Sunday Stretch: Vol. 79

Start off your week with a grounded take on Bible, prayer, the world, and your life ...

Hi Readers,

I’m back in Minneapolis and here again writing and praying with you after a whirlwind weekend last week! I spent last Thursday - Saturday (April 25-27) in Houston for a conference on Christian Nationalism at Rice University, during which I served as a panelist on Christian Nationalism and Theology.

I cannot recommend this entire event enough: the organizers truly put together an outstanding group of panelists for the day, and they also created a rich environment of learning and listening that extended to pre-and post-event gatherings that really enriched the experience. I’m so grateful. You can watch it all here; I’m on the second panel about an hour into the event, but I really recommend watching the opening panel also, featuring Substack friend and eminent researcher Andrew Whitehead of

American Idolatry

, as well as leaders in this space, Whitehead’s coauthor and leading researcher and author Sam Perry, and journalist and multi-bestselling author Tim Alberta. (Additional note: truly enjoyed meeting and collaborating with these three in person for the first time!)

(If you’re local to the Twin Cities, join me for Part II of my Series on Christian Nationalism at Bethlehem Lutheran Church - Minneapolis, this Wednesday night at 6:30. Register here).

The past weekend was just incredibly rich in its entirety. On the way to Houston, flying from MSP, I happened to be seated next to a man who is originally from Gaza, though he has lived in Minnesota and been an American citizen for several years. We had a heavy and powerful conversation about faith, life, love, religion, family, and war for almost the entire flight, even though both of us said we are ordinarily quiet on planes! I truly felt the presence of the Holy Spirit as we talked together, and I promised Sully that I’d add his family to our prayer list, especially his mom, who is still stuck in Gaza and in constant danger despite his many valiant efforts to bring her to safety. His father was killed in Gaza when Sully was just 9 years old.

So please note this addition to our prayer requests at the bottom of the page. I know that often world events feel overwhelming, and I’ve talked before about the phenomenon that sometimes empathy decreases as numbers of suffering and dying people grow larger (it’s a horrible truth that our brains seem to kind of shut down as the numbers grow incomprehensible). My hope is that by attaching a specific person and family to our prayers for peace, safety, and resolution in the Holy Land - and I know many of us pray for other specific loved ones there as well, I know I do - it might help us to focus our prayers, efforts and advocacy.

When I got back from Houston on last Saturday afternoon, I went straight to three of my youngest son’s basketball games - then I preached last Sunday morning at Bethlehem Lutheran Church - Twin Cities (Minnetonka Campus), and got to see my uncle that night, who’s in town from California!

It was a full weekend; one of uncountable blessings. I am grateful this week for the rain and new life that it brings here in Minnesota. This weekend the people of the Minneapolis-Area Synod of the ELCA elected a new synodical bishop. By the time you read this, we will know who it is! I have a few close friends and other acquaintances who had agreed to put their names up for the job. Please pray for the Spirit to guide the new bishop-elect and to provide discernment toward truth, justice, and love.

Are you ready to get to the texts? We need God’s guidance - in all of our lives in each facet of them. I know I sure do, especially in times like these, packed with stress, excitement, and lots of action and important work to be done. Let’s do it …

An image from my panel at Rice last week, with moderator Dr. Elaine Howard Ecklund, who helped make the event possible, along with, to my left, Yale’s Rev. Dr. Willie Jennings, one of America’s preeminent modern-day theologians, and Dr. Jonathan Tran, a theologian and the George W. Baines Chair of Religion at Baylor.

Bible Stories

Acts 10:44-48

Acts 10:44   While Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. ⁴⁵ The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles, ⁴⁶ for they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter said, ⁴⁷ “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” ⁴⁸ So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they invited him to stay for several days.

We are getting just the tail end of this story from Acts, which has been one of the most transformational pieces of Scripture in the entire Bible for me. As I’ve shared on this Substack in the past, Acts 10 comprised the theological argument that helped shift my own personal theology and commitment to full acceptance and celebration of LGBTQIA+ people in the Church.

So on this Sunday, I do urge you to read all of us Acts 10, and maybe even to revisit that article and think about your own response to what is basically a “Second Pentecost” in the Book of Acts.

What I also think as I read this short snippet of text this Sunday, is that, while we don’t likely know for sure, many of our personal ancestral roots would likely put us at this Second Pentecost, for the Gentiles, rather than the First Pentecost, made up of Jewish followers of Jesus. God’s story in the Bible is one of ever-extending, ever-widening, ever-accepting grace and love to the entirety of the world. Sometimes I find it helpful and important to de-center myself from that story; to remember that perhaps I was one of those who was a later invite.

Questions to Ponder

How do you think the “circumcised believers” felt at this moment of the second Pentecost?

Try to look back at the narrative of Peter’s life throughout the Gospels. How hard must it have been for him to deal with all the constant changes and new revelations from God, since he began following Jesus as a Galilean fisherman?

Why do you think Peter decided to stay for several days?

1 John 5:1-6

1John 5:1   Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ^a has been born of God, and everyone who loves the parent loves the child. ² By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. ³ For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, ⁴ for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith. ⁵ Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

1John 5:6   This is the one who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not with the water only but with the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one that testifies, for the Spirit is the truth.

I’ve noticed, as we dwell here in 1 John for a few weeks, that the writing in 1 John often follows a similar pattern, from our belief, to God’s love. Many later interpreters have