Ordinary Time is a span of the church year during which lectionary preachers often consider preaching topically rather than from the lectionary. The following ten Sundays offer a preacher several "both-and" options: using the lections, there are several recurring topics that could be worked into a fitting, powerful series of sermons. Chiefly, those topics are the Christian community and stewardship, keeping time, doing justice, and witnessing. Actually, all of these topics could fall under the one heading of stewardship, with practices in regard to keeping time, doing justice, and witnessing viewed as expressions of Christian stewardship.

At its core, stewardship refers to a way of living that sees life in all its parts as held in trust from God. As Christians, we know ourselves to be stewards of God's gifts rather than owners. Thus, in this understanding of being human, Christians present a radical alternative to the image of human beings as owners, as consumers, and as devotees of mammon. Although we are not "in the Garden," our fundamental responsibility before God is still "to till and to keep," to take good care of the Earth and of the people whom God has entrusted within our relationship circles. Both the Earth and people, including our most intimate relations (for instance, parents, children, spouses), belong to God and not to us. Christian stewards orient their resources of time, energy, attention, and money toward preparing to receive the reign of God. This active reception is expressed through engaging in acts of mercy and justice and in witnessing to the peace and justice-making activity of God in the world.

Many congregations conduct their annual stewardship campaigns during the fall. The lections from these ten Sundays offer the opportunity for the preacher to prepare the congregation to think about stewardship and to evaluate the community's stewardship practices in a deep and broad manner. Yes, stewardship practice and education must include our relationship with money and possessions; a yearly stewardship campaign can be part of that practice and education. But Christian stewardship practice and education are really a constituent dimension of being a Christian and deserve far greater attention than most congregations give. These ten Sundays provide a wonderful opportunity to give attention to stewardship.

The Gospel texts provide the foundation for stewardship preaching, with great assistance coming from the other readings for each Sunday. The lections will cover portions of Luke 12–17. Jesus and the disciples are already on the way to Jerusalem, already on the way toward the cross. Luke takes much of chapters 12–16 to address issues of possessions, anxiety, wealth, Sabbath keeping, and what time it is. Luke helps us view the meaning of Christian life with the cross in focus; and that focus affects, often in upsetting ways, how we treat our possessions, how we spend our time, and how we relate to our families. In Luke, we will encounter a rich farmer who tries to act as an owner rather than a steward and fails to act justly and for the sake of the community with the wealth that he mistakes as his own (12:13-21); a dishonest steward who nonetheless has something to teach us about resolute action (16:1-3); and the rich man who knows Lazarus but who cannot treat Lazarus as a human being (16:19-31). We will be instructed twice that household stewardship must yield to the demands of the reign of God, once when Jesus says he came to bring divisions within households (12:49-56) and once when he asserts that whoever does not hate family cannot be his disciple (14:25-33). The contemporary icon of the Christian family will find no support in these texts. The meaning of keeping Sabbath will be tied to liberation of the oppressed and the celebration of freedom from bondage (13:10-17). And Christians will be instructed to allow the reign of God to transform attitudes toward family, possessions, and party invitations and seating, as well as their stance toward how they should spend their ordinary time—to wait attentively, seek the lost, and trust the power of God (12:32-40; 14:1, 7-14; 15:1-10; 17:5-10).

The other readings that the lectionary shapers chose for these Sundays are strong selections, rich and interesting texts. There is one powerful set of lections on sin, which can be viewed as teachings on what happens when stewards attempt to act as owners, when creatures confuse themselves with the Creator (Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost/Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time/Proper 19). Then there is Philemon 1-21, arguably Paul's most engaging rhetorical presentation in his extant letters, which could be the basis of several sermons all by itself. But this text on what should be done in regard to a runaway slave also provides a powerful example from the early church of the change in household relations that being a Christian demands. The preacher will find great support for stewardship themes from many of the first and second readings. Texts from Amos, Isaiah, Hosea, and Jeremiah connect Sabbath keeping with just economic practices. Selections from Hebrews open windows into a persecuted community that was struggling to stay together and whose members were tempted to revert to former religious practices. We overhear their exhorter reminding them who they are, what time it is, and who all is counting on them to finish the race. Texts from 1 and 2 Timothy express the need for courageous witness, both within the Christian community and outside the community when the government takes on the trappings of deity.

The lessons for these Sundays begin with the preacher from Ecclesiastes questioning the meaning of life. If we listen to him closely and take seriously his claim that life is emptiness, he may make us squirm. Get used to that feeling. Jesus' words in these six chapters almost assuredly will make hearers squirm. In writing the following pages and trying to take all these texts seriously, I know that I squirmed a lot!

Back in college and seminary, I was taught to work on texts for sermons by producing first an exegesis (what the text says) and then, through employing a hermeneutical method, an interpretation of what the text might mean for today. Over time, I have lost confidence in this method. I will not go into all the reasons here; but one of the major reasons I do not work with texts this way anymore is that I know that I am always interpreting, that I am always using my imagination to try to discern what the texts might have meant to the first hearers and readers and what these texts might mean to the community who will be hearing the text today. So I look for the elements in the texts that might stir imaginations: metaphors and images; drama and tension; plot twists; and, very important, points of view. I use these as access points into the world of the text and then, from this imaginative point of view, look around at my world and my communities and ask where the analogous points of contact might be. Sure, history and word studies and sociocultural work are very important in helping to know what I am looking at. But with those tools, I am increasingly trying to find connection points between the spiritual imagination expressed through the text and what taking that imagination seriously might mean for the communities I serve as a preacher.