Lectionary Readings
(from the Revised Common Lectionary)
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This lectionary covers the next thirty days. For full lists, see the seasons and years below.
Sunday, January 5, 2025
Second Sunday after Christmas Day—Christmas, Year C
Summary
Though John 1 was read on Christmas Day, the reality of sparse church attendance in modern America means that this Sunday will likely be the first time it is heard by most of the congregation, so the themes of the Christmas Day commentary may be safely repeated. The option to extend the passage to verse 18 brings a new valence for the preacher to expound: Jesus is God made visible. Though no one has seen the God the Father, Jesus, the "only begotten God" has "expressed" the Father (v. 18) perfectly. This is how Jesus can assure Philip in 14:9, that he who has seen him has seen the Father and is not in need of fuller revelation.
Monday, January 6, 2025
Epiphany of the Lord—Epiphany, Year C
Summary
The Epiphany season focuses on three traditional manifestations: the magi (celebrated on January 6), Jesus' baptism, and the Miracle at Cana. Luke gives a brief account, with no mention of John's protestations, so the preacher may focus on the meaning of the scene itself. At his baptism, Jesus stands in the place of sinners. This is the most important part of the picture. Jesus' ministry would be one of repentance and also accompaniment: he would stand with sinners and accompany them to everlasting life. Jesus' nearness to sinners is a theme the Gospels return to again and again. Jesus shows up for them in the market and at their dinner tables, consorting with them in public and in private. His baptism shows that intent to go everywhere with them, even to be baptized, when he is the only one who needs no purification. Traditionally, the church also understood Jesus as himself "baptizing" the very waters that would go on to baptize the church, giving them their purifying power. The Holy Spirit's descent seems to confirm this, and it is also a foreshadowing of what will happen at the baptisms of all Christians. As John says: Jesus' baptism is not water only, but it also brings the Holy Spirit with it.
Sunday, January 19, 2025
Second Sunday after the Epiphany—Epiphany, Year C
Summary
Cana is the final manifestation of Christ celebrated in Epiphany. Here, he reveals himself to his disciples. There is much more to the story than meets the modern eye. First, John speaks of the events transpiring on "the third day" after the fifth day of a week of Jesus' opening ministry in chapters 1 and 2, which by ancient numbering makes it the seventh day of the week. That this miracle simultaneously happens on the "third day" and the seventh day signifies that what Jesus does here links together Jesus' resurrection and the work of a new work of a new creation. Clearly this is more than just helping out at a party. Each detail is worth calling to the congregation's attention. Mary's statement "they have no wine" recalls Isaiah 24 and 25 where it is foretold that God will reverse Israel's downfall, signified by a lack of wine, with a great feast of "well aged wine." Jesus' answer "what does this have to do with us?" makes clear that his miraculous power isn't available for solving the pedestrian problem of running out of drinks. He is up to something more. By providing the wine, Jesus identifies himself as the true bridegroom of the heavenly feast, bringing out the wine to fill his people. However, the "hour" yet to come which Jesus speaks of (a recurring theme throughout John) shows that the wine foretold in Isaiah is in fact the blood of the Messiah, poured out on the Cross at the hour of his crucifixion, glorified in his resurrection, and distributed at the Eucharist at the church's hour of prayer. In the Eucharist, the blood of the Messiah is actually consumed and the people of God partake in the eternal feast which will end with death swallowed up by God for all time. The six stone water pots for the rite of purification signify the old law's insufficiency, since six is one less than seven, the number of completion and fullness. Here Jesus makes clear that he is not just a Josiah-like figure reforming Israel to her old ways but the generation of something new, indeed the very thing the law had always pointed to: the great feast at the end. Just as one washes one's hands before the feast, so too did the law prepare the people for the coming of Jesus the Bridegroom.
What to take from this swirl of prophecy and portent? First, that Christ's objective is not simply to wash the sins off of people, as at the water jars, but to fill them with God's own life. Also that Jesus is not a guest in our lives, helping us get out of jams from time to time, rather we are guests in his life and invited to the final marriage between God and humanity.
Sunday, January 26, 2025
Third Sunday after the Epiphany—Epiphany, Year C
Summary
Jesus announces his ministry publicly by invoking the messianic prophecy in Isaiah 61:1-2 and 58. Luke reminds frequently that same Spirit that inspired Isaiah is in Jesus (cf. Lk 4:1, 4:14), emphasizing the continuity of God's words in the Old Testament scriptures with Jesus' teaching ministry. This claiming of the messianic mantle was misinterpreted--both in Jesus' day and in ours, as political liberation--as a statement of political liberation. But the jubilee promised by Jesus is not immediate liberation from temporal powers but from the power of death itself. However, the gospel does have immediate temporal consequences. "The poor" are not an abstraction here, and the preacher must not spiritualize the idea. The poor are those with unfulfilled physical needs. Jesus habitually reserves special blessings for the poor, and it is to them that the gospel is primarily addressed. This does not restrict the good news from the comfortable and well off--since all are ultimately subject to the same corruption and death--but it does establish God's focal point for his work on earth. If the message preached and ministry enacted by our churches is not good for the needy then it is good for nobody.
