Drew Downs
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Standing Among Us
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8 min read
John the Baptist returns for Advent 3B (John 1:6-8,19-28). But do we handicap the truth by expecting honesty in response to a dishonest question? Advent 3B | John 1:6-8,19-28 Who are you? This is the question the priests and Levites were sent to ask. Sent. By whom? The Pharisees. So why are the Pharisees sending the…
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Rethink the Gospel for Advent 3B – Who are you?
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5 min read
Advent 3B | John 1:6-8,19-28 Two weeks in a row, the preacher gets to deal with John the Baptizer. And some of the elements sound repetitive. The quote from Isaiah, the preaching and preparing of the way, for instance. It is a subtle switch from Mark to John. And yet, while we might have the…
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Repentance–Turning Toward Love
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7 min read
In preaching repentance, John reveals the surprising truth about the mission of Jesus. That we are first called to admit that we were wrong. Advent 2B | Mark 1:1-8 Reading the opening verses of Mark, we’re often struck by what’s not there. There’s no Mary and Joseph. No trip to Bethlehem, to David’s city. We…
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A Better Lord’s Prayer
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7 min read
Is it time to change the Lord’s Prayer? “Do not let me fall into temptation because it is I who fall, it is not God who throws me into temptation and then sees how I fell,” – Pope Francis I For many Christians, the ubiquity of the Lord’s Prayer is everything. Because of that, I…
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The Purpose of Punishment
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5 min read
We want punishment to communicate what it can’t. It’s bad at telling us what not to do and fails to tell us what to do. Punishment isn’t the point. The purpose of punishment is to communicate our intolerance of certain behaviors. It is not about feeling good exorcising our demons stealing the dignity of others…
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Rethink the Gospel for Advent 2B- The Long Beginning
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5 min read
Advent 2B | Mark 1:1-8 We dive into Advent with an apocalypse, which is the last thing we expect to receive at this moment. And then follow it up with John the Baptizer, screaming about repentance like a wild man and dunking people in the river. This is about the least “Christmas” the church can…