A Famine Not of Bread

  Click here to listen to this sermon. “When [Jesus] saw the crowds, He had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest’” (Matthew 9:35–38). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Seeing. Calling. Sending. That is the movement in the Gospel reading for today. It is also the movement of Jesus’ response to those who are harassed and helpless, of God’s interaction with His fractured and fallen creation, and of the sanctified Christian life as it lives by the Spirit of Jesus. Jesus sees. Jesus calls. Jesus sends. As He goes throughout the cities and villages, Jesus sees. This is not a minor detail. Many people go through life wondering if anyone sees, anyone notices. If you listen closely, that is at the heart of many of our cur...

Click here to listen to this sermon. The text for today is our Gospel lesson, Matthew 9:9-13. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Most parents have felt the disappointment of having a carefully chosen gift spurned. You give a gift you hope will bond you together or re-create a particular joy of your own childhood—the thrill of your first fishing rod or the warm feeling you got from your Cabbage Patch doll—only to have the gift barely glanced at and quickly tossed aside. In such cases, even a polite “thank you” brings little comfort. On the other hand, few things delight parents as much as having a child so thrilled with a particular gift that he abandons the remaining unopened gifts to start playing with it. I remember the year our not-quite-two-year-old grandson, Andersen, got his first combine. The joy on his face and the way his whole body squirmed with delight said it all. No formal “thank you” was necessary. The gratitude was evident in the ...