WESLEY ARNING

In this teaching, Jesus reframes Hanukkah — this festival remembering the Temple’s renewal and rededication — and through the lens of faith, we discover that Jesus is not only the new Temple, the very place God’s glory resides, but he is renewing and reconsecrating the people of God to be his flock. Those with ears to hear are called to listen and believe the shepherd’s voice. Unbeknownst to the crowd, Jesus was offering a wholesale reconsecration not of a Temple or any build

Though our scars don’t ultimately define us, Jesus’ scars do. By his bruises, we have been healed—once and for all. We can look at his scars for our hope in the troubling moments of our life, while also recognizing that our mission is to go towards the broken and scarred places in our world. Nothing is outside of God’s redemptive power.

What makes Christianity unique is that Jesus is the one God who actually comes out of the pages of mythology. He comes out of the legends of bygone tales, and is born in a time and place we know, while Caesar Augustus reigned, and while Quirinius was governor of Syria, and Herod ruled Judea. Jesus lived, died, and was resurrected within history. The other gods can’t do that, they are bound in the books in which they reside. They are prisoners of ink and paper.

This psalm begs us to put down the mask and stop running away. At some point, we need to face the music.

A repentant life, therefore, is marked by such characteristics as gratitude and grace. We have sinned, yet our Lord does not desire the

The transcendent experience on the Mount of Transfiguration is worthless without the Cross and the Grave that are on Mount Zion.

And so, Peter gives us a helpful lesson in discipleship: Stop, Drop, and Follow. There are so many things to hold onto, including all the

Isaiah 43 is God’s love letter to anyone who has felt alone, unloved, forgotten, or in some form of exile. It is a grand reminder that you 

The reply that Mary and Joseph got at the door was, “Our guest room is full, but we will make room for you among us. Come in, come in, the

In Jesus, God’s glorious light was breaking in, and soon that knowledge would flood the whole world. Glory, Light, and Knowledge.

This Time Between is a strange place to be, it is filled with uncertainty and a whole lot of stretching. But it’s exactly in this unsettling

To grow deeper with Jesus is to grow wiser. And I think that’s because, in a relationship with Jesus, we are first invited, and then command

Saints are like the Church’s runway lights. They are lights in the darkness that help lead people to safety and to our ultimate destination.

Our soul will take on the shape of whatever character we allow to be impressed upon us. We are wax being formed in the image of whatever we

The Feast Day of St. Michael and All Angels forces us to think bigger; to not put a limit on the infinite simply because we cannot underst

It appears that Moses is being taught a lesson about leadership in the Kingdom of God. It is given in order to be given away; responsibility

As we see in this chapter, God is working quietly behind the scenes. He is working through a very fraught

Today’s reading is a great reminder of the totality of Jesus’ teaching, and a stern warning to anyone who assumes they know what’s going to

Obadiah pointed to a future that he could not fully see. He could glimpse a bright morning star in the distance, ever so faintly amid the

Neither Saul nor his bravest warriors are willing to enter the valley as Israel’s “man between” against the 9-ft-9-in Philistine.