Martha, Lazarus, and Mary were all disciples of Jesus, people who loved and followed Jesus, opened their home to Him, shared their table with Jesus in fellowship and enjoyed Jesus’ friendship as well as lived by Jesus’ teaching. Each had their own unique relationship with the Lord, yet together, as a family, they displayed all the aspects of a church.Especially the sisters, Martha and Mary, teach you and me about blessing God as a whole body of believers.Studying the Bible, learning the doctr...
Years and years ago, when I was in a high school writing class, we were asked to write our own obituary. I remember us all laughing nervously, it sounded so macabre! But it was the teacher’s sideways device to get us to write about our hopes and dreams. What would we want to be remembered for someday?And it made me wonder what Martha would have wanted to be remembered for?Most of us remember the Martha depicted in Luke’s Gospel, the busy beaver who is reprimanded by Jesus, and chastened to be...
The story of the woman at the well comes right after Jesus made a blockbuster statement to the Pharisee and Sanhedrin member Nicodemus: God loves not just Pharisees, not even just Judeans, but the whole world. And, to illustrate this very point, Jesus made his way to some of the most despised people in the region, the Samaritans.Now, as Jesus and his disciples arrived at Jacob’s famous well, they decided to take a break. Jesus sat down to rest, and the disciples went into the nearest town to ...
Matthew, Mark, and Luke acknowledge the women who traveled with Jesus. Matthew and Mark do not mention these female disciples until they are found at Jesus’s cross. Luke gives more details about them, describing them as ministering to Jesus, and along with Jesus, from their own resources and ability. These women received teaching and revelation from Jesus along with his other disciples and were given Jesus’s call to proclaim the truth they received. The Gospel of John’s less formal and m...
Though Mary of Magdala is a well-known figure in the gospels, she is not introduced by name until Jesus’s crucifixion in John’s Gospel (John 19:25). John doesn’t explain who she is, or what her relationship is to Jesus or his family, but there she is, with John and Mary, Jesus’s mother. That alone says how important she was to Jesus’s inner circle.In fact, Mary of Magdala is the only other woman besides Jesus’s mother who is identified in all four Gospels. In total, she is mentioned twelve ti...
This is a six-part series, and this is the fourth installment, exploring how the calling narrative found in the Gospel of John, chapter 1 is repeated in the story of the Samaritan Woman in John chapter 4, and in Mary of Magdala's story at the end of John's Gospel, chapter 20.There are twelve calling elements to Jesus's call to discipleship and apostolic mission portrayed in the calling of Jesus's first five disciples: Andrew, John, Peter, Phillip, and Nathanael. The synoptic gospels key in on...
We don’t often think of Jesus gathering disciples together as a rabbi starting a school, but the shape of what Jesus did very much is the shape of a school. Jesus did depart from the traditional rabbinical model of his day in a few significant ways. For instance, unlike other schools, Jesus kept his table fellowship open to everyone, people in every stratum and sphere of life. And, Jesus chose as his disciples some unexpected people. Apart from the Twelve, there is evidence Jesus had women di...
Did Jesus call women into discipleship in the same way Jesus called men? Or did women simply start following Jesus of their own accord, with no formal call? Can we say, for instance, that Mary of Bethany was actually a disciple, or was she simply acting like a disciple when she sat at Jesus’s feet?In the same way, was Mary of Magdala only acting like an apostle to the apostles, as she is sometimes called, or was she actually sent by Jesus as an apostle?Three years ago, as I sat down to read t...
The debate continues as to whether Scripture endorses, or at least permits, or rather forbids women from certain roles within the Body of Christ. May women be deacons? May women be elders? May women be pastors? May women be bishops? May women teach or lead in church?At stake, of course, is how to live rightly before God, how to do what God has in mind, and to live within the space and the design God has laid out for humankind. And, questions of women's roles—whatever they may be—within the Bo...
The story of Jairus’s daughter and the woman who suffered from a bleeding disorder are told together in all three of the synoptic gospels—the gospels that more or less track with each other, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. I am going to be teaching out of Mark’s gospel, who has the most detailed account of these two stories. I believe this to be a true story, but it is a story that also reveals startling truths Jesus was teaching his disciples, revealing to the crowds of people who followed him, and...
Throughout his ministry, Jesus gathered around him men and women who became a community of 120 people joined in their love for and faith in Jesus. And one of those women was Mary of Magdala. She is mentioned fourteen times, in all four Gospels, and her name is almost always placed first, seemingly implying she was first in service, first in support. However, Mary’s most significant story appears not during Jesus’s ministry, but rather at his resurrection.In this twenty minute talk, we’ll firs...
Is the cross a symbol about death or life? defeat or triumph? humiliation or glory? Or all those things?As I searched for answers, I became drawn to how Christians depicted crosses a thousand years ago and more, and that search became this fifteen minute video on the ancient symbols of Christianity.From the eight-hundred-year old Batllo Majsty, now residing in in the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain, to the gorgeous Basilica di Sant’Apollinare, Ravenna, Italy, the fifth cen...
Of the several influential women in the Bible who are not given names—Job’s wife, comes to mind—the wife of Pilate is perhaps the most shadowy. All that is known of her from the scriptures is her relationship to the Procurator Marcus Pontius Pilate, and the message she sent to him while he was sitting on the Seat of Judgment in the Praetorium the morning Jesus of Nazareth was tried for treason.Yet her message, and its impact, have been felt for the two thousand years since it was delivered, a...
In the passage just before this one, Mark talked about the scribe who had asked Jesus about the greatest commandment and was impressed with Jesus’ answer. Jesus was also pleased. He told the scribe he was very close to entering the kingdom of heaven. With such a warm endorsement from a scribe, this was a rare teachable moment, the right moment, in today’s passage (Mark 12:35-44), for Jesus to talk about Messiah, and to teach His disciples the difference between a false reading, and a true rea...
We don’t know this woman’s backstory at all, whether she was young or old, her culture or clan. Some in our Bible study thought perhaps she was the woman who had committed adultery and was forgiven privately by Jesus after everyone had left (John 8:11). Maybe! We really have no information on her at all but what is given in this text.Back in 591 A.D. Pope Gregory preached an Easter sermon in which he combined the stories of Mary the Magdalene with Mary of Bethany and the woman in this story, ...
Most Bibles point out that the earliest manuscripts do not include this story, and sometimes it appears in Luke However, Jerome, in 383 AD, included it in his translation of the Gospel of John, right after chapter 7, where it is usually found today. Jerome noted that many ancient Greek and Latin manuscripts at his disposal had this story, in its usual position.Ambrose of Milan, and Augustine confirmed Jerome’s report, and Augustine, in 403 AD, wrote “…certain persons of little faith, or rathe...
Herodias’ story is introduced in both Matthew’s gospel and Mark’s with Herod Antipas hearing reports about Jesus’ astonishing miraculous powers."Some were saying, 'John the baptizer has been raised from the dead; and for this reason these powers are at work in him.' But others said, 'It is Elijah.' And others said, 'It is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.' But when Herod heard of it, he said, 'John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.'"Mark 6:14-16 (NRSV)In spite of others’ reassuranc...
There is some debate as to whether the book of Esther is historical, or possibly written as a play or allegory. Haman’s seventy-five foot gallows, the difficulty in establishing which king—and more notably, which queen—Esther’s story describes, and the depiction of a few unlikely scenes such as a massive, three-day civil war which is completely absent from Persian sources, move many scholars to suggest Esther is a dramatized story.That said, I am going to treat the story as it is presented. W...
Have you ever even -heard- of Huldah? I bet not!Most timelines for the history of ancient Israel place prophets alongside the kings they advised. Even prophets without their own books, such as the prophet Nathan who counseled King David, are listed. But as much as I look for her, I have yet to see the prophet Huldah listed as well.It is a strange choice, to leave her out of Judah’s timeline, as she was perhaps the most influential prophet of her day. The fate of her people, her nation, and he...
Just the word “jezebel” evokes a whole evil, erotic, seductive mystique, doesn’t it? I looked “jezebel” up in the dictionary, and here’s what Webster-Merriam has to say: “an impudent, shameless, or morally unrestrained woman.” According to other definitions,A jezebel is a wicked, evil, scheming female who is manipulates her victims into giving her wealth, status and power. She is often beautiful and knows it, using her looks to her advantage to “lure in” her preyShe very much has to be the ce...