You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Jesus said his disciples were to be “salt and light.” I’m not ready to leave the salt metaphor yet, for salt has properties beyond giving and catalyzing flavor. Salt can also act as a preservative, and was used for centuries before refrigeration came along to keep meat from spoiling. (How effectively, I don’t know, but if that's how we got bacon…)
As we are “salt for the earth,” we participate in this ministry of preserving life in systems – and people – that are decaying. We bring freshness, we bring flavor, we boost systems – and people – to be fruitful beyond what they thought possible. We hold life.
Where around you do you see a system or a person in need of preservation? Certainly we have to work to preserve healthy democracies, basic values of freedom and welcome, diversity and unity, protection for the vulnerable and equal rights and responsibilities for the many. In the church realm, we need continually to infuse the “old, old story” into our worship and missional life, not to preserve institutional structures, but to uphold fidelity to Jesus as Lord. Where else are we called to preserve what is essential, while being open to innovation and fresh ideas?
Salt also has another property: it facilitates water retention in the bloodstream. Too much salt can create unhealthy and unwanted effects, but just speaking metaphorically, how might we as “salt of the earth” help our communities to retain water – the living water which Jesus said wells up within us continually to eternal life? (John 4).
Where do you see thirst for spiritual life, for purpose and meaning, for connection to God and other people? Where are systems - churches, non-profits, families - running on empty? How might we as salt create little pools of water in a dry landscape, rivers in the desert, as the prophets foretold?
In the prophet Ezekiel’s great vision of a river flowing from the center of the temple out to arid places, fresh water renewing the stagnant waters so that a diversity of fish and fruit trees thrive, there is an interesting verse about that restored sea: “But its swamps and marshes will not become fresh; they are to be left for salt.” (Ezekiel 47:11) Salt flats are part of healthy wetlands.
Salt is essential to balance in our bloodstream. It is essential to balance in our natural environment. And we as salt are essential to bringing the Life of God to every system, every person, every place, so that all might be whole, and "the whole earth filled with the knowledge of the glory of God, as the waters cover the sea." (Habakkuk 2:14)
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
2-2-26 - Salty
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
As Jesus’ followers began to live and travel with him, they discovered just how many things they had to learn how to do: feed the hungry, proclaim the Gospel, encourage the poor, heal the sick – oh, and raise the dead when necessary. But he also told them how they were to be: “You are the salt of the earth.”
As we know, salt has many functions – flavor-enhancer, food-preserver, fluid-retainer are a few that come to mind. Jesus here refers to the first, to salt as an agent that adds flavor to food, and brings out the flavors in other ingredients. He suggests that this is a critical function of religious communities – that they both add and elicit flavor.
And if they’re bland or watered down… forget it. Jesus does not mince words about the consequences of salt having lost its flavor. “…but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled underfoot.”
Is he talking about the lukewarm, semi-corrupt religious leadership of Israel in his day? Or the tepid, play-it-safe ministry of so many churches today? Is he warning his followers to maintain their character no matter what comes at them?
How do we interpret this call to be “salt” in our spiritual lives and communities? First, we might think about where we add flavor and zest. What sectors of your life do you enliven because of who you are, and because of your connection to God? Work, school, family, ministry, play, church – these are a couple of spheres; you might name more. In recent years millions of ordinary people around the world have added “activist” to their resumes, carving out time for community organizing. That is being salt in the body politic. Ask God where you are called to be salt.
And how about this second function of salt, to bring out the natural flavors of other ingredients? How do you elicit the gifts and enthusiasms and generosity of the people with whom you interact in those spheres? How does – or doesn’t – your faith community do that within its larger context? How can we be salt in our world?
And who is adding salt to your life? Who is bringing forth your natural flavors? Does the interaction work to make something greater than the parts?
At its most basic level, this teaching of Jesus reminds us that our spiritual engagements need to be full of life and flavor, not rote, dull, lukewarm, complacent, or tired. I’d go further: God wants our whole lives to reflect the savory flavor of God’s love and mercy, justice and peace – and we're how that flavor gets in to what God is cooking up.
So into the shaker we go - get ready to be sprinkled.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
As Jesus’ followers began to live and travel with him, they discovered just how many things they had to learn how to do: feed the hungry, proclaim the Gospel, encourage the poor, heal the sick – oh, and raise the dead when necessary. But he also told them how they were to be: “You are the salt of the earth.”
As we know, salt has many functions – flavor-enhancer, food-preserver, fluid-retainer are a few that come to mind. Jesus here refers to the first, to salt as an agent that adds flavor to food, and brings out the flavors in other ingredients. He suggests that this is a critical function of religious communities – that they both add and elicit flavor.
And if they’re bland or watered down… forget it. Jesus does not mince words about the consequences of salt having lost its flavor. “…but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled underfoot.”
Is he talking about the lukewarm, semi-corrupt religious leadership of Israel in his day? Or the tepid, play-it-safe ministry of so many churches today? Is he warning his followers to maintain their character no matter what comes at them?
How do we interpret this call to be “salt” in our spiritual lives and communities? First, we might think about where we add flavor and zest. What sectors of your life do you enliven because of who you are, and because of your connection to God? Work, school, family, ministry, play, church – these are a couple of spheres; you might name more. In recent years millions of ordinary people around the world have added “activist” to their resumes, carving out time for community organizing. That is being salt in the body politic. Ask God where you are called to be salt.
And how about this second function of salt, to bring out the natural flavors of other ingredients? How do you elicit the gifts and enthusiasms and generosity of the people with whom you interact in those spheres? How does – or doesn’t – your faith community do that within its larger context? How can we be salt in our world?
And who is adding salt to your life? Who is bringing forth your natural flavors? Does the interaction work to make something greater than the parts?
At its most basic level, this teaching of Jesus reminds us that our spiritual engagements need to be full of life and flavor, not rote, dull, lukewarm, complacent, or tired. I’d go further: God wants our whole lives to reflect the savory flavor of God’s love and mercy, justice and peace – and we're how that flavor gets in to what God is cooking up.
So into the shaker we go - get ready to be sprinkled.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
1-30-26 - Blessed Are
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Having spent the week delving into Paul’s teaching about the Cross and the way God effects transformation through what looks like weakness and failure, we turn now to Sunday’s gospel passage, the Beatitudes. In this first training talk with his new disciples, Jesus chimes the same theme – that those who follow him will find they are blessed in just the areas that look to the world like weakness and insignificance.
Blessed are the poor in spirit…. those who mourn.. the meek… those who hunger and thirst for righteousness… the merciful… the pure in heart… the peacemakers… those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.
I have never been fond of the Beatitudes, perhaps because I want blessings to look like blessings – good health, good job, comfortable living, peace and security. When I exhort people to “expect blessing,” hardship and hunger are not what I have in mind. And looking at the state of our nation and our world, I am not comforted by this reminder that Jesus had a much deeper kind of blessing in mind. Gee, thanks!
I am not predicting that the hardships Jesus’ original disciples endured are ahead for us. I hope not, as I pray daily, “Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.” I do know, though, that to count myself a disciple of Jesus means I need to be prepared, to learn to locate blessing in the presence of God unleashed on this earth, not in my own circumstances. And I need to remember daily that I am to be an agent of that unleashing, that releasing of God’s power to love, to heal, to forgive, to have mercy, to make peace. It is not our power, but God’s, which we receive through Christ, and pass along through the power of the Holy Spirit.
We are to expect blessing, but we don’t get to write the script. The blessings may not come as direct answers to our prayers. They come as God gives from a heart of generosity and love and more knowledge than we will ever have. The more we open ourselves to that flow, the more we experience it, whatever our circumstances. It is both now and later. Our future, and our daily bread, is blessing beyond measure. Own it!
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Having spent the week delving into Paul’s teaching about the Cross and the way God effects transformation through what looks like weakness and failure, we turn now to Sunday’s gospel passage, the Beatitudes. In this first training talk with his new disciples, Jesus chimes the same theme – that those who follow him will find they are blessed in just the areas that look to the world like weakness and insignificance.
Blessed are the poor in spirit…. those who mourn.. the meek… those who hunger and thirst for righteousness… the merciful… the pure in heart… the peacemakers… those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.
I have never been fond of the Beatitudes, perhaps because I want blessings to look like blessings – good health, good job, comfortable living, peace and security. When I exhort people to “expect blessing,” hardship and hunger are not what I have in mind. And looking at the state of our nation and our world, I am not comforted by this reminder that Jesus had a much deeper kind of blessing in mind. Gee, thanks!
I am not predicting that the hardships Jesus’ original disciples endured are ahead for us. I hope not, as I pray daily, “Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.” I do know, though, that to count myself a disciple of Jesus means I need to be prepared, to learn to locate blessing in the presence of God unleashed on this earth, not in my own circumstances. And I need to remember daily that I am to be an agent of that unleashing, that releasing of God’s power to love, to heal, to forgive, to have mercy, to make peace. It is not our power, but God’s, which we receive through Christ, and pass along through the power of the Holy Spirit.
We are to expect blessing, but we don’t get to write the script. The blessings may not come as direct answers to our prayers. They come as God gives from a heart of generosity and love and more knowledge than we will ever have. The more we open ourselves to that flow, the more we experience it, whatever our circumstances. It is both now and later. Our future, and our daily bread, is blessing beyond measure. Own it!
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
1-29-26 - God's Foolishness
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's epistle reading is here.
I’ve never been a big fan of rallies and marches – they take a lot of time and resources to organize, divert people’s energies from more strategic action on the issue being marched for, and rarely change anyone’s mind. But on the occasions when I have participated in such events, especially ones that draw hundreds of thousands of people together to bear witness to a desire for justice and equity, I understand their power: a power based not on might or authority, but on agreement, on ordinary people coming together to become a political force. They send a message of empowerment to those who are regarded – or regard themselves – as foolish, weak, low and despised, things that are not. They can remind us of the power we have when we come together as the “insignificant." We can overcome evil. And when we come together in Jesus’ name, in the name of the One who allowed himself to become shamed, weak, low and despised, evil does not have a chance.
For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.
Great words – but evil is still having a good run, is it not, when governments turn guns on their own citizens; when people of color remain more likely to be shot by police and denied opportunities afforded white people; when hunger continues to devastate some communities and countries, while much of the world throws away food as waste? We will never run out of injustices to protest – what power do we have?
I’ve shared before a definition of the devil, whom Christians regard as the source of evil in this world, as “the enemy of human nature.” Paul reminds us in Ephesians 6:12 that “our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers, the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” Yes, we are called as those “who are not” – in the sight of the powers that be – to reduce to nothing things that are. But our weapons are spiritual and communal, not destructive.
The Good News we have been called to proclaim is this story of God’s great reversal, of God’s lifting up those who are downcast. It has always been good news to the poor and those on the margins; less so to the wealthy and powerful. And where we are wealthy and powerful, we need to consider God’s call to humility and justice.
As we embody this good news, we bring it into being, this realm of God in which peace and justice already reign. Let it be so on earth, as it is in heaven.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
I’ve never been a big fan of rallies and marches – they take a lot of time and resources to organize, divert people’s energies from more strategic action on the issue being marched for, and rarely change anyone’s mind. But on the occasions when I have participated in such events, especially ones that draw hundreds of thousands of people together to bear witness to a desire for justice and equity, I understand their power: a power based not on might or authority, but on agreement, on ordinary people coming together to become a political force. They send a message of empowerment to those who are regarded – or regard themselves – as foolish, weak, low and despised, things that are not. They can remind us of the power we have when we come together as the “insignificant." We can overcome evil. And when we come together in Jesus’ name, in the name of the One who allowed himself to become shamed, weak, low and despised, evil does not have a chance.
For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.
Great words – but evil is still having a good run, is it not, when governments turn guns on their own citizens; when people of color remain more likely to be shot by police and denied opportunities afforded white people; when hunger continues to devastate some communities and countries, while much of the world throws away food as waste? We will never run out of injustices to protest – what power do we have?
I’ve shared before a definition of the devil, whom Christians regard as the source of evil in this world, as “the enemy of human nature.” Paul reminds us in Ephesians 6:12 that “our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers, the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” Yes, we are called as those “who are not” – in the sight of the powers that be – to reduce to nothing things that are. But our weapons are spiritual and communal, not destructive.
The Good News we have been called to proclaim is this story of God’s great reversal, of God’s lifting up those who are downcast. It has always been good news to the poor and those on the margins; less so to the wealthy and powerful. And where we are wealthy and powerful, we need to consider God’s call to humility and justice.
As we embody this good news, we bring it into being, this realm of God in which peace and justice already reign. Let it be so on earth, as it is in heaven.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
1-28-26 - A Stumbling Block
You can listen to this reflection here. The epistle reading for Sunday is here.
If you were to invent a religion, you probably wouldn’t want to make it as unfathomable and sometimes unpalatable as Christianity. You wouldn’t insist that God is three persons and yet one. You wouldn’t assert that God became human for a time, yet remained fully God and fully man, full of divine power yet completely vulnerable. And you certainly wouldn’t orient your worship around a story about that God-man being executed by crucifixion, a death reserved for criminals and insurrectionists.
Yet, as the early church proclaimed the Life of God revealed in Jesus Christ, that story became most central. In all four gospels the narrative slows down and zooms in for closer detail when it comes to Jesus’ passion and death, which occupy more chapters than other incidents. The Gospel of John sees the cross as the place where the Son of God is glorified. Yet this emphasis on the Cross also caused trouble for the early Christ-followers – as it does for many today.
For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
The idea of a crucified Messiah was anathema to many of the era’s Jewish people. Many thought it blasphemous to claim that Jesus had a special relationship with God, or was God; others were appalled to think that God would send a Messiah to deliver his people from oppression, only to allow the oppressors to kill that man on a cross. The idea that God may have been about a much bigger deliverance than a military one did not compute.
And to many Greeks, so fond of logic and philosophy, the story was ridiculous. They could embrace the notion that the mind of God could be expressed in human form, in the way that a thought becomes a word, but then for that human to live a life of poverty and weakness? That was unlike any god they could conceive.
How does the crucifixion strike you? Can you see the freedom and love in this horrible tale around which we weave our faith? Many Christians turn away from this brutal story, preferring to emphasize Jesus’ wisdom as a teacher, or goodness as a moral exemplar, or power as a worker of miracles. But Jesus was also, perhaps primarily, savior, redeemer. Understanding the Cross as the place where he took upon himself the consequence of all humanity’s sin, and endured the agony not only of human cruelty, but of estrangement from God, helps us to more fully experience God's forgiveness and freedom.
Can we see in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ “the power of God and the wisdom of God?” It takes special vision, the eyes of faith to make sense of this awful paradox. In fact, our minds cannot make sense of it. It Is a mystery that seeps into our hearts through contemplation and worship. Let’s open the cracks.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
If you were to invent a religion, you probably wouldn’t want to make it as unfathomable and sometimes unpalatable as Christianity. You wouldn’t insist that God is three persons and yet one. You wouldn’t assert that God became human for a time, yet remained fully God and fully man, full of divine power yet completely vulnerable. And you certainly wouldn’t orient your worship around a story about that God-man being executed by crucifixion, a death reserved for criminals and insurrectionists.
Yet, as the early church proclaimed the Life of God revealed in Jesus Christ, that story became most central. In all four gospels the narrative slows down and zooms in for closer detail when it comes to Jesus’ passion and death, which occupy more chapters than other incidents. The Gospel of John sees the cross as the place where the Son of God is glorified. Yet this emphasis on the Cross also caused trouble for the early Christ-followers – as it does for many today.
For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
The idea of a crucified Messiah was anathema to many of the era’s Jewish people. Many thought it blasphemous to claim that Jesus had a special relationship with God, or was God; others were appalled to think that God would send a Messiah to deliver his people from oppression, only to allow the oppressors to kill that man on a cross. The idea that God may have been about a much bigger deliverance than a military one did not compute.
And to many Greeks, so fond of logic and philosophy, the story was ridiculous. They could embrace the notion that the mind of God could be expressed in human form, in the way that a thought becomes a word, but then for that human to live a life of poverty and weakness? That was unlike any god they could conceive.
How does the crucifixion strike you? Can you see the freedom and love in this horrible tale around which we weave our faith? Many Christians turn away from this brutal story, preferring to emphasize Jesus’ wisdom as a teacher, or goodness as a moral exemplar, or power as a worker of miracles. But Jesus was also, perhaps primarily, savior, redeemer. Understanding the Cross as the place where he took upon himself the consequence of all humanity’s sin, and endured the agony not only of human cruelty, but of estrangement from God, helps us to more fully experience God's forgiveness and freedom.
Can we see in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ “the power of God and the wisdom of God?” It takes special vision, the eyes of faith to make sense of this awful paradox. In fact, our minds cannot make sense of it. It Is a mystery that seeps into our hearts through contemplation and worship. Let’s open the cracks.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
1-27-26 - The Wisdom of the World
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's epistle reading is here.
It’s the kind of paragraph for which Paul is famous, and which church lectors struggle to render with clarity: Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe.
If Paul were speaking to us in person, I think he’d use air quotes and vocal inflection to convey sarcasm. It’s pretty clear that he doesn’t think much of the “wisdom of the world,” at least not in comparison with the wisdom of God – which, he notes, can look a lot like foolishness to those who think they are wise. Paul skewers those who would dismiss or overlook the inconvenience or the scandal of the Cross.
All through the bible we find a distinction between the wisdom of God and the wisdom of humankind. “For my ways are not your ways, nor my thoughts your thoughts, says the Lord.” (Isaiah 55:8) “You are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things,” Jesus says to Peter (Matt 16:23). Paul is on solid ground in deeming the wisdom of the world to be a flimsy foundation on which to rest our faith.
It is good for us periodically to examine what our beliefs are resting on. The Gospel of Jesus Christ and Christian claims about his incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection are so counter-cultural, there is a constant temptation to explain away, or synthesize core doctrines with more palatable philosophies. Many Christians in the mainline denominations believe the scriptures to be literature with helpful metaphors, not the inspired Word of God. Some have come to regard the crucifixion as a disturbingly dark idea and are reinterpreting sacrificial understandings of the Cross. And, of course, many Christians choose to ignore altogether Christ’s teachings on wealth and poverty, self-righteousness and mercy. We all need to return to the Gospels at times, asking the Spirit to guide our interpretation.
But how do we distinguish the wisdom of God from the wisdom of the world? Paul was sure he knew which was which. There is no easy answer – but there are processes:
It’s the kind of paragraph for which Paul is famous, and which church lectors struggle to render with clarity: Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe.
If Paul were speaking to us in person, I think he’d use air quotes and vocal inflection to convey sarcasm. It’s pretty clear that he doesn’t think much of the “wisdom of the world,” at least not in comparison with the wisdom of God – which, he notes, can look a lot like foolishness to those who think they are wise. Paul skewers those who would dismiss or overlook the inconvenience or the scandal of the Cross.
All through the bible we find a distinction between the wisdom of God and the wisdom of humankind. “For my ways are not your ways, nor my thoughts your thoughts, says the Lord.” (Isaiah 55:8) “You are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things,” Jesus says to Peter (Matt 16:23). Paul is on solid ground in deeming the wisdom of the world to be a flimsy foundation on which to rest our faith.
It is good for us periodically to examine what our beliefs are resting on. The Gospel of Jesus Christ and Christian claims about his incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection are so counter-cultural, there is a constant temptation to explain away, or synthesize core doctrines with more palatable philosophies. Many Christians in the mainline denominations believe the scriptures to be literature with helpful metaphors, not the inspired Word of God. Some have come to regard the crucifixion as a disturbingly dark idea and are reinterpreting sacrificial understandings of the Cross. And, of course, many Christians choose to ignore altogether Christ’s teachings on wealth and poverty, self-righteousness and mercy. We all need to return to the Gospels at times, asking the Spirit to guide our interpretation.
But how do we distinguish the wisdom of God from the wisdom of the world? Paul was sure he knew which was which. There is no easy answer – but there are processes:
- Hold our beliefs up to the whole Bible – where is there agreement, where is there contradiction?
- Hold our beliefs up to the whole Church, throughout time and space… do our ideas square with the Creeds, the tradition? That’s tricky, for it seems clear that the revelation of the Spirit is progressive. We have the same scriptures about slavery or women’s roles, but have come to a different understanding by the Spirit. Still, we look for gaps and overlaps.
- Ask the Spirit to let us see by the fruits of one interpretation or another which is correct – does one interpretation lead to condemnation or to life?
In all of this, we must live by the Spirit with generosity of heart, under the supreme law of grace. What we believe and how we believe matter, but in the end it’s how we follow and worship Jesus as Lord that makes known the Life of God. Recognizing how little we know can be the highest exercise of wisdom.
1-26-26 - Foolishness
You can listen to this reflection here. The epistle reading for Sunday is here.
This coming Sunday, our Gospel reading is “The Beatitudes,” Jesus’ core training session for followers. We’ll take a look at that this Friday, but for most of the week, let's explore this passage from Paul’s first letter to the church he launched in Corinth.
In this discourse, Paul asserts the primacy of the cross of Jesus Christ, arguing against teachers who held that this doctrine was either unimportant or wrong. Corinth was a commercial city through which trade from many regions passed by land and sea. Its populace was sophisticated, eager to explore every new religious fad and philosophical trend. In a climate that so prized wisdom and knowledge, it could be hard to defend a religion which venerated as divine an itinerant rabbi who had died a criminal’s death on a Roman cross. “We need a good P.R. firm,” thought some Christian leaders, seeking to reframe the central story.
Paul was having none of it: "For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."
He means that those who see this story as “foolish” prove by their lack of discernment that they are among those who are perishing. In contrast, those who have accepted Jesus’ death on the cross as a saving act can see the power of God evident in what looked like pathetic defeat.
That principle is manifest any time ordinary people confront political power that threatens their freedom. When people work or advocate or march for human rights and democratic principles, it can look like foolishness too. But when enough people come together on an issue, change can happen.
This coming Sunday, our Gospel reading is “The Beatitudes,” Jesus’ core training session for followers. We’ll take a look at that this Friday, but for most of the week, let's explore this passage from Paul’s first letter to the church he launched in Corinth.
In this discourse, Paul asserts the primacy of the cross of Jesus Christ, arguing against teachers who held that this doctrine was either unimportant or wrong. Corinth was a commercial city through which trade from many regions passed by land and sea. Its populace was sophisticated, eager to explore every new religious fad and philosophical trend. In a climate that so prized wisdom and knowledge, it could be hard to defend a religion which venerated as divine an itinerant rabbi who had died a criminal’s death on a Roman cross. “We need a good P.R. firm,” thought some Christian leaders, seeking to reframe the central story.
Paul was having none of it: "For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."
He means that those who see this story as “foolish” prove by their lack of discernment that they are among those who are perishing. In contrast, those who have accepted Jesus’ death on the cross as a saving act can see the power of God evident in what looked like pathetic defeat.
That principle is manifest any time ordinary people confront political power that threatens their freedom. When people work or advocate or march for human rights and democratic principles, it can look like foolishness too. But when enough people come together on an issue, change can happen.
- Where do you feel called to stand up for a principle – or for your faith – that others call foolish or weak?
- Where might you be called to proclaim your status as a “foolish” Christ-follower?
- What weakness might you bring God’s power into?
Paul takes the accusation of “foolishness” and runs with it, reminding his listeners that God was up to something in allowing his Son to die that shameful death, that God irrevocably broke the hold of sin and death in what looked like humiliating defeat. God is still up to something as the freedom Christ won for us is revealed in our lives.
Sometimes we need to get to the end of the story to know just how powerful God’s power really is. But here we are, living both at the end and smack dab in the middle of it, holding to this truth: “God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.” Thanks be to God.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Sometimes we need to get to the end of the story to know just how powerful God’s power really is. But here we are, living both at the end and smack dab in the middle of it, holding to this truth: “God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.” Thanks be to God.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
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