32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C, RCL)

People want to be champions. Psalm 98 offers something different.

God’s parentage operates by entirely different logic than human patriarchy.

The psalmist is bossy: “Sing to the Lord a new song.”

What do you want Jesus to do or say?

My church is located in the first municipality in the country with a public reparations fund.

Sometimes I picture its author looking down at us and shaking his head.

Sometimes someone else has to start singing before we can.

What men have placed a premium on, God has not.

Resurrection is where God is—across generations, across circumstances.

God loves the creation. In response the creation sings praise and adoration to God.

Job describes “an iron pen” with which words could be “engraved on a rock forever.” Few writers have such a pen. Even C. S. Lewis might well have been surprised that The Screwtape Letters has enjoyed such a long life. 

Some years ago, a small group in our church watched the award-winning documentary The Fog of War, in which former secretary of defense Robert McNamara talks about his life, especially the Vietnam War.

We need to be reminded, as we celebrate Pentecost, that the Spirit is always much bigger and more "other" than we normally think.