Gary Collins, Pastor Emeritus

In the Sermon on the Plain, Jesus describes those who judge others as trying to remove a speck from the other’s eye while having an I-beam in their own eye. A better approach would be to wash the feet of the other, trusting that God will guide their journey.

We  have a habit of judging the truthfulness and relevance of Scripture by our middle-class American values, rather than judging the truthfulness and relevance of our middle-class American values by Scripture. Luke’s Sermon on the Plain calls our value system into question.

Luke’s “Sermon on the Plain” is the little-known version of Matthew’s more popular “Sermon on the Mount.” When we read the stark economic emphasis of Luke’s sermon, it is no wonder that we either ignore it altogether, or we filter it through Matthew’s more spiritualized version. “Blessed are the poor” is a challenge to our […]

We often hear “The Great Commission” as being about us, our duty, our call, our commission. In fact, Jesus’ words begin and end with declarations about himself, his power and his presence in the world. Our “commission” is nothing less than an invitation to participate in what God in Christ is doing in the world.