The noted preacher Fred Craddock once observed that there are two kinds of sermons that are difficult to hear: bad sermons and good sermons. Bad sermons are hard to listen to because the preacher has nothing to say. A good sermon is hard to hear because it gets under your skin and bothers you. Sometimes we preachers even aim for this, and it can be disappointing when people say, “I really enjoyed that sermon, Father!” We want to reply, “Well, I was actually hoping you’d be

In the book called How to Do Things With Words , the author claims words don't simply describe things, they make things happen. When it comes to words that create worlds, there is no better example than Jesus’ parables. In these brief, simple stories, Jesus doesn’t just relate information to us about God or about heaven. He’s calling a new reality into being. These stories don’t just describe the new order God is bringing to earth, as much as they cause it to come to lif

Whenever I see a weed, it just seems to scream, “Pull me!” When Jesus tells stories about farming, his stories simply don’t make any agricultural sense. Listen to the story again - A farmer plows his field, sows it with wheat of the highest quality, and goes to bed that night. While he was sleeping an enemy comes and lays some weed seed in the same furrows. So as the wheat starts to grow, the farmer's hired hands notice the weed growing with the wheat and ask the farmer

Rarely did Jesus say things bluntly or straightforwardly. More often than not, he came at a truth indirectly, sideways-like, in order to come in under our defenses and around our prejudices. His best tools in this were his “parables.” In them, Jesus takes images drawn from familiar things and uses them a new way, to explain God’s Kingdom. It’s to our benefit then that Jesus’ first parable is such an easy one to understand. The story begins with a man who goes forth to s

In today’s reading from John, Jesus is speaking to his disciples about fences, specifically the kind that you keep sheep in, a “sheepfold.” He says that those who are thieves and bandits try to “hop the fence,” but the shepherd comes in the right way, through the gate, and the sheep know him, know his voice, and they follow him.

James Tissot (French, 1836-1902) is largely remembered for his scenes and portraits of the upper-middle class, but, during the 1880s he had a religious awakening and produced a number of works inspired by the New Testament. In 1885, he had what he referred to as an “epiphany” and “revelation” that lead him on a pilgrimage to cathedrals in France and to create a series of 35 scenes from the life of Christ. During this religious decade, Tissot did multiple versions of the Pro

Matthew 25:14-30 Jesus said: “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?’ He said to the