Trusting God doesn’t mean that you’re at all excited about doing the thing you’ve committed to. (And “temptation” is about wavering from faithfulness, not cheating on your diet.)

Notes for week 4 of A Curriculum of Love #CurriculumOfLove #NarrativeLectionary

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/06/12/a-funny-thing-luke-22/

When we rest in connection with God, our activity comes to reflect the life of God in the world.

Notes for week 3 of A Curriculum of Love #CurriculumOfLove #NarrativeLectionary

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/06/03/a-funny-thing-philippians-4-mark-6/

We like to believe in unconditional love, as long as we can choose whom it applies to. And as long as it doesn’t imply that we’re among the people who need it.

Week two of A Curriculum of Love #CurriculumOfLove #NarrativeLectionary

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/05/31/a-funny-thing-luke-10-john-8/

The question of faith is whether the life Jesus showed us is what God is really like. The answer is love.

Notes for the first week of Siri Strommen’s #NarrativeLectionary summer series A Curriculum of Love. #CurriculumOfLove

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/05/25/a-funny-thing-1-john-4/

When the #NarrativeLectionary has been in John, I want to use some of Jesus’ teachings about the #HolySpirit for #Pentecost. Instead of portraying the Spirit as a miracle translator that helps us convince other people of what we believe, John’s “farewell discourse" promises that the Spirit will teach us how to live in the love we already intuitively know.

It’s not that we’re inherently untrustworthy, but that we are formed by a world that teaches us what we ultimately know to be false.

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/05/17/a-funny-thing-john-14-16/

In John, Jesus doesn’t just commission the church to propagate his teachings, or even just to go forgive the world (although that would probably be enough). The disciples’ real commissioning is to feed and tend each other in imitation of Jesus’ life laid down for them.

#NarrativeLectionary

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/04/30/a-funny-thing-john-2115-19-2/

I follow a variant of the #NarrativeLectionary readings that I call the #EpicLectionary. Instead of trying to cover the same 15 Old Testament stories every year, I follow three narrative arcs that allow us a little deeper engagement with the characters and stories.

Now that we’re finishing a full Narrative Lectionary cycle, I’ve posted an updated four-year Epic schedule. I’ll still plan to post a late-2026 update in the summer to attach calendar dates and account for anything that looks weird in how the liturgical and secular calendars line up.

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/04/29/epic-lectionary-version-3/

With a little perspective between Easter and now, we can see that Jesus’ appearance to Thomas is part three of an ongoing conversation between Jesus and one of his most diligent disciples.

(I always stretch out the resurrection appearances longer than the #NarrativeLectionary spends with them.)

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/04/17/a-funny-thing-john-2024-31-2/

Jesus’ day-one agenda for the resurrection is to ordain the church to extend his mission beyond his one body.

(I always stretch out the resurrection appearances longer than the #NarrativeLectionary spends with them.)

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/04/13/a-funny-thing-john-2019-23-2/

The resurrection of the light takes place while it is still dark, because Jesus is not ultimately bound even by death. The resurrection comes into being by way of death, because the whole point has been to set free a world that was bound by the power of death.

#NarrativeLectionary #Easter #Bible

https://ecologian.wordpress.com/2026/03/25/a-funny-thing-john-201-10-11-18/