Easter Day. April 20, 2025 Luke 24:1-12 Revd. Neli Miranda Today’s Gospel narrative opens with a group of women, disciples of Jesus, going to the tomb… It is the first day of the week, and in the wake of Jesus’ crucifixion, the first community of disciples is experiencing profound grief. As noted in the preceding chapter, after Jesus’ death all his acquaintances, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance observing these events. Luke also recounts that a righteous man named Joseph, from the town of Arimathea, approached Pilate and requested Jesus’ body. Joseph was a member of the council that had dissented from its plan and action to execute Jesus. Joseph took Jesus’ body down from the cross, wrapped it in a linen cloth, and laid it in a tomb hewn in the rock, where no one had ever been laid. Luke notes that the women who were Jesus’ disciples followed Joseph and observed the tomb where Jesus’ body was placed. As ...
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Palm Sunday 2025 Luke 19:28-40 Rev. Neli Miranda The celebration of Palm Sunday commemorates Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem accompanied by his disciples and a multitude of pilgrims—children, women, and men—who journeyed to the city to celebrate Passover. Passover was one of the three major pilgrimage festivals as well as Pentecost and Tabernacles when all the Israelites were called to travel to the temple in Jerusalem. During Passover they celebrated the Exodus, when God delivered their ancestors from slavery in Egypt. In Jerusalem they attended and participated in different festivities and rituals at the temple, including the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb and the offering of its blood to God by the priests. Since his childhood, Jesus had often journeyed to Jerusalem as a pilgrim. However, on this occasion, he is more than a pilgrim. He is a herald of the Kingdom of God proclaiming a new Exodus. This time, he himself will become the Paschal Lamb. Jesus...
Fifth Sunday in Lent 2025 John 12:1-8 Rev. Neli Miranda On the fifth Sunday in Lent, our Gospel readings shift from Luke to John’s account, where Jesus arrives in Bethany, the home of Mary, Martha, and their brother Lazarus whom Jesus had raised from the dead. As John details in the preceding chapter, this act by Jesus has placed the Jewish authorities on high alert. So, after this event, the chief priests and the Pharisees concerned about Jesus’ growing influence, called a council meeting and asked themselves, “What are we to do? This man is performing many signs” (11:47). They feared the potential political repercussions of Jesus’ action in the eyes of the Roman authorities; thus, they begin to plot Jesus’ death. Aware that Jesus is coming to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover, the chief priests and the Pharisees have given orders that anyone knowing his location should report it, so that they might arrest him and silence his message. Today’s gospel begins by no...