Mark Whittall

Have you ever been there for the birth of a child? Do you remember what it was like? Of course you do! The excitement, the nervousness, the sounds and smells of the birthing place. The overwhelming sense of joy when the child is born. Hearing those words, “it’s a girl” or “it’s a boy”. For those of us who have had the privilege of being there, it is a peak experience, an event that fills us with joy and sends us running to tell the good news, by phone and email and Insta

(Luke 2.8-14) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVp5AGte_4Q The gospel we just heard reminds me of a time that I was doing some laundry, and I walked past the TV with the laundry basket full of clothes in my hands. There on the TV was A Charlie Brown Christmas, and it was just at the part that we just saw, where Charlie Brown throws back his head and cries out, “isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?” And Linus says, “Sure Charlie Brown, I can tell you what

“You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath that is to come? That’s how John the Baptist greets the crowds who swarm out into the wilderness by the Jordan River to be baptized. That’s how our gospel reading begins this morning. And this is how it ends: “So, with many other exhortations, John proclaimed the good news to the people” In between that first verse and the last verse of today’s gospel, Luke is telling us that there is good news. Did you hear it? Is

It matters how we begin. The gospel, the good news, begins in the wilderness. Great writers know that beginnings matter. Beginnings set the tone, they introduce characters and themes, they set up the plot, they give us a glimpse of what’s to come, of what’s important. The reading that we just heard is the beginning of Luke’s gospel. You can think of chapters 1 and 2 as a preamble, a prologue of sorts. Chapter 3 is where Luke really begins. “In the fifteenth year of the reig