Sermons (Page 102)

Sermons (Page 102)

Fourth Sunday in Lent

Today’s gospel reading has, arguably, the most recognizable verse in the Bible. On a long car trip, I usually see it posted on a billboard. At sports games, I see it on a poster. In confirmation class, I had to memorize it. It’s the infamous John 3:16. And, while today’s translation from the New Revised Standard Version was decent, I want to offer you an alternative translation from the original Greek. It goes like this, “For this is the way God loved the cosmos: to give the Only Begotten One, that whoever believes may not die, but have eternal life.”…

Third Sunday in Lent

In my imagination I picture the scene from our Gospel reading today: the crowds of Jewish people coming from all over to make their sacrifices in the Temple, the mooing and cooing and baaing animals – unblemished of course – that  will be sacrificed, the money-changers waiting to convert foreign currency to the acceptable coinage for the Temple Tax.  Everything going according to plan, the way it was every year…