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Matthew 21: 33-46
Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of East Amwell NJ, October 4, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
Today we are celebrating World Communion Sunday. This is a great day of inclusiveness joining Christians from all over the world to share in this meal that the Lord has prepared for us. The inclusiveness of Christians in every time and space coming together to share this meal is the centerpiece of this day.
In contrast, in today’s lectionary we have Jesus, flat out telling the religious leaders of Israel that the Kingdom of God will be taken away from them. Because of their wickedness they will be excluded from it. We have (I think) a purposeful juxtaposition of the themes of Exclusion and Inclusion. In our lectionary, we have Jesus telling the religious leaders that they will be excluded from and that God’s Kingdom will be taken away from them. Then on our church calendar, we have this special celebration of inclusiveness.
At the same time as we are coming to celebrate the inclusiveness of the Lord’s Supper, we are challenged to confront the parable of the wicked tenants. The wicked tenants who in the very words of the religious leaders Jesus was confronting should be put “to a miserable death.” A death that I suspect they would have exacted were those wicked tenants brought before them for justice.
Ultimately, Jesus takes the religious leaders that he is debating with to the conclusion that they will lose their ability to enter God’s Kingdom. The parable’s theme is centered on the notion of the exclusion of the wicked – those who have abused their rights to be tenants of the God’s vineyard or from entering the Kingdom of God at all.
These two themes are stark in how they stand in opposition from each other. And we Christians have to deal with them both. That’s the challenge.
In his parable, Jesus is clearly painting a picture of how He and God view the mismanagement of God’s vineyard by the chosen people that God has entrusted it to.
But before we get into today’s parable, let’s look at some of the background to what is happening in Matthew’s story line. This is the week leading up to Passover. Jesus has just entered Jerusalem on what we call Palm Sunday. Huge crowds have greeted him shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David.” Calling Jesus, the Son of David is assigning to him a Messianic title of a King. Calling out “Hosanna,” which means “Save us!” this was tantamount to raising the flag of rebellion.
These are two very dangerous things that will catch the eyes of the Roman authorities. The Chief Priests and Pharisees are rightly concerned that they will lose control of the people and the city. They have to be careful that nothing happens that would make the Romans think that a possible uprising was about to occur. Because that would threaten their authority over the Temple and the city. They need to keep a lid on what’s happening.
What happened next? Jesus enters the Temple and causes a riot whipping the vendors and overturning the money changing tables and then ultimately driving them out of the Temple.
This is not the quiet religious festival that the religious authorities planned on or that the Romans expected. No. Jesus has entered the city in a grand procession. The people are calling him their King and shouting that he should save them from their oppressors.
So, the chief priests and Pharisees go to him and demand to know by what authority he has done these things. Jesus refuses to debate with them and instead asks them to answer his question concerning John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?” They answer by saying, “We don’t know.” Then Jesus refuses to answer their question. From there we proceed to today’s lectionary.
Jesus has obviously had enough of these religious authorities and is going to confront them directly by challenging their hypocrites.
So, Jesus begins, “Listen to another parable.” “There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it. He put a winepress in it and he built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect the rents due to him. The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. When the vineyard owner heard of this, he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way – beating, killing and stoning them. Ultimately, he sent his son to them thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So, they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
Jesus then presents them with this question, “Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” “He will bring those wretches to a miserable death,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.” Jesus allows their own words to condemn them.
Then Jesus brings it all to a conclusion, “Therefore, I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce good fruits of the Kingdom.
Now make no mistake, the religious leaders listening to Jesus understood every word and symbolisms in this Parable. The representation of the vineyard to be the nation of Israel. Yeah, they got that. In Isaiah 5:7, the prophet clearly states, “The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel.” They knew their sacred scripture, and they knew Israel was meant to be the Lord’s vineyard. They understood the meaning of the hedge line and the protection it provided. They understood the purpose of the winepress and the benefits of the watchtower. They got all that. What they hadn’t yet seen was that they were the wicked tenants that they had just condemned to death.
And the Lord of Hosts that Isaiah was speaking of had given Israel everything it could need to bear good fruit and to make the Lord’s vineyard grow. In the parable, the vineyard owner sets up the vineyard with a hedge and a watchtower to protect it from wild animals and thieves. Throughout Israel’s history we know the stories of how the Lord had protected Israel from its enemies acting as its hedge line and its watchtower. The vineyard owner provides a winepress to make wine from the harvest the vineyard produced. Though it never understood its role, Israel was expected to go into the nations to till and cultivate God’s good soil and bring in a good harvest.
Israel was given the promised land of milk and honey. It was made strong by good kings who feared the Lord and kept the Lord’s precepts. Israel had been given every opportunity to grow and prosper and to make the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts spread throughout creation sharing the good fruits of the harvest.
But Israel did not. Instead, Israel turned away from the pathway that God had laid out for them. They made alliances with foreign kings and brought their foreign gods into God’s Temple and worshipped them there. They no longer feared the Lord. They no longer followed the precepts of the Lord or kept God’s Commandments. In fact, Israel’s religious leaders had constructed their own laws so that they could circumvent many of the God’s Ten commandments.
How did God respond to their infidelity? God sent prophets as messengers to speak to the people and remind them of their covenant relationship with the Lord.
But how did Israel respond to God’s messengers? Legend has it that Jeremiah and Habakkuk were stoned to death. God’s messenger Zechariah was murdered in the Temple. Then too, God’s prophet, Micah was killed by King Joram.
In the parable, the vineyard owner’s messengers were beaten and stoned. They were killed. And ultimately the vineyard owner’s Son was murdered.
Now Jesus asks the religious leaders this question, “What is the vineyard owner to do?” Jesus lets them use their own words to hang themselves. “He will bring those wretches to a miserable death, and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”
Now the hammer falls on them, Jesus looks them square in the eye and tells them, “Therefore, I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”
Jesus was casting judgment over the mismanagement of the Lord of Hosts vineyard by the religious leaders.
He builds it all to a crescendo telling them the kingdom of God will be taken away from them and given to those who will produce the fruits of the kingdom. This is a demonstrative act of exclusion. Jesus is making a judgment that the kingdom of God will be taken away from Israel and from the religious leaders to whom it was entrusted, and it will be passed on to those who will make it bear good fruit.
That is where our lectionary reading for today takes us. It is harsh. It casts judgment. It is a terrible and demonstrative act of exclusion that takes away the Kingdom from those religious leaders.
What Jesus does later in the week (on the day we now call Maundy Thursday) was to create something for his disciples that would be a forever remembrance of him. Later at the close of his Gospel, Matthew records the charge Jesus gave the made his disciples the new tenants of the Lord’s vineyard. You know it.
“All authority in heaven and on the earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations…” You know the rest.
This was the same charge that God had given Israel – to share God’s Shalom with all creation. But it did not. So now, Jesus passes that charge onto the new tenants of the vineyard. Go out into the world and share the good news story of God’s reconciliation and salvation with all of creation. That is the task passed onto us.
So, standing in juxtaposition to this act of exclusion where Jesus took away the vineyard from those wicked tenants, we have World Communion Sunday. Today we have the celebration of the meal that Jesus had prepared for his disciples and because of the authority given to him that he passed on to those disciples. It is the same meal that he has prepared for us. Today we have the meal – through which Jesus had created for the world – a new covenant. One in which he gave up his body for our sins and then sealed that Covenant with his blood.
In this Communion meal, Jesus is calling us to gather together as all the faithful in every time and place. On World Communion Sunday he opens his arms to gather in ALL the faithful from around the world, joining us together in one inclusive celebration of the Lord’s Supper. We do it in remembrance of him and we do it in remembrance of all that he has taught us. Now go out into the world and make it so.
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Matthew 21: 23-32
Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of Franklin, NJ on September 27, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
OK. So right at the beginning of today’s gospel reading, the chief priests and elders of the people charge right up to Jesus and demand to know of him “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”
Let’s stop for a moment right here. If you haven’t been following Matthew’s Gospel these past weeks, let’s stop to refocus our memories it.
This portion of Matthew’s Gospel is telling about the day after Jesus had entered Jerusalem in triumph. That is the day after what we call Palm Sunday. Jesus has entered the city to a cheering crowd who were yelling aloud, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”
Now let’s look carefully at what that means.
“Hosanna” translates to “save us”.
Calling Jesus, “the son of David” is assigning to him not only a kingly title but a Messianic title, as well. “Hosanna, to the son of David” The people were calling Jesus as the Messiah to assume his rightful place as heir to the house of David, and as God’s Messiah raise an army and free the people from Roman subjectivity. They were praising Jesus as a military king entering the city on the fold of a donkey to liberate it from Roman domination.
Matthew says that when Jesus entered the city, it was thrown into turmoil.
That was the first thing that precedes today’s Gospel. The next was that Jesus entered the Temple and in a fit of rage overthrows the tables of the money changers and the vendors selling animals approved for sacrifice.
Jesus drove them out of the Temple yelling, “My house shall be called a house of prayer; but you make it a den of robbers.” “My house” referring to his Father’s house. Jesus is outraged that the chief priests and elders have turned it into a business selling franchises to vendors exchanging money and selling sacrificial animals. These very vulgar and offensive activities were taking place within the walls of the Temple. Jesus rightly defended the sanctity of God’s holy and sacred house in the most violent display of his ministry.
And then once he had driven away all of that inequity and dishonesty, once he had cleared away the defilement of his Father’s house, he sat down teaching the people and curing the blind and the lame.
Matthew tells us the chief priests and the scribes watched him in amazement. Children were gathering around Jesus praising him saying, “Hosanna to the son of David.” They were stunned by what was happening. They were besides themselves unsure of what they should or could do about Jesus.
At the end of the day, Jesus left the city, went out to the village of Bethany and spent the night there.
So now in today’s passage, he returns to the city from Bethany and enters the Temple. And as we have heard today, the elders of the people and the chief priests immediately go up to him to demand to know “By what authority are you doing these things, and … and who gave you this authority?”
By what authority do you enter the city as a king on the folds of a donkey allowing the crowds to call you the son of David, by what authority do you overthrow the tables of the money changers and vendors who [by the way] we [the authorities of the Temple] have approved of, and by authority do you take over the Temple and sit here teaching and curing people just days before the Passover disrupting all of the atonement sacrifices of the people that must be made?
This is the thing. The chief priests, the Pharisees and Sadducees and the elders of the people, were the controlling authorities in the Temple and Jerusalem but … but only as long as they maintained the peace. The Romans allowed their religious festivals and these enormous gatherings of the people in the city only if these gatherings remained peaceful. If things got out of hand, if there were demonstrations like Jesus’ Palm Sunday entry into the city; if there unruly confrontations like the one Jesus caused in the Temple, then the Roman garrison would enter the city and take control. That meant a military confrontation. The chief priests, the Pharisees and the elders of the people had a lot at stake and a lot to lose.
Do you get a picture of the dynamic that is at play here?
But this is only half of the story. Jesus has a lot at stake here, too. He could answer their questions. He could make an outright claim that he was God’s Anointed One. He could have done that and claimed all the authority he needed as the son of David and rightful king of Israel. He could have done that. But that would have sent God’s plan for salvation spiraling off in the wrong direction.
If he had made those claims of authority one of two things might happen. Either the people would have rushed to crown him as their earthly king and begun an uprising against the Roman authority or the chief priests and elders would have arrested him immediately putting the Cross ahead of God’s schedule. Jesus still needed more time with his disciples and still more quiet time with God to prepare for what was to come.
You see either way, Jesus couldn’t allow either of these possibilities to happen. He couldn’t because the timing was not yet right. He was not the Messiah that the people wanted him to be, and he still needed time to get that idea across, especially to his disciples. God’s plan had been put into motion, but Jesus could not allow it to be rushed. Jesus was not ready. God’s plan was not supposed to roll out in that way.
So, Jesus turns the tables on the chief priests and elders yet again. He says to them, “I will ask you one question, if you tell me the answer, then I will tell you by what authority I do these things.” OK. That seems fair. We answer a question and then we get him to incriminate himself and then we have him arrested for inciting a rebellion. It seems simple enough. What could go wrong?
Here is Jesus’ question, “Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?”
Oh, no! What? How do they answer that question? They argue between themselves. “If we say that it was from heaven, then he will ask why did you not believe him? If we say from human origin, then the crowds will attack us for they considered John a great prophet.” Their conclusion – the safe answer, they thought, “We do not know.”
Jesus’ answer, perhaps with sadness in his eyes because these priests and elders were refusing to acknowledge John’s authenticity and his message to repent and make straight the way of the Lord.
Jesus’ answer, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”
Now the confrontation could have ended there but Jesus goes one step further to expose their hypocrisy. Jesus poses to them this question. And remember everyone is watching – the disciples and the people.
“What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ ‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.”
“Which of the two did the father’s will?”
“The first,” they answered.
Jesus said to them, (now comes the hammer) “Truly I tell you, these tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but these tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.”
Could you imagine their outrage now? Jesus has just pronounced to these holier than thou elders, Pharisees, and chief priests who are all dressed in the sacred robes that denoted their rank and authority that those hated tax collectors, and the defiled prostitutes would enter the kingdom of God ahead of them.
Why? Because despite of their sinful lives and livelihood these two highly disrespected and disreputable People of the Land had heard John’s message and repented and turned back to God. But you, the highly respected People of the Law, had heard John’s message and choose not to believe.
We need to also place this parable of the two sons alongside that of the wicked tenants. You recall the one where the tenants of the vineyard refused to pay the rents due the landlord and when he sent his son to collect them, they beat and killed him. They refused to acknowledge the Lordship of the vineyard owner. This frames Jesus’ view of how these chief priests and elders had corrupted their roles as the religious leaders of Israel. They were refusing to acknowledge the voice of God spoken to them by John and by Jesus.
So right here, Jesus makes it clear who of God’s lost sheep the Good Shepherd is called to seek out and return to the God’s fold. These lost ones (the tax collectors and prostitutes) have heard the voice of their Shepherd and have returned to the safety of his care. These are the lost sheep of God’s fold that he had been sent to rescue and provide salvation. That was John’s message and you rejected it. You are refusing to hear the voice of God speaking to you. You are rejecting me. You are rejecting God’s Kingdom.
Holy (expletive deleted)!
If the elders and chief priests weren’t angry before, they sure were now. For all their sanctimonious displays, for all their rituals and superficial sacrifices, for all the smoke and mirrors that they use to bamboozle the people, Jesus sees right through them and berates them placing the tax collectors and prostitutes before them at the gates of God’s Kingdom.
Now I said before that Jesus could not allow God’s plan to be rushed. Well, I think that now he has lit a match to a powder keg igniting the events that would lead to the Cross just two days hence.
We can see two lessons from this encounter that Jesus has with the elders and priests.
The first is that there is a difference between Words and Actions. In the parable, the first son symbolizes the tax collectors and prostitutes who had reject God’s word initially but who ultimately with their actions repented and returned to hear the voice of God. The second son represents the religious leaders of Israel who profess their obedience, but who failed to act it out in their lives. Jesus clearly says that obedience is measured by actions not professions.
The second lesson is that repentant sinners will enter the Kingdom of God before the religious elite who made only showy displays of superficial obedience. Those sinners believed John’s message of repentance and that leads to righteousness. The religious leaders saw and heard John’s message of repentance but refused to believe it. That led to a denial of God’s Word and a sin of a more heinous nature.
There you have it. The lines were drawn. Not just between Jesus and the religious leaders but between those whose actions reveal their true hearts and those who prefer a showy exterior that conceals a heart both cold and hardened refusing to hear the voice of God.
My friends, this is the question that Jesus asks of you. Where is your heart?
When the Father asks you to go, do you say, “I will go”, but then blow God off thinking no one sees.
Or do you hear the voice of the Shepherd calling you and repent your sinfulness and submit to the will of the Father.
My friends, your actions matter. The faith in your hearts must be seen through your actions. Profession is one thing. Faith in action is what makes God’s righteousness alive in the world. That is the work in the vineyard that we are called to do.
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Matthew 16: 13-20, offered to the Mine Hill Presbyterian Church, Mine Hill, NJ, August 23, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
There are a couple of things going on in today’s Gospel story that I would like to get into with you today.
First, Matthew tells us in verse 13 that Jesus had gone to the district of Caesarea Philippi. This is the second time that Jesus and his disciples had traveled away from Jerusalem to very pagan areas of the Roman Empire.
In chapter 15, Matthew tells us that Jesus went to those two wicked and sinful towns of Tyre and Sidon. There he had a very revealing encounter with a Canaanite Woman.
This was an unusual time in Jesus’ ministry when he was avoiding the towns in Judah where he would be crowded by the people and harassed by the religious leaders.
The reason that Jesus traveled to these Gentile and pagan areas was that he needed time alone with his disciples so that he could instruct them about God’s Salvation plan, his role in it – but more importantly what their role in God’s Salvation plan would be. And he was running out of time.
Jesus was aware that his time to return to Jerusalem and go to the Cross was coming – sooner than he might have desired. And the result was, he was running out of the time he needed to teach his disciples why it was he had called them to follow him and what their role in God’s Salvation plan was to be.
Whenever Jesus traveled close to Judah, Pharisees and Scribes would accost him demanding signs to prove who he was. If not that, they were seeking to entrap him in one of their legal arguments and perhaps convince the people that he was a fraud. Jesus needed to avoid these types of engagements if he was going to be able to teach his disciples what God’s plan was. These encounters with the Pharisees and Scribes were just too time consuming and a waste of his most valuable commodity – time.
Also, Jesus needed to be in a place where he was not known so that the people would not come running, pressing in on him demanding healing miracles. Those encounters consumed valuable time. Jesus needed time to recharge his spirit and bolster his own courage in the face of what he was being called to do.
So, he traveled to Tyre and Sidon where he had hoped that he would not be recognized. That didn’t work out so well. The Canaanite Woman recognized him and beseeched him to make her daughter well. That meant the gig was up there. His identity had been revealed even in a place where gods like Baal were worshiped.
Now he took his disciples to Caesarea Philippi where he hoped he would get some quite time with them.
So now, once there, once Jesus could sit alone and quietly with his disciples, Jesus begins by asking them right there in verse 13, “Who do the people say that the Son of Man is?”
This was an important question because Jesus was probing to see if his message, his ministry was getting across to the people. He had been teaching the people for three years, curing them, performing miracles. How was that all being received? How was he being received? Did the people believe that the miracles he was preforming were signs pointing to his relationship with the Lord, their God? Or did the people see him as something less than or other than the Messiah?
The responses he gets from his disciples are all over the spectrum. They tell him that the people say that you are John the Baptist – risen form the dead. Others say that you are Elijah or Jeremiah, or some other prophet. None of these responses were what Jesus wanted to hear.
Now Bible scholar William Barclay has some interesting thoughts on these responses. First, it is that the people believed that John the Baptist was so great a prophet that it might be possible that he had come back from the dead to continue to challenge and torment Herod. They thought perhaps Jesus was the resurrected John.
But the other responses were that the people thought that he could be either Elijah or Jeremiah. These were revealing more of how the people viewed Jesus.
First, Elijah. You will recall that Jewish tradition held that Elijah would return to announce the coming of God’s Messiah. It would be Elijah’s role to announce to the people that they should make straight the way of the Lord. It is the reason that even today, Jews leave and empty seat at their Passover Table for the prophet. They, who are still waiting for the Messiah, leave an empty seat for Elijah at the Table. Some believed Jesus was that predecessor coming to announce and make ready the coming of the Messiah but not that Jesus was the Messiah.
Second, Jeremiah. Barclay explains that Jeremiah had a curious role in the expectations of the people. It was believed that before the people went into exile to Babylon, Jeremiah had taken the Ark of the Covenant and the altar incense from the Temple and hid them in a cave on Mount Nebo.
These people believed that it would be Jeremiah who – before the coming of the Anointed One – would return and produce these relics from their hiding place and restore the Glory of God to the people. By restoring the arc, God’s place would once again be seated in the Temple in Jerusalem.
Some believed that Jesus was Jeremiah and that he was returning with the Arc of the covenant bringing the Glory of God with it. They didn’t see Jesus as the Anointed One and that it would be he who would free them from their sin and establish a new Covenant relationship with God.
Now these characterizations by the people were in their minds great compliments being paid to Jesus. They were setting him in a high place of regard since Elijah and Jeremiah were highly revered prophets and expected forerunners to the arrival of God’s Anointed One. When they arrived, the Kingdom of God would indeed be near. But they were only getting it partially right. The Kingdom of God was indeed near. It was just that Jesus was not the forerunner. John the Baptist was the forerunner. Jesus had pronounced it to the people: telling them that John was Elijah.
All of this was to show what the whirlwind around Jesus was like. There was no clear perception among the people or the religious authorities of who Jesus was. Their opinions were all over the place. Some people held him in high regard potentially leading to their being set free from Captivity; yet others, like the Scribes and Pharisees saw him as a potential threat to the peace they had negotiated with the Romans – a Peace that assured their survival as the religious authorities in Jerusalem.
Jesus asked what the people were saying about him and the disciples told him. In truth, the people did not understand who Jesus was. There was a lot of hysteria spinning around Jesus but there was very little understanding. That had to be disappointing. It pointed to how much work still had to be done in the little time left to him.
But now Jesus gets personal. Now he asks his disciples directly, “And you – who do you say that I am?”
This is the question that cuts to the quick with the disciples. And it is something that we have to think about, too.
This is a key question that Barclay focuses on. What is it we have heard about Jesus and what is it we KNOW about Jesus?
It is one thing to have heard stories about what other people think and say about Jesus – to have second-hand knowledge of who Jesus is. No matter how credible it may be. You can read all of Paul’s letters and come away saying, “This guy really nails it.” That sounds like something I could believe in. But it is quite another to know Jesus in your own heart.
Some people think of him as a great teacher, a great thinker, or even as a theologian. People will acknowledge him as the founder of a great religion. But none of these ways of thinking about Jesus makes you a believer in Jesus.
Barclay makes this comment, “Christianity never consists in (merely) knowing ABOUT Jesus; it … consists of – knowing Jesus” – on an intimate and personal level.
So, Jesus asks his disciples a very personal question. He is asking them, “How do you know me?”
With this question, the room goes silent. The air – so to speak – is sucked out of the room. Because many of them are just as confused as the people outside their group are. Time and again we have heard in the gospel stories when the disciples turn to one another asking, “Who is this guy?” You remember the time Jesus was asleep in the back of a boat when a storm came up, and his disciples roused him and he calmed the winds and the seas. They asked, “Who is he who commands the seas and the winds?”
If after three years, Jesus’ closest followers were still unsure of who he was, then his ministry would be in danger of collapse after the Cross. He had to know if there was a glimmer of light behind those dull, dimly lit eyes. The silence is deafening. If you were there, you could probably have heard their hearts beating in their chests.
Matthew tells us that it is Simon Peter who answers, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
AH! Finally, There is the glimmer of light behind the dim eyes of his disciples that Jesus was searching for. Finally, someone is getting it. The Pharisees and Scribes don’t get it. The people didn’t see it. And for most of the time – up to that point, his disciples didn’t understand it, either. But finally, Peter gets it and says it aloud.
“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus responds, “Blessed are you, Simon, … For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.” In other words, you could not have gotten to this conclusion on your own. But now I know that my Father in heaven has opened your eyes and revealed this to you.
In a devotional this week in These Days, Kirk Louis of Decatur Georgia characterizes their exchange this way. He says, “Peter did not arrive at this confession on his own. It was God who opened his eyes, stirred his heart, and enabled him to see Jesus for who he truly is.
He goes on, “This is the wonder of salvation: God acts first. God awakens understanding, softens hearts, and invites people close [in] to witness God’s revelation for all.”
So, if any of the disciples still thought that Jesus was John, or Elijah, or Jeremiah a predecessor to the Messiah, Peter was put it all that to rest. Peter states with certainty “– the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
This was a very personal answer to a very personal question. Peter is finally saying aloud what Jesus needs to know is in his heart. Peter is saying you are not a prophet. You are not a forerunner to the Messiah. You are the Anointed One. Peter is saying aloud what he knows in his heart as it was revealed to him by the Father.
Barclay makes this point. You cannot be a Christian if you only know about what other people say about Jesus. You can be well read. You can know what the theologians say about Jesus. You can listen to great preachers and hear stories about his outstanding presence and abilities, his healing powers, and his compassion for people.
But knowing the stories is not enough. Being a follower of Jesus means knowing who Jesus is personally in your heart. Being a Christian means knowing that Jesus IS the Messiah, the Son of the living God as Peter says it for us. It means accepting Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, not just knowing the stories about him.
Jesus asked Peter but he also asks each of us, “Who do you say that I am?” This is a personal question, and Jesus expects a very personal response about what is on our hearts.
My friends, the only way you can know who Jesus is, is if you have sat quietly listening for the wee small voice of God and allowed God to enter into your hearts, to reveal the salvation that God has planned for you through Jesus, the Christ, the Anointed One, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.
God will act first. God will soften your hearts, open your eyes to see and your ears to hear the Word of God so that you can KNOW God’s anointed one – truly KNOW him in your hearts.
Then when Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” You can respond, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”
May it be so.
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Matthew 15: 21-28
Offered at the Long Valley Presbyterian Church, August 16, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
First off, let me confess to you, I have dreaded preaching on this story in Matthew’s Gospel – this meeting between Jesus and the Canaanite Woman. Because, it had long been my misunderstanding that Jesus was being downright nasty to this woman.
This is not the Jesus that I knew from the gospels. The One who displays compassion not only to Jews but to the Samaritan woman he met at the well and to Gentiles when he cured the servant of the Roman Centurion who beseeched him.
This is not the Lord who had spoken through the prophet Isaiah and the minor prophets telling us clearly that God’s offer of reconciliation and salvation is to be offered to all the nations.
And it was because of my misunderstanding that I saw this Jesus, his attitude toward this Canaanite woman as not being the Lord and Savior that I love. I looked at this story in Matthew and wondered to myself, “Who is this guy?”
So, when this passage came up in the lectionary for today, I had a choice. I could skip over it and use something from another part of the lectionary; or I could deal with it. I could confront this different Jesus hoping the Holy Spirit would help me through my confusion and reveal to me why Jesus acted as he did.
To that end, I needed to do some digging. I went through William Barclay’s commentary, and several Ai commentaries. But the one that was most helpful was a YouTube channel entitled, “Deep Made Simple.” I found their commentary to be most helpful.
So, let’s get into it. Back at the opening of this chapter, the Pharisees and scribes go to Jesus and demand to know why he allows his disciples to break the traditions of the “elders”. That’s important – key in on that – the traditions of the elders. Jesus was allowing his disciples to eat without first going through the ritual cleansings that the traditions of the elders demanded. This was part of their on-going attempts to find fault in Jesus and to discredit him.
Jesus’ responds by immediately turning the tables on them. Jesus demands of them, “Why do you break the commandments of God for the sake of your traditions?”
What is Jesus getting at here was the fifth commandment to “…honor your father and mother…” You see what the “elders” had done was to create a work around this commandment. It allowed them to say, “what I would have given to you, my parents, for your support, I have given to God, therefore I am absolved of the obligation to support you.”
Jesus calls them hypocrites and quotes Isaiah, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; … teaching human precepts as doctrines.”
Do you get it? They were writing their own laws as a means of circumventing God’s commandments. So, Jesus throws it all back at them. Your elder’s tradition of ritual washing is hogwash. It’s superficial. It is meaningless to God.
Then Jesus says, “…it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but … what comes out of the mouth that defiles.”
In plain talk, it is not what you eat that makes you unworthy. It is what comes out of your mouth. For what comes out of the mouth truly reveals what is in the heart. If what comes out are evil intentions: murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness and slander, then that is what defiles a person and makes them unworthy before God.
Now get this. Everything in the list that Jesus gives us are accusations he making against the religious elders. Because by withholding support and honor of their parents their evil intentions were exposed. They were stealing from their parents. By claiming that their traditions superseded God’s commandments they were bearing false witness. By claiming that their parents were not worthy of their support, they were slandering them.
All of this is the backstory Matthew uses leading up to Jesus’ encounter with the Canaanite woman. So, let’s now look at that and how it happens.
Jesus has reached a point where he knows what lies ahead for him in Jerusalem. He knows of the plots to kill him and how the Pharisees are trying to entrap him.
But he cannot allow any of their plans to come to fruition just yet. He needs time to prepare his disciples for what is coming. He needs time to explain to them what God’s plan is and what their role in it will be. He needed time, peace and quiet away from the crowds who were constantly pressing in on him. He needed to be able to go to a place where he was unknown where he could have uninterrupted time with his disciples.
So, he leaves Judah where he had been dealing with ritualistic hypocrisy and goes to Canaanite territory. He goes to Tyre and Sidon – two infamous Biblical cities known for their sinful wickedness. But what surprises us in this story is what Jesus finds in this foreign Gentile land of sinfulness.
What develops in this story is a teaching opportunity. You will see that Jesus uses this confrontation with the Canaanite Woman to show to his disciples what their role in the salvation story will be.
As Jesus and his entourage are traveling into one of these cities, a Canaanite woman comes to them. She is calling out to Jesus for his attention, “Have mercy on me Lord, Son of David, my daughter is tormented by a demon.” She is seeking healing.
Now observe what follows. Bible Scholars refer to it as the three “Nos”.
First, Jesus ignores the woman and refuses to acknowledge her petitions. The first No. This has always been difficult for me. God has told us that God will never ignore our petitions. So, why is Jesus?
The woman is persistent and Jesus’ disciples come to him and urge him to send her away. She is unruly and making a scene. Does this sound like a parable you should recall, the parable of the woman and the unjust Judge. In that parable, the woman is persistent and the unjust Judge ultimately yields to her demands.
We are told in that parable to keep coming to God in prayer and show determination and faith in our petitions. Whether the disciples urged Jesus because they understood this parable or because they just wanted to be rid of her is not clear. But Jesus responds to them.
“I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” That’s “No”, number two.
Jesus is saying, I am the Messiah of God to the chosen people of God. I am not the Messiah to the Gentiles. Listen carefully here. Jesus is defining his role in the Salvation story. But at the same time Jesus is defining the disciples’ role in God’s Salvation plan.
In verse 25, “… the woman came and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me.”
Now there is something we need to note here. Twice now the woman refers to Jesus as “Lord”; once as “Lord, Son of David.” She is addressing him by his Messianic title. This is not an ordinary pagan woman. In Mark’s gospel, she is referred to as a Syro-Phoenician woman. In fact, she is probably not Canaanite at all. Before the Romans, the Greeks had driven out the original inhabitants of Canaan and expelled them to Egypt. Syrians and Phoenicians under Greek influence had repopulated the land. This woman was probably educated and understood who the Jewish Messiah was, and she attributed respect in the way she addressed Jesus.
“Lord, Son of David.” She kneels at his feet. This is a position of humility. This is the right posture in which to approach God. This is in contrast to the haughty attitudes of the Pharisees who Jesus had accused of having the gall of writing their own human laws to supersede God’s Commandments.
To understand the meaning of this story, we have to see the contrast between the haughty attitudes of Israel’s religious leaders as they arrogantly approached their god and how this Canaanite woman in this land of wicked sinfulness approached Jesus whom she called Lord.
Jesus is trying to display to his disciples what faithful worthiness looks like.
OK. She’s got Jesus’ attention. She is prostrate at his feet and He responds to her.
“It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” This is the third No. This part of the exchange between Jesus and the woman has always troubled me.
But there are two things to be aware of here. First, the “children’s food” referred to here is the Word of God spoken through Scripture by the Holy Spirit to God’s chosen People.
Second, the word Matthew uses for “dogs” is a Greek word that does not refer to wild animals. Rather the word Matthew uses refers to domesticated household pets. This may not seem like much but watch how the woman uses it and how she answers Jesus.
She doesn’t take offense at Jesus’ remarks. She understands the distinction between who she is and who the Messiah was sent to. She responds.
“Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table.”
This woman is sharp. She understands that Jesus is Lord, Son of David. That he is the Messiah of Israel. She understands the priority of the order of Salvation. Salvation will come from the Jews and then go out to the Gentiles.
She immediately points out to Jesus that the children of Israel are allowing crumbs of the Word of God to fall from the Master’s Table to the floor.
This reflects back directly upon the “Elders” and their defilement of God’s Commandments and their refusal to repent and accept Salvation on God’s terms.
This Canaanite Woman is asking for nothing more than those crumbs that the children of God are allowing to fall to the floor. She accepts the order of Salvation. She accepts that Jesus, Lord, Son of David is the Messiah to the Jews. But she knows deep in her Faith that there is more to him and to God’s Salvation plan.
Jesus responds to her, “Woman, great is your faith. Let it be done for you as you wish.”
A couple of things here. First, the Greek word that Jesus uses for “Woman” is the same word that he had used when his mother came to him at the wedding feast at Cana. “Woman, it is not yet my hour.” The word used for “woman” in both instances is a compassionate word.
Next, “Let it be done for you as you wish” …that is not only that her daughter be freed from her demon. But also, that the crumbs that fall from the Master’s table be shared with you, as well. Jesus is saying to her, to his disciples and to us, …let Salvation go from the Jews to all of the peoples of the world.
This is how Jesus was revealing to his disciples what their role in God’s salvation plan would be. This is why he left the land of ritual hypocrisy to travel to a land where he could find worthiness and show his disciples what great faith looked like.
Yes. Salvation would be offered to the Jews first but then it would go out to the Gentiles. That was the role the disciples would play. But Salvation would not be based on position, prestige or ritual cleanliness. Salvation would be based upon faith, humility and the persistence of that faith. Not faith that demands salvation on its own terms but faith that is humble and persistent even when there is no initial response.
The three “Nos” that the woman initially received from Jesus were not doors being closed to her. They were steps meant to bring here closer to the healing she desired.
Have you ever felt that your prayers have gone unanswered? That all you hear from God is silence. My friends, don’t think for a moment that God is closing a door to your petitions. Instead view the silence as an opportunity to build greater faith. View it as a steppingstone to greater healing. Understand that it isn’t that God is not hearing your prayers. It is that God is using the time to build greater faith in you. God is working to bring you closer to healing and salvation.
May it be so.
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Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-23
Offered to the Community Presbyterian Church of Chester, NJ on July 12, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder PCUSA
When I saw the lectionary for today, I thought to myself, “Oh, good! This is a Gospel passage that almost explains itself.” But as I sat down to read it, I found myself asking questions.
Verse one begins, “That same day Jesus left the house and went out…” I asked myself, “House, what house?” So, I went back into the previous chapter to find out what Jesus was up to. What I found in chapter 12 was that Jesus was having a running debate with “…some pharisees and teachers of the Law of Moses.”
These Pharisees and Teachers of the Law confronted Jesus demanding that he “show them a sign from heaven” to validate who he claimed to be. Now keep in mind that all through this portion of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus had been out in full view of those Pharisees and Teachers of the Law curing people and casting out demons. Yet, these religious leaders demanded something more, some greater sign so that they could judge if he was truly a messenger from God.
Jesus responds to them. And I sense some tension in his response.
You want to see a sign? Here’s the sign that I will give you. Like Jonah who “…was in the belly of the great fish for three days and nights, the Son of Man will be deep in the earth for three days and nights.” We know that after three days and nights Jonah arose from the deep and so too the Son of Man would rise again from the depths of the earth after three days and nights.
He tells them that the city of Nineveh listened to Jonah’s message and repented and that those people will stand on the day of Judgement with you and condemn you. The Queen of Sheba who went to Solomon’s Court to test his wisdom, she too will stand at the judgement and condemn you. I sense that Jesus is mocking the Pharisees and Teachers of Law regarding any claim to wisdom that they might make.
Some verses later, still in the previous chapter, we find that Jesus is in a house teaching his disciples. Someone interrupts Jesus to tell him that his mother and brothers are outside the house and want to see him. Jesus responds, “Who are my mother and brothers?” He points around the room and says, “…These are my mother and brothers…” People who willingly and wholeheartedly accept the Word of God. People who repent of their sins and turn to God for forgiveness.
So now, this is the scene that we come to as Jesus exits the house and begins to tell the people following him the parable of the farmer that is sowing seeds.
So Jesus begins, “A farmer went out to scatter seed in a field…” STOP!
Again, I had a question – already knowing what comes later when Jesus explains what happens with the seed that is scattered.
I stopped to ask myself, wouldn’t a farmer who was sowing seeds be careful to sow his seed exclusively in the field where he had prepared the soil? It seems to me that this farmer is either not careful about preserving his resources; or this farmer has such an abundant store of resources that he is not concerned at all about holding back where and how he sows his seed.
I think that Jesus right in the very first line of this parable is teaching us something about our God. And it was not new. They should have known it, but from what we know about the religious leaders of Judah, they were unwilling to recognize it. It is this, and it is as God had spoken through the prophet Isaiah and several of the minor prophets before, God’s offer of reconciliation and salvation is to be offered to all the nations. Hence, this farmer is sowing his seed as far and wide as he can reach with what we can only hope is an endless abundance of grace, mercy, forgiveness and love.
So, this farmer goes about his sowing. He scatters seed and some falls on the road where it was eaten by birds. Other seed fell on thin, rocky ground where it quickly started to grow but was scorched and dried up under the heat of the sun because they did not have enough roots. Some seed fell into thorn bushes and grew but were choked by the thorns. But a few seeds fell on good ground and produced thirty, sixty and a hundred-fold.”
Now later in today’s reading, Jesus disciples ask him to explain what he meant in this teaching. They didn’t get it. So, beginning in verse 18 Jesus explains. Let’s listen to it and be reminded about the two confrontations Jesus had before he left the house he was teaching in.
Jesus begins, “The seed that fell along the road are the people who hear the message of the kingdom, but don’t understand it.” Or, perhaps, don’t want to understand it. Remember the confrontation with the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law of Moses. These are people who are repeatedly characterized throughout Scripture as those with hardened hearts who refuse to hear the Truth.
The seeds – that is God’s promises of reconciliation and salvation are offered to them, but they refuse it. Their hearts are hardened and they refuse to hear it. Remember that all through Isaiah’s prophesy, he warns Israel and Judah, but their hearts are hardened and they refuse to listen. All through the Minor Prophets – Hosea, Joel, Amos, Micah, Habakkuk, and Zechariah the people were warned and told to abandoned idolatry and injustice. But the messages of these prophets fell on deaf ears. The seed the farmer was scattering in their direction fell to the ground where evil comes and snatches it from their hearts. Jesus uses the word “snatches” – from their hearts, but I also think we can imagine that same evil fills their hearts hardening them against the Word of God.
Also, in a less harsh way this rocky road seed also is a description of Jesus’ mother and brothers who are standing outside the house where he is teaching his disciples. At this early juncture of Jesus’ ministry, I think “not understanding” is a big part of their relationship with Jesus’ ministry. At this early time, they just don’t understand. We know later that his mother Mary and brother James do become a part of his following but not yet. While Jesus is teaching his family inside the house, his earthly family is on the outside.
Then we have the people represented by the seed that fell on the thin, rocky ground. They gladly hear and accept the message, but they don’t have deep roots and quickly fall away. I think that Jesus must have experienced that every day in his ministry as he went around teaching through the villages. People heard his good news message of God’s mercy and forgiveness and accepted it, but the moment things got difficult – when they were challenged by religious leaders back in their synagogues – their devotion fell into peril, it waned and they fell away. Not everyone he met was as receptive as the Samaritan woman.
Then there are the seeds that fell into thornbushes. Jesus tells us that these are people who hear the message, but who become distracted by the daily demands of life and are pulled off in a different direction.
Do you know where we have seen examples of this. How about when Peter sees Jesus walking on the water and asks that he call Peter to walk on the water to him. Jesus holds out his hand, but what happens? Peter steps out and begins to walk on the water. But when a wave splashes his face and distracts him. He begins to see where he is and worries that the water will overtake him. At that moment, he looks away from Jesus and instead – at the water and he sinks.
We do it, too. Don’t we?
Sometimes, we look at our daily lives, our careers, our families and think, how are we going to provide? Families need to be fed. Children need to be clothed. Employers require full-time focus and dedication. Some jobs require that we travel or might demand more than the simple nine to five, five day a week schedules we thought we were hired for. And that takes away from the time we can spend in devotion to the Christ and to being involved in the work of his Church.
Then the demands of this life, the thornbushes begin to choke and overwhelm us. This life deceives us into thinking that is how we build up riches. Jesus’ message of good news gets choked and we not only fail to produce good fruit, but we fail to be able to enjoy the fruits – the blessings – that God has bestowed upon us – our spouses, our children, our families, our church.
“The seeds that fell on the good ground are the people who hear and understand the message.” Now this is a dicey line, and we have to be careful as to how we interpret it. I don’t think that it means that because we are active in a church congregation and because we are here in worship on our Sabbath day that we are the only good seed. That we are set apart from the seed that fell on the road, the thin soil and into the thornbushes.
Let me explain. All through Isaiah and the Minor Prophets, God’s repeated message is that God’s offer of mercy, forgiveness and salvation is to go out to ALL the nations. God’s desire for Shalom is to heal ALL of God’s creation.
Jonah, the prophet of the Lord, is sent to that wicked city of Ninevah to tell them to repent and they do – for a time but like the seed that fell on the rocky soil their faith dries up and falls away.
In Isaiah 56, the Lord says, “Don’t let foreigners who commit themselves to the Lord say, ‘The lord will never let me a part of his people’…I will also bless the foreigners who commit themselves to the Lord,” says our God.
So, what I am suggesting is that we can’t define or limit how God goes about revealing God’s good news message to God’s creation. We can’t impose upon God a limit to where and how God’s seed is scattered. God’s seed is not only scattered on the fields that were prepared for sowing, but that seed was, is and will be scattered across the roads, rocky soil, thornbushes, and then good soil for eons past, today and for eons into the future. We have to allow and make room for the notion that God can sow Jesus’ message, God’s Word, in ways that we cannot fully understand. So, we cannot be so bold as to think we are the only good seed.
But here’s another thought. Where the Sower’s seed lands not only describe how different people receive the Word of God, but it can also describe how we receive it at different times in our own faith journeys. It can describe how our faith journeys can waffle from receptiveness to hardheartedness and then back again.
Sometimes we can be receptive and receive God’s Word, and it grows in us. But at other times in our lives, we are distracted by life’s hardships [like Peter while he was walking on the water] and we let the thornbushes choke us and prevent us from thriving.
Other times we may not be receptive at all. There may be times when we do want to be distracted by our thornbushes. There may be times when we don’t want to be distracted by this world – Sunday Softball, Golf, yard work, landscaping, weekend yard sales, work that we need to complete from home before our next workweek begins. Sometimes we let all of this distract us because we want it to. Then it is not until we realize the hopelessness of trying to build earthly riches through these distractions and finally look up to see God’s face and turn back to God.
The Sower understands and anticipates the ebbs and flows of our faith journeys and returns repeatedly to sow more of God’s abundant love and compassion. Remember from Isaiah. God tells us that God’s Word, the Sower’s seed, will not return to God empty. God speaks the Word to us and then it is planted into our hearts. God does this with the expectation that it will accomplish its purpose and then return again to God.
So, during those times when we come to our senses and see the face of God shining upon us, during those times while we are good seed that has fallen upon good soil, we have a task. It is to multiply thirty, sixty and a hundredfold. We have been commanded and it is our task…to go to all nations, to share the good news of God’s saving grace and forgiveness, to baptize and make disciples of the nations in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to do everything that Jesus has taught us to do. It is our job to prepare the soil so that when God’s seed is sown, it will have a chance to grow and flourish.
May it be so.
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Matthew 11: 16-19, 25-30 – Offered to the Clinton Presbyterian Church of Clinton, NJ
Sunday July 5, 2026, by Mel Prestamo, Ruling elder PCUSA
The Voices of Jesus
Today’s lectionary is one of several disjointed discourses recorded by Matthew. In 11 chapter, Jesus is teaching as he travels through villages in Galilee. Matthew gives us one discourse after another with seemingly very little to connect them. Looking at just today’s reading makes it difficult to understand what Matthew is trying to teach us about Jesus’ interactions in these villages.
So, I went back into Matthew to see what the set up was. Because normally you would expect that Jesus would be using these expositions as teaching opportunities for his disciples. But his disciples weren’t with him.
Jesus had sent his disciples to go out to preach on their own. So each grouping of the verses in this chapter represents different interactions Jesus had with the villages he visited. And as I read I learned that today’s reading should not stand alone. It needs to be connected to Jesus’ other interactions disjointed as they may seem.
I found a commentary by Bible scholar William Barclay in which he suggests what we have here are six different expressions of what he calls the voices of Jesus. And what I would like to do today is look at these voices and see what Matthew is trying to reveal to us.
In Matthew 11 are vignettes – differing expressions of Jesus’ voice [how he speaks of and comments on what he encounters].
Let’s look at these briefly so that we can come back again to consider what is going on in today’s lectionary.
At the start, John the Baptizer is in prison. He sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he is the One. Jesus responds by essentially saying, “I am not going to answer that question. Instead, you go back and tell John what you have seen. Tell him that you have seen the blind given sight; the lame walking; that the deaf given hearing; the dead are raised to life, and the poor are hearing the good news.”
Jesus is saying, I know that John might be impatient for me to do things as he wants to see them done – on his terms, on his schedule, but this is my answer, tell him what you have seen and witnessed.
I suspect the gist of what Jesus is saying is, ‘The proof John is looking for is in how Jesus acts out God’s plan’ – on God’s schedule, on God’s terms.
Jesus finishes this conversation by saying to John’s followers, “God will bless everyone who doesn’t reject me because of what I do.” This is Jesus speaking with the voice of confidence. Jesus is saying that you may be impatient, but God will bless everyone who accepts me because of what I do. Jesus is saying, I am confident in God’s plan.
In verses seven through eleven. Jesus speaks with a voice of admiration for John.
Jesus asked them, “When you went out into the desert to see John, what did you expect?
Did you go to see a reed shaking in the wind – someone without conviction?
Did you go to see a man who wore purple robes?
Or did you go to see a prophet?”
Jesus pronounces that John was more than a prophet. “John was of whom it was written, ‘I will send you a messenger who will prepare the way for you’…If you believe the Law of Moses and the Books of the Prophets then believe that John is Elijah, the prophet you have been waiting for.”
That is high praise from the Son, from the One God has sent. Jesus asses that John was the voice crying out in the wilderness, “…make straight the way of the Lord.” I am the One he was preparing the way for. Jesus pays high praise for the work John has done.
In verses sixteen through nineteen we hear what Barclay calls a voice of sorrowful rebuke. But I don’t want to talk about this just yet. I want to save it for the end.
I’m going to verses twenty through twenty-four. Here we hear a voice of heartbroken condemnation.
Here we find Jesus on his own traveling through some towns in Galilee healing and performing miracles. But even though Jesus was performing great signs pointing to who he was, the people did not believe. In verse twenty Matthew tells us, “…the people refused to turn to God.”
So, Matthew recounts Jesus specifying these towns by name. Of Chorazin, Bethsaida. Jesus says, “You people are in trouble, if I had performed these miracles in the towns of Tyre and Sidon, they would have believed and turned to God. But you people will suffer more on the day of judgement than they.”
Then Jesus speaks of Capernaum, “You will go down to hell!” If the miracles I performed in your town were performed in Sodom, they would have believed and that town would still be standing.
These are serious charges leveled by Jesus because those two Gentile towns along with Sodom are denounced in scripture for their wickedness – in Isaiah, Jerimiah and Ezekiel. The bottom line is that these Galilean towns had been given the privilege of hearing Jesus directly speaking to them of God’s Truth and they refused to listen. Here is the voice of heartbroken condemnation.
The next voice we hear from Jesus is the voice of authority. In verse twenty-seven, Jesus states openly and clearly, “My Father has given me everything and he is the only one that knows the Son. The only one that truly knows the Father is the Son.”
Here Jesus is clearly claiming the special relationship between He and the Father. The Father has given the Son everything –complete knowledge of who the Father is and with that comes complete authority over everything the Father knows.
In verses twenty-eight to thirty, we hear in Jesus’ the voice of compassion.
“Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Jesus is speaking to all of the people who were endeavoring to the best of their ability to be good and seek God, but they were being heavily burdened by onerous Temple rules for worship.
Jesus uses the example of a yoke that is well fitted for oxen. Oxen were beasts of burden expected to do heavy work. The people knew however that a well fitted yoke made that burden easier. Jesus is telling them that he offers them a well fitted spiritual yoke so that their burden in approaching God would be made easy and light. You see, a “Yoke” was fitted for a pair of oxen. Jesus is telling them and us that the Yoke he offers is paired for us and him and that he walks, and works, and worships along and beside us.
Approach God through Jesus and you will find rest for your souls. This is the compassion and love that God has for God’s children. God does not want to make your faith journey difficult. God wishes to embrace you lovingly.
Now let’s return to today’s lectionary where Jesus is speaking with the voice of sorrowful rebuke.
Jesus asks the question, “What is wrong with you people?”
“You people are like little children at play. One cries, we played the flute and you did not dance. You say, “I’m sad”. Then they said we’ll play a funeral song, and you then respond, “I don’t want to be sad.”
Jesus continues, “John did not eat or drink with you and you said, ‘There’s a demon in him.’ Then the Son of Man comes eating and drinking and you say, ‘He eats and drinks too much! He’s even a friend of sinners and tax collectors.’”
Jesus frames the people as whining little children. No matter who comes bringing them God’s truth, they find fault in the messenger.
Sometimes this is how we can be?
Imagine yourself at a dinner, and the host presents you with a beautiful and expensive bottle of White wine that he selected with care just for you. But you decline it saying that you prefer Red. Then they go and return with a bottle of Red and you decline again saying that it is too fruity and that you would just prefer water – but not tap water – perhaps something bubbly. Then you hear the bottle pop when it is opened, and you tell the host, ‘it’s too gassy,’ and that you are fine without anything to drink.
That is how Jesus is characterizing the people.
John came and he had a very austere presence. He lived a solitary life in the desert. He didn’t eat the kinds of foods in the people’s regular diet. He ate honey and locusts. Locusts – that’s disgusting! And the people said of John, “…he has a demon in him.” Why? Because he didn’t socialize? Because he was different?
Then Jesus says that he [the Son of Man] has come reaching out to the community by eating and drinking as they did. He ate at celebrations and drank at weddings. He socialized with sinners eating and drinking with them.
Then Jesus says, but then you complain saying “…That man eats and drinks too much!”
What is it you want?
You complain no matter how the Truth comes to you. The truth had come bluntly to you with no airs telling you to prepare yourselves, repent and make straight the way of the Lord. And you complained.
Now the Son of Man comes gently and humbly offering an easy yoke, welcoming repentant sinners and sharing food and drink with them and you call him a glutton.
Whinny, whining little children. You exhaust me! Jesus throws up his hands in frustration.
Then comes Jesus’ rebuke. “Wisdom is shown to be right by what it does.” Barclay comments here, “The ultimate verdict [of God’s plan] lies not with … perverse critics [those whining little people] but with events [that is the things that the Son does].”
What Jesus does is to give sight to the blind so that they can see; healing to the lame so that they can walk upright; curing people with leprosy making them clean; giving hearing to the deaf; bringing the dead to life and bringing the good news of God’s salvation to the poor. And each time, he not only heals their outward malady but washes them clean on the inside forgiving their sins. This is how Jesus validates the Truth of God’s Wisdom – by his actions – because he would not have been able to do these things if God’s Truth was not with him.
Matthew tells us this is how Jesus comes to us. He comes with the voice of confidence because he is the One that God has sent to bring rest to your soul. Even though at times, he may be heartbroken when we refuse his healing touch. Then we might hear a voice of sorrowful rebuke. But Jesus knows that he has the authority to bring to you God’s mercy and saving grace then Jesus speaks with a voice of compassion offering you a yoke that easy to bear.
Jesus comes to open your eyes so that you can see the Truth. He comes to heal your inability to walk upright before your God. He comes to open your ears so that you can hear the Word of God. He comes to give you [who are poor in heart] new life with the promise of God’s saving grace and mercy. He comes to wash you clean so that you can walk humbly before your God.
So now I ask you, how will you react to Jesus when he comes to meet you? Will you complain about his demeanor? Will you complain about the kinds of people the Spirit draws to him? Will you complain that he eats with people that you don’t like or understand? Or will you respond, please sir, I desire the yoke that you have prepared for me.
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Act 2: 1-21, Offered to the Minehill Presbyterian Church of Minehill, NJ on May 24, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Elder PCUSA
There is a lot happening in this second chapter of Acts – and I think it is important for us to look at it in a step-by-step fashion so that we can see how the Holy Spirit is revealing to us the wider scope of God’s plan for Shalom. Because this isn’t solely a story about Apostles speaking in tongues. No. This is a story of how God’s Holy Spirit is at work in Creation and how that work (the work of the church of Jesus Christ) begins to come into focus in Luke’s Book of Acts.
The first thing for us to realize is that with the arrival of the Holy Spirit comes the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise that an Advocate, a Counselor, a Guide, a Protector would come to his followers. In this story of the first Pentecost of our Christian Witness, we see the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise that his followers would not be left alone. In John 14:16, Jesus tells His disciples, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to help you and be with you forever — the Spirit of Truth.”
Now, why do I use the phrase “The Fist Pentecost of Our Christian Witness. Well, I say that because it wasn’t the first Pentecost. Pentecost – meaning ‘fiftieth’ – was a Jewish Harvest Festival which at the time of Jesus had no religious significance. Jews were simply celebrating the bringing in of the wheat harvest.
But for we Christians, for us, it has the religious significance that it was the beginning of our witnessing to the world who the Jesus Christ was and is. So, for us, it was the first Pentecost of our Christian Witness.
Let’s get back to Jesus’ promise in John when Jesus promises an Advocate. There’s a lot in that verse. But for today, I want you to key in on the last part of the verse – “…that the Advocate would be with you forever…” That’s going to be a theme that I will touch on throughout my message today.
But first, let’s look at the event and how things happened. Let’s look at how Luke describes the arrival of the Holy Spirit. It comes like a “mighty” wind that then settles as tongues of fire over the heads of each of Jesus’ followers who are gathered together in this “one place.”
There’s a lot of imagery here going back to the Exodus story, of Moses and Israel’s journey through the dessert. I don’t want to spend a lot of time here, but I do want you to recall how God’s presence with Israel in the desert is described. It is as smoke during the day and fire by night.
God’s presence [described as Fire] is an important visual for us to keep in mind when we listen to how Luke describes the arrival of God’s Holy Spirit.
Luke tells us that the God’s Holy Spirit comes rushing in as a mighty wind and settles upon each one in the assembly as tongues of fire. This is the Baptism by the Spirit that Jesus spoke of. In Acts 1:5, Jesus says to his disciples, “John baptized with water but in a few days, you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”
Next in verse four, Luke tells us that “The Holy Spirit took control of everyone…”
“Took control.” That is a powerful description.
What is Luke trying to tell us about this special “Baptism” by the Holy Spirit. It is different from the Baptism by water that John had been doing in the dessert.
John was baptizing with water. What the Spirit is doing with Jesus’ followers who had been hiding in seclusion (in the darkness of that one place) was the samething that God was doing when God guided Israel through the dessert. The Holy Spirit was moving Jesus’ followers out of the darkness of their fears forward into the Light.
Let’s look at how this happens.
Once the Holy Spirit comes, Luke tells us that it took control of everyone. It then pushes Jesus’ followers out into the city to give witness to what they knew about the Jesus. That he was the Christ, the Messiah, the One sent by God.
But something unusual happened. They were heard to be speaking the native languages of the people attracted to them so that anyone listening could hear and understand.
What Luke tells us is that by this special Baptism of the Holy Spirit the Ministry of Jesus’ new church began. And it began with a cacophony of noise – a mighty wind and then a beautiful symphony of sound – all these different languages being interwoven together.
Each of those followers gathered together for that Pentecost festival received the Holy Spirit and that Spirit filled them, took control of them and moved them out into the city to begin the Ministry of the Church of Jesus Christ.
OK. Item number three. It is about the sound of this “mighty” wind.
Verse 5 tells us: “Many Jews from every country in the world were living in Jerusalem.” I read the regions that Luke lists. And if we were to plot them on an ancient map, we would find that Luke lists them in order – from the East, the North, then the South, and then finally the West.
And then in verse 6 we learn, “And – when – they [these many Jews] – heard this noise…” this mighty wind … they were drawn to it.
Do you get the picture here? The sound of the Holy Spirit’s “mighty” wind was loud enough that the people in the nearby areas of Jerusalem heard it, too. This sound of the Holy Spirit was not just something that Jesus’ followers heard. No, it was demonstratively loud enough for people nearby to hear, as well.
Not only did the Holy Spirit come to Baptize Jesus’ followers, take control and initiate their Ministry but it attracted and drew people to it.
Now what happened when the people heard this mighty wind. They came to investigate and heard this group of the newly baptized of Jesus’ followers that the Holy Spirit had taken control of – proselytizing so that each of them – could hear and understand in their own native language the truth of Jesus Christ. They came asking, “What does this mean?”
What does it mean when those who were grieving are now speaking in a new language of comfort? What does it mean when those who feared for their lives are now speaking openly in public? What does it mean when those who were ashamed that their Lord had been crucified are now so renewed and alive that people are drawn to listen to them witnessing about the good news story of Jesus Christ.
It means that the Holy Spirit had taken control and was making things happen.
And if we jump forward, we are told that after the claim that these proselytizers are drunk, the Holy Spirit takes control of Peter and pushes him forward to respond. As Peter steps out in front of the crowd, the Holy Spirit puts words into his mouth. Peter begins to explain the entire good news story of God’s Messiah, Jesus Christ. He begins by quoting from the Prophet Joel.
In Joel 2: 28, “In the last days it will be, God declares, I will pour out my Spirit upon all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see visions and your old men will dream dreams.”
Now this is of vital importance for us to hear and understand. The prophet Joel spoke of the “Day of the Lord” in his prophetic messages. And what Joel meant by that was, on the “Day of the Lord”, God would step into history to set things right. And how would we know that day? Joel tells us we would know that by the sign that “…your sons and daughters will prophesy, young men would see visions and old men would dream dreams…” This was the Day that the Jewish people were waiting for. So, Peter used Joel’s words to announce to the assembly that the Day of the Lord had come in Jesus Christ.
When the people had heard Peter’s proclamation – that the Day of the Lord had come – that God had finally stepped into our human history to set things right in the person of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit moved three thousand people to believe Peter’s message and to be baptized. And Luke tells us that after their baptism, they spent their time learning from the apostles and that they broke bread and prayed together much like we are doing and will do later when we celebrate our communion meal together.
So, this mighty wind of the Holy Spirit was more than a passing breeze. And it was certainly not something that was meant to be confined in a small space. It was something so startling demonstrative that it not only took control of Jesus’ followers, it not only attracted an enormous crowd, it gave impetus to the beginning of the ministry of the Church of Jesus Christ. It was at that point that God’s Word and God’s plan of Shalom went out to the world.
And so, it began from Jerusalem and then it went out, to Sumaria, to Galilee and then ultimately to us, the Gentiles. The good news of God’s plan for Shalom went out to the world under the control of the Holy Spirit. That has a special meaning for us. It means that all Christian Baptisms from then on include not only a symbolic washing of us clean with water. That is the outward sign of what is happening spiritually for us. Spiritually, our souls are being blessed and taken possession of by God’s Holy Spirit. This is the promise made to us by Jesus handed down through the ages by his first disciples.
Now I want you to understand what the Holy Spirit taking control means for us. Because that is what defines this epoch of our church ministry that we are a part of. God’s Holy Spirit not only took control on that first Pentecost Day, but the Holy Spirit continues to take control of us – of you, of me and of the church of Jesus Christ. That is what defines the age we live in.
And now it is we who come and ask, What does this mean? What does the story of the first Christian Pentecost mean for us today?
Well, it means that if we believe in the risen Christ, God’s messenger of Hope; if we believe that his sacrifice of love showers us and washes us clean with God’s saving grace and mercy; and if we believe in the power of God’s Holy Spirit to empower not only Jesus’ followers on that Pentecost morning, then we must also believe in the Holy Spirit’s power to take control of our lives and push us out into this world to tell the good news story of God’s saving love and God’s plan for Shalom for God’s Creation.
This is what I mean when I say this is the Age of the Holy Spirit. In these times the Holy Spirit continues to be at work furthering the message of God’s promised plan of Shalom – God’s desire that through God’s mercy and forgiveness to bring peace into your lives.
But this promise of God’s Shalom is not to be locked in “one place” as Jesus’ followers were before the Holy Spirit came to them. It is also not meant to be locked within this sanctuary. It is meant to go out and be shared.
In Matthew 28, Jesus commands us, “… Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely, I am with you always, [even] to the very end of the age.”
If you allow God’s Holy Spirit to take control of your hearts you will be energized to reflect the love and compassion of God into this community just as Jesus has commanded us. And if you allow it, the Holy Spirit will also fill your yearnings with God’s presence, then what you will find in that relationship is God’s Shalom. And in God’s Shalom, you will find eternal life in the Kingdom of God.
May it be so.
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Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of Franklin, NJ on May 17, 2026
Before we get into today’s lectionary, I want to tell you about a small book that I read recently. The book entitled “Season’s Greetings: Christmas Letters From those Who Were There,” written by Ruth Boling. In it she has assembles “letters” that she suggests might have been written by the people who there at the first Christmas…from people who actually experienced it. It is a beautiful read, and I recommend it to you.
In it, there are letters from such characters as King Herod, Elizabeth, Isaiah, the Innkeeper, a Midwife [Boling suggests Mary couldn’t have given birth on her own], from a Shepherd, from Joseph, from Mary and finally from Jesus himself.
Her perspectives of what each of these people might have said in letters to us are thought provoking while at the same time very touching.
In it, portions of two of the letters jumped out and have stuck with me. And I am going to try to show you how they help us to understand what Jesus is saying in today’s passage from John’s Gospel.
The first is from the letter from Mary. Here Boling suggests to us, that as the mother who gave birth to God’s son, Mary should have some intimate understanding of God’s will and God’s purpose in the Christmas birth. After all, It was Mary who had that extraordinary visit from the Angel who told her of God’s special plan for her. And it was her prayer that we call the Magnificat that displayed her utmost devotion and submission to God’s plan for her.
In her letter, Mary describes God, when deciding how to bring God’s healing Shalom to Creation, God looked out on all that God had previously done. God had selected some specific persons to lead God’s people – Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and David – then God sent prophets such as Jeremiah, Isaiah and Micah to speak to the people. Then, at the time God was considering what more God could do, God measured the results of all God’s previous efforts, and God found that God’s creation was still fractured and God’s people were failing in bringing the Shalom to Creation that God desired.
So, in her letter, Mary suggests that God once again asks, “Whom shall I send – this time?” Now this phrase should resonate with us. We remember that when God previously called out, “Whom shall I send?” It was Isaiah who notably responded, “Here I am, send me!”
After Isaiah and the last of God’s prophets had spoken to the people, you may also recall that God remained silent for over four hundred years. Before Jesus, the people had not heard the voice of God for four hundred years.
Perhaps that was because over all that time when God asked, Whom shall I send, there was no response. Perhaps, Israel couldn’t hear the voice of God because it was diverting its time and energy to making alliances with foreign nations and even praising their pagan gods. Perhaps they were not even trying to hear that wee small voice of God.
So, Mary suggests when God asked this time, “Who shall I send?” God arrived at the only possible answer left to God. God decided “I will go. I will send me.”
Boling concludes, “The God who does the sending, sent himself.”
That little bit of insight shines a beautiful light on one of the most quoted verses in our Christian testimony. It is of course, John 3:16, “For God so loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”
Sometimes, because we view our God as a Trinity, we think that God split God’s self-up and sent the person of the Son. But we have to also remember that our God is one God [triune, but one] – which would mean when God sent the Son, God sent God’s self.
I don’t know why but when I read that line in Boling’s book, it gave the verse John 3:16 a new and awesome perspective for me. When God sent the Son, God sent God’s self. This is the fundamental tenet upon which our faith is built. It is that God is interactive with Creation. God created but has never stopped creating. When God asked, “whom shall I send?” And there was no one left to send, God sent God’s self. God entered into our time and space and did what was necessary to bring Shalom to God’s Creation.
It also brings clearer meaning to the conversation Jesus had with Philip earlier in these center chapters of John’s Gospel. When Philip asked Jesus to show them the Father, Jesus responded by saying, “…if you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” Wow! Jesus is saying, “Hey, Philip, you want to see the Father?
Here I am. I am the Father.” What Jesus is saying here is Philip, I know that you are having difficulty understanding but look at me. Look at me and you will see the Father.
And that was one of the defining purposes of Jesus life, wasn’t it? To help us to see the Father. And in doing that…helping us to see the Father… Jesus made the presence of God in our lives a real thing. Further, by making God visible in our lives, Jesus brought glory to God.
Ultimately, that is what the life of Jesus was all about isn’t it? To make visible for us the presence of God and to bring glory to God.
In the prayer that John recounts for us in this reading, Jesus is speaking and having a conversation directly with God, the Father. He is saying that it is time for the Son to be glorified so that the Son can glorify the Father.
The glory that Jesus is talking about is his willingly acceptance of the Will of the Father by going to the Cross. By going to the Cross, Jesus will display for all of us to see his willing submission to the Will of the Father as a loving Son.
When we think of the crucified Christ, we usually think of sacrifice. Jesus sacrificed himself for our sins and yes that is part of it.
But what we don’t often think of in the crucifixion story is the Son doing the Will of the Father out of pure love of the Father. Jesus’ death on the Cross is the ultimate act of loving the Father more than loving life itself.
This is the glory that Jesus brings to the Father and that the Father gives back to the Son.
And by thinking that in the Son, God sent God’s self – then by submitting to the Will of the Father, Jesus shows us just how far God is willing to go to recreate Shalom for God’s creation.
That brings me to the second phrase from Boling’s book that stuck with me. This one was from the letter from Jesus. Jesus’ letter begins with a love poem. It goes:
Roses are Red, violets are blue.
The meaning of Christmas is, “I love you.”
And that is what is going on in John 3:16 and in the text that we shared from today’s lectionary. Everything that Jesus is saying about giving glory to the Father comes out of the love that Jesus has for the Father and the love the Father has for God’s Creation. So, what Boling is suggesting that Jesus is saying to us is that the meaning of Christmas, as well as the meaning of the Cross – is the display of love that God has for you.
And – and, out that love – because of that love, Jesus will glorify the Father by submitting to the Will of the Father by going to the Cross. It is through that offering of love that Jesus displays to us a life fully lived in devotion and obedience to God. Jesus shows us the kind of life that will lead us to a righteous relationship with the Father.
Bible scholar Wiliam Barclay speaks also of the necessity of Jesus completing his work for the glory of the Father. If Jesus were to have stopped short of going to the Cross, then his work would have been incomplete and left undone.
Barclay asks, “Why should that be so?”
Because Jesus came into the world to tell us about the faithful and prodigal love of God – and to show it to us. And a display of that love was demonstrated by Jesus’ sacrifice of love by going to the Cross.
To have stopped short of the Cross, to have pulled back at Gethsemane – would be to say that God’s love goes “Thus far and no further.” In other words, if Jesus had stopped short of the Cross it would have been like saying, this is far as I [your God] am willing to go on your behalf. After this you are on your own. Go and build your own Shalom on your own.
But by going to the Cross, Jesus displays to us that there was nothing that the love of God was not prepared to do for us. In other words, there was no limit to God’s love – even to the point of giving up life itself.
God’s love is prodigal. God’s love is poured out upon us with a lavishness that is over the top extravagant. It is beyond imagining. It washes us clean and offers us forgiveness even when forgiveness and mercy do not seem justified.
That is how the Father gives glory to the Son and how the Son gives glory to the Father.
At the top of a page in William Barclay’s commentary on this chapter in John’s Gospel, I had written in the words long before I sat down to prepare for today’s worship service. I wrote, “Glory is to make visible the presence of God.”
So, this image comes into focus for me. In Jesus, yes, we have the Son of our Triune God, but we also have The Father and God’s Holy Spirit. In Jesus, we have the entirety of our God because as Boling paints the picture for us, God sent God’s self.
“Glory is to make visible the presence of God.” And that is what Jesus did. In the person of Jesus Christ, we see glorified the Father as well as the presence of God’s Holy Spirit because God sent God’s self and was fully present in the Christ.
This is the level of God’s commitment to bring Shalom to God’s Creation. God was all in. There is no suggestion in the life of Jesus that there would be a point beyond which he was unwilling to submit to the Father’s will.
In Luke 22:42, Jesus prays “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet your will to be done, not mine.”
There is no suggestion that God was only willing to go thus far and no farther. No. God’s commitment in the life of Jesus was to submit fully to God’s desire that God’s Creation be healed – that the sin that so dominated humankind be overcome and that the grip of death that it held over us be broken and conquered. By going to the Cross, Jesus brings glory to the Father, and the Father brings glory to the Son. And through Jesus’ resurrection from death Jesus makes the awesome presence of God visible for us to see.
To all of us, like for Philip, Jesus tells us, “Hey. Here I am. When you see me, you see the Father.” If you let God’s Spirit reveal it to you, you will see the glory of the Father and the glory of the Son. Instead of saying, “thus far and no farther”, God goes beyond the point of what humanity deserves. In Jesus’ love of the Father, He gives glory to the Father by making the presence of God visible in our lives.
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John 14: 1-14
Offered to the Community Presbyterian Church of Chester NJ, May 3, 2026
Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA
In these center chapters of John’s Gospel, John is recounting the discourses in which Jesus had spent much time trying to prepare his disciples for what was coming. And what was coming was going to take them on the roller coaster ride of a lifetime. There would be some highs [his triumphant entry into Jerusalem], some abysmal lows [his arrest and crucifixion], and then another high – [his resurrection and his conquering of sin’s death grip on humanity]. The lows of their hiding in fear in that lock room. Then finally, after all of this, the ultimate high – his ascension to the Father. This was the roller-coaster ride they would be experiencing during the next several weeks.
But what all of these long discourses are leading up to– in a nutshell – what Jesus was telling them was that he would be leaving them.
Of his crucifixion, he told them, “Where I am going, they could not go with him.”
This of course throws them into a tizzy. They are frightened and afraid. What do you mean we can’t go with you? What he was telling them meant that the world they thought they were living in was about to collapse into chaos. Can you imagine their shock and then the utter fear that befell them? The authorities were already searching for Jesus. They wanted to kill him. If Jesus leaves, then what about us. Won’t the authorities come hunting for us, next?
Then in the face of their fear and their angsts, Jesus tells them, “Don’t let your hearts be distressed.” He tells them, “I am going to the Father and when I go to the Father – I will prepare a place for you and then later I will return to take you to myself.”
Now we have probably heard these verses preached on in sermons hundreds of times. You know the message. Buck up guys. Take courage. “Believe in God and believe in me.” …and all will be fine. It’s a message that is spoken to us so that we can take courage and buck up when we are challenged in our own lives with the perils of the dark valleys that beset us. And that’s all well and good. We should believe in God and take courage in the faith that God will never abandon us.
But I tell you what. That is not the phrase that jumped out at me when I was preparing for today’s message. What jumped out at me was the second half of verse two. Let me read it for you again,
“If it were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?” The Contemporary English Version translates it as, “I wouldn’t tell you this if it were not true.”
In other words, I wouldn’t tell you that there is room for you in my Father’s house and that I am going to prepare a way for you, IF IT WERE NOT TRUE!
“What I tell you is the Truth.” These words jump out at me because they speak I think to the very essence of who Jesus was and who he is.
He said as much when he answered Thomas’ plea to know the way. Jesus told him, “I am the Way, I am the Truth, and I am the Life. Jesus is Truth. And that is what jumped out at me when I read, “I wouldn’t tell you this if it were not true.” Jesus speaks Truth. Jesus is Truth.
This is where the honesty of Jesus becomes the rock upon which we stand as Christians. Let’s examine both sides of that rock.
No one could ever claim that by following Jesus they received promises under false pretenses.
Bible scholar William Barclay points out that Jesus bluntly told his followers that following him would mean leaving friends and family behind and denying all comforts for the sake of loving him. Luke 9: 58, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to call his own.”
In other words, these simple creatures have a home where they can find safety ad rest. But he and his followers will not often be able to find those comforts.
He told them of the persecution and hatred that they would have to bear. In Matthew 10: 16, Jesus tells his disciples, “I am sending you like lambs into a pack of wolves.”
Again, in Matthew 16: 24-25, Jesus says, “If any of you want to be my followers, you must forget about yourself. You must take up your cross and follow me. If you want to save your life, you must destroy it. But if you give up your life [that is your sin filled life] for me, you will find life.” We will find life because our spirits will be joined with his Spirit.
All of this attests to Jesus’ brutal honesty. He never told any of his disciples it would be easy. He told Peter, he would deny him – three times – that in a time of peril, he would deny him for his own safety’s sake. Peter then would suffer the agony and shame of his failure.
No nothing about being a follower of Christ was going to be easy. We have Jesus’ word on that. And we can believe that it is true because we have the history of the church that bears out what happens to each of the disciples.
Philip is the first to be killed by being stoned by Saul outside the city of Jerusalem. Matthew was killed by sword in Ethiopia. Mark was dragged through the streets of Alexandria by horses. Luke [though he was not an original disciple] was hanged in Greece due to his fervent preaching of the Gospel. Peter was hung on a cross-upside-down in Rome. James, the son of Zebedee, was beheaded in Jerusalem. Andrew was crucified on a cross. And Thomas whose mission took him to India was stabbed with a spear. Paul [who was the man Saul who stoned Philip] was beheaded by Nero in Rome for his constant preaching. There are countless other martyrs in our church history whose sacrifices were no less severe. And I am not going to minimize any of our own struggles and blowback in the work place, or with family and neighbors when we try to live out our faith.
Now this is my point, and I think it is the point that John is trying to make in his Gospel. If Jesus was truthful about how difficult following him would be, then He must certainly be telling us the truth about going to his father’s house to prepare a room for us.
And that is the truth that jumps out at me from today’s lectionary. Jesus is telling us the truth when we hear him say, He is going to the Father’s house to prepare a room for each of us. That is a truth for us to latch onto no less valid than his warnings he gave us about how difficult it would be to be one of his followers.
Now, Jesus and John don’t go into great detail about what the Father’s house would look like, what size our rooms may be, or what the style of architecture the house would be. Or, what this multiplicity of rooms means.
And that lack of detail has opened the door to many differing theories of what it could mean. And I have to be honest with you, most of them, don’t land on solid ground for me. I mean, I think the explanations become too much of a stretch for me to buy into.
The Jews who believed in resurrection, thought that there were different grades of blessedness in heaven which would be given to people according to their goodness and fidelity on earth. In other words, if you led a pure and righteous life, your accommodation in heaven might be quite luxurious. But if you led just an OK life, failing most of the time and being good only part of the time, then your room might be much smaller with fewer perks. Perhaps we can expect something in between the two. I don’t know. This vision of the afterlife doesn’t resonate with me.
Clement of Alexandria said something similar. He said there were degrees of glory and rewards and stages that a person achieved in proportion to their holiness in this life. This says pretty much the same as the Jews did. Both ideas of the afterlife were based upon the notion that our good works would impact what our heavenly experience would be like. But all that flies in the face of God’s gracious mercies which are poured out on all of us indiscriminately by the Father.
Now one of the words used in translations of this passage is the Greek word “monai” which translates to stages along the way. And what it means here is that after death, our souls continue to progress through stages in heaven. Our souls continue learning and getting ever closer to God by progressing through higher and higher levels of holiness until we reach the final stage of being one with God in heaven.
Again, William Barclay characterizes it this way. “There is something attractive in the idea of a development which goes on even in heavenly places.” And that is a nice thought. That even as we have ascended to a nearness to the Father, our souls continue to learn, continue to grow, continue to have the Holy Spirit reveal more about God to us. Barclay continues, “it suggests that even in heaven we would need to be purified and helped onward to face even greater glory.”
I guess that is a nice way of thinking about heaven. But still I hesitate and point out that it wasn’t something Jesus ever said or suggested. All of these explanations of what we may want heaven to be like are borne out of our need to define God. And I don’t really think that we should be in the business of trying to define God. I think we should allow Jesus to reveal God for us.
Here, I think the simpler meaning is more lovely. It is this. That there are many abiding places in the Father’s house because in God’s heaven there is room for all. That is the notion that appeals more so to me. That God’s heart is wide enough, big enough, expansive enough to accommodate every soul that turns to God’s Truth for the Light on their path.
And Jesus tells us that “I will welcome you to myself so that where I am, you will be also.” Isn’t that enough?
My friends, these are the Truths that you can believe and cling to.
That the Father’s love for you is gracious beyond any measure. There is nothing that you can do to earn it. No good work that you can do can make you grow in esteem or righteousness before the Father.
Now this is NOT to say that good works are not an important part of Christian life. If we use Jesus’ life as an example [and that is what we are called to do]; if we live the life of the servant who washes the feet of his friends; if we live the life of the Good Samaritan who bends down to aide his neighbor in need; if we live the life of the loving Son who submits totally to the Father’s will because the love the Son has for the Father goes beyond a love of life itself – then good works would come naturally flowing out of the love Jesus calls us to share for one another.
For Jesus has given us the commandment that we “…Love one another. Just as he loves us, we should love each other.Our love for one another will prove to the world that we are his disciples.”
In other words, the love we share with one another will shine out to the world and would be evidenced by our works. But those works, no matter how numerous, will not buy us a more luxurious room in the Father’s house. And we shouldn’t be doing them to earn a greater reward. We should just let them happen.
Jesus tells us the truth when he tells us the Father pours out God’s mercy upon you simply because the Father loves you. As the Psalmist has suggested, “…This is how the gates to the Kingdom are opened so that the righteous may enter in.”
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