Pastor Sullivan's Blog

In the Name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. A landowner ventures out into the marketplace at the beginning of the workday, 6am. He invites the men standing there to come and work in his vineyard for the day. They agree on a price, a denarius for a day’s work, and the men go to the vineyard to begin their day. But the landowner is not content. He wants to invite more men to work in His vineyard. So again He ventures out into the marketplace at the third hour, 9am. The men he originally found were the early birds, the hard workers. They were men who were out to earn a buck. The men whom the landowner finds at the third hour are “ standing idle in the marketplace. ” These men are loafers and idlers. But the landowner invites them to labor in his vineyard anyway. “ You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you. ” These men don’t try to haggle for their wages. They know that they don’t deserve a day’s wages. But they trust the landowne...

Grace and Peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up on a high mountain, probably Mount Tabor, the highest mountain in Galilee. There “ He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as with as the light. ” In that moment Jesus shined with the glory and radiance that was His because He is true God. Since His conception, though, the only begotten Son of God had hidden this glory. From eternity He is the “ brightness of God the Father’s glory and the express image of His person ” (Heb. 1:3). But when He assumed human flesh in the incarnation, St. Paul says He took the form of a slave and came in the likeness of men, being found in appearance as a man. Thought His entire life Jesus looked like any other man, even though He was the Word of God in human flesh. Throughout His ministry He reveals His glory through miraculous healings: water into wine, cleansing lepers with a touch, rebu...

Grace and peace be unto you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. “ This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory. ” It is tempting to despise this first miracle of Jesus and think little of it. When we compare this first sign of Jesus to the miracles He would later perform, this one feels different. Healing a leper by touching him, exorcising demons from people, healing a paralytic with just a word, raising Lazarus from the dead, all these seem to be more in line with Jesus’ divine power. It also seems that the need that Jesus meets in this miracle is different from His later miracles. The leper, the demoniac, the paralytic, and the mourning sisters of Lazarus all have dire need of Christ’s help. They struggle against deformity, decay, and death. At this wedding in Cana, the need appears less serious. A man and a woman were married. They are so poor and destitute that they run out of wine during their wedding feast. This is a t...

Grace and peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Mary and Joseph have been frantically searching Jerusalem for three days. After celebrating the Passover in the holy city, as the Lord commanded through Moses, Joseph and Mary set off on their journey home. They’re travelling in a large caravan of worshipers who are heading north toward Nazareth. Jesus was such a good natured boy that they assume He is with his friends or distant relatives that are part of the caravan. It isn’t until the end of the first day’s journey that His parents realize He’s missing. They experience one of every parent’s worst nightmares. They have no idea where their son is. Therefore they have no idea if He’s even safe. No one probably wants to admit it, but this is something that happens to every parent at one point or another. Except Mary and Joseph’s anxiety have another angle to it. It’s not just their own son whom they’ve lost. Their child is the only begotten Son of God ...

The Sunday after Christmas Luke 2:33-40 December 31, 2017 Grace and peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. In the twelfth chapter of Leviticus Moses wrote that forty days after a woman gives birth to a son, she is to appear before the Lord. He writes, “ When the days of her purification are fulfilled, whether for a son or a daughter, she shall bring to the priest a lamb of the first year as a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtledove as a sin offering, to the door of the tabernacle of meeting ” (Leviticus 12:6). Today’s Gospel lesson finds Mary and Joseph doing just that. After the days of Mary’s purification are complete, she and her husband, Joseph, are in the temple doing what the Lord has commanded them through Moses. They’re so poor that they can only afford to offer turtledoves, the cheapest of the assigned offerings. As they doing this an aged man, Simeon, approaches them. Simeon “ was just and devout, waiting for the Consolatio...