Sometimes our greatest threat is not from what others do to us but what we do to ourselves. When I first began serving as a solo pastor, I was eager to...

Several years ago, I began a new job thousands of miles from family and friends. Not long after settling in, the peculiar rhythms and challenges of the position left me lonely,...

The Temple leaders are flummoxed. For once, instead of having all the answers, they are at a loss for words. When they ask Jesus to account for his authority as God’s...

As a child, whenever I found myself complaining, hurt, or wishing ill-will on someone who had wronged me, my grandmother would say to me: “Always remember who you are and whose...

Living worthily of the gospel includes Christlike self-giving and God’s joyful generosity; friendship with God and equality with others; abandoning fantasies of security and accepting complexity; discerning God’s correction and God’s...

This selection from Psalm 105 includes the story of “bread from heaven” that we read in Exodus. When comparing this psalm to the version of the story in Exodus, the differences...

Read Exodus 16:12 a few times. How do you hear God’s voice? Aggravated, almost threatening? “I heard that! Here, take this and keep quiet!” Or gentle and promising? “Yes, children, I...

“If only we had died . . . in the land of Egypt, when we . . . ate our fill of bread.” When we go through liberating change, we may feel that the grass...

If the parable of the workers presents God’s grace in a story with surprising social contours, it fits well with what precedes it. In Matthew 19, Jesus overturns expectations about family...

The parable of the workers in the vineyard appears to take place in the familiar world of workers, bosses, and paychecks—including the perhaps all-too-familiar world of subsistence wages. But don’t let...