Month: November 2020

  • Wild Jesus: the Jesus that John did not make up

    Here’s a pretty literal translation of Revelation 1:9-20: (9) I, John, y’all’s sibling and fellow sharer in the afflictions, and kingdom, and steadfast endurance in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. (10) I was in a spirit on the Lord’s day, and…

  • Beyond Judging Doug: a mini-sermon on the parable of the talents

    I had another chance to give an eight minute mini-sermon at (online) church this past Sunday. The text is below if you’re interested, or feel free to watch the video here. My part starts around 39:57. Esther Lee before me (starting around 33:43) and Michael Won after me (starting around 48:44) both have great things…

  • Politicians, resistance, and Jesus the all-ruling one

    In the earlier days of the pandemic, I decided to translate the book of Revelation from its original Greek.  It turned out to go more quickly than my current project, the book of Luke. Revelation’s author, John, tends to use language that is (relatively) simple and straightforward in Greek. So, I’m not sure how many…

  • Election Week Blessing

    Because I wanted to be cool like Nadia Bolz-Weber (just kidding―I’ll never be as cool as Nadia!) and write some blessings of my own. (Check out Nadia’s beautiful “Blessed are the Agnostics” piece here, if you like. It’s really lovely.) These words are loosely inspired by the beatitudes (Matthew 5:3-12), and much less loosely inspired…