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Matthew’s Gospel begins with a scandal. The genealogy in Matthew 1 is the first clue. It’s not a polished family tree. It’s a roll call of the complicated and the compromised. The scandal continues in Matthew 2. The Magi arrive in Bethlehem, and the insiders stay home in Jerusalem. God draws near, and the wrong people notice. Jesus shows up at the Jordan in Sunday’s gospel reading from Matthew 3. Jesus is not at the Temple, not at the center of religious life, but out in the wilderness with John, the wild prophet who eats locusts and calls everyone to repentance. And Jesus, the Messiah, stands in line with sinners. And in all of it, God is revealing a kingdom that unfolds in unlikely places and with unlikely people, including us.
Looking forward to Sunday, when we gather for worship to celebrate THE BAPTISM OF OUR LORD. Blessings, Fr. Karl
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