Mark

Apparently some people are determined to get rid of Jesus—and some are willing to push through any barrier to get near him.

"And they took him with them in the boat." Why is Jesus suddenly in the passive role?

A new reformation of the seed and the corn is evolving.

When I was a child, I loved Palm Sunday because we got to act out the biblical version of a ticker-tape parade. Later I learned of the ephemeral quality of stardom and parades and decided that Palm Sunday and Passion Week belong together. As a pastor, I have accepted the dismal fact that most of our people skip Thursday, Friday and Saturday, slipping from parade pandemonium to Easter ecstasy with none of the suffering and pain.

Jesus and Peter care about each other enough to call each other out.

Jesus and Peter care about each other enough to call each other out.

The Christian church was born with Simon Peter’s mother-in-law.

True prophets have a different bottom line than false ones, but that doesn’t make them any easier to recognize.

If it were me, I would have stayed in the fishing boat or dithered about what to do until Jesus was just a speck on the horizon.

Will the water bring death or life?

There they all stood, gaping at the blinding wonder of the temple wall and thinking about how magnificent it was. That is, until Jesus stunned the group by blurting out, "Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down."

I read this week’s lectionary passages last summer in the Urubamba Valley in my native Peru, and in my native Spanish: “Pero Cristo ya vino, y ahora el es el Sumo sacerdote . . .” At first I resisted the Hebrews passage, as I prefer Jesus’ concrete teachings to more abstract theological concepts. So, while leading a tour group across the Andes, I turned to Mark: “And man must love God with all his heart and with all his mind and with all his strength; and he must love his neighbor as he loves himself.”

I remember seeing Helena, a widow, unfolding a $20 bill to put in the offering plate. I knew that her family was selling its possessions to pay the ransom for her only son, imprisoned by guerrillas.

This portion of the narrative is a continuation and expansion of what has just preceded. The other ten disciples are jealous, are angry with James and John because they have pushed Jesus—successfully—to give them a preeminent share in his destiny. Jesus has not criticized or dismissed their insistent demand but has lovingly transformed it from a desire for glory into a willingness to suffer. Still, why should some of the disciples be granted privileges over the rest?