken down and passersby pluck its fruit. “Turn again, O God of hosts; look down from heaven, and see; have regard for this vine, the stock that your right hand planted.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm imagines God as the planter and Israel as the tended vine. It is a picture of intimate care — God’s own right hand doing the planting. What might your sermon do with a picture of God’s investment in the people that is this personal? * “Turn again, O God” is a psalm of return — not the people’s return to God, but a prayer that God will turn back toward them. What might it look like to preach a faith that includes asking God to notice again, when God’s face seems turned away? Significant Cautions * This psalm’s laments have sometimes been used to shame communities into thinking their difficulties are always God’s judgment. Not all suffering is discipline. Philippians 3:4b–14 The Epistle — I Count It All as Loss Summary Paul lists his credentials. Circumcised on the eighth day. Of the people of Israel. Tribe of Benjamin. Hebrew of Hebrews. A Pharisee. A persecutor of the church — by which he means he was zealous. Blameless under the law. Then the turn: whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. He counts everything as rubbish compared to the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus his Lord. He wants to know Christ, the power of his resurrection, the sharing of his sufferings. Not that he has already obtained this or reached the goal, but he presses on to make it his own, because Christ Jesus has made him his own. Forgetting what lies behind, straining forward to what lies ahead, he presses on toward the goal. Key Ideas for Preaching * Paul’s list of credentials is not fabrication. He really did have every advantage of Jewish religious life in the first century. He is not saying his credentials were worthless in themselves. He is saying that compared to knowing Christ, they are loss. Where in your congregation has this passage been read as if Paul were dismissing Jewish life? Preach it more honestly. * Paul’s word for what he considers his gains to be is stronger than “rubbish.” In Greek it means excrement — the kind of language you would not read from the pulpit lightly. Paul is being deliberately shocking. What is your sermon doing to hold the shock of this passage rather than sanitizing it? * “Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal” — Paul refuses spiritual complacency. He has been at this for years, and still he presses on. What might it look like to preach a mature Christian life that includes this specific refusal of arrival? Significant Cautions * Paul is not rejecting Jewish life. He is naming his own reordering of priorities. Do not preach this passage as if Judaism were the enemy Paul overcame; that reading has caused enormous harm. * “Forgetting what lies behind” has been misused to shame people who need to process their past. Paul is talking about not resting on his own credentials, not about pretending painful history did not happen. Matthew 21:33–46 The Gospel

Another week, another great set of readings. Let’s think about preaching! The Gospel is the confrontation in the temple. Jesus is teaching after his triumphal entry when the chief priests and elders come to challenge his authority. He refuses to answer directly. Instead, he tells a parable that exposes them — a parable about two sons, one who said no but did the work anyway, and one who said yes but did not. The parable closes with one of Jesus’s sharper lines: tax collectors and prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. Track One brings us the Israelites at Massah and Meribah — a story of thirst, complaint, and water from the rock. Track Two brings us Ezekiel’s rejection of the proverb “the parents have eaten sour grapes,” insisting that change is possible for anyone and ending with God’s astonishing plea: “turn, then, and live.” The Epistle gives us the Christ hymn — Christ’s self-emptying as the pattern for the church’s common life. For preachers continuing a series: last week’s parable of the vineyard workers exposed our envy of God’s generosity. This week’s parable of the two sons exposes the difference between the yes we say and the yes we do. The Matthew arc keeps sharpening. The Readings Exodus 17:1–7 First Reading (Track One) — Water from the Rock at Massah and Meribah Summary The Israelites are camped at Rephidim, and there is no water. They quarrel with Moses, demanding water. Moses asks why they are testing God. The people press harder — they and their children and their livestock are thirsty; they wish they had died in Egypt. Moses cries out to God: what am I supposed to do? They are ready to stone me. God tells Moses to take his staff, go ahead of the people to the rock at Horeb, and strike it. Water will come out. Moses does this in the sight of the elders. The place is named Massah (testing) and Meribah (quarreling), because the people asked: “Is the Lord among us or not?” Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash Key Ideas for Preaching * The people’s complaint is real. They are thirsty. Their children are thirsty. Their livestock is thirsty. The text does not shame them for being scared; it simply gives them water. Where in your congregation have people been told their complaints were faithless when what they actually needed was water? * Their question — “Is the Lord among us or not?” — is honest. It is the question we ask when we are exhausted and afraid, when God’s presence seems more theoretical than real. What might your sermon do with a God who does not answer this question with a lecture on faith, but with actual water? * The place is named Massah and Meribah, and the naming stays in the tradition. Israel remembers their doubt as part of the story, not as something to be edited out. Where in your congregation has the impulse been to erase the memory of doubt rather than name it as part of the faithful story? Significant Cautions * Do not preach this in a way that shames people who are asking honest questions about God’s presence. The people’s question is not what the text critiques; it is the testing (implying “prove yourself to us or we walk away”) that is more problematic. * Later in the Torah, Moses’s own impatience at another version of this story will cost him entry into the promised land. Do not conflate the two stories. Psalm 78:1–4, 12–16 The Psalm (Track One) — We Will Tell the Coming Generation Summary A wisdom psalm calling for the passing down of God’s works from one generation to the next. The selected verses focus on Egypt and the wilderness — the dividing of the sea, the cloud that led by day and fire by night, the water from the rock that split open like rivers. The psalmist insists this story must be told to children. Key Ideas for Preaching * “We will not hide them from their children; we will tell to the coming generation.” That is a specific pastoral commitment. Where in your congregation is the passing-down of the faith going quiet, and how might this psalm invite grandparents, parents, and mentors into concrete practice? * Read alongside the Exodus reading, the psalm’s calm narration of “water flowed from the rock” flattens the tension of Massah and Meribah. Where has your congregation’s remembering of the past made the actual difficulty feel smaller than it was? Significant Cautions * Do not use the psalm to shame parents who are struggling to pass the faith on. The passing-down is a communal responsibility, not a solo parental burden. Ezekiel 18:1–4, 25–32 First Reading (Track Two) — Turn, Then, and Live Summary God rejects the proverb Israel had been quoting to itself: “the parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” This proverb had become an excuse — the current generation is suffering for what their ancestors did. God insists otherwise: every life belongs to God; the person who sins is the one who is accountable. If a wicked person turns from their sin, they will live. If a righteous person turns from righteousness, they will die. The people complain that God’s way is unfair; God answers that it is their ways that are unfair. And the passage closes with God’s astonishing plea: “Have I any pleasure in the death of anyone? Turn, then, and live.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The rejected proverb had become a way of avoiding responsibility — blaming the past for the present. God’s response is not “let it go” but “turn.” Where in your congregation has intergenerational blame become a substitute for actual change? * The passage insists that change is possible in either direction. A wicked person can turn. A righteous person can fall away. Neither category is permanent. What might your sermon do with a God who refuses to give up on people who have failed and who refuses to guarantee people who have succeeded? * “Have I any pleasure in the death of anyone?... Turn, then, and live.” That is God’s own posture. God is not eager for judgment; God is longing for return. Where in your congregation has God been imagined as more eager for judgment than the text depicts? Significant Cautions * The passage’s insistence on personal responsibility should not be used to dismiss the real effects of intergenerational trauma. Ezekiel is arguing against fatalism, not denying that families and communities pass down real wounds. * “The soul that sins shall die” has been used in ways that make God sound bloodthirsty. In context, this is a call to change, not a threat of eternal punishment. Psalm 25:1–9 The Psalm (Track Two) — Remember Not the Sins of My Youth Summary A psalm of trust and prayer. “To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.” The psalmist asks to be taught God’s ways, remembered by God’s mercy, forgiven for the sins of youth. Good and upright is the Lord; therefore he instructs sinners in the way. The humble are led in what is right and taught his way. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Remember not the sins of my youth… according to your steadfast love, remember me.” That is a prayer many people in your congregation have never given themselves permission to pray. What might it look like to offer them the specific practice of asking God to remember them by mercy rather than by the mistakes they made when they were younger? * “He instructs sinners in the way.” That is a striking picture — God as a teacher of the ones who have failed. Where in your congregation has failure been imagined as the end of instruction, when the psalm imagines it as the beginning? Significant Cautions * “Sins of youth” should not be read narrowly. The point is that God’s memory of us is not our worst moments. Philippians 2:1–13 The Epistle — The Mind of Christ; the Christ Hymn Summary Paul writes to a community he loves, urging them to be of one mind, one love, one accord. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit; in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Look not to your own interests but to the interests of others. Then the great Christ hymn: let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death — even death on a cross. Therefore God highly exalted him and gave him the name above every name. The passage closes: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, because God is at work in you. Key Ideas for Preaching * The Christ hymn is the pattern — self-emptying downward before glory. Paul asks the Philippians to have this same mind. That is a radical reframing of how a Christian community holds together. Where in your congregation has upward mobility (position, recognition, honor) been mistaken for the shape of Christian life? * “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit” is not a call to passivity — it is a call to reorient ambition itself. The Christ of the hymn is enormously active; he simply does not act for himself. What might your sermon do with the difference between Christian ambition and Christian selfish ambition? * “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you.” That paradox holds together human effort and divine work in the same sentence. Where in your congregation has one been emphasized at the expense of the other? Significant Cautions * The Christ hymn has been used to tell women, enslaved people, and the poor to accept their subjugation as an imitation of Christ’s humility. This is a horrifying misuse. Christ’s self-emptying was voluntary and toward the mission of God. It is not a template for anyone else’s forced humiliation. * “Regard others as better than yourselves” has been used to reinforce unhealthy self-abasement. The point is other-orientation, not the erasure

The Gospel is one of the most disorienting parables Jesus ever told. A landowner keeps going out throughout the day, hiring workers even at the eleventh hour, and pays everyone the same. The all-day workers grumble. The landowner responds with what may be the sharpest question in any of the parables. Track One brings us the manna in the wilderness — daily bread, given as needed, no more, no less. Track Two brings us Jonah’s anger at God’s mercy toward Nineveh, and the book’s astonishing final image: God’s concern for a great city and also its animals. The Epistle gives us Paul from prison, torn between longing for Christ and remaining for the sake of the churches — with the famous line, “for me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” For preachers continuing a series: last week’s parable of the unforgiving servant exposed what we do when we forget the scale of mercy we have been shown. This week’s parable of the vineyard workers exposes what we do when we cannot bear that mercy being shown to others. The Matthew arc keeps turning the mirror slowly. Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash The Readings Exodus 16:2–15 First Reading (Track One) — Manna in the Wilderness Summary The Israelites, only weeks out of Egypt, complain against Moses and Aaron. They would rather have died in Egypt where they had food than starve in the wilderness. Moses hears the complaint as ultimately directed at God, not at him. God tells Moses that bread will rain from heaven — each family gathering just what they need for the day. That evening, quails cover the camp; in the morning, a fine flaky substance appears on the ground. The people look at it and ask, “What is it?” Moses tells them: it is the bread the Lord has given you to eat. Key Ideas for Preaching * The people’s complaint is honest. They are hungry and afraid. It is easy to preach against them for lacking faith, but that misses what the text is doing. God does not scold them; God feeds them. Where in your congregation have people been shamed for honest complaint when what they needed was bread? * The manna comes daily. Not weekly. Not monthly. Daily. And no one can hoard it — later verses tell us it spoiled when they tried. What might it look like to preach a faith that is fed each day, not stockpiled? * The people’s first response to the bread is “what is it?” They do not recognize it. God’s provision does not always come in a form we would have anticipated. Where in your congregation might people be missing manna because they were expecting something else? Significant Cautions * Do not preach the manna in a way that shames people who are food insecure. The text is about God’s provision to people who genuinely did not have bread, not a metaphor for what to do when a delivery is late. * “Daily bread” is a phrase Jesus takes up in the Lord’s Prayer. That connection is worth noting, but the manna story stands on its own. Psalm 105:1–6, 37–45 The Psalm (Track One) — God’s Provision in the Wilderness Summary A section of the great remembering psalm, now focused on the exodus and wilderness. God brought Israel out with silver and gold. God spread a cloud for covering, gave quails and bread from heaven, opened the rock so water gushed out. God brought the people into the promised land. The closing is a single hallelujah. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm remembers not just the dramatic deliverance but the daily provision — quails, bread, water from a rock. God’s care for the people included every meal. What might your sermon do with a picture of God’s faithfulness that includes the ordinary? * The psalm’s mode is remembering. The Israelites are being asked to keep the story alive across generations. Where in your congregation is the practice of shared remembering going quiet, and how might this psalm invite its recovery? Significant Cautions * The psalm’s cheerful retrospect flattens a lot of pain in the wilderness generation’s experience. Do not preach the calm summary as if it were the whole truth of what those people lived. Jonah 3:10–4:11 First Reading (Track Two) — Jonah’s Anger at God’s Mercy Summary God sees that Nineveh has turned from its evil ways, and God does not destroy the city. Jonah is furious. He prays a bitter prayer: this is exactly why I fled to Tarshish in the first place — I knew you were a gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing. Jonah asks God to take his life. God asks, “Is it right for you to be angry?” Jonah goes outside the city and sulks. God provides a bush for shade, which Jonah loves. Then a worm attacks the bush; it dies; Jonah is again ready to die. God asks: is it right for you to be angry about the bush? And the book ends with God’s question, unanswered: you are concerned about a bush; should I not be concerned about a great city with more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who do not know their right hand from their left — and also many animals? Key Ideas for Preaching * Jonah’s honesty is remarkable. He does not pretend his anger is righteous. He says plainly: I ran away because I knew you would show mercy, and I did not want you to. Where in your congregation has anger at God’s generosity been hiding, unspoken, behind more acceptable feelings? * Jonah’s theology is not wrong — his summary of God’s character (gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love) is exactly right. What has gone wrong is that he does not want that God to be that God toward these people. What does it look like to preach a Jonah-shaped hypocrisy — the theology we affirm about God we do not want extended to certain neighbors? * God’s argument at the end is unforgettable. You cared about a bush you did not plant. I care about a city with a hundred and twenty thousand people. And also many animals. That final phrase is a stunning small note. God’s concern is bigger than the human world. Where in your congregation has God’s concern been imagined as narrower than the text describes? * The book of Jonah ends on God’s question, unanswered. The reader is left to answer it themselves. What might your sermon do with the fact that Jonah is silent at the end, and we are asked to speak in his place? Significant Cautions * The book of Jonah is often preached as a story about a big fish. Do not spend the sermon on the fish. The fish is a subplot; the point is God’s mercy toward people Jonah wanted destroyed. * Do not use Jonah as a stand-in for Judaism (a common Christian misreading). Jonah is a specific prophet with a specific problem, and the book is Israel’s own honest self-critique. Handle carefully. Psalm 145:1–8 The Psalm (Track Two) — Gracious and Merciful Summary A psalm of praise. Every day I will bless you. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised. One generation shall laud your works to another. The psalmist meditates on God’s greatness and steadfast love. The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. Key Ideas for Preaching * “One generation shall laud your works to another” — the psalm assumes praise is handed down. Where in your congregation is the passing-down going quiet, and how might your sermon speak to grandparents, parents, and young adults about it? * The psalm’s picture of God — gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love — is the same picture Jonah quotes bitterly. The psalmist praises what Jonah resented. What does it look like to preach the difference between celebrating God’s mercy and hating that God’s mercy extends to others? Significant Cautions * “Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised” has been used as an empty affirmation. Handle the language so that it lands as specific, not generic. Philippians 1:21–30 The Epistle — To Live Is Christ; Live Worthy of the Gospel Summary Paul writes from prison, torn between two things he wants. For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain. If he continues in the body, he will keep laboring fruitfully for the churches. If he dies, he will be with Christ, which is far better. He is hard pressed between the two, but thinks it more necessary for him to remain, for their sake. So he expects to stay — for their progress and joy in faith. Meanwhile, he asks them to live in a manner worthy of the gospel: standing firm in one spirit, striving side by side with one mind, not intimidated by opponents. And he names something surprising: they have been granted the privilege not only of believing in Christ but of suffering for him. Key Ideas for Preaching * Paul’s ambivalence is remarkable. He is not pretending to want death for spiritual show, nor pretending he does not want to be with Christ. He holds both honestly. What might your sermon do with a picture of Christian maturity that includes real desire for what comes next without contempt for what is now? * “In a manner worthy of the gospel” is not a call to moral perfection. Paul’s specifics are relational — standing side by side, striving with one mind, not intimidated. Where in your congregation has “worthy of the gospel” been reduced to personal morality when Paul was describing communal courage? * “The privilege of suffering for him” is easy to skip past. Paul is describing suffering not as punishment but as proof that we belong to Christ. This is dangerous language when misused. But rightly heard, it names something real about what discipleship costs. Where has your congregation been surprised by suffering it did not expect its faith to cost? Significant Cautions * “To live is Christ, to die is gain” has been quoted in ways that shame grieving people for their grief. Paul is not saying we should not mourn death. He is naming his own particular readiness in a particular moment. * “The privilege of suffering” has been badly misused — again, to justify staying in situations of abuse and expl

Last week we heard the process for handling harm within the community. This week we hear how far the forgiveness extends. Peter asks the question we all quietly want to ask — is there a limit? — and Jesus answers by rejecting the whole counting frame, then tells one of the hardest parables in the Gospels. Track One brings us the crossing of the Red Sea and, at the preacher’s choice, either Psalm 114 or the Songs of Moses and Miriam that celebrated the crossing. Track Two brings us Joseph forgiving his brothers — a fitting Old Testament companion to the Gospel, and one of the most extraordinary reconciliation scenes in the Bible — paired with Psalm 103’s picture of a mercy as wide as the distance between east and west. The Epistle continues Paul’s practical instructions, this time on judging one another over matters of conscience: welcome those who are weak in faith, do not despise those whose consciences differ from yours, and remember that we all give an account to the same Lord. For preachers continuing a series: the Matthew 18 arc closes here. Next week brings the parable of the workers in the vineyard — a shift to the question of God’s generosity toward those who came late. The Gospel keeps exposing our secret bookkeeping. The Readings Exodus 14:19–31 First Reading (Track One) — Crossing the Red Sea Summary Israel is trapped between Pharaoh’s army and the sea. The pillar of cloud that has been leading them moves behind them, becoming a barrier between the Egyptians and the Israelites. Moses stretches out his hand; the Lord drives back the sea by a strong east wind all night, and the waters divide. Israel walks through on dry ground. Pharaoh’s chariots pursue them. In the morning watch, God throws the Egyptians into panic; the wheels of their chariots clog. Moses stretches out his hand again; the waters return; the Egyptian army is drowned. Israel sees the great work the Lord has done and believes. Photo by Miguel Lindo on Unsplash Key Ideas for Preaching * The pillar that led Israel now stands between them and their pursuers. God’s presence is not just a light for the road ahead; it can also be a wall between us and what pursues us. Where in your congregation might people need to hear that God’s presence protects as well as leads? * The sea is parted by wind and by night — a whole night of what must have looked like slow, uncertain divine work. Deliverance in this text takes time. What might your sermon do with a God whose deliverance is not always instantaneous? * The text names the Egyptians’ death honestly. This is not a story of pure joy for anyone who reads it carefully. How might your sermon hold together the reality of God’s deliverance and the sober fact that it came at cost to others? Significant Cautions * The drowning of the Egyptians has been used triumphally in ways that make God’s people cheer at the death of enemies. Rabbinic tradition teaches that God rebuked the angels for singing when the Egyptians drowned. Christian preaching should honor that restraint. * Do not press the Red Sea as a metaphor for whatever escape your people are hoping for. The text is doing specific historical and theological work; it is not a general promise about deliverance from difficulty. Psalm 114 The Psalm (Track One, primary option) — When Israel Went Out from Egypt Summary A short psalm celebrating the exodus. The sea saw and fled. The Jordan turned back. The mountains skipped like rams. The whole earth is called to tremble at the presence of the Lord. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm imagines the whole creation reacting to God’s deliverance — the sea, the Jordan, the mountains. The natural world has skin in the game. What might your sermon do with a picture of deliverance that includes creation, not just people? * The closing line — “tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord” — is a call, not a threat. The trembling is reverence, not fear. Where has your congregation confused reverence with terror? Significant Cautions * The vivid poetry (“mountains skipped like rams”) is imagination, not physics. Do not preach a literalist reading that flattens the psalm’s exuberance. Exodus 15:1b–11, 20–21 The Psalm (Track One, alternative option) — The Songs of Moses and Miriam Summary A song celebrating the crossing. Moses and the Israelites sing that the Lord has triumphed gloriously — the horse and rider thrown into the sea. The song rehearses God’s mighty acts against Pharaoh. Then Miriam, named as a prophet, and the women take up tambourines and sing back the refrain: sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously. Key Ideas for Preaching * The song is answered by Miriam and the women, dancing with tambourines. The tradition of women’s celebration is worth honoring in a church that has too often silenced it. What might it mean to preach a Miriam-shaped moment in your congregation this week? * The song is exuberant, martial, and specific. It names Pharaoh’s death by name. Later Jewish tradition will pull back from too much celebration of enemies’ death. What does it look like to sing the song faithfully in the modern moment, honoring the joy of the delivered without the cruelty of the triumphant? Significant Cautions * The song’s celebration of enemies’ destruction has been used to bless violent triumphalism in Christian history. Handle with care. Genesis 50:15–21 First Reading (Track Two) — Joseph Forgives His Brothers Summary Jacob has died, and Joseph’s brothers are afraid. They imagine that Joseph has only been kind to them because their father was alive, and that now he will finally take revenge for what they did to him. They send a message pleading for forgiveness, claiming their father commanded it before he died. Joseph weeps. When they come to him and offer themselves as his slaves, he refuses. “Am I in the place of God?” he says. “Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good, in order to preserve a numerous people, as he is doing today.” And he speaks kindly to them and promises to provide for them and their little ones. Key Ideas for Preaching * Joseph’s brothers cannot believe they are forgiven. They construct a story about their father commanding it — as if forgiveness requires a legal warrant. Joseph’s tears seem to be for the fact that they still cannot receive what he has been giving them for years. Where in your congregation are people still constructing stories to make forgiveness legally binding, when what has been offered is grace? * “Am I in the place of God?” That is Joseph’s own restraint — the recognition that judgment is not his to hand out. What does it look like to preach a restraint like Joseph’s in a culture that keeps insisting we get to keep score? * “You intended it for harm; God intended it for good” is Joseph’s theological interpretation of his own suffering. It is his to offer, not ours to impose. Where has this line been forced on people whose harm has not yet been redeemed, and how might Joseph’s own timing correct the church’s misuse? Significant Cautions * “God intended it for good” should not be handed to suffering people as an explanation. Joseph earned that meaning through decades of hardship. No one else has to earn a lecture on it. * The brothers’ fear is real, and Joseph does not dismiss it. Do not preach forgiveness in a way that skips over the wounder’s guilt or the wounded’s ongoing work. Psalm 103:(1–7), 8–13 The Psalm (Track Two) — As Far as East Is from West Summary One of the tenderest psalms in the psalter. Bless the Lord, O my soul. The Lord forgives your iniquity, heals your diseases, redeems your life from the Pit, crowns you with steadfast love. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. God does not deal with us according to our sins. As far as the east is from the west, so far God removes our transgressions from us. As a parent has compassion for their children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him. Key Ideas for Preaching * The images the psalmist reaches for are specific: as far as east is from west, as high as heavens above the earth, as a parent has compassion. Each is stretched to the breaking point of comparison. Where in your congregation has God’s mercy been imagined as measured, when the psalm imagines it as immeasurable? * “God does not deal with us according to our sins.” Read alongside the Gospel’s parable of the unforgiving servant, that sentence reframes the question. God is not scorekeeping. Where in your congregation are people still keeping score of their own failures with a strictness God has already refused? * The psalm opens and closes with “bless the Lord, O my soul.” Blessing is what the psalmist owes God for what God has done — not obligation, blessing. What might your sermon do to help a congregation practice the specific spiritual movement of blessing God for mercy already received? Significant Cautions * “The Lord has compassion for those who fear him” has been used to make God’s mercy conditional. Read in context, “fear of the Lord” here is closer to reverence than to terror, and the whole psalm’s argument is about mercy that outstrips deserving. Romans 14:1–12 The Epistle — Do Not Judge One Another Summary Paul writes to a community with real conflict over matters of conscience — some think one day is more sacred than another; some eat meat and others eat only vegetables. His instruction is striking. Welcome those who are weak in faith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions. Do not judge those who eat what you do not; do not despise those who abstain from what you enjoy. Each is responsible to the Lord for their own conscience. We do not live to ourselves; we do not die to ourselves. We belong to the Lord. And each of us will give an account of ourselves — to God, not to

The Gospel is a practical continuation of last week’s way-of-the-cross language. If we are going to follow Jesus together, how do we handle it when we hurt each other? Matthew 18 gives us one of the most concrete passages in the New Testament about how a Christian community handles conflict — a text often preached badly and often skipped altogether. Track One brings us the institution of Passover — the community meal that will define God’s people, remembered forever. Track Two brings us Ezekiel as watchman — the prophet made responsible to warn, but not responsible for the response. The Epistle gives us the ethical grounding for all of it: owe no one anything except love, for love is the fulfillment of the law. For preachers continuing a series: last week we heard about taking up the cross and following. This week, the road brings us into a specific and hard question — what does following look like when the person following alongside us has hurt us? Photo curated by Unsplash.com The Readings Exodus 12:1–14 First Reading (Track One) — Passover Instituted Summary God gives Moses and Aaron detailed instructions for a meal — one that will mark a whole new calendar, and one that will be remembered for generations. Each household takes a year-old lamb without blemish, keeps it until the fourteenth of the month, and then slaughters it at twilight. The blood is put on the doorposts and lintel. The lamb is roasted whole, eaten with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, and the family eats in haste — dressed to travel, sandals on their feet, staff in hand. It is the Passover of the Lord. And this night is to be remembered as a festival forever. Key Ideas for Preaching * The instructions are elaborate and detailed — a whole liturgy for a meal. Israel’s freedom will begin with a shared table and a specific practice of remembering. Where in your congregation has the shared table been reduced to a formality, and how might this text restore its weight? * The lamb is to be shared — if your household is too small, join with a neighbor. Even the meal of deliverance requires community. What might it mean for your people to hear that no one is meant to eat this meal alone? * The meal is eaten “in haste, ready to travel.” This is not a celebration of arrival but a meal for the road. God’s people are being fed for a journey they have not yet made. Where in your congregation has faith been imagined as arrival, when the biblical picture is more often provision for the road? * Jesus will later use this meal as the frame for his own last supper with his disciples. Christian preachers should honor both readings — the meal as it is celebrated by our Jewish neighbors, and the meal as it has shaped the Christian eucharist — without letting the second erase the first. Significant Cautions * Do not preach the Passover in a way that reduces its meaning for Jewish communities who continue to celebrate it. The Christian tradition of reading Jesus into this meal is real, but it does not replace the meal’s own meaning. * The tenth plague, which frames this text, involves the death of every firstborn in Egypt. Do not skip this or celebrate it. It is a hard, painful part of the story that deserves acknowledgment rather than triumphalism. Psalm 149 The Psalm (Track One) — The Lord Takes Pleasure in His People Summary A short psalm of praise for the community of the faithful. Sing a new song. Praise God in the assembly. Let the faithful dance and rejoice, for the Lord takes pleasure in his people and adorns the humble with victory. The closing verses take a sharp turn toward warfare — a two-edged sword, vengeance on the nations, binding kings — that has troubled Christian readers for centuries. Key Ideas for Preaching * “The Lord takes pleasure in his people.” That is one of the most tender lines in the psalter — God as a delighted parent, not a distant judge. Where has your congregation quietly assumed God’s default posture toward them was disappointment? * “He adorns the humble with victory.” The word for adorn is not the language of grim reward — it is the language of dressing up, decorating, honoring. God does not merely permit the humble to succeed; God delights in decking them out. What might your sermon do with a God whose delight in the humble is that concrete? Significant Cautions * The closing verses about the two-edged sword and executing vengeance have been used in some of the worst chapters of Christian history — to justify religious violence, crusades, and colonial conquest. Do not preach the joyful opening without acknowledging what the closing verses have done in the world. Ezekiel 33:7–11 First Reading (Track Two) — The Watchman Summary God appoints Ezekiel as a watchman for the house of Israel. He is to warn the wicked when he hears God’s word — and if he fails to warn them and they die in their iniquity, their blood will be on his hands. But if he warns them and they refuse to turn, he has done his duty. The passage ends with a striking word from God: “As I live, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from their ways and live. Turn back, turn back... why will you die, O house of Israel?” Key Ideas for Preaching * The watchman is responsible to warn, not responsible for the response. That is a distinction many faithful people have not been given. Where in your congregation are people carrying the weight of outcomes that were never theirs to control? * “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from their ways and live.” That is God’s own posture. The God we serve is not eager for judgment; God is longing for return. Where in your congregation has God been imagined as more eager to judge than the text actually depicts? * The plea “why will you die?” is the heart of this passage. It is not the voice of a wrathful judge; it is the voice of a heartbroken parent. What might it look like to preach a God who genuinely does not want the people God loves to be destroyed? Significant Cautions * The watchman role has been used throughout Christian history to justify harsh, aggressive, and self-righteous confrontation. That is a distortion. Ezekiel is not being given license to browbeat; he is being given a solemn responsibility of loving witness. * The “blood on your hands” language is meant to weigh on the prophet, not to be used to weigh on ordinary Christians who are silent for good reasons. Be careful. Psalm 119:33–40 The Psalm (Track Two) — Turn My Eyes from Vanities Summary Another section of the long acrostic psalm on God’s word. The psalmist prays to be taught God’s statutes, given understanding to keep them, turned from vanities, and given life. The prayer is not that God’s law be made easy but that the psalmist be shaped to receive it. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Turn my eyes from looking at vanities; give me life in your ways.” That is a beautiful pairing — asking to be turned from what wastes attention and asking, in the same breath, for life. Where in your congregation are people whose eyes have been captured by vanities they cannot easily look away from? * Every verb in this section is a request. The psalmist is not boasting about his obedience; he is asking to be made able to obey. What might it look like to preach a faith that begins with asking, not with claiming? Significant Cautions * The psalm’s love for God’s law is not legalism. Do not preach against a strawman the psalm never sets up. Romans 13:8–14 The Epistle — Love Fulfills the Law Summary Paul turns to specific ethical instruction. Owe no one anything except the debt to love one another — for the one who loves fulfills the law. The commandments — do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not covet — are all summed up in one word: love your neighbor as yourself. Then Paul shifts key. You know what time it is, he says. The night is far gone; the day is near. Wake from sleep. Lay aside the works of darkness. Put on the armor of light. Live honorably as in the day. And put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Owe no one anything except to love one another.” Paul frames love as a debt that cannot be paid off — it is owed continually, freshly, to every neighbor. Where has your congregation quietly imagined love as a finite currency, when Paul describes it as a debt you carry always? * Love, Paul says, is the fulfillment of the law. Not its opposite. Not its softening. Its fulfillment. What does it mean for your sermon to hold together the demands of Christian ethics and the primacy of love, without letting one erase the other? * “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” is one of the most striking phrases in Paul. He treats Christ like a garment we put on each morning. Where in your congregation might people be helped by the practice of consciously beginning the day this way? Significant Cautions * “The night is far gone, the day is near” has been misused as fuel for end-times prediction. Paul is describing a posture of expectant readiness, not a timetable. * The love-fulfills-the-law language has been used to argue against Christian ethical seriousness — “as long as we love, anything goes.” That is not Paul’s argument. He names the specific commandments and says love is what actually makes them possible. Matthew 18:15–20 The Gospel — If Your Brother Sins Against You Summary Jesus gives his disciples a specific process for handling harm within the community. If a member sins against you, go first alone and speak with them privately. If they will not listen, take one or two others as witnesses. If they still will not listen, tell the church. And if they still refuse, treat them as a Gentile and a tax collector. Then Jesus repeats the binding and loosing language he gave Peter two chapters ago — but now given to the whole community. And he closes with a

As we draw nigh unto the end of summer, we wanted to get an announcement out about the Fall… and Advent… and planning your preaching as you get ready for Christmas. It sure does roll around, don’t it? Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash John and Delmer are going to host an online workshop on October 22, 2026 — ONE DAY ONLY! — for discussing the texts for the four Sundays of Advent, complete with pastoral colleague conversation and the likely result of some sermon ideas and a goal for the holy season. If you have been to a Two Bubbas and a Bible workshop or retreat before, you know how good and pleasant it is for preaching brothers and sisters to dwell together. If you haven’t experienced what happens in one of these — well, all I can say is I highly recommend it! The workshop begins at 10 am (Eastern time) and concludes by no later than 4 pm; we’ll take a short break for lunch but most of our time will be spent getting into the texts and sharing ideas from the Bubbas and with one another. I’ve never been to a bad one of these… I guess we could offer a money-back guarantee, or some such. The cost for the day is $99… $79 if you are a paid subscriber to Lectionary.pro. (If you need to verify whether you are paid up or not, you can drop me a question in the comments below, or at [email protected]). You’ll get a fancy-dancy course syllabus and what we lovingly call our “text apparatus” for working with the four scriptures for each week. Heck, we may even throw in a copy of the Chilton Quadrilateral, if we can get a round tuit. More info and registration forms forthcoming; just wanted you to know about the date as you plan your calendars! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lectionarypro.substack.com/subscribe

Hold on to your seats this week — the gospel makes a hard right toward Jerusalem and never looks back! This is the immediate turn from last week. Peter has just confessed Jesus as the Messiah. Now Jesus begins to teach what that means — suffering, death, resurrection. Peter is scandalized. Jesus is direct. The way of the cross gets named, and the same disciple who was blessed six verses ago is called Satan for objecting to it. The Old Testament tracks both give us people called to hard tasks. Track One brings us Moses at the burning bush — the divine name revealed, the reluctant prophet given his commission. Track Two brings us Jeremiah’s lament — a prophet accusing God of being like a deceitful stream that goes dry when you need it most, and God’s bracing rather than soothing response. The Epistle continues Paul’s practical instructions in Romans 12. After last week’s call to living sacrifice, now come the specifics: let love be genuine, bless those who persecute you, weep with those who weep, and overcome evil with good. For preachers continuing a series: last week’s confession is followed this week by its cost. This is the turn from “who is Jesus?” to “what does following this Jesus mean?” The Readings Exodus 3:1–15 First Reading (Track One) — Moses at the Burning Bush Summary Moses is tending his father-in-law’s flock in the wilderness of Sinai. He notices a bush that is on fire but not consumed, and turns aside to look. From the bush, God calls his name. God has heard the cry of the Israelites in Egypt; God is sending Moses to bring them out. Moses offers a series of objections — starting with “who am I to go?” and moving to the deeper question, “what is your name?” God’s answer to the second is one of the most enigmatic sentences in the Bible: I AM WHO I AM — or I will be who I will be — a name whose tenses refuse to settle. Key Ideas for Preaching * The bush is on fire but not consumed. Moses turns aside to look. That turning aside is the whole beginning of the story. Where in your congregation might God be waiting for a turn of attention that no one has yet made? * Moses’s first objection is “who am I?” God does not answer that question. God changes the subject to “I will be with you.” The confidence for the task, in this text, does not come from the sender knowing anything special about himself. It comes from the promise of God’s presence. What does it look like to preach a call that does not require self-confidence, only God’s promise? * The divine name — “I AM WHO I AM” — is deliberately unfixed. The Hebrew can mean “I am who I am,” “I will be who I will be,” or “I will be what I will be.” The name refuses to settle. Where has your congregation been trying to freeze God into a definition God has refused to be frozen into? * God calls Moses by name — the same Moses whose past includes murder, exile, and running away. This is not a call to a person who has proven himself. It is a call to a person whose past is complicated. Where in your congregation are people quietly assuming their past disqualifies them from what God might be calling them to now? Significant Cautions * The burning bush has become such a familiar image that it can be preached as a metaphor for any inspiring experience. It is more specific than that — a genuine encounter at a particular time and place with a particular commission attached. * “I AM WHO I AM” is contested territory in translation. Do not preach a confident philosophical reading of the divine name; the Hebrew resists that. * Moses’s objections to the call are legitimate. He is not portrayed as faithless for offering them, and God takes them seriously. Do not use this passage to shame people who have their own honest objections to what they are being asked to do. Psalm 105:1–6, 23–26, 45c The Psalm (Track One) — Remember the Wonders Summary This section of the great remembering psalm focuses on the descent of Jacob’s family into Egypt and God’s raising up of Moses and Aaron to lead them out. The selected verses call the people to remember the wonders God has done — with Abraham, in Egypt, through Moses — and close with a single “hallelujah.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm remembers Moses’s story from a great distance — after everything worked out, after generations have passed. What might it mean for your congregation to make the same practice of long remembering, so that today’s uncertain calls can be trusted to become tomorrow’s remembered deliverances? * The psalm names Moses as God’s “chosen” and Aaron as the one God “sent.” This is theological language for what looked, in the moment, like the reluctant conscription of two brothers who did not want the job. Where in your congregation has “chosen by God” language obscured how much resistance actual calls have met? Significant Cautions * The psalm’s cheerful retrospect does not undo the pain the Israelites lived through in Egypt. Do not let the celebration minimize present suffering in your congregation. Jeremiah 15:15–21 First Reading (Track Two) — Jeremiah’s Lament Summary Jeremiah is in real distress. He accuses God of being unreliable — like a stream that goes dry when you need it most, “deceitful waters that cannot be trusted.” He has been faithful, he says. He has eaten God’s words. He has not sat with the merrymakers. And still he is in pain. God’s response is bracing rather than tender: if you turn back to me, I will take you back. If you utter what is precious and not what is worthless, you will serve as my mouth. And I will make you a fortified wall of bronze to this people — they will fight against you, but they will not prevail, for I am with you. Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash Key Ideas for Preaching * Jeremiah accuses God to God’s face — of being unreliable, of failing him, of being like a stream that runs dry. This is not sinful speech; it is the honest lament of a prophet in pain. Where in your congregation has honest complaint to God been mistaken for faithlessness? * God’s response is not soothing. It does not include an apology or a comforting explanation. It includes a call to return and a strengthening for the road ahead. What might your sermon do with a God who does not always answer our pain with sympathy but sometimes with a call to keep going? * God promises Jeremiah he will be like a fortified wall of bronze against opposition. Not that opposition will go away. That he will be strong enough for it. Where in your congregation are people needing strength for opposition that is not going away? Significant Cautions * Jeremiah’s lament should not be preached as a warmup to a happy ending. The pain is real and the response is a call to keep going, not an assurance that the pain will end. * “Fortified wall of bronze” imagery has been used to encourage rigidity where flexibility was needed. The bronze wall is protection against opposition, not against learning. Psalm 26:1–8 The Psalm (Track Two) — I Have Walked in Integrity Summary A psalm of protested innocence and love for God’s house. The psalmist asks God to vindicate him — he has walked in integrity, he does not sit with the wicked, he washes his hands in innocence. And he loves the house where God’s glory dwells. It is a confident psalm, close to boasting, and honest about what the psalmist most wants. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalmist’s confidence sounds surprising to modern ears used to more humble language in prayer. But there is a real place in the psalter for asking God to notice when we have tried to be faithful. Where has your congregation been too shy to name, in prayer, the ways they have tried to be honest with God? * “I love the house in which you dwell, O Lord, and the place where your glory abides.” That is unabashed love for the community of worship. What might your sermon do with the specific love of the church as a spiritual practice worth honoring? Significant Cautions * The psalmist’s claim of innocence has been used to prop up self-righteousness. Read in context, it is a plea for a fair hearing, not a claim to moral perfection. Romans 12:9–21 The Epistle — Let Love Be Genuine Summary Paul continues the practical section of Romans 12 — one of the most concentrated ethical passages in his letters. Let love be genuine. Hate what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Be joyful in hope, patient in suffering, persevering in prayer. Extend hospitality to strangers. Bless those who persecute you — bless, and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Do not repay evil with evil. So far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. And the closing: do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Let love be genuine.” That is Paul’s opening. Not “let love be adequate.” Not “let love be present.” Genuine — un-performed, un-simulated, the real thing. Where in your congregation has the love been well-intentioned but not quite genuine, and how might Paul’s opening word press on that? * “Weep with those who weep” is often quoted; “rejoice with those who rejoice” is often skipped. Weeping is expected; rejoicing at someone else’s joy is harder. Where in your congregation has envy quietly kept people from rejoicing when their neighbors flourish? * The closing — “do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” — is Paul’s summary of Christian resistance. Not retaliation. Not passive absorption. Active good, offered in response to what is wrong. What might your sermon do to make that both concrete and credible in a world where retaliation feels satisfying? Significant Cautions * “Bless those who persecute you” has been used to tell people to endure abuse.

This is the climax of the summer’s Matthew arc. Everything since Trinity has been building toward Peter’s answer to the question Jesus finally asks him directly: “Who do you say that I am?” Today Peter answers, and the answer shapes everything that follows. * Track One begins Exodus — the birth of Moses, protected by an unlikely coalition of women who defy Pharaoh’s murderous order. Psalm 124 sings the deliverance from the other side. * Track Two brings us Isaiah’s call to remember the rock from which we were hewn, paired with Psalm 138’s personal thanksgiving. * The Epistle turns an important corner: after eleven chapters of theological argument, Paul opens Romans 12 with “therefore” — the practical application begins. Present your bodies. One body, many members. Different gifts, all needed. For preachers continuing a series: this is the destination. The confession is what the summer has been building toward. Next week the Gospel will turn — Peter will be corrected, the way of the cross will be named — but this week we stop and let the confession stand. The Readings Exodus 1:8–2:10 First Reading (Track One) — The Midwives and the Birth of Moses Summary A new king arises in Egypt who does not know Joseph. Threatened by the growing number of Hebrews, he enslaves them and orders the Hebrew midwives to kill every male child at birth. But the midwives — Shiphrah and Puah, named by the text against Pharaoh’s namelessness — refuse. When Pharaoh escalates and orders all male children thrown into the Nile, three more women defy him: Moses’s mother, who hides him and then places him in a basket on the river; his sister, who watches from the reeds; and Pharaoh’s own daughter, who finds the baby and takes him as her own. Deliverance begins through the courage of women. Key Ideas for Preaching * The story of Israel’s deliverance begins with women whose defiance no one wrote down until much later. An unlikely coalition forms across ethnic and class lines. Where in your congregation might God’s deliverance be already beginning through people whose work no one has yet noticed? * Shiphrah and Puah are named by the text. Pharaoh, the most powerful man in the story, is not. The narrator has decided who matters. What might it mean for your congregation to notice whose names Scripture chooses to lift up? * The midwives lie — or, dissemble at the very least — to Pharaoh, and the text approves — God deals well with them. Where in your congregation has an obedience to institutional authority been quietly mistaken for faithfulness, when a deeper faithfulness would have refused? Significant Cautions * Do not idealize any of the characters. The midwives are ordinary working women doing what they can. Pharaoh’s daughter defies her father but does not free the Hebrews. Their courage is real and it is also partial. * The civil disobedience reading of this text is available, but should not be pressed into any particular contemporary political program. * Say the names — Shiphrah and Puah — from the pulpit when you can. Pharaoh’s namelessness is part of the text’s judgment on him. Psalm 124 The Psalm (Track One) — If It Had Not Been the Lord Summary A psalm of thanksgiving for deliverance, sung from the safe side. If it had not been the Lord who was on our side when enemies rose against us, when the waters would have swept us away, we would have been overwhelmed. Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm is written in retrospect — thanksgiving from safety, not desperate pleading in the moment. What might it look like for your congregation to make a practice of naming past deliverances honestly, so that hope in future ones is grounded in something remembered? * Paired with today’s Exodus reading, the psalm reads like a song sung generations after the midwives did their quiet work in a birthing room. What began as unnoticed courage becomes a whole people singing. Significant Cautions * Be careful not to preach this in a way that identifies contemporary political opponents as the “enemies” God delivers us from. The psalm is looking back at Egypt, not writing policy for today. Isaiah 51:1–6 First Reading (Track Two) — Look to the Rock Summary A word of comfort to God’s people in exile. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, the quarry from which you were dug — remember Abraham and Sarah, from whom your whole people came. God is bringing comfort to Zion, making her wilderness like Eden. Instruction will go out; justice will be a light to the peoples. The heavens will vanish like smoke and the earth wear out like a garment, but God’s salvation will endure forever. Key Ideas for Preaching * The prophet asks the people to remember. Look to the rock. Remember Abraham and Sarah. Where in your congregation has the loss of memory made the current moment feel more precarious than it should? * The pairing of “the heavens will vanish like smoke” with “my salvation will be forever” is a striking piece of realism about what lasts. Where has your congregation been placing lasting trust in what will not last? * Paired with the Gospel, this text sets up the wordplay Jesus will use with Peter — “on this rock.” Isaiah’s rock is Abraham and Sarah; Matthew’s rock is Peter’s confession. Both texts are asking about the ground beneath our feet. Significant Cautions * The imagery of Zion’s restoration is specific to Israel’s exile. Do not press it into a program for any modern nation. * “Look to the rock from which you were hewn” is an invitation to remember, not a mandate to romanticize the past. Psalm 138 The Psalm (Track Two) — Do Not Forsake the Work of Your Hands Summary A psalm of personal thanksgiving that expands to a global vision. The psalmist gives thanks with his whole heart and praises God’s steadfast love. All the kings of the earth will one day praise God. The closing line is a prayer that God will not forsake the work of God’s hands. Key Ideas for Preaching * “The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me… do not forsake the work of your hands.” That is one of the most reassuring sentences in the Psalter — a prayer that trusts God is not done. Where in your congregation are people who need to hear that they are still the work of God’s hands? * The psalm begins with a personal thanksgiving and ends with all the kings of the earth. What might your sermon do with a psalm whose horizon widens that quickly? Significant Cautions * “All the kings of the earth” praising God should not be read as a program for religious empire. It is a prayer for a widening praise, not a mandate. Romans 12:1–8 The Epistle — A Living Sacrifice; One Body, Many Members Summary After eleven chapters of theological argument, Paul turns a corner. “I appeal to you, therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.” Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. Paul then turns to community life: think of yourselves with sober judgment. We are one body with many members, and no member is complete without the others. Different gifts have been given — prophecy, ministry, teaching, encouragement, giving, leading, showing mercy — and each should be exercised in the measure of faith God has given. Key Ideas for Preaching * “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice” is one of the strangest images in Paul. Sacrifices in the ancient world were dead. Living sacrifices are not a category. Paul is describing a whole life, offered without being consumed. What does it look like to preach whole-life offering in a culture that keeps splitting body from soul, work from worship? * Paul opens the practical section with an appeal for humility — think of yourself with sober judgment, not more highly than you ought. This is his first instruction for community life. Where in your congregation might humble self-assessment be the missing precondition for everything else Paul goes on to ask? * The list of gifts is illustrative, not comprehensive. Some are visible (prophecy, teaching, leading). Others are quieter (ministry, showing mercy, giving with generosity). Where in your congregation have visible gifts been overvalued and quieter gifts overlooked? Significant Cautions * “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice” has been misused to justify Christians accepting abuse or unhealthy suffering. That is not what Paul is describing. Handle the language carefully in pastoral contexts where suffering is not chosen. * The gifts list has sometimes been made into a personality test. Paul is describing what happens in a healthy community, not offering a diagnostic for individuals. Matthew 16:13–20 The Gospel — Peter’s Confession at Caesarea Philippi Summary Jesus takes his disciples to Caesarea Philippi — a city built by Herod’s son at the base of Mount Hermon, next to a massive rock cave that was a shrine to the Greek god Pan, and named after Caesar. In this heavily symbolic place, Jesus asks two questions. First: who do people say that the Son of Man is? The disciples report the various answers — John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, one of the prophets. Then the sharper question: who do you say that I am? Peter answers: you are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Jesus blesses him — this insight, he says, has come from God, not from human reasoning. Then comes the famous wordplay: you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.* (see excursus below) Peter is given the keys of the kingdom. And the disciples are charged to tell no one that Jesus is the Messiah. Photo by Emile Guillemot on Unsplash Key Ideas for Preaching * The setting is not accidental. Caesarea Philippi was named after Caesar and built next to a shrine to Pan. When Jesus asks “who do you say that I am?” he is asking in the

This is one of the more challenging Sundays of the year, and its texts all press toward the same difficult question: who is inside God’s people, and by what authority is the boundary drawn? The Gospel gives us the story of the Canaanite woman — a scene that has troubled Christian readers for centuries because Jesus appears, at first, to refuse her request and to compare her people to dogs. What she does with his answer, and what he does with hers, is one of the most striking moments in Matthew. We will handle the passage with care and honesty about how difficult it is. The Old Testament tracks lead toward the Gospel from complementary angles. Track One brings us the moment of reconciliation in Genesis — Joseph revealing himself to the brothers who sold him — paired with Psalm 133’s famous celebration of kindred living together in unity. Track Two brings us Isaiah’s expansive invitation to foreigners to join themselves to the Lord, paired with Psalm 67’s prayer for God’s blessing to reach all nations. The Epistle continues in Romans 11 with what may be Paul’s clearest word against the church’s later attempts to replace or displace Israel: God has not rejected his people, and the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. For preachers continuing a series: the Matthew arc is now on the threshold of Peter’s great confession at Caesarea Philippi, which comes next week. But before Jesus arrives there, the Gospel takes him first through a challenging encounter with a Gentile woman who insists on being heard. The Readings Genesis 45:1–15 First Reading (Track One) — Joseph Reveals Himself Summary The Joseph story reaches its most tender turning point. Joseph has been elevated in Egypt. His brothers, driven by famine, have come to Egypt to buy grain, not knowing that the powerful Egyptian official standing in front of them is the brother they sold into slavery decades ago. Joseph has tested them, wept privately more than once, and now can hold back no longer. He sends the Egyptians away so that he can weep in private with his family. And then he tells them: I am Joseph, your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. They are speechless with fear. He reassures them, kisses them, and weeps again. Key Ideas for Preaching * This scene has been prepared by pages of pain. The reconciliation does not happen quickly, and it does not happen because the brothers deserve it. Where in your congregation are people carrying the pain that comes before reconciliation, and how might this text steady them without pretending the timeline is short? * Joseph names what happened plainly — I am Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. He does not paper over the wrong. But he also does not turn the naming into a weapon. What does it look like to preach a reconciliation that tells the truth about what happened without weaponizing it? * Joseph’s theological interpretation — that God sent him ahead of the brothers to preserve life — has been misused throughout Christian history as a formula for “God used the bad thing for good.” Read within the story, it is Joseph’s hard-won meaning, offered to his brothers as a gift so they can live with what they did. Where in your congregation has “God used it for good” been forced on people prematurely, and how might Joseph’s own timing correct that? * The reconciliation happens through tears, not explanation. Joseph weeps three times in this scene. How might your sermon honor the role of grief in real reconciliation — the weeping that has to happen before the family can eat together again? Significant Cautions * “God sent me before you to preserve life” is Joseph’s interpretation of his own experience. It should not be handed to any suffering person as an explanation of what God is doing in their life. Joseph earned that meaning through years of hardship; no one else should have to earn a lecture on it. * The reconciliation is real but incomplete. The brothers remain afraid. Jacob will hear the news and be transformed. The years of harm have consequences that this scene does not undo. Do not preach reconciliation as if it erases the past. * The trafficking of Joseph, which we read about two weeks ago, is not made good by his elevation. Do not use his rise to soften the reality of what was done to him. Psalm 133 The Psalm (Track One) — How Very Good and Pleasant Summary One of the shortest psalms in the Bible, and one of the most quoted. How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity. The psalm reaches for two vivid images — oil running down Aaron’s head onto his beard and clothing, and dew falling on the mountains — to describe what such unity is like. The psalm closes with the observation that this is where the Lord commanded blessing. Photo courtesy of the Catholic Scot Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm’s images are surprisingly bodily — oil on the head, running down the beard, falling on the collar; dew on mountains. Unity, for the psalmist, is something felt and touched, not just theorized. Where has your congregation reduced unity to an idea that can be agreed on, when the psalm imagines something more embodied? * Read alongside today’s Genesis reading, the psalm’s celebration of kindred in unity comes at the cost of what preceded it in Joseph’s story. Unity is real, and it is also the fruit of long, painful work. How might your sermon hold both together? Significant Cautions * Do not preach unity as the suppression of difference. The psalm celebrates kindred living together, not kindred pretending to be identical. * “Kindred” can be read narrowly — only our people, only our tribe. In light of today’s Isaiah and Matthew readings, the wider point of the day is that God’s kindred is larger than we thought. Isaiah 56:1, 6–8 First Reading (Track Two) — A House of Prayer for All Peoples Summary The prophet speaks a word from God that extends the covenant beyond the boundaries of ethnic Israel. The verses selected for today focus on foreigners who have joined themselves to the Lord — they are welcomed to the holy mountain, their offerings will be accepted, and God’s house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples. God declares plainly: I will gather still others besides those already gathered. (The verses between 1 and 6, not included in the reading, extend the same welcome to eunuchs — a striking expansion for its time.) Key Ideas for Preaching * The prophet is naming a widening of the people of God that many in the community would have resisted. Foreigners are welcomed. God’s house is a house of prayer for all peoples. Where in your congregation is this widening still contested, and how might Isaiah’s word speak to it? * The verses skipped by the lectionary include the equally striking welcome of eunuchs — people who could not have children and were, in the ancient world, excluded from full covenant standing. The wider prophetic vision includes people whose bodies and identities the community had already written off. What might it look like to name that omitted section in your sermon, so that its welcome is not left silent? * “I will gather still others besides those already gathered.” That is God’s own commitment to keep expanding the people. Where has your congregation quietly assumed that the gathering is complete? Significant Cautions * Do not use this text to bless or condemn any modern political program — the prophet is speaking about God’s covenant people, not about state immigration policy. * “House of prayer for all peoples” was quoted by Jesus in the temple. That connection is worth naming, but be careful not to use the connection to displace the original Jewish audience of the prophet. Psalm 67 The Psalm (Track Two) — Let All the Peoples Praise You Summary A short psalm that opens with the language of the priestly blessing — may God be gracious to us and bless us — but extends outward almost immediately. The whole point of God’s blessing on this people is that God’s saving power might be known among all nations. “Let all the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you.” The psalm closes with the harvest and God’s blessing reaching to the ends of the earth. Key Ideas for Preaching * The blessing on this people, in this psalm, is for the sake of all peoples. God’s grace does not stop with those who first receive it. Where has your congregation received God’s grace as if it were for their consumption, and how might this psalm turn it outward? * The refrain “let all the peoples praise you” is repeated for emphasis. It is not a decorative flourish; it is the psalm’s central conviction. What might your sermon do with the specific vision of every people praising God? Significant Cautions * Do not read “all the peoples” as a program for religious conquest. The psalm imagines every people praising God, not becoming absorbed into any one particular tradition. Romans 11:1–2a, 29–32 The Epistle — The Irrevocable Gifts Summary Paul asks the direct question: has God rejected his people, Israel? His answer is emphatic: by no means. He himself is a Jew, an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, and God has not rejected the people God foreknew. The lectionary jumps ahead to Paul’s summary: the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. All — Jews and Gentiles both — have been disobedient in various ways, and God has bound all to disobedience so that God may have mercy on all. Key Ideas for Preaching * Paul, a Jew writing to Gentile Christians, is at pains to insist that God has not abandoned Israel. In a Christian tradition that has too often taught the opposite, Paul’s word is worth reading slowly and letting land. What does it look like to preach this text in a way that names, and refuses, the church’s long anti-Jewish history? * “The gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” That is one of the most beautifu

The Gospel picks up on the same night as last week’s feeding of the five thousand. Immediately after Jesus feeds the crowd, he sends the disciples across the sea, dismisses the crowd, and goes up the mountain to pray alone. A storm rises. Some time before dawn, Jesus comes to them, walking on the water. Peter, characteristically, asks to join him — and takes a few steps before he starts to sink. It is one of the most famous scenes in the Gospels, and one of the most misused. We want to handle it with care. The Old Testament tracks reach the Gospel by very different paths. Track One begins the Joseph story — the coat, the favoritism, the brothers’ plot, and the trafficking of Joseph into Egypt. Psalm 105 remembers that same descent as part of God’s long providence. Track Two brings us Elijah at Horeb, exhausted and suicidal, meeting God not in the wind or earthquake or fire but in the sound of sheer silence — paired with Psalm 85’s beautiful image of steadfast love and faithfulness meeting each other. The Epistle continues into Romans 10, with Paul’s insistence that the word of faith is not far away but near — on our lips, in our hearts — and his celebration of the beautiful feet of those who carry good news. For preachers continuing a series: the Matthew narrative arc is picking up momentum. The identity of Jesus is being asked with increasing urgency — the disciples’ confession at the end of this scene (“Truly you are the Son of God”) anticipates the great confession at Caesarea Philippi in two weeks. Something is building. The Readings Genesis 37:1–4, 12–28 First Reading (Track One) — Joseph Sold Into Slavery Summary The Joseph story begins; this will become the longest narrative in the book of Genesis. Jacob favors Joseph — the son of his old age — and dresses him in the famous coat that will follow him into legend. The brothers see the favoritism, feel the sting of Joseph’s dreams that place him above them, and cannot bring themselves to speak peaceably to him. When Jacob sends Joseph to check on his brothers at pasture, they see him coming from a distance and plot his death. Reuben talks them out of murder and throws him into a pit, hoping to rescue him later. Judah spots a caravan of traders and suggests selling him instead. The brothers sit down to a meal while Joseph is in the pit. Then they pull him out, sell him for twenty pieces of silver, and let him disappear into Egypt. Key Ideas for Preaching * The family in this story is genuinely dysfunctional. Parental favoritism produces jealousy; jealousy produces murderous rage; rage becomes trafficking. Genesis does not clean any of this up. What does it look like to preach honestly about the destructive patterns in a family that many of your people have inherited in their own? * Reuben tries to save Joseph without confronting the brothers. Judah calculates a middle path — profit rather than murder. Neither of these is heroism. Where in your congregation has quiet compromise passed for moral courage, and how might the text expose that? * The most chilling detail in the scene is that the brothers sit down to eat while Joseph is in the pit. Cruelty and appetite living together in the same body. Where has your congregation grown comfortable eating while others suffer, and what would it look like to notice again? * The Joseph story that begins here will end with reconciliation and rescue. But the reconciliation is decades away. What does it look like to preach the opening of a story whose good ending we know, without collapsing the pain of the beginning? Significant Cautions * The trafficking of Joseph is a real evil, not just a plot device. Do not use it as a metaphor in a way that minimizes what actually happened to him — or what still happens to trafficked people today. * “God used it for good” is where this story eventually ends up, but it does not begin there. Do not use the eventual outcome to blame the victim or to bless the brothers’ cruelty in advance. * Joseph is not blameless in the family dynamic. His dreams and his coat are part of what has produced the tension. But that does not make him deserve any of what happens. * Do not preach Jacob’s favoritism as a charming quirk. It is a wound the family will carry for generations. Psalm 105:1–6, 16–22, 45b The Psalm (Track One) — Joseph in Fetters Summary This section of the great remembering psalm now focuses on Joseph specifically. God sent a famine on the land; he sent a man before them — Joseph, sold as a slave. His feet were hurt with fetters, his neck put in a collar of iron, until his word came true and God’s word tested him. Then the king sent for him and set him over his household. The psalm remembers Joseph’s suffering openly, as part of God’s long faithfulness. Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalm names Joseph’s suffering openly — feet in fetters, neck in iron — before it names his elevation. It does not skip over the pain. What does it look like for your congregation to remember the hard chapters of God’s people alongside the good ones, without pretending either did not happen? * “The word of the Lord tested him.” That is a striking phrase. Joseph’s suffering is not caused by God’s word, but it is what he had to endure while God’s word did its slow work. Where in your congregation are people enduring something long and hard while God’s promise seems to be delayed? Significant Cautions * “The word of the Lord tested him” can be misread to suggest that God causes suffering to test people. The psalm is describing the experience of waiting for God’s promise, not endorsing a theology of trial. 1 Kings 19:9–18 First Reading (Track Two) — Elijah at Horeb Summary Elijah has just fled Queen Jezebel’s threat on his life after killing the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. Exhausted and suicidal — in the verses just before our reading, he asks God to take his life — he has walked forty days into the wilderness and arrived at Horeb, the mountain of Moses. He goes into a cave. The Lord’s voice asks: “What are you doing here, Elijah?” Elijah answers with a complaint. God tells him to stand on the mountain. Wind splits rocks; earthquake shakes; fire burns — but the Lord is in none of these. Then a sound of sheer silence — or, in older translations, a still small voice. Elijah wraps his face in his mantle. God asks the same question again. Elijah gives the same answer. God sends him back with an assignment to anoint successors, and with the correction that seven thousand others in Israel have not bowed to Baal. Key Ideas for Preaching * Elijah is not simply tired. He is suicidal. Just before our reading, he has asked God to take his life. What does it look like to preach on this text with tenderness for those in your congregation who have been that low, without preaching over their heads? * God does not lecture Elijah out of his despair. In the verses just before ours, God feeds him and lets him sleep before saying anything at all. Only then comes the question — twice — “What are you doing here?” That is pastoral care, not correction. How might your sermon model the same slowness with people in crisis? * The famous line is that the Lord was not in the wind or the earthquake or the fire, but in the sound of sheer silence. That is not a general rule about how God speaks; it is what Elijah needed to hear that day. Where in your congregation are people expecting God only in the dramatic, and how might this text open the possibility of a quieter meeting? * God’s correction of Elijah’s “I alone am left” is the one honest word in the whole scene. Elijah has been sure of his isolation, and he has been wrong. Seven thousand others have stayed faithful. Where in your congregation are people convinced they are alone in their faithfulness, and how might the text steady them? * God sends Elijah back to work. The vision is not the end. The next day begins. What does it look like to preach that quiet encounters lead to ordinary faithfulness, not away from it? Significant Cautions * Do not universalize “God is in the quiet.” God is in the dramatic too, elsewhere in Scripture. The text describes what Elijah needed that day, not a doctrine about how God always comes. * Do not treat Elijah’s suicidal despair as a stage he had to move through to reach the still small voice. The despair is real, and any congregant hearing this text may be living it. Handle with care, and if it fits your context, name real resources for those who need them. * The seven thousand who have not bowed to Baal are named to correct Elijah’s loneliness, not to diminish his suffering. Do not use this line to tell someone in real isolation that they are wrong to feel alone. * “Still small voice” is one translation choice among several. “Sound of sheer silence” is another. If you dwell on the phrase, mention that faithful translators disagree — both readings are honest attempts at a Hebrew phrase that resists a single English equivalent. Psalm 85:8–13 The Psalm (Track Two) — Steadfast Love and Faithfulness Meet Summary A short psalm of confidence. The psalmist commits to hear what God will speak — a word of peace to God’s people. God’s salvation is near. Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other. The land will yield its increase; righteousness will go before God and prepare a way. Key Ideas for Preaching * The image at the center is remarkable: steadfast love and faithfulness meeting, righteousness and peace kissing. The qualities we sometimes hold apart — mercy and truth, justice and peace — belong together in God. Where has your congregation been forced to choose between qualities that should meet, and how might this psalm free them from the false choice? * Paired with the Gospel, the psalm’s promise that God speaks peace prepares us to hear Jesus

This Sunday marks a shift in the Gospel. The parables arc that ran through the last three Sundays gives way to a return to Jesus in action. Matthew 14 gives us the feeding of the five thousand — one of the most famous miracles in Christian memory, and the only miracle told in all four Gospels. After weeks of listening to Jesus tell stories about the kingdom, we now watch him embody the kingdom — with a hungry crowd, a deserted place, and five loaves. Photo by nilufar nattaq on Unsplash The Old Testament tracks lead toward the Gospel in different ways. Track One brings us one of the most famous scenes in Genesis — Jacob’s night at the river Jabbok, wrestling with a stranger who turns out to be more than a stranger. Track Two gives us Isaiah’s great invitation to the thirsty and hungry to come and eat without money and without price. Both pair naturally with the Gospel’s feeding. The Epistle turns a corner as well. Romans 8 has been running under the Sundays since Proper 9, and it culminated last week in the great crescendo: nothing can separate us from the love of God. Today Paul opens Romans 9 in a completely different key — anguish, unceasing sorrow, grief for his own people, Israel. It is a difficult passage and easy to preach badly. The guide handles it with care. For preachers continuing a series: the parables arc has closed. The next several weeks return to Matthew’s narrative — the feeding this week, walking on water next week, the Canaanite woman the week after. Jesus is on the move again, and Matthew’s pen is following him. The Readings Genesis 32:22–31 First Reading (Track One) — Jacob at Peniel Summary Jacob is returning to face his brother Esau after twenty years away. He has sent his family and possessions across the Jabbok in the night and been left alone. There, in the darkness, a man wrestles with him until daybreak. Neither prevails; the stranger strikes Jacob’s hip, and Jacob’s hip is put out of joint. As morning is coming, the man asks to be released. Jacob refuses without a blessing. He receives one: a new name — Israel, “one who has striven with God and prevailed.” Jacob names the place Peniel, “the face of God,” because, he says, he has seen God face to face and lived. He limps away into the sunrise. Key Ideas for Preaching * Jacob is at the darkest point of the story so far. He has cheated his brother, been cheated by his uncle, and now must face the brother he wronged. The wrestling comes at exactly this moment. Where in your congregation are people in the darkest stretch of their story, and what might it mean for them to hear that this is exactly where God has been known to show up? * The wrestling is not tidy. Jacob is not blessed for pious cooperation. He is blessed because he held on through a struggle he did not choose. What might it mean for your people that a faithful life includes wrestling — with God, with the questions we cannot resolve, with our own patterns — and not only calm assent? * Jacob asks for a blessing and receives a limp. The blessing is real, and so is the wound. He walks away permanently changed. Where in your congregation have people received both a blessing and a mark from their encounter with God, and how might this text help them make peace with the mark? * The new name — Israel, “one who has striven with God” — becomes the name of a whole people. The identity of God’s people is not “one who has agreed with God” but “one who has striven with God.” What does it look like to preach faithful striving, not just faithful agreement? Significant Cautions * Do not romanticize the wrestling into an image of triumphant persistence. Jacob does not defeat God. He simply refuses to let go, and he is wounded in the encounter. * “I have seen God face to face” is Jacob’s claim in awe, not a doctrine. Do not build a theological system on the specific language of the encounter. * The wound to the hip is not a moral punishment. It is what encounter with the holy sometimes costs. Preach it gently. Psalm 17:1–7, 15 The Psalm (Track One) — I Shall Behold Your Face Summary A prayer for help from someone under real pressure. The psalmist asks God to hear his cry, to test his heart, to keep him under God’s wing. He is being pursued by enemies who want to bring him down. The closing verse turns to hope: “I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake I shall be satisfied.” Key Ideas for Preaching * The psalmist is honest about the pressure he is under. He is not pretending to be calm. Where in your congregation are people under real pressure who need permission to name it in prayer without dressing it up? * Paired with Jacob’s wrestling, the psalm’s closing hope — “I shall behold your face” — takes on unexpected weight. Both texts imagine a face-to-face meeting with God as the goal, however costly the road there. What does it mean to preach a faith where seeing God face to face is worth the wrestle? Significant Cautions * The psalmist’s claim of innocence can sound self-righteous. Read in context, it is a plea for a fair hearing, not a boast about moral perfection. Isaiah 55:1–5 First Reading (Track Two) — Come to the Waters Summary One of the great invitations in the prophets. Everyone who thirsts is called to come to the waters. Everyone without money is called to come, buy, and eat — without money and without price. The prophet asks why we spend our money on what is not bread, our labor on what does not satisfy. God’s covenant is renewed as an everlasting one, in the pattern of God’s steadfast love for David. Key Ideas for Preaching * The invitation is remarkable. Come, buy, and eat — without money and without price. God’s economy runs on a different currency than the market’s. Where in your congregation has the culture of transaction crept into people’s sense of what they can receive from God? * “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?” That is a question worth reading slowly in a culture built on selling us things that will not satisfy. What might your sermon do with that question, alongside the Gospel’s picture of a crowd fed for free? * Paired with today’s Gospel, the connection is direct. Both texts describe God feeding people freely. What does it mean for your congregation that the free feeding of the multitude is not a departure from the God of Israel but an expression of exactly who this God has been all along? Significant Cautions * The invitation to “come, buy, and eat without money” is easy to spiritualize in ways that let the church off the hook for the actual hungry. Do not use this text to sanitize scarcity in the world. Psalm 145:8–9, 14–21 The Psalm (Track Two) — You Open Your Hand Summary Another section of the great hymn to God’s compassion. God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, good to all. God upholds the falling, feeds every living thing in its season, and is near to all who call. The closing verses affirm that God fulfills the desires of those who fear him and preserves those who love him. Key Ideas for Preaching * “The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand, satisfying the desire of every living thing.” This is divine hospitality on a cosmic scale. How might your sermon place today’s feeding of the five thousand inside this larger picture — God’s steady, ongoing feeding of everything alive? * “The Lord is near to all who call on him.” Not near to some. Not near to the deserving. Near to all. Where has your congregation quietly assumed nearness was on a shorter list? Significant Cautions * “The Lord watches over all who love him, but the wicked he will destroy” appears in this section of the psalm. Handle it carefully. Do not use it to license human judgment against people we have decided are wicked. Romans 9:1–5 The Epistle — Paul’s Grief for His People Summary The tone in Romans changes sharply. After the crescendo of chapter 8, Paul opens chapter 9 in grief. He has, he says, unceasing sorrow in his heart. He would wish himself cut off from Christ if it would somehow bring his own people, the Israelites, into what he has come to know in Jesus. The passage names what belongs to Israel: the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, the promises, the patriarchs, and — according to the flesh — the Messiah himself. Key Ideas for Preaching * Paul is anguished about his own people. He is not writing them off. He is not preaching against them. He is grieving because he loves them and because he has come to believe something that separates them from him. What does it look like to preach on grief for people we love who see the world differently — not with contempt, but with the ache Paul is describing? * The list Paul gives — adoption, glory, covenants, law, worship, promises, patriarchs, and the Messiah — is a list of gifts to Israel. Paul is not disparaging his own tradition; he is celebrating it, even in his grief. How might your sermon guard against the anti-Jewish readings that have plagued this passage in Christian history? * Paul’s willingness to wish himself cut off from Christ, if it would help his people, is one of the most striking lines in the letter. He is not being noble; he is naming the depth of his love for people he cannot make see what he sees. Where in your congregation has love for someone across a divide taken people to that kind of place? Significant Cautions * This passage has been used to argue that Christianity has replaced Judaism, or that Jewish people have been cut off from God. Paul does not say this. He says the opposite — the covenants, the promises, the patriarchs, and even the Messiah belong to Israel. Preach against the anti-Jewish uses of this passage plainly. * “According to the flesh comes the Christ”