Irreverently Reverend

  Fourth Sunday of Easter 16  This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.  And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.  17  If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?  18  Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. 19  This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence:  20  If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.  21  Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God  22  and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him.  23  And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.  24  The one who keeps God’s commands lives in him, and he in them. And this is how we kn

  Third Sunday of Easter See what kind of love the Father has given to us in that we should be called God’s children, and that is what we are! Because the world didn’t recognize him, it doesn’t recognize us. 2  Dear friends, now we are God’s children, and it hasn’t yet appeared what we will be. We know that when he appears we will be like him because we’ll see him as he is.  3  And all who have this hope in him purify themselves even as he is pure.  4  Every person who practices sin commits an act of rebellion, and sin is rebellion .  5  You know that he appeared to take away sins, and there is no sin in him.  6  Every person who remains in relationship to him does not sin. Any person who sins has not seen him or known him. 7  Little children, make sure no one deceives you. The person who practices righteousness is righteous, in the same way that Jesus is righteous. (CEB)             The preacher Fred Craddock tells a story about meeting an elderly man at a restaurant near Gatli

  Easter Sunday When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him.  2  And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb.  3  They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?”  4  When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back.  5  As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed.  6  But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him.  7  But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.”  8  So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said not