As regular readers of 'Better Living' know, I'm inviting the people of the congregation I serve as pastor, Friendship Church, to prepare for Sunday worship by reading and responding to notes I leave here on the Bible texts around which that week's worship will be built.
I also hope that they and other readers of the blog will join an ongoing discussion in the comments sections of these posts.
This week's Bible passage is Matthew 25:14-30.
At present, I'm just going to link you to an interesting commentary on the passage written by Brian Stoffregen, a fellow Lutheran pastor in California, who writes and posts fantastic discussions of Gospel passages used in preaching. You can link to his commentary, insights, and questions about the passage here.
I intend to add some comments based on issues Stoffregen raises in a later post. Right now though, because we've just had the carpeting at our house steam-cleaned, including that area where I usually do my blogging, and I must wait for it to dry, I'm using my son's laptop in our kitchen. I'm finding it a bit awkward since I'm not accustomed to this keyboard. So, I don't want to undertake any major writing projects on it yet.
One other thing: On most Sundays, I use a Bible lesson from what is called a lectionary. A lectionary is simply a plan of Bible lessons for wirship and built around the Church Year. (I'll talk about that at another time, maybe.) The lectionaries of most denominations--that is, those denominations that use lectionaries--are almost the same, with only slight occasional variations.
The passage addressed here is a portion of the Gospel lessons likely to be used in most churches--at least Lutheran, Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, United Church of Christ, Episcopal, Methodist, American Baptist, and other ones--this coming Sunday. So, I hope that this and the other posts I may leave here this week help laypeople and clergy alike prepare hearts, minds, and wills for worship.
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