Understanding the Jesus of the Gospels

Sermons from the Gospels

recent posts

Subscribe

1-corinthians-12 all-saints-day bible chalenge christianity commentary-on-luke-12-13-21 communion diversity Easter faith fear god gospel-of-john gospel-of-luke Gospel of John Gospel of Matthew gratitude healing holy-spirit jairus jesus john-17 John 20 Lazarus lords-supper love-in-the-darkest-hour luke-15 luke-16-13 luke-17-11-19 luke-24 my-fathers-house pentecost prayer resurrection say-thank-you talents temptation the-dishonest-steward the-rich-fool the Empty Tomb to-whom-do-you-belong unity witness witnessing world-communion-sunday

  • More Like the Father

    Luke 15: 11-32

    Offered to the United Presbyterian Church of Alpha, NJ on November 1, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA

    OK. So last week, we talked about the wandering lost Sheep and the Lost Coin. And then very briefly, I introduced the third parable in Luke 15 – that of the Prodigal or as William Barclay called it, the Parable of the Loving Father. And I left you at that cliff hanger. So today, let’s look at this Prodigal story.

    In the third parable, we will see how we can choose to turn and walk away from the Father – when we knowingly make the choice to replace our right relationship with the Father with the material things of this world. In the third parable we become lost by choice. We decide to turn our backs on God and walk away. With our free will, we choose to reject God’s love.

    And we will see in this parable how both sons make that same decision.

    Here’s a personal story. Years ago, when my wife and I moved out to Jersey, we took a deep breath and said to ourselves, “OK, we are out from under the watchful eyes of parents and family and now we are free to live as we liked.” We decide to give up our relationship with the Father for the comfort of sleeping in on Sunday mornings.

    And while we putted around tending to our new house, the children and our jobs, we lost sight of our relationship to God. We forgot whose we were. Then one Sunday afternoon our daughter Robyn came running into the house. She had been playing with her friend Adrienne next door who had just returned from Sunday School. Adrienne had learned that Jesus was her friend, and she told my daughter about her new friend. Distraught, my daughter came running back into our house yelling out, “Mommy, who is Jesus and why is He Adie’s friend and not mine?” I looked at my wife and muttered, “Damn, he’s found us.”

    While we had chosen to hide ourselves away, denying whose we were, he used two children at play to make his voice heard. The Shepherd spoke and his sheep recognized his voice and turned to follow.

    Have you found yourself lost in similar denial of whose you are? What you need to know is that the Father is patiently waiting for you to look up and hear God’s voice. And when you finally do find your way home, the Father will celebrate your return.

    Jesus begins his third story, “There was a man had two sons…” It is only partly a story about the younger son. So, we will examine and both his sons but more importantly we will examine this man [the Father].

    The younger son chooses to reject the way of living that has been handed down as a sacred legacy.

    This son’s actions are a betrayal of family and community. It is a disrespecting of all that the Pharisees and scribes would have viewed as important within a Jewish family and the Law.

    Within the context of the story, this son’s actions are a denial of the basic tenets of the Jewish faith and law. He has violated the law by demanding an inheritance that he is not entitled to and a commandment by disrespecting his father. His request was tantamount to wishing his father dead.

    The father in this story would have been justified in having the son beaten, disowned, kicking him out of the family and denying him any inheritance at all. The Pharisees would have approved of that. It would have been the actions they would have expected of their own judgmental god especially toward these sinners surrounding Jesus. They would say that these sinners had also disrespected the Law. And therefore, they were not entitled to share in Israel’s inheritance. By their sin, they had been rightly disowned.

    We can also see that this son is also denying the spiritual reality that we belong to God. We belong to the Father. And when we choose to walk away from this Truth, then we are denying whose we are. We know the disastrous end that this decision leads the younger son to.

    The younger son takes all he has been given – all the talents and gifts bestowed upon him by the Father and wastefully squanders them. Then when disaster strikes and the time of reckoning comes, he finds that he is not only financially broke and spiritually broken as well. And that he has been abandoned by his good-time friends and the material comforts that he sought from this world could offer him nothing to fulfill his needs materially or spiritually.

    The younger son is lost. In order to survive, he finds work slopping pigs. From the depths of a pig stye, this lost son looks up to hear the voice of God once again and realizes how much he has squandered. He then resolves to go back to his Father’s house.

    He gets up and begins his walk back to his Father’s house. Recall that in the story that on the road, he is rehearsing a confession.

    “Father, I have sinned against heaven and you. I am no longer worthy of being your son. Treat me as one of your workers.” That last phrase is vital because it reveals something that is lacking in the son’s heart.

    And it is this. While it may sound like a confession, it is not true repentance.

    Rev. Kenneth Bailey notes the son is not returning with remorse in his heart seeking forgiveness and restoration. Not yet. While he recognizes his failures – that he has squandered his inheritance, his plan is to be received back as a worker. The lost son is not yet returning in repentance. He is going back with his own plan that would provide himself with a means of rebuilding his position on his own in training as a worker.

    When the watchful Father sees his wandering son walking on the road returning to the Father’s house, the Father runs out to greet him. Kenneth Bailey suggests this running out is parallel to the Shepherd going out in search of the lost sheep and the Woman scouring the floor to find the lost coin. Bailey calls this going out a “costly demonstration of unexpected love.”

    Costly because everyone in the community is observing this demonstration. Like the Pharisees observing Jesus, they would be disapproving of his actions.

    The Father’s actions are unexpected because the son is not yet returning to the Father’s house in repentance. His expectation is to be put into training as a worker so that he can earn his own way back into the respect of the community.

    However, after the Father (with tears flowing from his eyes) has hugged and kissed him, welcoming him back. Now, (belatedly) but finally Now, the lost son begins to see the anguish, the pain and the cost of what he has done. The tenor of his well-rehearsed apology changes.

    “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” Finally realizing the pain and the hurt he has caused to the Father’s heart, now his well-rehearsed confession becomes repentance.

    Initially his intent is not perfect. Bailey’s criticism of the young son’s motives is valid in pointing out that he is selfishly seeking to return as a worker. His intent is flawed, yes. But Saint Augustine would assert that it is still the Spirit of God that has urged him in the direction of the Father’s house. The Spirit brings him to the road leading to the Father’s house so that he can make his repentance and seek restoration of a relationship with the Father. In the Father’s arms, he acknowledges the wrong he has done and the hurt he has caused.

    What happens? The Father hears the confession and accepts that the son finally understands his sin and truly has repentance in his heart. But rather than assess any judgment or punishment he turns to his workers and immediately starts giving instructions.

    “Give him a Robe” – this would display to all that his honor in the household had been restored.

    “Give him a ring” – this would display to all that his authority in the household had been restored.

    “Give him sandals” – this would show all that he had been received back into the household as a son and not as a worker for those did not wear sandals.

    These three gracious gifts of restoration were outward signs of the father’s forgiveness, and the restoration of the Shalom the Father has created for his lost son and his family. This is an important caveat that Bailey points out. The son is not restoring himself through repentance. It is the Father who is restoring Shalom.

    All this was to ensure that everyone would know that this son’s position and his inheritance in the Father’s house had been restored. The Father is being lavish in his grace and forgiveness. The Father risks his own stature and position with this costly demonstration of unexpected love

    This is important to see because it defines the celebration of the Father joy.

    In his instructions to his servants, the Father defines the cause for celebration. “…This son of mine was dead but now has come back to life.” What the Father has done is to re-create new life (the Shalom of Eden’s first creation) from out of the empty void of sin.

    The Father’s celebration is not that the son has returned but that Shalom has been restored not only to the son’s life but to his family’s life and for the community that has joined him in his celebration.

    Here Bailey points us to a deeper understanding of what Jesus is saying here. It is not through some accident or happenstance that the lost son is found or resuscitated to life. No. It is through the graciousness of the Father that this lost son has become alive. It is the Father who is bringing him the final steps to the Father’s house. It is the Father that is the source of the son’s salvation.

    All of this is to restore this wanderer, this lost sinning son, to his prior status. There is no demand for groveling or servitude, no ultimatum, or suggestion of probation. There is only forgiveness.

    The Father chooses to pour out mercy, love and forgiveness lavishly to an extravagant extent without demanding retribution, without limit or concern for appearances. The Father’s celebration goes over the top with fatted calf, music and dancing. It is the Father who is prodigal.

    In order to learn more about our God, we have to examine and understand the actions of this prodigal Father. The actions which Jesus ascribes to the Father in this parable are extraordinary and beyond the religious leader’s understanding of how family inheritance and the laws concerning the division of property worked. Nothing this Father does from the initial acquiescence to the younger son’s demands, to his reception and restoration of the son’s position in the family and community, even to his going out later and pleading with the older son to join in the celebration of the Shalom is according to prescribed custom.

    In this third parable, Jesus sets the Father’s lavish and prodigal forgiveness in opposition to that of the religious leaders through the actions of the Elder son. The Elder son refuses to understand the Father’s lavish behavior. He displays an unwillingness to go beyond the Law in finding forgiveness for his Younger brother. He and the religious leaders who are disapproving of Jesus’ actions are lost in the Law. The irony is that these religious leaders cannot hear the voice of the God that gave them the Law. Jesus exposes their unwillingness to be sympathetic and forgiving to the sinners surrounding Jesus. They refuse to see the God that Jesus knows and is trying to reveal to them.

    When we become lost, it is one thing to be found, picked up and carried home like the Coin or the Sheep. It is another to be drawn back to God by the Spirit and realize how much our decisions to turn away from the Father have hurt the Father and how much it has cost God and us. When we decide for ourselves that our hope lies in the righteousness of the Father, then our decision to repent and return to the Father’s house can become the rock upon which true faith can be built. This is a vital lesson in the Bible’s salvation story. We have to decide where the hope of our redemption lies so that our salvation has real value. Then God can create true Shalom in our lives. How does God do this? By giving up the Son for us.

    Jesus’ characterization of the Father is that the Father is recklessly lavish in his desire to create Shalom. God remains steadfast in God’s commitment to God’s covenant promise of salvation. And it is Jesus’ desire that we see and know God in that way.

    Jesus wants us to know his Father as our loving and forgiving Creator – the Mother/Father/Parent who has made us in their image and since we are created in their image our purpose is to reflect God’s lavish loving mercy and forgiveness in extravagant ways. We are to reflect that image of God by being prodigal ourselves.

    Jesus is teaching us that we are called to be patient, to be caring, to be loving, to be welcoming, to be merciful and to be forgiving even when mercy and forgiveness may not seem justified. God has treated us this way. Now Jesus calls us to treat others in the same way.

    We are called by Jesus to share that story. “To go out to the world and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey all that He has commanded us.” And those commandments are to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength AND to love your neighbor as yourself with an extravagantly lavish and prodigal love even when sharing that love may not seem justified.

    This is the God Jesus wants us to know and reflect out to the world and this is the story we are called to tell.

    My friends, may it be so.

  • Know the Way, the Truth, and the Life

    John 14: 1-14

    Offered by Mel Prestamo to the First Church of Hanover, NJ on October 31, 2021

    In the Gospel passage from John that we read today, Jesus is discussing with his disciples where he is going and that they can’t go with him – but that they will be able to follow him there. That’s a bit confusing. You can’t come but you can follow.

    Take a moment to put yourself in the sandals of Anfrew, Thomas, Peter and John. They were more than confused. At the prospect of being separated from Jesus, being left behind…they were terrified.

    In this passage, Jesus is talking with his disciples at a time of great uncertainty. Jesus has just spent a great deal of time trying to explain to his core group what will be happening to him. He would be betrayed, handed over to the authorities, beaten and ultimately put to death. Their reaction had to be a stunned silence. A fear of abandonment must have struck deep within their hearts.

    After all, they had invested three years of their lives in following the person that they believed to be the Messiah. Now whether they thought that he would be a military leader who would reconquer Jerusalem and take it back from the Romans or in some other way establish a great kingdom here or in the heavens didn’t matter. They had invested time, heart and soul into this man and his ministry. But now, instead of riding on to great victory, they are being told he will be leaving them; and not because he had found a more worthy group but because he was going to be put to death.

    Imagine their shock, their utter feeling of despair. Their visions of how they thought this journey would end were being shattered. Instead of being part of a glorious kingdom, he would be leaving them. But hey, he was going to make a place for them in his Father’s house. How cryptic! Their fear and anxiety left them looking over a great abyss of uncertainty.

    Have we experienced this type of uncertainty? Have we sat beside family and friends trying to find comfort at the prospect of losing a loved one to death? Where we face the abyss of uncertainty that death causes, of being left behind. It is hard to have a rejoicing heart, celebrating with God when a child or elderly loved one will be joining God in heaven. For those of us who are left behind in this world, it is hard to find comfort. Yes, there will be glorious resurrection. But first, there must be loss.

    It is at times such as these that we need to know that the Christ has sent his Spirit to us. His Spirit will guide and comfort us. The Spirit will be our Advocate, and it will continue to shepherd us on in this life, through its dark valleys, through pain and loss. It is in our faith in the Christ that gives us the assurance that he has gone to the Father, that he prepares a place for us and is waiting to receive us.

    So, Jesus says to his disciples and to us, “Do not be worried. Have faith in God and have faith in me.” At times of great uncertainty, there is only one thing that we can do; that is, to stubbornly hold onto our trust in God. There are times that all we have is our faith in what we cannot prove or see. We have to accept what we cannot understand. In the darkest hour, if we believe that somehow there is a purpose in life and that purpose is LOVE, then even the unbearable becomes bearable and even in the darkest hour there is a glimmer of light.

    Here is where we find the disciples. They are being told they are about to face their darkest hour. And what’s more, they will be facing it without him. He is leaving them.

    Their immediate response is to ask that he would take them with him. But no.

    Jesus tells them, “Where I am going, you cannot follow.”

    What Jesus means here is that his path to reconciliation with the Father will lead to the Cross and on that road, there can be no surrogates. He has to walk that road alone. He is the sinless One. He is the only one who can display what total obedience to the Father looks like – a display that love of the Father is greater than a love of life itself.

    But … “do not be afraid. Believe in God (the God that has always been steadfast to its covenant promises to Israel) and believe on me.

    At the time when we do not understand what is happening, believe in God and believe in Jesus. When the hour is darkest, believe in God. When life is unbearable and we want to scream out in our anguish and pain, believe in Jesus. Believe in the God who bends down to hear your prayers. Believe in the God who gave up the Son submitting himself to the Cross to free us from our sins and death’s grip. All because God loves the world, loves you, and loves all that is good within it.

    In Psalm 141, the psalmist writes hundreds of years before Jesus, “O Lord, God, in thee I seek refuge.” If the Psalmist could believe that, how much easier is it for us because we have Jesus. Jesus is the proof that God is willing to give us everything that god has to give. Paul writes in romans, the “God that did not spare his Son … (God) gave him up for us all. If God did this, will not God give all things in Christ?” With that amazing love to bolster us up, it may not be easy, but at least it is possible to accept what we cannot understand and bear the storms of life.

    So, the disciples are facing an abyss of uncertainty. Jesus is telling that the Son if Man must be raised up on the Cross and that he will be going to the Father and they are stunned with the idea that they will be left behind and alone. Jesus speaks these words of assurance. To them and us:

    “There are many abiding places in my Father’s house. If it weren’t so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and I will welcome you to myself, that where I am, there you may be too.”

    Now the words “abiding places” have differing theological meanings. The Jews believed in gradations of blessedness. The Greeks held that there were stages along the way and we could progress from one level of blessedness to the next. Early Church thinkers spoke of degrees of glory in heaven. There is something attractive about the notion that our souls do not stop growing in  closeness to Jesus and in revelation in god but that after death we continue to grow, ever onward growing closer to God.

    But I would like to look at the more simple explanation and that is in heaven there is room for all. Jesus is telling his disciples that we are all living in a world where people close doors on us. Sometimes, those closings can be arbitrary done with very little reason. But God’s love is everlasting to everlasting. Heaven is as wide as the heart of God and there is room for us all. They (we) need not be worried and concerned about the uncertainties; for He will come again and take us to himself as He has the Saints that have gone before. This is the ultimate triumph of Jesus. He will come again and take us to himself. He has prepared the way. He has blazoned the trail so that we may follow.

    That is the way it would be for the disciples and so it is for the Saints that have gone before us. Jesus has blazoned the trail and prepared the way for them to follow. And they are not growing closer to the Christ and to God in every moment of their everlasting.

    Now for those of us who have doubts, there is Thomas. Thomas was never one to fear having doubts or asking for explanations. Thomas says, “Lord, we do not know where you are going.” Then he asks, “How do we know the way?” We should thank God for Thomas. Thomas asks the questions that we hide in the backrooms of our consciousness. And his questions give Jesus the opportunity to respond to our doubts.

    Jesus explains to them, “I am the way, (I am) the truth and (I am) the Life.”

    What better answer could we have to asway our doubts? But for a Jew of Jesus’ time, it had great meaning.

    Jews talked about the “way” in which we must walk and the” ways” of God. God said to Moses, “You shall not turn aside to the right or to the left. You shall walk in all the ways which the Lord, your God, has commanded you.” Isaiah speaks to us, “Your ears shall hear a word behind you saying, “This is the way, walk in it”. That wee small voice you hear is the Advocate that Jesus sent to us. It is the Spirit whispering to us, “This is the way, walk in it.”

    You know when we are trying to get around in an unfamiliar town and get lost, we might stop and ask someone for directions. They might give us instructions that sound like, “Well you go down to the third street and make a left and then make a right at the next intersection. Make sure it’s an intersection and not just a right turn. There will be a large office building with no signage on it, then you know you are on your way.

    That might be helpful. But it would be easier if someone would say to you, “I’m going that way, let me show you the way. That, I think, would be more comforting. So it is with Jesus. He does not simply give us directions, He takes us by the hand to show us the way.

    About Truth, the Psalmist says, “Teach me your ways, O Lord, that I may walk in Truth.”

    Truth today has become subjective. We are bombarded by media, social and otherwise, telling us that we can determine the validity of facts for ourselves and decide what is true or not. It tells us that we can be our own diviners, that truth is relative, and that we can pick and choose what is true.

    But the Palmist tells us otherwise. The Psalmist tells us that Truth comes in walking in the “Way” of the Lord. And Jesus tells us that He is the “Way”, so it follows that Jesus is Truth. You know that many a person can say to you, “I am speaking the truth to you.” I could say that I am teaching you the truth here today. But I can never say, no other person can ever say, “I am the Truth.” Jesus is not only the best teacher of Truth; Jesus is the realization if Truth. In following Jesus in His Way, we can learn Truth.

    In Proverbs the writer says, “He who needs instructions is on the path of life.” The Psalmist tells us “Thou dost show me the path of life”. In the final analysis, what we are all seeking is life. You can say that we seek knowledge or love; but that is true only if those things make life worth living. But what it is that makes life worth living for a Christian? It is knowing that Jesus is the Way; the Jesus is the Truth and from these we receive life, a new life in Christ.

    Jesus tells us that if you see these things in me, then you see the Father, “No one comes to the Father except through me.”

    What does that mean? Does it mean that anyone that does not confess Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior is condemned to eternal damnation? No, I don’t think Jesus is explicitly saying that. What I believe He is saying is, if you want to know God, if you want to see the Father, then Jesus is your best and only way of doing that. Other prophets, mystics and teachers can lead exemplary lives but none of them can be the Way of God. They can tell you the Truth but no one of them is the Truth. They can raise your spirits but none of them can give you life. That is what Jesus is for us and for anyone seeking to know God.

    Therefore, do not be afraid. Believe in God. Believe in Jesus. Know that He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Amen.

  • HOW WE GET LOST: Luke 15: 1-13

    Offered to the United Presbyterian Church of Alpha, NJ

    October 25, 2026, Mel Prestamo [Ruling Elder, PCUSA]

    These three parables from Luke 15 can be called the greatest story ever told within the Greatest Story ever told. The Bible Scholar William Barclay has referred to Luke 15 as “the Gospel within the Gospel.” The three parables preserved for us by Luke provide a wealth of meaning, richness, and insight into how Jesus knows God, the Father. And that is what we want to discover today and next Sunday.

    Some of the key religious leaders of Jesus’ time disapproved of the kinds of people that Jesus attracted and then as a Rabbi would sit to teach and then even eat with. They passed judgment that these sinners [these people of the Land as they were referred to] were unworthy of the inheritance promised to the righteous People of the Law made through God’s covenants. But Jesus gives us God’s perspective. Jesus wants us to learn more about who God is and how God views us, as sinners. In Luke 15, we get to see all this through Jesus’ eyes.

    Jesus displays to us a God who is steadfast in the covenant promise and is ever faithful. Jesus’ God is unwilling to allow Creation to wander without the promise and hope of reconciliation and does not give up on it. True to God’s promise, God seeks out the lost and broken until God finds and offers healing to them. Then God is joyous [to an extravagant extent] in celebrating over the healing of the brokenness of even one sinner. (Luke 15:8)

    Jesus wants to open our eyes to this Truth about God. Without the benefit of Jesus’ vantage point of what he knows about God, the God depicted in Hebrew Scripture can at times be distorted. Distorted because that god was often depicted in the image of man rather than the God Jesus knew being the Creator and humankind the reflection.

    Through these parables in Luke 15, Jesus is giving us a glimpse into who God is and with each glimpse Jesus reveals a more expansive vision of God. At the same time, he reveals to us what and who we are called to be. These parables are meant to show the crowd surrounding him, especially Israel’s religious leaders, how their own life choices and Israel’s own bad decisions as a nation had separated them from a right relationship with God leading to their failure to fulfill their role as God’s Chosen People. And to be clear, Israel’s role as God’s Chosen People was to share God’s message of Shalom and reconciliation with all of humankind.

    Before we begin to read these parables, it is important for us to be aware of who Jesus is teaching these stories to. While Jesus is seated teaching the sinners and tax collectors, there are also religious leaders who are described by Luke as grumbling in disapproval. “This man is friendly with sinners. He even eats with them.”

    It is important to understand that comment. Strict observers of the Law would never sit down to “eat” with people they considered to be sinners, these People of the Land.

    Jesus is aware of the presence of these religious leaders. He is aware of their disapproval. But rather than moving away to avoid their condemnation, Jesus turns to confront them. He offers them the first of three parable stories.

    Now pay attention as Jesus tells these three parables. He reveals to us the many ways we can become lost. He uncovers how our everyday decisions can lead us to separate ourselves from the love of God.

    Jesus begins with the parable of the Lost Sheep.

    Now the thing about sheep is they can get themselves into some hilarious predicaments. During a trip to Scotland, my wife and I spotted a group of sheep on a grassy mound. They were offshore feeding on this lush area that had been exposed by a low tide. But by the time we arrived they were being surrounded by a rising tide. In their search for food, they had wandered onto this lush spot offshore. They had their heads down as sheep will do following their noses to food. However now, what was once a lush feeding area exposed by the low tide was being quickly washed over. The rising tide had started to come back in and oblivious to it all these sheep were now trapped, completely surrounded with no escape back to dry ground.

    It was actually quite comical. But it provides a real-life picture of what Jesus was describing in this story. Sheep wander off with their heads down, nibbling here or there just following their noses and they don’t realize where they have wandered off until suddenly, they are in need to be rescued.

    Sometimes, that is how we can get lost. We can lose sight of where we are going in life. We lose sight of whose we are. Sometimes, we put our noses to the grindstone, and we go plodding through our nine to five jobs never looking up to see where we have wandered off to.

    More importantly, we lose sight of whose we are. We get overcome by necessity and we allow our work to become the most important thing in our lives. We forget that we are a beloved of God. Suddenly, we find ourselves lost in unfamiliar surroundings. It might be a business career, or a relationship which distracts us from who we should be; or one that sends us spiraling off in a destructive direction. Regardless, we have lost sight of whose we are. And because of that, we lose sight of where we are going, and we find ourselves in perilous surroundings lost, alone and in need of being rescued.

    This parable points out that this is one of the ways we become lost. Sometimes we just go astray. We put our heads down, and follow our hunger looking for fulfillment, trying to satisfy ourselves with what this world can provide us. And when we cannot find fulfillment in the things of this world we are lost and in need of rescue.

    In the parable, Jesus tells us the Shepherd [who represents God] searches diligently for the lost sheep and when he finds it, he hoists it upon his shoulders and rejoices. Upon returning home, the shepherd calls his friends and neighbors to come and celebrate with him in his joy for he has found the lost sheep.

    Now joy is a special word. It doesn’t simply mean that God is happy. Joy expresses an over-the-top, extravagant, and lavish display of love. This is how God celebrates when the brokenness of a sinner has been healed.

    Now, let’s look at the story of the Woman and the Lost Coin.

    In Jesus’ parable, he paints the picture of the young woman franticly searching for a lost coin. She sweeps. She crawls on her hands and knees searching for the coin. What is described here is another way we can become lost. Sometimes we just fall through the cracks of life.

    Now picture the portrait that Jesus is painting of God. Picture God down on God’s hands and knees searching franticly or us when we become lost. That is an awesome image. Imagine God, the creator of the Cosmos, down on all fours searching for your lost soul. That is the enormity of your value to God. When you read Luke 15 keep that image in your mind. You are that valuable to God.

    If we look at us as the lost coin in this parable, we have a depiction of how we become lost through no fault of our own.

    I have a friend who as a young man growing up had a father who was the center of his life. His father was his rock. During his first year at college, his father passed away suddenly. The shock of his passing sent the young fellow into a tailspin that caused him to fall to the floor lost in the cracks of life. He spent the next several years of his life wandering aimlessly. It wasn’t until [in his married life] when he and his wife had begun to struggle and sought counseling that he was found again by God. He was lost through no fault of his own. He simply got lost. But God did not give up on him. God got down on all fours and searched until he was found. God returned him to a faith community in which he could be nurtured and grow in his faith.

    William Barclay remarks that a Jewish scholar once admitted that this was a completely new teaching about God – that God would actually search for us. The religious leaders listening to Jesus’ parables that day could not conceive of a God that would do that. The religious leaders, whose lives were dedicated to observing the law, were blinded by that law. They could not see or experience God’s joy over the return of these lost sinners listening to Jesus and their worth to God. This was a painful and almost tearful irony.

    At the conclusion of this parable Jesus provides another glimpse of God’s joy when a sinner is found. I like to imagine God in raucous celebration when my friend was found.

    As we go deeper into Luke 15, we will see Jesus unveiling to the religious leaders that they had gotten it wrong. They misunderstood their God and what they were chosen for. In Jesus’ eyes, Israel was chosen to share the good news of God’s promise of salvation with all of humankind. They were not meant to withhold it for themselves, confining it tightly within a closed community.

    There is also in these first two parables a framing of how Jesus thinks and feels about lost sinners. For him it is personal. He depicts the shepherd as personally going out and searching for the lost sheep. He did not send an underling. He describes the woman as personally getting down onto the floor to sweep and hunt for the lost coin. She did not call for a servant to search for it. To Jesus, we are that important. God and he are not so far distant or too far removed that they do not see or notice individual sinners. We are not to be lost swallowed up in the cosmos. His love for us is personal.

    This is the God that Jesus is trying to reveal – not only to the sinners surrounding him but more specifically to the religious leaders of Israel.

    Jesus wants us to know the Father that loves us deeply and cares for our safety. When we get lost, God will search for us. Jesus tells us that the God of the universe will crawl around on hands and knees until we are found.

    This is the God that Jesus wanted them and wants us to know.

    Now let’s begin to take a look at the third parable. In it we will see a completely different view of the Father God Jesus wants us to know.

    But initially, let’s look at the additional ways that Jesus teaches us we can get lost.

    In it we will see how we can choose to turn and walk away from the Father. That is the choice the younger son makes. And it exposes how we can knowingly make the choice to replace our right relationship with the Father with the material things of this world. When we become lost by choice. When we decide to turn our backs on God and walk away. Because God has given us free will, we can choose to reject God’s love. This is a different way of becoming lost from wandering off or falling through the cracks.

    Concerning this parable, the key word used to describe it is “prodigal.” Prodigal can be either an adjective or a verb. As an adjective it is defined as sumptuously rich, elaborate or luxurious. As a verb it is defined as when an individual or community is generously extravagant in how they treat the other. The Elder brother in the story characterizes his younger sibling as having squandered or devoured the father’s property and for millennium the word prodigal has been assigned to the younger son. However, I looked through multiple Bible versions, and I could only find one that calls this story by that name. That’s the NRSVUE. It calls it “The Parable of the Prodigal and the His Brother.” But really, the title doesn’t work. Jesus never uses the phrase, and Luke never gives this parable a title referring to the younger son as prodigal. And assigning that name has probably hampered our understanding of it for millennia. Some Bible versions give this passage the title of the Lost Son. Bible scholar William Barclay calls it the Parable of the Loving Father. These, I think, are better names for it.

    We will see next week that the word, Prodigal – when we use it –  more aptly applies to the Loving Father. And that is the cliff hanger that I will leave you with until next week.

  • Commentary on Luke 15

    I invite you to order and read my new publication A Commentary on Luke 15 available on Amazon.

    Go to: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Mel+Prestamo&crid=2GCW6R06XHRCG&sprefix=mel+prestamo%2Caps%2C130&ref=nb_sb_noss

  • Exclusion & Inclusion

    Matthew 21: 33-46

    Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of East Amwell NJ, October 4, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA

    Today we are celebrating World Communion Sunday. This is a great day of inclusiveness joining Christians from all over the world to share in this meal that the Lord has prepared for us. The inclusiveness of Christians in every time and space coming together to share this meal is the centerpiece of this day.

    In contrast, in today’s lectionary we have Jesus, flat out telling the religious leaders of Israel that the Kingdom of God will be taken away from them. Because of their wickedness they will be excluded from it. We have (I think) a purposeful juxtaposition of the themes of Exclusion and Inclusion. In our lectionary, we have Jesus telling the religious leaders that they will be excluded from and that God’s Kingdom will be taken away from them. Then on our church calendar, we have this special celebration of inclusiveness.

    At the same time as we are coming to celebrate the inclusiveness of the Lord’s Supper, we are challenged to confront the parable of the wicked tenants. The wicked tenants who in the very words of the religious leaders Jesus was confronting should be put “to a miserable death.” A death that I suspect they would have exacted were those wicked tenants brought before them for justice.

    Ultimately, Jesus takes the religious leaders that he is debating with to the conclusion that they will lose their ability to enter God’s Kingdom. The parable’s theme is centered on the notion of the exclusion of the wicked – those who have abused their rights to be tenants of the God’s vineyard or from entering the Kingdom of God at all.

    These two themes are stark in how they stand in opposition from each other. And we Christians have to deal with them both. That’s the challenge.

    In his parable, Jesus is clearly painting a picture of how He and God view the mismanagement of God’s vineyard by the chosen people that God has entrusted it to.

    But before we get into today’s parable, let’s look at some of the background to what is happening in Matthew’s story line. This is the week leading up to Passover. Jesus has just entered Jerusalem on what we call Palm Sunday. Huge crowds have greeted him shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David.”  Calling Jesus, the Son of David is assigning to him a Messianic title of a King. Calling out “Hosanna,” which means “Save us!” this was tantamount to raising the flag of rebellion.

    These are two very dangerous things that will catch the eyes of the Roman authorities. The Chief Priests and Pharisees are rightly concerned that they will lose control of the people and the city. They have to be careful that nothing happens that would make the Romans think that a possible uprising was about to occur. Because that would threaten their authority over the Temple and the city. They need to keep a lid on what’s happening.

    What happened next? Jesus enters the Temple and causes a riot whipping the vendors and overturning the money changing tables and then ultimately driving them out of the Temple.

    This is not the quiet religious festival that the religious authorities planned on or that the Romans expected. No. Jesus has entered the city in a grand procession. The people are calling him their King and shouting that he should save them from their oppressors.

    So, the chief priests and Pharisees go to him and demand to know by what authority he has done these things. Jesus refuses to debate with them and instead asks them to answer his question concerning John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?” They answer by saying, “We don’t know.” Then Jesus refuses to answer their question. From there we proceed to today’s lectionary.

    Jesus has obviously had enough of these religious authorities and is going to confront them directly by challenging their hypocrites.

    So, Jesus begins, “Listen to another parable.” “There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it. He put a winepress in it and he built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect the rents due to him. The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. When the vineyard owner heard of this, he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way – beating, killing and stoning them. Ultimately, he sent his son to them thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance.’ So, they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.

    Jesus then presents them with this question, “Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” “He will bring those wretches to a miserable death,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.” Jesus allows their own words to condemn them.

    Then Jesus brings it all to a conclusion, “Therefore, I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce good fruits of the Kingdom.

    Now make no mistake, the religious leaders listening to Jesus understood every word and symbolisms in this Parable. The representation of the vineyard to be the nation of Israel. Yeah, they got that. In Isaiah 5:7, the prophet clearly states, “The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel.” They knew their sacred scripture, and they knew Israel was meant to be the Lord’s vineyard. They understood the meaning of the hedge line and the protection it provided. They understood the purpose of the winepress and the benefits of the watchtower. They got all that. What they hadn’t yet seen was that they were the wicked tenants that they had just condemned to death.

    And the Lord of Hosts that Isaiah was speaking of had given Israel everything it could need to bear good fruit and to make the Lord’s vineyard grow. In the parable, the vineyard owner sets up the vineyard with a hedge and a watchtower to protect it from wild animals and thieves. Throughout Israel’s history we know the stories of how the Lord had protected Israel from its enemies acting as its hedge line and its watchtower. The vineyard owner provides a winepress to make wine from the harvest the vineyard produced. Though it never understood its role, Israel was expected to go into the nations to till and cultivate God’s good soil and bring in a good harvest.

    Israel was given the promised land of milk and honey. It was made strong by good kings who feared the Lord and kept the Lord’s precepts. Israel had been given every opportunity to grow and prosper and to make the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts spread throughout creation sharing the good fruits of the harvest.

    But Israel did not. Instead, Israel turned away from the pathway that God had laid out for them. They made alliances with foreign kings and brought their foreign gods into God’s Temple and worshipped them there. They no longer feared the Lord. They no longer followed the precepts of the Lord or kept God’s Commandments. In fact, Israel’s religious leaders had constructed their own laws so that they could circumvent many of the God’s Ten commandments.

    How did God respond to their infidelity? God sent prophets as messengers to speak to the people and remind them of their covenant relationship with the Lord.

    But how did Israel respond to God’s messengers? Legend has it that Jeremiah and Habakkuk were stoned to death. God’s messenger Zechariah was murdered in the Temple. Then too, God’s prophet, Micah was killed by King Joram.

    In the parable, the vineyard owner’s messengers were beaten and stoned. They were killed. And ultimately the vineyard owner’s Son was murdered.

    Now Jesus asks the religious leaders this question, “What is the vineyard owner to do?” Jesus lets them use their own words to hang themselves. “He will bring those wretches to a miserable death, and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”

    Now the hammer falls on them, Jesus looks them square in the eye and tells them, “Therefore, I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.”

    Jesus was casting judgment over the mismanagement of the Lord of Hosts vineyard by the religious leaders.

    He builds it all to a crescendo telling them the kingdom of God will be taken away from them and given to those who will produce the fruits of the kingdom. This is a demonstrative act of exclusion. Jesus is making a judgment that the kingdom of God will be taken away from Israel and from the religious leaders to whom it was entrusted, and it will be passed on to those who will make it bear good fruit.

    That is where our lectionary reading for today takes us. It is harsh. It casts judgment. It is a terrible and demonstrative act of exclusion that takes away the Kingdom from those religious leaders.

    What Jesus does later in the week (on the day we now call Maundy Thursday) was to create something for his disciples that would be a forever remembrance of him. Later at the close of his Gospel, Matthew records the charge Jesus gave the made his disciples the new tenants of the Lord’s vineyard. You know it.

    “All authority in heaven and on the earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations…” You know the rest.

    This was the same charge that God had given Israel – to share God’s Shalom with all creation. But it did not. So now, Jesus passes that charge onto the new tenants of the vineyard. Go out into the world and share the good news story of God’s reconciliation and salvation with all of creation. That is the task passed onto us.

    So, standing in juxtaposition to this act of exclusion where Jesus took away the vineyard from those wicked tenants, we have World Communion Sunday. Today we have the celebration of the meal that Jesus had prepared for his disciples and because of the authority given to him that he passed on to those disciples. It is the same meal that he has prepared for us. Today we have the meal – through which Jesus had created for the world – a new covenant. One in which he gave up his body for our sins and then sealed that Covenant with his blood.

    In this Communion meal, Jesus is calling us to gather together as all the faithful in every time and place. On World Communion Sunday he opens his arms to gather in ALL the faithful from around the world, joining us together in one inclusive celebration of the Lord’s Supper. We do it in remembrance of him and we do it in remembrance of all that he has taught us. Now go out into the world and make it so.

  • I Will Ask You This Question

    Matthew 21: 23-32

    Offered to the First Presbyterian Church of Franklin, NJ on September 27, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA

    OK. So right at the beginning of today’s gospel reading, the chief priests and elders of the people charge right up to Jesus and demand to know of him “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”

    Let’s stop for a moment right here. If you haven’t been following Matthew’s Gospel these past weeks, let’s stop to refocus our memories it.

    This portion of Matthew’s Gospel is telling about the day after Jesus had entered Jerusalem in triumph. That is the day after what we call Palm Sunday. Jesus has entered the city to a cheering crowd who were yelling aloud, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”

    Now let’s look carefully at what that means.

    “Hosanna” translates to “save us”.

    Calling Jesus, “the son of David” is assigning to him not only a kingly title but a Messianic title, as well. “Hosanna, to the son of David” The people were calling Jesus as the Messiah to assume his rightful place as heir to the house of David, and as God’s Messiah raise an army and free the people from Roman subjectivity. They were praising Jesus as a military king entering the city on the fold of a donkey to liberate it from Roman domination.

    Matthew says that when Jesus entered the city, it was thrown into turmoil.

    That was the first thing that precedes today’s Gospel. The next was that Jesus entered the Temple and in a fit of rage overthrows the tables of the money changers and the vendors selling animals approved for sacrifice.

    Jesus drove them out of the Temple yelling, “My house shall be called a house of prayer; but you make it a den of robbers.” “My house” referring to his Father’s house. Jesus is outraged that the chief priests and elders have turned it into a business selling franchises to vendors exchanging money and selling sacrificial animals. These very vulgar and offensive activities were taking place within the walls of the Temple. Jesus rightly defended the sanctity of God’s holy and sacred house in the most violent display of his ministry.

    And then once he had driven away all of that inequity and dishonesty, once he had cleared away the defilement of his Father’s house, he sat down teaching the people and curing the blind and the lame.

    Matthew tells us the chief priests and the scribes watched him in amazement. Children were gathering around Jesus praising him saying, “Hosanna to the son of David.” They were stunned by what was happening. They were besides themselves unsure of what they should or could do about Jesus.

    At the end of the day, Jesus left the city, went out to the village of Bethany and spent the night there.

    So now in today’s passage, he returns to the city from Bethany and enters the Temple. And as we have heard today, the elders of the people and the chief priests immediately go up to him to demand to know “By what authority are you doing these things, and … and who gave you this authority?”

    By what authority do you enter the city as a king on the folds of a donkey allowing the crowds to call you the son of David, by what authority do you overthrow the tables of the money changers and vendors who [by the way] we [the authorities of the Temple] have approved of, and by authority do you take over the Temple and sit here teaching and curing people just days before the Passover disrupting all of the atonement sacrifices of the people that must be made?

    This is the thing. The chief priests, the Pharisees and Sadducees and the elders of the people, were the controlling authorities in the Temple and Jerusalem but … but only as long as they maintained the peace. The Romans allowed their religious festivals and these enormous gatherings of the people in the city only if these gatherings remained peaceful. If things got out of hand, if there were demonstrations like Jesus’ Palm Sunday entry into the city; if there unruly confrontations like the one Jesus caused in the Temple, then the Roman garrison would enter the city and take control. That meant a military confrontation. The chief priests, the Pharisees and the elders of the people had a lot at stake and a lot to lose.

    Do you get a picture of the dynamic that is at play here?

    But this is only half of the story. Jesus has a lot at stake here, too. He could answer their questions. He could make an outright claim that he was God’s Anointed One. He could have done that and claimed all the authority he needed as the son of David and rightful king of Israel. He could have done that. But that would have sent God’s plan for salvation spiraling off in the wrong direction.

    If he had made those claims of authority one of two things might happen. Either the people would have rushed to crown him as their earthly king and begun an uprising against the Roman authority or the chief priests and elders would have arrested him immediately putting the Cross ahead of God’s schedule. Jesus still needed more time with his disciples and still more quiet time with God to prepare for what was to come.

    You see either way, Jesus couldn’t allow either of these possibilities to happen. He couldn’t because the timing was not yet right. He was not the Messiah that the people wanted him to be, and he still needed time to get that idea across, especially to his disciples. God’s plan had been put into motion, but Jesus could not allow it to be rushed. Jesus was not ready. God’s plan was not supposed to roll out in that way.

    So, Jesus turns the tables on the chief priests and elders yet again. He says to them, “I will ask you one question, if you tell me the answer, then I will tell you by what authority I do these things.” OK. That seems fair. We answer a question and then we get him to incriminate himself and then we have him arrested for inciting a rebellion. It seems simple enough. What could go wrong?

    Here is Jesus’ question, “Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?”

    Oh, no! What? How do they answer that question? They argue between themselves. “If we say that it was from heaven, then he will ask why did you not believe him? If we say from human origin, then the crowds will attack us for they considered John a great prophet.” Their conclusion – the safe answer, they thought, “We do not know.”

    Jesus’ answer, perhaps with sadness in his eyes because these priests and elders were refusing to acknowledge John’s authenticity and his message to repent and make straight the way of the Lord.

    Jesus’ answer, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”

    Now the confrontation could have ended there but Jesus goes one step further to expose their hypocrisy. Jesus poses to them this question. And remember everyone is watching – the disciples and the people.

    “What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ ‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.”

    “Which of the two did the father’s will?”

    “The first,” they answered.

    Jesus said to them, (now comes the hammer) “Truly I tell you, these tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but these tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.”

    Could you imagine their outrage now? Jesus has just pronounced to these holier than thou elders, Pharisees, and chief priests who are all dressed in the sacred robes that denoted their rank and authority that those hated tax collectors, and the defiled prostitutes would enter the kingdom of God ahead of them.

    Why? Because despite of their sinful lives and livelihood these two highly disrespected and disreputable People of the Land had heard John’s message and repented and turned back to God. But you, the highly respected People of the Law, had heard John’s message and choose not to believe.

    We need to also place this parable of the two sons alongside that of the wicked tenants. You recall the one where the tenants of the vineyard refused to pay the rents due the landlord and when he sent his son to collect them, they beat and killed him. They refused to acknowledge the Lordship of the vineyard owner. This frames Jesus’ view of how these chief priests and elders had corrupted their roles as the religious leaders of Israel. They were refusing to acknowledge the voice of God spoken to them by John and by Jesus.

    So right here, Jesus makes it clear who of God’s lost sheep the Good Shepherd is called to seek out and return to the God’s fold. These lost ones (the tax collectors and prostitutes) have heard the voice of their Shepherd and have returned to the safety of his care. These are the lost sheep of God’s fold that he had been sent to rescue and provide salvation. That was John’s message and you rejected it. You are refusing to hear the voice of God speaking to you. You are rejecting me. You are rejecting God’s Kingdom.

    Holy (expletive deleted)!

    If the elders and chief priests weren’t angry before, they sure were now. For all their sanctimonious displays, for all their rituals and superficial sacrifices, for all the smoke and mirrors that they use to bamboozle the people, Jesus sees right through them and berates them placing the tax collectors and prostitutes before them at the gates of God’s Kingdom.

    Now I said before that Jesus could not allow God’s plan to be rushed. Well, I think that now he has lit a match to a powder keg igniting the events that would lead to the Cross just two days hence.

    We can see two lessons from this encounter that Jesus has with the elders and priests.

    The first is that there is a difference between Words and Actions. In the parable, the first son symbolizes the tax collectors and prostitutes who had reject God’s word initially but who ultimately with their actions repented and returned to hear the voice of God. The second son represents the religious leaders of Israel who profess their obedience, but who failed to act it out in their lives. Jesus clearly says that obedience is measured by actions not professions.

    The second lesson is that repentant sinners will enter the Kingdom of God before the religious elite who made only showy displays of superficial obedience. Those sinners believed John’s message of repentance and that leads to righteousness. The religious leaders saw and heard John’s message of repentance but refused to believe it. That led to a denial of God’s Word and a sin of a more heinous nature.

    There you have it. The lines were drawn. Not just between Jesus and the religious leaders but between those whose actions reveal their true hearts and those who prefer a showy exterior that conceals a heart both cold and hardened refusing to hear the voice of God.

    My friends, this is the question that Jesus asks of you. Where is your heart?

    When the Father asks you to go, do you say, “I will go”, but then blow God off thinking no one sees.

    Or do you hear the voice of the Shepherd calling you and repent your sinfulness and submit to the will of the Father.

    My friends, your actions matter. The faith in your hearts must be seen through your actions. Profession is one thing. Faith in action is what makes God’s righteousness alive in the world. That is the work in the vineyard that we are called to do.

  • WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?

    Matthew 16: 13-20, offered to the Mine Hill Presbyterian Church, Mine Hill, NJ, August 23, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA

    There are a couple of things going on in today’s Gospel story that I would like to get into with you today.

    First, Matthew tells us in verse 13 that Jesus had gone to the district of Caesarea Philippi. This is the second time that Jesus and his disciples had traveled away from Jerusalem to very pagan areas of the Roman Empire.

    In chapter 15, Matthew tells us that Jesus went to those two wicked and sinful towns of Tyre and Sidon. There he had a very revealing encounter with a Canaanite Woman.

    This was an unusual time in Jesus’ ministry when he was avoiding the towns in Judah where he would be crowded by the people and harassed by the religious leaders.

    The reason that Jesus traveled to these Gentile and pagan areas was that he needed time alone with his disciples so that he could instruct them about God’s Salvation plan, his role in it – but more importantly what their role in God’s Salvation plan would be. And he was running out of time.

    Jesus was aware that his time to return to Jerusalem and go to the Cross was coming – sooner than he might have desired. And the result was, he was running out of the time he needed to teach his disciples why it was he had called them to follow him and what their role in God’s Salvation plan was to be.

    Whenever Jesus traveled close to Judah, Pharisees and Scribes would accost him demanding signs to prove who he was. If not that, they were seeking to entrap him in one of their legal arguments and perhaps convince the people that he was a fraud. Jesus needed to avoid these types of engagements if he was going to be able to teach his disciples what God’s plan was. These encounters with the Pharisees and Scribes were just too time consuming and a waste of his most valuable commodity – time.

    Also, Jesus needed to be in a place where he was not known so that the people would not come running, pressing in on him demanding healing miracles. Those encounters consumed valuable time. Jesus needed time to recharge his spirit and bolster his own courage in the face of what he was being called to do.

    So, he traveled to Tyre and Sidon where he had hoped that he would not be recognized. That didn’t work out so well. The Canaanite Woman recognized him and beseeched him to make her daughter well. That meant the gig was up there. His identity had been revealed even in a place where gods like Baal were worshiped.

    Now he took his disciples to Caesarea Philippi where he hoped he would get some quite time with them.

    So now, once there, once Jesus could sit alone and quietly with his disciples, Jesus begins by asking them right there in verse 13, “Who do the people say that the Son of Man is?”

    This was an important question because Jesus was probing to see if his message, his ministry was getting across to the people. He had been teaching the people for three years, curing them, performing miracles. How was that all being received? How was he being received? Did the people believe that the miracles he was preforming were signs pointing to his relationship with the Lord, their God? Or did the people see him as something less than or other than the Messiah?

    The responses he gets from his disciples are all over the spectrum. They tell him that the people say that you are John the Baptist – risen form the dead. Others say that you are Elijah or Jeremiah, or some other prophet. None of these responses were what Jesus wanted to hear.

    Now Bible scholar William Barclay has some interesting thoughts on these responses. First, it is that the people believed that John the Baptist was so great a prophet that it might be possible that he had come back from the dead to continue to challenge and torment Herod. They thought perhaps Jesus was the resurrected John.

    But the other responses were that the people thought that he could be either Elijah or Jeremiah. These were revealing more of how the people viewed Jesus.

    First, Elijah. You will recall that Jewish tradition held that Elijah would return to announce the coming of God’s Messiah. It would be Elijah’s role to announce to the people that they should make straight the way of the Lord. It is the reason that even today, Jews leave and empty seat at their Passover Table for the prophet. They, who are still waiting for the Messiah, leave an empty seat for Elijah at the Table. Some believed Jesus was that predecessor coming to announce and make ready the coming of the Messiah but not that Jesus was the Messiah.

    Second, Jeremiah. Barclay explains that Jeremiah had a curious role in the expectations of the people. It was believed that before the people went into exile to Babylon, Jeremiah had taken the Ark of the Covenant and the altar incense from the Temple and hid them in a cave on Mount Nebo.

    These people believed that it would be Jeremiah who – before the coming of the Anointed One – would return and produce these relics from their hiding place and restore the Glory of God to the people. By restoring the arc, God’s place would once again be seated in the Temple in Jerusalem.

    Some believed that Jesus was Jeremiah and that he was returning with the Arc of the covenant bringing the Glory of God with it. They didn’t see Jesus as the Anointed One and that it would be he who would free them from their sin and establish a new Covenant relationship with God.

    Now these characterizations by the people were in their minds great compliments being paid to Jesus. They were setting him in a high place of regard since Elijah and Jeremiah were highly revered prophets and expected forerunners to the arrival of God’s Anointed One. When they arrived, the Kingdom of God would indeed be near. But they were only getting it partially right. The Kingdom of God was indeed near. It was just that Jesus was not the forerunner. John the Baptist was the forerunner. Jesus had pronounced it to the people: telling them that John was Elijah.

    All of this was to show what the whirlwind around Jesus was like. There was no clear perception among the people or the religious authorities of who Jesus was. Their opinions were all over the place. Some people held him in high regard potentially leading to their being set free from Captivity; yet others, like the Scribes and Pharisees saw him as a potential threat to the peace they had negotiated with the Romans – a Peace that assured their survival as the religious authorities in Jerusalem.

    Jesus asked what the people were saying about him and the disciples told him. In truth, the people did not understand who Jesus was. There was a lot of hysteria spinning around Jesus but there was very little understanding. That had to be disappointing. It pointed to how much work still had to be done in the little time left to him.

    But now Jesus gets personal. Now he asks his disciples directly, “And you – who do you say that I am?”

    This is the question that cuts to the quick with the disciples. And it is something that we have to think about, too.

    This is a key question that Barclay focuses on. What is it we have heard about Jesus and what is it we KNOW about Jesus?

    It is one thing to have heard stories about what other people think and say about Jesus – to have second-hand knowledge of who Jesus is. No matter how credible it may be. You can read all of Paul’s letters and come away saying, “This guy really nails it.” That sounds like something I could believe in. But it is quite another to know Jesus in your own heart.

    Some people think of him as a great teacher, a great thinker, or even as a theologian. People will acknowledge him as the founder of a great religion. But none of these ways of thinking about Jesus makes you a believer in Jesus.

    Barclay makes this comment, “Christianity never consists in (merely) knowing ABOUT Jesus; it … consists of – knowing Jesus” – on an intimate and personal level.

    So, Jesus asks his disciples a very personal question. He is asking them, “How do you know me?”

    With this question, the room goes silent. The air – so to speak – is sucked out of the room. Because many of them are just as confused as the people outside their group are. Time and again we have heard in the gospel stories when the disciples turn to one another asking, “Who is this guy?” You remember the time Jesus was asleep in the back of a boat when a storm came up, and his disciples roused him and he calmed the winds and the seas. They asked, “Who is he who commands the seas and the winds?”

    If after three years, Jesus’ closest followers were still unsure of who he was, then his ministry would be in danger of collapse after the Cross. He had to know if there was a glimmer of light behind those dull, dimly lit eyes. The silence is deafening. If you were there, you could probably have heard their hearts beating in their chests.

    Matthew tells us that it is Simon Peter who answers, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

    AH! Finally, There is the glimmer of light behind the dim eyes of his disciples that Jesus was searching for. Finally, someone is getting it. The Pharisees and Scribes don’t get it. The people didn’t see it. And for most of the time – up to that point, his disciples didn’t understand it, either. But finally, Peter gets it and says it aloud.

    “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

    Jesus responds, “Blessed are you, Simon, … For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.” In other words, you could not have gotten to this conclusion on your own. But now I know that my Father in heaven has opened your eyes and revealed this to you.

    In a devotional this week in These Days, Kirk Louis of Decatur Georgia characterizes their exchange this way. He says, “Peter did not arrive at this confession on his own. It was God who opened his eyes, stirred his heart, and enabled him to see Jesus for who he truly is.

    He goes on, “This is the wonder of salvation: God acts first. God awakens understanding, softens hearts, and invites people close [in] to witness God’s revelation for all.”

    So, if any of the disciples still thought that Jesus was John, or Elijah, or Jeremiah a predecessor to the Messiah, Peter was put it all that to rest. Peter states with certainty “– the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

    This was a very personal answer to a very personal question. Peter is finally saying aloud what Jesus needs to know is in his heart. Peter is saying you are not a prophet. You are not a forerunner to the Messiah. You are the Anointed One. Peter is saying aloud what he knows in his heart as it was revealed to him by the Father.

    Barclay makes this point. You cannot be a Christian if you only know about what other people say about Jesus. You can be well read. You can know what the theologians say about Jesus. You can listen to great preachers and hear stories about his outstanding presence and abilities, his healing powers, and his compassion for people.

    But knowing the stories is not enough. Being a follower of Jesus means knowing who Jesus is personally in your heart. Being a Christian means knowing that Jesus IS the Messiah, the Son of the living God as Peter says it for us. It means accepting Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, not just knowing the stories about him.

    Jesus asked Peter but he also asks each of us, “Who do you say that I am?” This is a personal question, and Jesus expects a very personal response about what is on our hearts.

    My friends, the only way you can know who Jesus is, is if you have sat quietly listening for the wee small voice of God and allowed God to enter into your hearts, to reveal the salvation that God has planned for you through Jesus, the Christ, the Anointed One, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.

    God will act first. God will soften your hearts, open your eyes to see and your ears to hear the Word of God so that you can KNOW God’s anointed one – truly KNOW him in your hearts.

    Then when Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” You can respond, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

    May it be so.

  • Jesus and the Canaanite Woman

    Matthew 15: 21-28

    Offered at the Long Valley Presbyterian Church, August 16, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder, PCUSA

    First off, let me confess to you, I have dreaded preaching on this story in Matthew’s Gospel – this meeting between Jesus and the Canaanite Woman. Because, it had long been my misunderstanding that Jesus was being downright nasty to this woman.

    This is not the Jesus that I knew from the gospels. The One who displays compassion not only to Jews but to the Samaritan woman he met at the well and to Gentiles when he cured the servant of the Roman Centurion who beseeched him.

    This is not the Lord who had spoken through the prophet Isaiah and the minor prophets telling us clearly that God’s offer of reconciliation and salvation is to be offered to all the nations.

    And it was because of my misunderstanding that I saw this Jesus, his attitude toward this Canaanite woman as not being the Lord and Savior that I love. I looked at this story in Matthew and wondered to myself, “Who is this guy?”

    So, when this passage came up in the lectionary for today, I had a choice. I could skip over it and use something from another part of the lectionary; or I could deal with it. I could confront this different Jesus hoping the Holy Spirit would help me through my confusion and reveal to me why Jesus acted as he did.

    To that end, I needed to do some digging. I went through William Barclay’s commentary, and several Ai commentaries. But the one that was most helpful was a YouTube channel entitled, “Deep Made Simple.” I found their commentary to be most helpful.

    So, let’s get into it. Back at the opening of this chapter, the Pharisees and scribes go to Jesus and demand to know why he allows his disciples to break the traditions of the “elders”. That’s important – key in on that – the traditions of the elders. Jesus was allowing his disciples to eat without first going through the ritual cleansings that the traditions of the elders demanded. This was part of their on-going attempts to find fault in Jesus and to discredit him.

    Jesus’ responds by immediately turning the tables on them. Jesus demands of them, “Why do you break the commandments of God for the sake of your traditions?”

    What is Jesus getting at here was the fifth commandment to “…honor your father and mother…” You see what the “elders” had done was to create a work around this commandment. It allowed them to say, “what I would have given to you, my parents, for your support, I have given to God, therefore I am absolved of the obligation to support you.”

    Jesus calls them hypocrites and quotes Isaiah, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; … teaching human precepts as doctrines.”

    Do you get it? They were writing their own laws as a means of circumventing God’s commandments. So, Jesus throws it all back at them. Your elder’s tradition of ritual washing is hogwash. It’s superficial. It is meaningless to God.

    Then Jesus says, “…it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but … what comes out of the mouth that defiles.”

    In plain talk, it is not what you eat that makes you unworthy. It is what comes out of your mouth. For what comes out of the mouth truly reveals what is in the heart. If what comes out are evil intentions: murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness and slander, then that is what defiles a person and makes them unworthy before God.

    Now get this. Everything in the list that Jesus gives us are accusations he making against the religious elders. Because by withholding support and honor of their parents their evil intentions were exposed. They were stealing from their parents. By claiming that their traditions superseded God’s commandments they were bearing false witness. By claiming that their parents were not worthy of their support, they were slandering them.

    All of this is the backstory Matthew uses leading up to Jesus’ encounter with the Canaanite woman. So, let’s now look at that and how it happens.

    Jesus has reached a point where he knows what lies ahead for him in Jerusalem. He knows of the plots to kill him and how the Pharisees are trying to entrap him.

    But he cannot allow any of their plans to come to fruition just yet. He needs time to prepare his disciples for what is coming. He needs time to explain to them what God’s plan is and what their role in it will be. He needed time, peace and quiet away from the crowds who were constantly pressing in on him. He needed to be able to go to a place where he was unknown where he could have uninterrupted time with his disciples.

    So, he leaves Judah where he had been dealing with ritualistic hypocrisy and goes to Canaanite territory. He goes to Tyre and Sidon – two infamous Biblical cities known for their sinful wickedness. But what surprises us in this story is what Jesus finds in this foreign Gentile land of sinfulness.

    What develops in this story is a teaching opportunity. You will see that Jesus uses this confrontation with the Canaanite Woman to show to his disciples what their role in the salvation story will be.

    As Jesus and his entourage are traveling into one of these cities, a Canaanite woman comes to them. She is calling out to Jesus for his attention, “Have mercy on me Lord, Son of David, my daughter is tormented by a demon.” She is seeking healing.

    Now observe what follows. Bible Scholars refer to it as the three “Nos”.

    First, Jesus ignores the woman and refuses to acknowledge her petitions. The first No. This has always been difficult for me. God has told us that God will never ignore our petitions. So, why is Jesus?

    The woman is persistent and Jesus’ disciples come to him and urge him to send her away. She is unruly and making a scene. Does this sound like a parable you should recall, the parable of the woman and the unjust Judge. In that parable, the woman is persistent and the unjust Judge ultimately yields to her demands.

    We are told in that parable to keep coming to God in prayer and show determination and faith in our petitions. Whether the disciples urged Jesus because they understood this parable or because they just wanted to be rid of her is not clear. But Jesus responds to them.

    “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” That’s “No”, number two.

    Jesus is saying, I am the Messiah of God to the chosen people of God. I am not the Messiah to the Gentiles. Listen carefully here. Jesus is defining his role in the Salvation story. But at the same time Jesus is defining the disciples’ role in God’s Salvation plan.

    In verse 25, “… the woman came and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me.”

    Now there is something we need to note here. Twice now the woman refers to Jesus as “Lord”; once as “Lord, Son of David.” She is addressing him by his Messianic title. This is not an ordinary pagan woman. In Mark’s gospel, she is referred to as a Syro-Phoenician woman. In fact, she is probably not Canaanite at all. Before the Romans, the Greeks had driven out the original inhabitants of Canaan and expelled them to Egypt. Syrians and Phoenicians under Greek influence had repopulated the land. This woman was probably educated and understood who the Jewish Messiah was, and she attributed respect in the way she addressed Jesus.

    “Lord, Son of David.” She kneels at his feet. This is a position of humility. This is the right posture in which to approach God. This is in contrast to the haughty attitudes of the Pharisees who Jesus had accused of having the gall of writing their own human laws to supersede God’s Commandments.

    To understand the meaning of this story, we have to see the contrast between the haughty attitudes of Israel’s religious leaders as they arrogantly approached their god and how this Canaanite woman in this land of wicked sinfulness approached Jesus whom she called Lord.

    Jesus is trying to display to his disciples what faithful worthiness looks like.

    OK. She’s got Jesus’ attention. She is prostrate at his feet and He responds to her.

    “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” This is the third No. This part of the exchange between Jesus and the woman has always troubled me.

    But there are two things to be aware of here. First, the “children’s food” referred to here is the Word of God spoken through Scripture by the Holy Spirit to God’s chosen People.

    Second, the word Matthew uses for “dogs” is a Greek word that does not refer to wild animals. Rather the word Matthew uses refers to domesticated household pets. This may not seem like much but watch how the woman uses it and how she answers Jesus.

    She doesn’t take offense at Jesus’ remarks. She understands the distinction between who she is and who the Messiah was sent to. She responds.

    “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table.”

    This woman is sharp. She understands that Jesus is Lord, Son of David. That he is the Messiah of Israel. She understands the priority of the order of Salvation. Salvation will come from the Jews and then go out to the Gentiles.

    She immediately points out to Jesus that the children of Israel are allowing crumbs of the Word of God to fall from the Master’s Table to the floor.

    This reflects back directly upon the “Elders” and their defilement of God’s Commandments and their refusal to repent and accept Salvation on God’s terms.

    This Canaanite Woman is asking for nothing more than those crumbs that the children of God are allowing to fall to the floor. She accepts the order of Salvation. She accepts that Jesus, Lord, Son of David is the Messiah to the Jews. But she knows deep in her Faith that there is more to him and to God’s Salvation plan.

    Jesus responds to her, “Woman, great is your faith. Let it be done for you as you wish.”

    A couple of things here. First, the Greek word that Jesus uses for “Woman” is the same word that he had used when his mother came to him at the wedding feast at Cana. “Woman, it is not yet my hour.” The word used for “woman” in both instances is a compassionate word.

    Next, “Let it be done for you as you wish” …that is not only that her daughter be freed from her demon. But also, that the crumbs that fall from the Master’s table be shared with you, as well. Jesus is saying to her, to his disciples and to us, …let Salvation go from the Jews to all of the peoples of the world.

    This is how Jesus was revealing to his disciples what their role in God’s salvation plan would be. This is why he left the land of ritual hypocrisy to travel to a land where he could find worthiness and show his disciples what great faith looked like.

    Yes. Salvation would be offered to the Jews first but then it would go out to the Gentiles. That was the role the disciples would play. But Salvation would not be based on position, prestige or ritual cleanliness. Salvation would be based upon faith, humility and the persistence of that faith. Not faith that demands salvation on its own terms but faith that is humble and persistent even when there is no initial response.

    The three “Nos” that the woman initially received from Jesus were not doors being closed to her. They were steps meant to bring here closer to the healing she desired.

    Have you ever felt that your prayers have gone unanswered? That all you hear from God is silence. My friends, don’t think for a moment that God is closing a door to your petitions. Instead view the silence as an opportunity to build greater faith. View it as a steppingstone to greater healing. Understand that it isn’t that God is not hearing your prayers. It is that God is using the time to build greater faith in you. God is working to bring you closer to healing and salvation.

    May it be so.

  • A Farmer Went Out…

    Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-23

    Offered to the Community Presbyterian Church of Chester, NJ on July 12, 2026

    Mel Prestamo, Ruling Elder PCUSA

    When I saw the lectionary for today, I thought to myself, “Oh, good! This is a Gospel passage that almost explains itself.” But as I sat down to read it, I found myself asking questions.

    Verse one begins, “That same day Jesus left the house and went out…” I asked myself, “House, what house?” So, I went back into the previous chapter to find out what Jesus was up to. What I found in chapter 12 was that Jesus was having a running debate with “…some pharisees and teachers of the Law of Moses.”

    These Pharisees and Teachers of the Law confronted Jesus demanding that he “show them a sign from heaven” to validate who he claimed to be. Now keep in mind that all through this portion of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus had been out in full view of those Pharisees and Teachers of the Law curing people and casting out demons. Yet, these religious leaders demanded something more, some greater sign so that they could judge if he was truly a messenger from God.

    Jesus responds to them. And I sense some tension in his response.

    You want to see a sign? Here’s the sign that I will give you. Like Jonah who “…was in the belly of the great fish for three days and nights, the Son of Man will be deep in the earth for three days and nights.” We know that after three days and nights Jonah arose from the deep and so too the Son of Man would rise again from the depths of the earth after three days and nights.

    He tells them that the city of Nineveh listened to Jonah’s message and repented and that those people will stand on the day of Judgement with you and condemn you. The Queen of Sheba who went to Solomon’s Court to test his wisdom, she too will stand at the judgement and condemn you. I sense that Jesus is mocking the Pharisees and Teachers of Law regarding any claim to wisdom that they might make.

    Some verses later, still in the previous chapter, we find that Jesus is in a house teaching his disciples. Someone interrupts Jesus to tell him that his mother and brothers are outside the house and want to see him. Jesus responds, “Who are my mother and brothers?” He points around the room and says, “…These are my mother and brothers…” People who willingly and wholeheartedly accept the Word of God. People who repent of their sins and turn to God for forgiveness.

    So now, this is the scene that we come to as Jesus exits the house and begins to tell the people following him the parable of the farmer that is sowing seeds.

    So Jesus begins, “A farmer went out to scatter seed in a field…” STOP!

    Again, I had a question – already knowing what comes later when Jesus explains what happens with the seed that is scattered.

    I stopped to ask myself, wouldn’t a farmer who was sowing seeds be careful to sow his seed exclusively in the field where he had prepared the soil? It seems to me that this farmer is either not careful about preserving his resources; or this farmer has such an abundant store of resources that he is not concerned at all about holding back where and how he sows his seed.

    I think that Jesus right in the very first line of this parable is teaching us something about our God. And it was not new. They should have known it, but from what we know about the religious leaders of Judah, they were unwilling to recognize it. It is this, and it is as God had spoken through the prophet Isaiah and several of the minor prophets before, God’s offer of reconciliation and salvation is to be offered to all the nations. Hence, this farmer is sowing his seed as far and wide as he can reach with what we can only hope is an endless abundance of grace, mercy, forgiveness and love.

    So, this farmer goes about his sowing. He scatters seed and some falls on the road where it was eaten by birds. Other seed fell on thin, rocky ground where it quickly started to grow but was scorched and dried up under the heat of the sun because they did not have enough roots. Some seed fell into thorn bushes and grew but were choked by the thorns. But a few seeds fell on good ground and produced thirty, sixty and a hundred-fold.”

    Now later in today’s reading, Jesus disciples ask him to explain what he meant in this teaching. They didn’t get it. So, beginning in verse 18 Jesus explains. Let’s listen to it and be reminded about the two confrontations Jesus had before he left the house he was teaching in.

    Jesus begins, “The seed that fell along the road are the people who hear the message of the kingdom, but don’t understand it.” Or, perhaps, don’t want to understand it. Remember the confrontation with the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law of Moses. These are people who are repeatedly characterized throughout Scripture as those with hardened hearts who refuse to hear the Truth.

    The seeds – that is God’s promises of reconciliation and salvation are offered to them, but they refuse it. Their hearts are hardened and they refuse to hear it. Remember that all through Isaiah’s prophesy, he warns Israel and Judah, but their hearts are hardened and they refuse to listen. All through the Minor Prophets – Hosea, Joel, Amos, Micah, Habakkuk, and Zechariah the people were warned and told to abandoned idolatry and injustice. But the messages of these prophets fell on deaf ears. The seed the farmer was scattering in their direction fell to the ground where evil comes and snatches it from their hearts. Jesus uses the word “snatches” – from their hearts, but I also think we can imagine that same evil fills their hearts hardening them against the Word of God.

    Also, in a less harsh way this rocky road seed also is a description of Jesus’ mother and brothers who are standing outside the house where he is teaching his disciples. At this early juncture of Jesus’ ministry, I think “not understanding” is a big part of their relationship with Jesus’ ministry. At this early time, they just don’t understand. We know later that his mother Mary and brother James do become a part of his following but not yet. While Jesus is teaching his family inside the house, his earthly family is on the outside.

    Then we have the people represented by the seed that fell on the thin, rocky ground. They gladly hear and accept the message, but they don’t have deep roots and quickly fall away. I think that Jesus must have experienced that every day in his ministry as he went around teaching through the villages. People heard his good news message of God’s mercy and forgiveness and accepted it, but the moment things got difficult – when they were challenged by religious leaders back in their synagogues – their devotion fell into peril, it waned and they fell away. Not everyone he met was as receptive as the Samaritan woman.

    Then there are the seeds that fell into thornbushes. Jesus tells us that these are people who hear the message, but who become distracted by the daily demands of life and are pulled off in a different direction.

    Do you know where we have seen examples of this. How about when Peter sees Jesus walking on the water and asks that he call Peter to walk on the water to him. Jesus holds out his hand, but what happens? Peter steps out and begins to walk on the water. But when a wave splashes his face and distracts him. He begins to see where he is and worries that the water will overtake him. At that moment, he looks away from Jesus and instead – at the water and he sinks.

    We do it, too. Don’t we?

    Sometimes, we look at our daily lives, our careers, our families and think, how are we going to provide? Families need to be fed. Children need to be clothed. Employers require full-time focus and dedication. Some jobs require that we travel or might demand more than the simple nine to five, five day a week schedules we thought we were hired for. And that takes away from the time we can spend in devotion to the Christ and to being involved in the work of his Church.

    Then the demands of this life, the thornbushes begin to choke and overwhelm us. This life deceives us into thinking that is how we build up riches. Jesus’ message of good news gets choked and we not only fail to produce good fruit, but we fail to be able to enjoy the fruits – the blessings – that God has bestowed upon us – our spouses, our children, our families, our church.

    “The seeds that fell on the good ground are the people who hear and understand the message.” Now this is a dicey line, and we have to be careful as to how we interpret it. I don’t think that it means that because we are active in a church congregation and because we are here in worship on our Sabbath day that we are the only good seed. That we are set apart from the seed that fell on the road, the thin soil and into the thornbushes.

    Let me explain. All through Isaiah and the Minor Prophets, God’s repeated message is that God’s offer of mercy, forgiveness and salvation is to go out to ALL the nations. God’s desire for Shalom is to heal ALL of God’s creation.

    Jonah, the prophet of the Lord, is sent to that wicked city of Ninevah to tell them to repent and they do – for a time but like the seed that fell on the rocky soil their faith dries up and falls away.

    In Isaiah 56, the Lord says, “Don’t let foreigners who commit themselves to the Lord say, ‘The lord will never let me a part of his people’…I will also bless the foreigners who commit themselves to the Lord,” says our God.

    So, what I am suggesting is that we can’t define or limit how God goes about revealing God’s good news message to God’s creation. We can’t impose upon God a limit to where and how God’s seed is scattered. God’s seed is not only scattered on the fields that were prepared for sowing, but that seed was, is and will be scattered across the roads, rocky soil, thornbushes, and then good soil for eons past, today and for eons into the future. We have to allow and make room for the notion that God can sow Jesus’ message, God’s Word, in ways that we cannot fully understand. So, we cannot be so bold as to think we are the only good seed.

    But here’s another thought. Where the Sower’s seed lands not only describe how different people receive the Word of God, but it can also describe how we receive it at different times in our own faith journeys. It can describe how our faith journeys can waffle from receptiveness to hardheartedness and then back again.

    Sometimes we can be receptive and receive God’s Word, and it grows in us. But at other times in our lives, we are distracted by life’s hardships [like Peter while he was walking on the water] and we let the thornbushes choke us and prevent us from thriving.

    Other times we may not be receptive at all. There may be times when we do want to be distracted by our thornbushes. There may be times when we don’t want to be distracted by this world – Sunday Softball, Golf, yard work, landscaping, weekend yard sales, work that we need to complete from home before our next workweek begins. Sometimes we let all of this distract us because we want it to. Then it is not until we realize the hopelessness of trying to build earthly riches through these distractions and finally look up to see God’s face and turn back to God.

    The Sower understands and anticipates the ebbs and flows of our faith journeys and returns repeatedly to sow more of God’s abundant love and compassion. Remember from Isaiah. God tells us that God’s Word, the Sower’s seed, will not return to God empty. God speaks the Word to us and then it is planted into our hearts. God does this with the expectation that it will accomplish its purpose and then return again to God.

    So, during those times when we come to our senses and see the face of God shining upon us, during those times while we are good seed that has fallen upon good soil, we have a task. It is to multiply thirty, sixty and a hundredfold. We have been commanded and it is our task…to go to all nations, to share the good news of God’s saving grace and forgiveness, to baptize and make disciples of the nations in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to do everything that Jesus has taught us to do. It is our job to prepare the soil so that when God’s seed is sown, it will have a chance to grow and flourish.

    May it be so.

  • The Voices of Jesus

    Matthew 11: 16-19, 25-30 – Offered to the Clinton Presbyterian Church of Clinton, NJ

    Sunday July 5, 2026, by Mel Prestamo, Ruling elder PCUSA

    The Voices of Jesus

    Today’s lectionary is one of several disjointed discourses recorded by Matthew. In 11 chapter, Jesus is teaching as he travels through villages in Galilee. Matthew gives us one discourse after another with seemingly very little to connect them. Looking at just today’s reading makes it difficult to understand what Matthew is trying to teach us about Jesus’ interactions in these villages.

    So, I went back into Matthew to see what the set up was. Because normally you would expect that Jesus would be using these expositions as teaching opportunities for his disciples. But his disciples weren’t with him.

    Jesus had sent his disciples to go out to preach on their own. So each grouping of the verses in this chapter represents different interactions Jesus had with the villages he visited. And as I read I learned that today’s reading should not stand alone. It needs to be connected to Jesus’ other interactions disjointed as they may seem.

    I found a commentary by Bible scholar William Barclay in which he suggests what we have here are six different expressions of what he calls the voices of Jesus. And what I would like to do today is look at these voices and see what Matthew is trying to reveal to us.

    In Matthew 11 are vignettes – differing expressions of Jesus’ voice [how he speaks of and comments on what he encounters].

    Let’s look at these briefly so that we can come back again to consider what is going on in today’s lectionary.

    At the start, John the Baptizer is in prison. He sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he is the One. Jesus responds by essentially saying, “I am not going to answer that question. Instead, you go back and tell John what you have seen. Tell him that you have seen the blind given sight; the lame walking; that the deaf given hearing; the dead are raised to life, and the poor are hearing the good news.”

    Jesus is saying, I know that John might be impatient for me to do things as he wants to see them done – on his terms, on his schedule, but this is my answer, tell him what you have seen and witnessed.

    I suspect the gist of what Jesus is saying is, ‘The proof John is looking for is in how Jesus acts out God’s plan’ – on God’s schedule, on God’s terms.

    Jesus finishes this conversation by saying to John’s followers, “God will bless everyone who doesn’t reject me because of what I do.” This is Jesus speaking with the voice of confidence. Jesus is saying that you may be impatient, but God will bless everyone who accepts me because of what I do. Jesus is saying, I am confident in God’s plan.

    In verses seven through eleven. Jesus speaks with a voice of admiration for John.

    Jesus asked them, “When you went out into the desert to see John, what did you expect?

    Did you go to see a reed shaking in the wind – someone without conviction?

    Did you go to see a man who wore purple robes?

    Or did you go to see a prophet?”

    Jesus pronounces that John was more than a prophet. “John was of whom it was written, ‘I will send you a messenger who will prepare the way for you’…If you believe the Law of Moses and the Books of the Prophets then believe that John is Elijah, the prophet you have been waiting for.”

    That is high praise from the Son, from the One God has sent. Jesus asses that John was the voice crying out in the wilderness, “…make straight the way of the Lord.” I am the One he was preparing the way for. Jesus pays high praise for the work John has done.

    In verses sixteen through nineteen we hear what Barclay calls a voice of sorrowful rebuke. But I don’t want to talk about this just yet. I want to save it for the end.

    I’m going to verses twenty through twenty-four. Here we hear a voice of heartbroken condemnation.

    Here we find Jesus on his own traveling through some towns in Galilee healing and performing miracles. But even though Jesus was performing great signs pointing to who he was, the people did not believe. In verse twenty Matthew tells us, “…the people refused to turn to God.”

    So, Matthew recounts Jesus specifying these towns by name. Of Chorazin, Bethsaida. Jesus says, “You people are in trouble, if I had performed these miracles in the towns of Tyre and Sidon, they would have believed and turned to God. But you people will suffer more on the day of judgement than they.”

    Then Jesus speaks of Capernaum, “You will go down to hell!” If the miracles I performed in your town were performed in Sodom, they would have believed and that town would still be standing.

    These are serious charges leveled by Jesus because those two Gentile towns along with Sodom are denounced in scripture for their wickedness – in Isaiah, Jerimiah and Ezekiel. The bottom line is that these Galilean towns had been given the privilege of hearing Jesus directly speaking to them of God’s Truth and they refused to listen. Here is the voice of heartbroken condemnation.

    The next voice we hear from Jesus is the voice of authority. In verse twenty-seven, Jesus states openly and clearly, “My Father has given me everything and he is the only one that knows the Son. The only one that truly knows the Father is the Son.”

    Here Jesus is clearly claiming the special relationship between He and the Father. The Father has given the Son everything –complete knowledge of who the Father is and with that comes complete authority over everything the Father knows.

    In verses twenty-eight to thirty, we hear in Jesus’ the voice of compassion.

    “Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

    Jesus is speaking to all of the people who were endeavoring to the best of their ability to be good and seek God, but they were being heavily burdened by onerous Temple rules for worship.

    Jesus uses the example of a yoke that is well fitted for oxen. Oxen were beasts of burden expected to do heavy work. The people knew however that a well fitted yoke made that burden easier. Jesus is telling them that he offers them a well fitted spiritual yoke so that their burden in approaching God would be made easy and light. You see, a “Yoke” was fitted for a pair of oxen. Jesus is telling them and us that the Yoke he offers is paired for us and him and that he walks, and works, and worships along and beside us.

    Approach God through Jesus and you will find rest for your souls. This is the compassion and love that God has for God’s children. God does not want to make your faith journey difficult. God wishes to embrace you lovingly.

    Now let’s return to today’s lectionary where Jesus is speaking with the voice of sorrowful rebuke.

    Jesus asks the question, “What is wrong with you people?”

    “You people are like little children at play. One cries, we played the flute and you did not dance. You say, “I’m sad”. Then they said we’ll play a funeral song, and you then respond, “I don’t want to be sad.”

    Jesus continues, “John did not eat or drink with you and you said, ‘There’s a demon in him.’ Then the Son of Man comes eating and drinking and you say, ‘He eats and drinks too much! He’s even a friend of sinners and tax collectors.’”

    Jesus frames the people as whining little children. No matter who comes bringing them God’s truth, they find fault in the messenger.

    Sometimes this is how we can be?

    Imagine yourself at a dinner, and the host presents you with a beautiful and expensive bottle of White wine that he selected with care just for you. But you decline it saying that you prefer Red. Then they go and return with a bottle of Red and you decline again saying that it is too fruity and that you would just prefer water – but not tap water – perhaps something bubbly. Then you hear the bottle pop when it is opened, and you tell the host, ‘it’s too gassy,’ and that you are fine without anything to drink.

    That is how Jesus is characterizing the people.

    John came and he had a very austere presence. He lived a solitary life in the desert. He didn’t eat the kinds of foods in the people’s regular diet. He ate honey and locusts. Locusts – that’s disgusting! And the people said of John, “…he has a demon in him.” Why? Because he didn’t socialize? Because he was different?

    Then Jesus says that he [the Son of Man] has come reaching out to the community by eating and drinking as they did. He ate at celebrations and drank at weddings. He socialized with sinners eating and drinking with them.

    Then Jesus says, but then you complain saying “…That man eats and drinks too much!”

    What is it you want?

    You complain no matter how the Truth comes to you. The truth had come bluntly to you with no airs telling you to prepare yourselves, repent and make straight the way of the Lord. And you complained.

    Now the Son of Man comes gently and humbly offering an easy yoke, welcoming repentant sinners and sharing food and drink with them and you call him a glutton.

    Whinny, whining little children. You exhaust me! Jesus throws up his hands in frustration.

    Then comes Jesus’ rebuke. “Wisdom is shown to be right by what it does.” Barclay comments here, “The ultimate verdict [of God’s plan] lies not with … perverse critics [those whining little people] but with events [that is the things that the Son does].”

    What Jesus does is to give sight to the blind so that they can see; healing to the lame so that they can walk upright; curing people with leprosy making them clean; giving hearing to the deaf; bringing the dead to life and bringing the good news of God’s salvation to the poor. And each time, he not only heals their outward malady but washes them clean on the inside forgiving their sins. This is how Jesus validates the Truth of God’s Wisdom – by his actions – because he would not have been able to do these things if God’s Truth was not with him.

    Matthew tells us this is how Jesus comes to us. He comes with the voice of confidence because he is the One that God has sent to bring rest to your soul. Even though at times, he may be heartbroken when we refuse his healing touch. Then we might hear a voice of sorrowful rebuke. But Jesus knows that he has the authority to bring to you God’s mercy and saving grace then Jesus speaks with a voice of compassion offering you a yoke that easy to bear.

    Jesus comes to open your eyes so that you can see the Truth. He comes to heal your inability to walk upright before your God. He comes to open your ears so that you can hear the Word of God. He comes to give you [who are poor in heart] new life with the promise of God’s saving grace and mercy. He comes to wash you clean so that you can walk humbly before your God.

    So now I ask you, how will you react to Jesus when he comes to meet you? Will you complain about his demeanor? Will you complain about the kinds of people the Spirit draws to him? Will you complain that he eats with people that you don’t like or understand? Or will you respond, please sir, I desire the yoke that you have prepared for me.