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Mark 13:1-31

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

I for one am heartily glad that the millennium (and its attendant madness) is well behind us. I'm glad that the millennium comes only once in a, well, millennium. The major reason for my relief is that I became sick of "Millennium Fever" and the doom-saying prophecies that (mercifully) did not come to pass. End of the world prophecies are nothing new, of course. They were around for centuries bef...

2. Hanging the Law on Love

Mark 12:28-34

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

Compared to some of the pericopes from Mark's Gospel, this one seems a piece of cake. "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength ... You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (vv. 29-31). That's straightforward enough! In fact, we might stumble over only fo...

3. Heart Transplant

John 8:31-41

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

Imagine the scene: you are in the doctor's office, an array of EKGs, echocardiograms, and other test results splayed around the room. The doctor's face is grim but resolute. "Your heart is so severely damaged that you will surely die without a transplant. I've placed your name on the waiting list; in a few months, we'll schedule the surgery and when it's over, God willing, you'll be healed. No mor...

4. In the Hot Seat

Mark 10:35-45

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

Everybody who thinks you could have done better than James or John, raise your hands. "If I worked up the nerve to ask Jesus to do anything I ask him to," most of us probably think, "I'd have done a lot better than their lame-brained request. Sitting next to Jesus when he comes into his glory -- what nerve! I'd have asked for something much more worthy -- an end to war, or a cure for cancer, or at...

5. The Dangerous Truth

John 18:28-40

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

I'd rather hear Saint Matthew talk about Christ the King. His story of the Last Judgment is vivid. Concrete acts are laid out. "As you have done to the least of these," Jesus says, "you have done to me." We may disagree or cringe, but we can picture this King claiming kinship with the lowly. Luke's story is good, too. Jesus hangs between two criminals and promises to one that "today you will be w...

6. The Impossible Option

Mark 10:17-31

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

Before there was Harry Potter, there was Bilbo Baggins, the hobbit. In J. R. R. Tolkien's wise fantasy, this short, hairy-footed resident of the Shire in Middle-Earth was a well-to-do bachelor and country squire. Comfortable and conventional, but just a touch bored with life, he nevertheless was shocked when the mysterious wizard, Gandalf, knocked on his door one spring morning and requested his s...

7. The Making of a Saint

John 11:38-44

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

Today's Gospel is difficult to preach on All Saints' Sunday. The story of the raising of Lazarus is familiar and uplifting, but this section is a little awkward. We enter just in time to witness Jesus' tears and anguish, some graphic words about how the body would smell, an odd little prayer, and -- almost as an afterthought -- the calling forth of four-day-dead Lazarus, still bound in his shroud,...

8. When Nothing Is Everything

Mark 12:35-40

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

I was startled by a recent analysis of per capita charitable contributions by state. Massachusetts, with the fourth highest personal income in the country, ranked last in charitable contributions. Mississippi, forty-ninth in income, ranked first in actual dollars contributed. Mississippians gave, on average, about forty percent more to charity than did their Yankee cousins! Converted to percentage...

9. Will the Real Blind Beggar Please Stand Up?

Mark 10:46-52

Sermon

Cathy A. Ammlung

It's easy to slap some people down. Little kids, poor people, beggars, the handicapped, foreigners, old people, minorities ... the list goes on. Sit down and shut up and be grateful for what you have. What do you know? Who asked you? You should be seen and not heard. Those are things we say -- or maybe have had said to us. That's assuming the person in question isn't being ignored into oblivion. W...

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