Thursday Theology

Co-missioners, I preach extemporaneously, which has the disadvantage that I cannot share my manuscript with anyone who didn’t hear the sermon live. But sometimes I take notes, such as this past Good Friday. And sometimes I flesh them out after the fact. So …

Co-missioners,  Today I’m following a nudge from my co-editor, Robin Lütjohann, to recycle a piece I wrote ten years ago. It addresses two details in the Gospel for this coming Sunday, John 20:19-31. Both are commonly mishandled in treatments of this text, or so …

Co-missioners,Here are some seasonal musings emerging from a rich conversation at the delightful Zoom-based text study group organized by David Kukelhan et al. I give full credit to the members of that group for any original or amusing insights in this peace. A very blessed …

Co-missioners,  I live these days in the northeast corner of Ohio, twenty miles south of Lake Erie and fifteen miles west of Pennsylvania. I started serving in 2024 as a supply preacher for my ELCA synod. Most all the congregations I’ve …

Co-missioners,  Here is another artifact from last January’s Crossings Conference, the manuscript of a sermon preached at our gathering by Pastor Jack Busche.Mindful of the conference’s theme of wrestling with the relationship between the Gospel and “Christian behavior,” Jack warns us …

Co-missioners, I was planning to have something else for you today. It was going to be a Lenten lament about what seems to be some changes in the way the church I’m institutionally connected to is talking about God these days. I’m hearing less of the language …

Co-missioners,   When I heard Pastor Candice Wassell’s sermon during the Eucharist at the most recent Crossings Conference, I immediately thought two things: (1) This is good! (2) Other people should hear this – I wish we were recording this! Thankfully, the preacher …

Co-missioners, Today we share the last section of Adam Morton’s presentation at our recent Crossings conference. Here he’ll lead us still further down paths that few other thinkers seem willing to tread these days, littered as they appear to be with impossible contradictions. Charles Wesley and Luther will serve …

Co-missioners, We continue through Adam Morton’s presentation on the “passive life” Christians, this time with part three (section IV), my favorite, in which he compares the Christ-trusting person who becomes a passive conduit for God’s grace to “a series of tubes”. I find …