St. John’s Lutheran Church25 February 2024 + Lent 2bMark 8:31-38; Gen. 17:1-7, 15-16Rev. Josh Evans Life is messy … so why would we expect the life of faith to be any different? Abraham, later exalted by Paul as the pinnacle of faith, was far from perfect. From the beginning of his call, when he was …
St. John’s Lutheran Church18 February 2024 + Lent 1bMark 1:9-15Rev. Josh Evans In the beginning was the wilderness. Every First Sunday in Lent, we hear this story. Three out of four gospels – Matthew, Mark, and Luke – what biblical scholars call the “synoptic gospels,” for the way they “see together” the story of Jesus …
St. John’s Lutheran Church14 February 2024 + Ash WednesdayMatthew 6:1-6, 16-21Rev. Josh Evans “Do you guys ever think about dying?” Nothing brings a party to a screeching halt quite like an existential crisis. Barbie Land was a perfect utopia … until it wasn’t. Until the worries and anxieties of the very much not perfect Real …
St. John’s Lutheran Church11 February 2024 + Transfiguration of Our LordMark 9:2-9; 2 Kings 2:1-12Rev. Josh Evans It’s tempting to want to stay in certain moments, isn’t it? Moments where everything is dazzling and bright and clean and safe – far removed from the pain and brokenness we experience on an all-too-regular basis. It’s tempting …
St. John’s Lutheran Church4 February 2024 + Epiphany 5bMark 1:29-39Rev. Josh Evans Give the woman a break! As quickly as Jesus takes her by the hand, lifts her up out of bed, and cures her of her fever, she gets up and begins to serve them?! It sounds ridiculous – and a little sexist – …
St. John’s Lutheran Church28 January 2024 + Epiphany 4bMark 1:21-28Rev. Josh Evans Diana was a passionate and gifted art curator when she began to suffer from symptoms of Parkinson’s disease and dementia. Possessed by illness, she started to experience vivid hallucinations, while John tried his best to enter into his wife’s world, to see what …
St. John’s Lutheran Church21 January 2024 + Epiphany 3bMark 1:14-20Rev. Josh Evans What was he thinking? Inviting fishermen to follow him? Not exactly the upper echelon of society – but smelly, day-laboring fishermen without any formal education or social standing. People the world would just as easily cast aside. It’s almost as absurd as God’s …
St. John’s Lutheran Church14 January 2024 + Epiphany 2bJohn 1:43-51Rev. Josh Evans Three simple words. One profound – and dangerous – invitation. “Come and see.” Words spoken by Philip to Nathanael, echoing Jesus’s own in the scene just one day before, as he calls Andrew and Simon Peter, the first of his disciples, on the …
St. John’s Lutheran Church24 December 2023 + Nativity of Our LordLuke 2:1-20Rev. Josh Evans To be perfectly honest: I never really cared for the Christmas Eve ritual of lighting candles and singing “Silent Night.” Maybe it has something to do with — oh, I don’t know — that time I was attending midnight mass at …
St. John’s Lutheran Church24 December 2023 + Advent 4bLuke 1:46b-55Rev. Josh Evans Between two concerts, Beer & Carols, and a Festival of Nine Lessons & Carols, it’s been a very musical week. It started a week ago Saturday, when I had the opportunity to attend Joy & Harmony, the Albany Gay Men’s Chorus holiday concert, …
Pastor Josh Evans 