This week we’re reading Luke 18:31-19:10, the stories the disciples being unable to comprehend Jesus’s impending death and resurrection, a blind man asking Jesus to regain his sight, and Jesus inviting himself to the home of Zacchaeus. Each of these stories, we realize, is about perception—who is able to see correctly and whose vision is blocked. The disciples cannot grasp Jesus’s words about his suffering, death, and resurrection, perhaps mercifully so, since seeing clearly what was about to transpire may have been more than they could handle. With some irony, we note that it is the blind man who sees correctly, recognizing Jesus as the Son of David and having the courage to imagine that a new reality is possible for him. And while Zacchaeus famously climbs a sycamore tree to see Jesus, it is the crowd who misperceives Zacchaeus, accusing him of being a sinner when in fact he is living a righteous life. Who is it we misperceive, we sonder, and how might we be bold enough to imagine a new reality?

This week we read Luke 16:19-31, the story of the rich man and Lazarus. What a rich and evocative story about wealth, and suffering, and isolation – about excess and need and compassion.  What blocks the flow of compassion in the different scenarios of this story, and in our own world – when is it a chasm, and when is it just a gate? What is the difference between having been told something, and knowing it – and how do we cross THAT chasm? What happens when we build a life that insulates us from all suffering – our own, and that of others?

This week we’re reading the parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin, and the Lost Son as told in Luke 15:1-32. While these stories are sometime read separately, we find that reading them together puts them in a different light, one that draws our attention to the value of each individual, the importance of the whole community, and especially the tendency of the kingdom of heaven to break out into a party. Whoever we are—whether the one who has wandered off, the one who made poor decisions, or the one who feels overlooked and unappreciated—we are invited into the party, too. Come one, what are we waiting for?

This week we read Luke 13:1-9, 31-35, a text that raised the biggest of questions for us. What exactly is the connection between sin and death that Jesus is getting at when he talks about the the Galileans who died at the hand of Pilate, or that freak accident with the tower? How does it hit readers for Jesus to explicitly name his imminent death as central to his purpose in going to Jerusalem, rather than letting us think of it as an unfortunate side effect of his work? We really felt the pull of his lament for Jerusalem – his deep knowledge of what is possible and what is meant for this holy city, and also his awareness of how the world has pressed it in another direction. His outcry rises up from the gaping chasm between them.  And our world, too, is broken in so many ways. So in this broken world, what does the fact of our death mean about how we should live?  

This week we’re reading two stories that are often read separately, the Good Samaritan parable and Jesus’s visit with Mary and Martha as told in Luke 10:25-42. The Good Samaritan has us thinking about the question of our obligations to our neighbors in need. When a lawyer asks Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?,” Jesus responds with a story that seems to dispense with the category of neighbor altogether, instead insisting that one must show compassion to whomever is in need. The Mary and Martha story leads us to think about the legitimate tasks of ministry and how they can sometimes be a distraction from listening to Jesus, which is the one thing a divine voice has commanded in this Gospel.

Our reading for Ash Wednesday is Luke 9:51-62–a real pivot point in Luke’s story. Jesus sets his face to go to Jerusalem, and the story gains a sense of focus, momentum, and urgency. Should we be surprised, then, that he wastes no energy on anger or retaliation when the Samaritans won’t host him? Should we be surprised that he asks people he encounters to follow him right there onthe spot, without a care for the people and responsibilities they leave behind? That’s a hard ask to understand if we’re just talking about your average Tuesday. But Jesus isn’t in ordinary time anymore.

This week we’re reading the stories of Jesus’ transformation on the mountain top and the disciples’ failed attempt to heal a possessed boy as told in Luke 9:28–45. We discuss the significance of Jesus’s transfiguration and the importance of the command from the heavenly voice, “Listen to him!” We talk about the appearance of Moses and Elijah and the coming Exodus that Jesus will undergo in Jerusalem through his crucifixion and resurrection. And we wrestle with the urgency Jesus must feel, knowing that the end of his life is near, and his frustration at the disciples’ inability to exercise the power he has given them. We wonder what power has been given to us, and whether we, too, might be able to cast out the demons that surround us, if only we could learn to believe.

This week, we are reading Luke 7:36-50, where Jesus, a Pharisee named Simon, and a woman who is a sinner come together at a dinner party. The emotional intensity of this story is hard to overstate. As the woman cries over Jesus’s feet, we wonder – what is the tenor of emotion that has cracked her open? Is it guilt & pleading? Gratitude or vulnerability? Is it longing?  Jesus says that her faith has saved her, but what can we say about her faith from this short story where she never speaks? And how is it that she is laid bare in Jesus’s presence, when the dinner host seems so ... calm?

This week we’re reading Luke 7:18-35. John the Baptist has been in prison since Jesus’s baptism, so he hasn’t been able to witness any of Jesus’ ministry for himself. Now he sends his disciples to Jesus to ask him if he is really the Messiah or if John should look for another. Imagine John, the great disciple preparing the way for the Lord, suddenly doubting his faith in Jesus. Rather than make a declaration to John, Jesus tells John that the blind see, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news proclaimed to them. That should be enough, Jesus seems to say. Among all our squabbles about who Jesus is or isn’t, who he should be or shouldn’t be, all that matters is that the hurting are being healed and that poor are receiving good news. 

This week, we are reading Luke 7:1-17 – stories of two miraculous healings, both of which seem to focus more on the person who is well, who is concerned or bereaved, than on the person whose body is failing. What might that tell us about the nature of healing, or faith, or community? And of all the suffering one might alleviate, why does Jesus respond to these two cases? One, an Israelite woman who mourns her son, one a Roman man concerned for his slave. A powerful person and a vulnerable one. Is there a system at play? Is that even the right question?