Living by the Word

Reflections on the lectionary readings by pastors, preachers and biblical scholars

Photo by Mary Harrsch

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Luke 4:21–30

Jan 22, 2013 by Matthew Myer Boulton and Elizabeth Myer Boulton

Indiana’s fiery love affair with basketball began just a few years after James Naismith taught his Massachusetts gym class to toss a soccer ball into an elevated peach basket. After he got a taste of Hoosier Hysteria in 1925, Naismith wrote that basketball seemed to have its “origin in Indiana.”

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Luke 4:14–21

Jan 15, 2013 by Matthew Myer Boulton and Elizabeth Myer Boulton

Breast-feeding is quiet and holy work—rocking, comforting, studying each other’s face and skin-to-skin bonding. When it goes well (and God knows, it doesn’t always go well!) nursing is a sweet and beautiful thing. It’s sweeter than honey, the psalmist might say, sweeter than the drippings of the honeycomb.

Sunday, January 13, 2013

Isaiah 43:1–7; Acts 8:14–17; Luke 3:15–17, 21–22

Jan 02, 2013 by Lawrence M. Stratton

I was ordained last February, and since then I’ve been invited to preach at more than a dozen churches as a supply preacher. It’s always an adventure to pack up my minister’s gown and stole and drive to a new church. Last summer I found myself preaching at the opening worship service for a local fair.

Sunday, January 6, 2013

Matthew 2:1–12

Dec 26, 2012 by Gracia M. Grindal

When I was growing up in a Lutheran parsonage on the prairies of North Dakota, our congregation hosted mission festivals during Epiphany. One week our family entertained two missionaries: a missionary to Japan who’d been born in China to Lutheran missionaries but then forced out by the communists, and a missionary who’d worked in Taiwan after the closing of the bamboo curtain.

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Luke 2:41–52

Dec 18, 2012 by Gracia M. Grindal

I love this story about Jesus and his parents and am astonished by the author’s deep understanding of the human condition. Mary and Joseph were facing the adolescent years with a most unusual child, and yet we have only this one glimpse in scripture of that time in their lives.