Text: Mark 9:38-50 Jesus says some really harsh words in this text from Mark’s Gospel. I have never seen these words slapped on a bumper sticker or sewn on a T-Shirt. They are troubling, deeply troubling words, and by far, they are the most troubling to those who insist that the Bible always be read literally: “The Bible says it. I believe it. That’s that!” In her book, Bread of Angels, Episcopal priest Barbara Brown Taylor is very convincing when she writes: “Walk into the

Text: Mark 9:30-37 Jennell and I have an extremely cute newborn nephew by the name of Jackson. And, in November, we will welcome the arrival of Sean and Maddie’s baby, who, I am sure will be equally cute. I love children. They can be so adorable, so cute. That said, I wonder if the child that Jesus held in his arms among the inner circle of his disciples was cute. We will never know. Mark tells us absolutely nothing about this child – not their name, not their favorite food,

September 12, 2021 Romans 12:17-21; Psalm 23 In Yaa Gyasi’s breathtaking novel, Homegoing, an aged mother takes the wounded hands of her adult son and says, “What I know now, my son: Evil begets evil. It grows. It transmutes, so that sometimes you cannot see that the evil in the world began as the evil in your own home. I'm sorry you have suffered. I'm sorry for the way your suffering casts a shadow over your life, over the woman you have yet to marry, the children you have