Looking Into the Lectionary — Worship resources for 1/23

January 23, 2022 3rd Sunday after Epiphany Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10, Psalm 19, Luke 4:14-21, 1 Corinthians 12:12-31 COMMENTARY In his latest novel Cloud Cuckoo Land, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Anthony Doerr explores, among other things, how stories come to be — not how they are written, but how they survive. He focuses on a (fictional) Greek manuscript and portrays some of the hands and lives that it passes through to survive millennia. Reading this book brought me back to my summer studying ancient Greek in seminary and our conversations around the art and history of translation, the different scrolls that have been debated and combined into our modern versions of the Bible. What a miracle the Bible is. Beyond the God-breathed stories, I’m talking about the physical book. Imagine all the hands that have touched these texts over millennia. The scribes, bent over poor candlelight, tracking words on one papyrus with one hand while they copy the text with their other hand on a new, clean sheet. The dusty, dark rooms that scrolls were kept in, and sometimes forgotten about (as we see when Hilkiah finds the Torah in 2 Chronicles 34:14-16). The stories of ancestors that were told around the firelight, whispered into ears of sleepy children, and proclaimed over meals that, eventually, were written into a narrative. The Bible is a miracle. It is full of human effort, mistakes, and edits. Yet, God blesses it and uses it as a gift to call us to God’s self, to remind us of our history. The Bible is our inheritance. It is a constant reminder that God is with us, in all our humanness. You can find the rest of the commentary on our website. An order of worship for January 23, 2022. This liturgy is free to use. The Uniform Lesson for January 23, 2022, by Richard Boyce. All the pieces of the puzzle — Weekly Christian ed lesson by Joelle Brummit-Yale  What My Grandmothers Taught Me — Ruth by Rosalind Banbury IN CASE YOU MISSED IT... Celebrating the life and legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. A PC(USA) worship service reflects on the life of MLK and God's love of diversity and justice. Did Jesus whip people? Personal reflections on a troubling Bible story Bruce Gillette explores the proper way to translate John 2:15, calling for the NRSVue to reconsider what they've printed. A struggle for a common PC(USA) vision Top denominational leaders had some honest talk on Jan. 13 about what has worked, and what hasn’t, in their efforts to collaborate in shaping the budgets of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). — Leslie Scanlon “Shaping Young People by the Thousands:” An Interview with Marjorie Hass Teri McDowell Ott interviews Marjorie Hass, the president of the Council of Independent Colleges, a Jewish scholar and a former president of two Presbyterian Church-related colleges. Ex-vangelicals are coming: How will mainline denominations welcome them? Jon Mathieu, an ex-vangelical and recent graduate of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, reflects on how mainline denominations such as the PC(USA) can welcome those leaving evangelical traditions.  Thunder in the Soul: To Be Known by God In this small collection of his writings from across Abraham Joshua Heschel's life, we get insight into his capacity to hold in balance a life of prayer and serious study of Scripture with prophetic action. — Roy Howard

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