St. Philip Lutheran Church4 April 2021 + Resurrection of Our LordJohn 20.1-18Rev. Josh Evans, preaching It was the strangest funeral I’ve ever led. I wasn’t allowed to pass out the bulletins I had brought. Everyone wore face masks. Even the family that had carpooled together was told to stand six feet apart from each other …
St. Philip Lutheran Church2 April 2021 + Good FridayJohn 18.1--19.42Rev. Josh Evans, preaching It was a groundbreaking image, the first of its kind. An actual image - not just a simulation - of a black hole. The first image of the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy, captured in April 2019, came …
Continue reading Black Holes, the Cosmos, and the Passion According to John
St. Philip Lutheran Church28 March 2021 + Palm/Passion SundayMark 14.1--15.47Rev. Josh Evans, preaching Reflection/Introduction: “I don’t even know what time means anymore,” admits one pastor in a recent essay for the Christian Century magazine. It’s not just the fact that she’s writing a reflection for a Holy Week issue in the midst of Advent to …
Continue reading The Passion According to St. Mark + Palm Sunday 2021
St. Philip Lutheran Church14 March 2021 + Lent 4BJohn 3.14-21Rev. Josh Evans, preaching “Why did Jesus have to die?” It was my first week as a chaplain intern. With just one year of seminary under my belt, the hospital handed me a badge and a key card and sent me on my way. Clinical Pastoral …
St. Philip Lutheran Church7 March 2021 + Lent 3BExodus 20.1-17; 1 Cor 1.18-25; John 2.13-22Rev. Josh Evans, preaching She wasn’t sure what she expected to happen, but it wasn’t that. She could never have imagined what happened next… You might even say it was unprecedented. That seems to be the word of the last year, …
St. Philip Lutheran Church28 February 2021 + Lent 2BMark 8.31-38; Genesis 17.1-7, 15-16; Romans 4.13-25Rev. Josh Evans, preaching https://www.youtube.com/embed/-bx8gwMjlQs You can imagine my surprise when I came home one day to the sound of rushing water. Did a pipe burst? Had there been a break-in? Was the toilet overflowing? No. The cats had discovered how …
St. Philip Lutheran Church17 February 2021 + Ash WednesdayMatthew 6.1-6, 16-21; Joel 2.1-2, 12-17Rev. Josh Evans, preaching “Ashes and anguish” - reads part of the headline of a recent article in the Los Angeles Times, chronicling the impact of the pandemic on local crematoriums. While the practice of cremation has gained increasing popularity and wider …
St. Philip Lutheran Church14 February 2021 + Transfiguration of Our LordMark 9.2-9; 2 Kings 2.1-12Rev. Josh Evans, preaching The thought of a week-long forecast of temperatures in the mid-90s - even reaching the lower 100s - seems unbearable … though maybe not altogether unwelcome on a snowy midwestern day with wind chills well below zero. …
St. Philip Lutheran Church31 January 2021 + Epiphany 4BMark 1.21-28Rev. Josh Evans, preaching What are you possessed by? The truth is we’re possessed by many things - politics, COVID, mental or physical illness, addiction, strained or broken relationships - to name a few. Some of us might feel possessed by our seemingly never-ending to-do lists, …
St. Philip Lutheran Church24 January 2021 + Epiphany 3BJonah 3.1-5, 10; Mark 1.14-20Rev. Josh Evans, preaching Fishing is dangerous work. I’m not talking about hazardous weather conditions at sea for people who make their living catching fish. No, I’m talking about when I was little, and my grandpa taught me how to fish in the …
Pastor Josh Evans 