Rev Chris Roth

John 2:1-11 In the Gospel of John, I love that Jesus’ ministry starts at a wedding. Isn’t it great to imagine Jesus at this huge celebration, laughing with friends and relatives, dancing, and drinking wine? And this wasn’t like a modern wedding which is usually the good part of an afternoon and evening. This was a huge event. It was a celebration that involved the whole town. Family traveled from other places. Jesus and his mother travelled from Nazareth, which was about 3 miles away. That part isn’t hard to grasp- we understand big weddings. But this wedding would have lasted for several days. People would come and go, and new people would arrive, friends and family, neighbours, all to celebrate the new couple. Hospitality was a huge issue in the Middle East. It still is. Your honour can be bound to your ability to be hospitable and welcoming. The preparation for this party fell on the shoulders of the groom. It was his job to talk to all his family and friends a...

Isaiah 60:1-6 ; Psalm 72:1-7, 10-14 ; Ephesians 3:1-12 ; Matthew 2:1-12 It is a very interesting passage we have here before us in the Gospel of Matthew. Men came to Jerusalem from somewhere in the East. We don’t know from where- perhaps Persia, or Arabia, or somewhere else, we don’t know. The song we often sing on this day proclaims “three kings”, but Matthew doesn’t actually indicate that they were kings. Though, perhaps someone could have mistaken them for kings based on the gifts they carried. In the story of the magi later Christians heard an echo of Isaiah 60:3,6b  “Nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn ...  They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the LORD" .  Likewise, in Psalm 72:10-11  “May the kings of Tarshish and of the isles render him tribute, may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts. May all kings fall down before him, all nations give him service”.  In the ma...

1 Samuel 2:18-20, 26; Colossians 3:12-17; Luke 2:41-52 We read in our Gospel lesson that Jesus “increased in wisdom and in years”. He sits in the temple among the teachers and is asking questions and giving answers. After the holiday celebrations have ended Jesus is still in the temple engaging the things of God. He is participating in learning the ways of his people. There was a development in Jesus. He learned. His character developed. Jesus is at about the age when Jewish boys have their Bar Mitzvah. It is a time when they are considered to make a transition from boyhood to manhood. They will responsibly enter into the worship of God as adults. Jesus would have entered the worship with the men at this point- entering into the inner courts of the temple with Joseph to make the offering of the Paschal Lamb, which would then later be eaten by him and his family. … Before their Bar Mitzvah the sin that boys commit is the responsibility of their parents. After their Bar Mitzvah it is...

Luke 2:1-20 When I think about this night I often think about a painting. It’s not a very Christmassy painting. It is a painting of Mary weeping over her son after his body was taken down from the cross. It was in the family home of a man named Martin Kober for a long time. It was an old painting that had always been a part of the background of the family. I remember at my grandma’s house she had a velvet painting of a mountain scene. It was just always there. It was like the wood paneling it hung on. It was just always there- a part of the background. Martin Kober’s painting was like that. It hung on the wall of the family home, in the background. It hung on the wall for many years until one day the painting was knocked off the wall when the kids were playing with a tennis ball. The family left the painting behind the couch, perhaps to keep it from being knocked to the ground again. There the painting sat for nearly 30 years, unseen, gathering dust. One day Martin decided to have ...

Lessons and Carols  Is 9:2, 6-7 Luke 1:26-38 Lk 2:1-7 Lk 2:8-16 Matt 2:1-11 Jn 1:1-14 If we had to pick one hymn for the season of Advent one would quickly rise to our minds- “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel”. It is an old hymn. The words have their roots at least as far back at the year 800, but probably go back further. They have been used and modified in the season of Advent ever since.  The first verse goes- O come, O come, Emmanuel, And ransom captive Israel, That mourns in lonely exile here, Until the Son of God appear. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel. That really sums up what Advent is all about. “O Come” is a yearning. … When thinking about Advent, the theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer uses the image of miners who have become trapped in a collapsed mine. They have no ability to save themselves. They sit in the darkness and wait. They have no power over when of if they will be saved. They sit in the darkness and yearn, “O Come,...

Luke 3:7-18 John the Baptist represents the school of the prophets. He is dressed like Elijah. They both wore Camel’s hair garments with a leather belt around the waist (2 Kings 1:8 and Matt 3:4). Elijah was the prophet’s prophet. He was supposed to come before the messiah would arrive (Mal 4:5). John also had the words of the prophets on his lips (Mal 3:1; Is 40:3-5). The stereotypical cry of the prophet is “repent”, which means to turn. You repent when you head down the wrong road and when you realize it you make a U-turn. It involves both turning away from what is wrong and turning towards what is right. The prophets usually arose to call people back to the Law and Covenant. The people would stop following God’s direction in their life. They would become attracted to the cultures around them. They would start participating in the worship of other gods, and forget the moral and religious direction God set out for them. So the prophets were those who stood up to call the people bac...

The Rev. Bud Sargent came to speak to us on behalf of the Mustard Seed at our 10am service. They are doing wonderful work in Red Deer. Please consider supporting the work they are doing. Click on the picture below to learn more.  The following was the sermon preached at the 8:00 service Luke 3:1-6  Our Gospel reading opens with a list of names, mostly obscure and hard to pronounce. It is completely reasonable to ask why those names are included as a part of the story of Jesus. What Luke is trying to do is to place this story in history. Ancient historians would often describe time by pointing to the year of an important political or religious person. So, what all this means is that we can place the ministry of John the Baptist sometime around 26 to 28 AD, by our way of measuring time. It would be a bit like saying, “in the 65th year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth the second, and the 3rd year of the leadership of Justin Trudeau as Prime Minister of Canada.” ...