[RCL] Exodus 12:1-14; Psalm 149; Romans 13:8-14; Matthew 18:15-20 In our Gospel reading, we have a fruitful pairing. In one moment, Jesus is giving advice to his disciples, and by extension, the larger church about reconciling with one another. We might even be tempted to call it a church policy of sorts – or one…

[RCL]: Exodus 12:1-14; Psalm 149; Romans 13:8-14; Matthew 18:15-20 The ocean is one of the most beautiful of all God’s creations. If you sit at the shoreline, you can never see where the ocean ends. There is a lot to be learned from sitting and looking at the ocean; if you are present at high…

“If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.” (Matt. 18:15) Congregations are communities of people. They usually function well. Some have very strong central authorities, and others work better with…

Church conflict is nothing new. Sometimes people think there should be no conflict in church, as though by virtue of being Christians we can and should cover over all disagreements with niceness. Jesus in his teaching in our gospel lesson today seems to proceed on the baseline assumption that conflict in Christian community is normal…

Today’s gospel lesson is part of Jesus’ teaching about our life together in community, how it is that we are to live and love within the Christian community, especially when things go wrong. And because we are talking about human beings living in community, we can be fairly sure that things will go wrong. Our…

We thought last week’s gospel was the tough one, didn’t we? Last Sunday’s passage was the turning point in Matthew’s gospel – the point where Jesus begins to announce his fate. He begins telling his followers that his end is death and theirs, most likely, would be death, too. Remember, Peter said, “God forbid,” and…

Long ago the great Anglican priest and poet John Donne reminded us that, “no man is an island, entire unto himself.” For centuries we have considered a person living totally alone to be a hermit. More and more we are discovering that even in densely populated cities loneliness is a chronic, debilitating, and common condition….

Some of you might have seen the film Signs this summer. Behind the scary, horror movie surface of its narrative is the very human story of a priest whose wife has recently been killed in a car accident. As a result, the priest finds he is losing his faith in God. He has taken off…

The Gospel reading today deals with ways to settle disagreements and conflicts. How do you feel about disagreements? Do you avoid them? Do you hate them? Do you enjoy them? Do you always win them or lose them? Sometimes people have the impression that since we claim to be Christians, we will live in eternal…