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Showing posts with the label Year B Proper 23

Sermon - Trinity XIII, 2026 - 2 Chronicles 28:8-15

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The Good Samaritan, Joseph Highmore, 1744   God’s People are Those Who Have Faith in Him We typically think my people are those who are like me externally History of the two kingdoms The Faithful Remnant of Samaria was more faithful than Judah We are God’s people through faith The lawyer asked Jesus: “ Who is my neighbor? ” That’s another way of asking: “Who are my people?” We ask this question because like prefers like and we want to love those people who are like us more than we love those who are not like us. This is a generally true principle in many facets of life. We do this in mostly playful ways with sports, where we greatly prefer our team which we identify with and we do not like the rival teams. This happens more seriously between countries, sometimes even to the point of war. This happens with some seriousness between political parties, sometimes leading to political assassinations. This happens in families when one family member defends another even through criminal be...

Sermon - Year B, Proper 23, 2024 - Mark 10:17-22

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If You Want to be Perfect (Christ and the Rich Young Man) , Andrey Mironov, 2017 Forsaking every earthly treasure to follow Christ Knowing Jesus and keeping the law is not enough Following Christ means we must forsake all worldly goods Greater Treasure in heaven awaits those who love the Lord alone “ He went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. ” Perhaps when you heard the readings this morning you were also filled with sorrow, because Jesus’ words are very challenging. “ Sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me. ” For the rich young man these words were devastating, because he was now at a crossroads and must choose either to follow Christ and gain a heavenly treasure, or follow this world and keep his worldly treasures. Today Jesus places us at the same crossroad, and our Lord bids us to forsake every earthly treasure to follow Him. The tempting thought for us though is that we can have both treasures: treasure on...