John the Baptist’s words in verse 7 strike out at the Pharisees and Sadducees of Matthew’s story with a quickness and venom fitting the snake imagery. Given only the scant background...

Welcome can feel like a familiar and comforting word. It appears on airport signs and doormats. We hang it on our walls and read it on websites. “Welcome home!” “We welcome...

Do God’s promises offer lessons, or limits? The audience for this Romans passage, the early Christian community in Rome, is caught up in questions of identity and belonging; those from the...

Although summer may seem like a distant memory and spring like a far-off promise during these early days of December in the global North, few things draw the mind as quickly...

Imagine an ideal political leader or Supreme Court justice. What skills would he or she possess? What characteristics might be her trademarks? What might he wear? A belt of righteousness or...

Do not let babies play with venomous snakes. It does not take parenting books, care guidelines, or child protection policies to teach us that; the thought of a chubby infant arm...

There is a popular bumper sticker I see often in the San Francisco Bay Area, “Jesus is coming. Look busy.” I imagine many people put this sticker on their car to...

There is a woman named Betty who prays for peace every Sunday. She has been doing this for as long as I have known her, and certainly since the wars in...

When I ordered internet service at my new home, the sales person gave me a four-hour window of time during which the technician would come to install my cable service. I...

Today is Thanksgiving, a day when many gather around tables to celebrate family and to give thanks to God for the blessings of the past year. Yet it can be a...