Well, I
really don’t have any thoughts going in to this Sunday. That’s because I’m on
vacation (again!). Actually, this week of vacation has been—as usual for this
time of year—the week I devote to a personal continuing-education retreat.
Indeed, this note comes to you from the shores of Lake Huron, and the Lake
Huron Retreat Center.
One of the
topics I chose to study this year was St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. The
primary reason for this is that the lectionary gives us a wonderful opportunity
to spend some time in Ephesians this year. Beginning Sunday, July 15th,
we will immerse ourselves in a seven-week sermon series that I’ve entitled “God’s
Blueprint for the Church.”
Catchy
titles aren’t my ‘thing,’ but this one sorta seemed easy. After all, we’re in
the process of thinking and praying about future building projects concerning
our worship space—and the letter to the Ephesians is SO dominated by Paul’s
wisdom for building/building-up the Church.
In order to
prepare for this upcoming series, I would like to encourage everyone to read
the entire book of Ephesians at least once. It’s really not that long. Ideally,
you’ll find time to read it a couple of times—and perhaps even in different
variations of the Bible. Of course in only 7 weeks there won’t be time to hit
everything—and the lectionary doesn’t even try. Indeed, some of the most
culturally-conditioned and/or ‘controversial’ passages have been judiciously omitted
from the Sunday readings (that little part about wives submitting to husbands,
and slaves submitting to masters, for instance). Yeah, in a way we could say
that the lectionary got a little bit “lilly-livered” there, and I’m sure many
pastors breathed a sigh of relief ….as they won’t have to wrestle with those
particularly difficult passages. Nor will we wrestle with them—at least not in
the Sunday sermon. However, if all goes well, I will at least try to make
periodic posts on the “leftovers”…aka…the stuff that the lectionary left out.
Cheers,
TM
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