What does it mean that "faith comes by hearing?” Does that exclude seeing? No. Rather, it teaches that the spoken word is God’s primary mode of communication. Hearing is the primary source of faith, but God adds visual aids to bolster what we have heard. Thus, faith comes by hearing, but hearing is aided by seeing. In the Reformed tradition, we call these sacraments. Sacraments are like visual aids appended to the spoken word to nurture our faith.

Today is Easter, or to use its older name, Resurrection Sunday. On this day, Christ rose from the dead and left behind an empty tomb for his followers. Every year, during the Jewish Passover, we celebrate the hope of the resurrection—a hope that carries us from despair to freedom.

Today is Palm Sunday. Jerusalem is where all the action takes place. Jerusalem is the City of Heaven. Long considered the dwelling place of God, to get there, you have to ascend a mountain because it is built at elevation. Herein we discover a certain irony about Jerusalem. The City on a Hill ought to be the closest thing to heaven on earth, yet, in practice, it is the farthest thing from it. The Roman colonizers have transformed the City of Heaven into a dungeon of desecration.

Can Judas be redeemed? His life was tragic, but who among us has not done things we regret? Judas betrayed Jesus. However, if we take the mercy and providence of God seriously, then Judas can be saved. Karl Barth's analysis of the New Testament provides grounds for rethinking the old Reformed doctrine of limited atonement in light of God's infinite mercy and providential care. Grounds that make it possible for even Judas to be redeemed.

If someone asks you, ‘What is the Gospel?’ You can tell them the parable of the prodigal son. Because everything that Jesus is and does is conveyed in this short parable. Jesus is the prodigal son. He makes possible even the possibility of reconciliation between God and humanity because, as the prodigal, he squandered his father’s possessions in the far country before returning home. And we who are sinners are carried with and by Jesus on his way home. Because of him, we are reconciled to our God and Father.

As we enter the Third Sunday in Lent, the theme is repentance. We all have things we regret. Things we wish we could do over. The moral of the Gospel reading this morning is that God gives us second chances. John the Baptist came into the wilderness and said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” As we turn our faces toward Jerusalem this Lent, let us hear anew the urgency of the call to repentance.

If the theme last week was temptation, then today, it is grief. Abram was no stranger to grief. In a vision from God, he laments that God had given him no child. But Abram’s story is the story of God’s promise. God makes a promise to Abram that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky. And God is forever faithful to the promise.

Today is the First Sunday of Lent. Lent is a journey through the wilderness. It is a time of testing and hardship. But it is the will of the Spirit that drives us into the wilderness. The Holy Spirit is a destabilizing force in our lives. The Spirit is always on the move. Stirring the waters of our lives. Pushing us to get off the couch and do something. Because unless we are moving, we will never get to where God wants us to be.

When tragedy strikes, we often blame God. Our blame doesn't stem from God's absence so much as from our perplexity regarding the situation. The disciples were no different. When faced with the transfiguration of Jesus, they were unsure exactly what to make of it, and their confusion led them to make some false assumptions about God.

“Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you.” These are some of the sharpest imperatives of what might be called Jesus’ ethic of nonviolence. Nonviolence does something superior that retributive violence could never achieve. It disrupts the endless cycle of violence by depriving your enemy of hostility.