My nonfiction reading this year has been Leah Payne's God Gave Rock & Roll To You which is a history book that follows the waxing and waning of CCM, Christian contemporary music. It's written for a broad audience, but at it's heart, it's still a history book and very careful about the connections it makes. As someone who lived in some of this history, I feel like there should have been a little more gossip.

Jesus is causing trouble in the temple and the temple leadership comes along for his credentials. Who said you could barge in here and throw out useful members of the temple community? Who gave you the authority to do this? Jesus refuses to answer. But then he tells a parable and this week I'm seeing the parable as an answer, although it turns the whole question upside down.

This is a parable. There was never a vineyard, never any workers hired at dawn, nor at any of the subsequent hours. There was never a disgruntled crowd upset that others were being paid the same for less work. It's a story that Jesus is telling in order to explore certain kinds of ideas with his followers. It's also an exaggerated, almost caricatured story so that we can see the contrasts.

As part of my trip to Waterloo this summer, I met up with a whole bunch of old classmates. It was a pretty simple event overall. We hung out in a park for an afternoon with lots of time to chat and catch up. I was a little surprised at the number of people who managed to come with several people even flying long distances to be there.

Suddenly we talking about forgiveness. Last week the gospel passage was that part of Matthew 18 with the procedure for confronting sin in the community of believers. I'm sure we're all aware of some of the negative effects of clinging to that procedure too closely. It ends with Jesus's remarkable declaration that he will be with his followers, even if they are scattered and without institutional power.

Exodus 12:1-14 Psalm 149 Romans 13:8-14 Matthew 18:15-20 Previously Child Two or Three I didn't manage to write anything for this week obviously. But here's the painting that I didn't get to post