Questioning Jesus

As we read through the stories we have about Jesus, there is one thing that we find numerous times throughout the Gospels -- people are always questioning Jesus. Jesus is questioned by the Pharisees and other Jewish leaders. Jesus is questioned by his disciples. Jesus is regularly approached by random people on his journeys that have questions for him. There are even times that Jesus seems to question all that he is doing himself; consider his prayer in Gethsemane, for example. Truthfully, I think the questions didn’t stop with Jesus’ earthly ministry; many of us today still have questions for Jesus.

As we encounter these different questions in Scripture, we can see that they seem to have many different purposes. There are some who questioned Jesus in an attempt to trap him. There are some who wanted something from Jesus. There are some who simply want to understand what it is that Jesus is talking about. I think that there are those of us today who still ask questions of Jesus for all of these reasons and more.

Season of Creation: Mountain Sunday

This Sunday, we wrap up the season of creation with Mountain Sunday. What is it about mountains that can be at once holy, inspiring, and intimidating all at the same time? We will also consider the joys and perils of the "mountaintop experience."

Our starting point is the idea of the holy mountain found in Isaiah and in the Psalms (see Isaiah 65:17-25 and Psalm 48).

Season of Creation: Sky Sunday

This week, we continue our look at God's creation by considering the skies. We think about the role of the skies and heavens as a part of creation and throughout the Bible. We also consider an apocalyptic vision from Jeremiah that feels right at home in any number of post-apocalyptic stories in our modern world (see Jeremiah 4:23-28).

Season of Creation: Humanity Sunday

Today, we continue our focus on God’s creation -- both the act of creation and the things created -- by taking a look at humanity, that is, all the people who inhabit God’s creation. Picking up our reading in the book of Genesis where we left off last week (Genesis 1:26-28), we see that following the creation of the Earth itself, the skies, the seas, the sun, moon, and stars, the plants and all living creatures, God creates humanity. If you’ve been following along, you know that this is a continuation of the same day on which God created all the animals on land. On the fifth day of creation, God created the creatures of the sea and the birds of the air. Now on the sixth day, so far, God has created all of the wildlife on land -- the cattle and livestock, the crawling things, and all manner of animals. And seeing that it was good and pleasing, God continued by creating humans.

Season of Creation: Planet Earth Sunday

As we enter the month of September, we return again to the Season of Creation. Throughout the year, our readings routinely remind us of God’s providence, of all that God has done for us, of all that God has given us. But we don’t always dig into the details, and we rarely focus exclusively on God’s creation.

However, if we stop and think about it for a moment, the very act of creation is the beginning of God’s relationship with the world and ultimately with us. The Hebrew Scriptures, commonly called the Old Testament in the Christian Bible, begin with God forming creation into a pleasing design. God is pleased with the results as the Earth takes shape.