Last night I was sitting in a pew of my church. Before the musicians could get past the second line of the first song, I was struck by a deep sense of joy that moved me to tears. All because of one word, “elders.” Why “elders”? When Jesus was on trial, he stood before the Sanhedrin, the council of seventy elders and priests. Those elders and priests were all facing him in that courtroom, sure that they knew God’s plans, and sure that Jesus didn’t fit those plans. They looked at him with...

It’s fall, and that’s got me thinking about harvests. “You reap what you sow” says the apostle Paul. It’s true - you can’t plant parsley seeds and expect pumpkins to come up in your garden. And yet, sometimes that happens. Last year’s pumpkins can leave behind seeds that grow this year. You don’t always get what you pay for, you get more down the line. Good done long ago can bring us good now. Yet even more surprising, sometimes you plant parsley and a volunteer maple tree comes up. Or a big...

Growing up, my church never celebrated Christ’s ascension on a special day, nor did I think too much about its importance. On Palm Sunday, I paraded with the other kids up the aisle singing Hosanna and waving palm branches as trumpets blared. Holy Thursday and Good Friday we were somber. On Easter morning, we gathered on the church patio to wait for sunrise and then we sang to a small brass band composed of any church members who could play a brass instrument; it didn’t sound very good,...