Stuck here at home as so many of us are now, I’ve had the chance to watch and listen to a number of preachers do it online recently, from churches of various sizes — all of them, though, (the preachers, that is) seemingly “progressive” theologically and compelling homiletically.

And I’ve noticed something.

Except for Thursday evening last week (Maundy Thursday) when the preacher used the Epistle for the day, I Corinthians 11:23-26, all of them based their sermons on a lesson from the Gospels, most from John, which is the book for the readings suggested by the lectionary this year, but one (yesterday morning) from Matthew’s telling of the Resurrection story, which was the alternate lesson suggested for Easter Day.

In every instance where the Gospel text was used, the preacher read and then preached as though the lesson were an accounting of something that happened long ago just that way and just as the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible now presents it to us.

But it didn’t, of course. It couldn’t have.

The Gospel writer who called himself “Matthew” (or who may have been given that name by someone else to make him seem more legitimate) didn’t do even  a  first draft of his book until late in the first century, 50 years or so after Jesus’ crucifixion and 80 years from the time he was born. That’s a long time! Think about it.

Plus, we know Matthew got what he wrote about, at least some of it, from stories that had been passed along by word of mouth for decades and some from accounts that others, like the writer we know as “Mark,” had written earlier, again, decades earlier.

Moreover, “Matthew,” like the other Gospel writers, had particular reasons for telling the “stories” the way he did. The most important of these was that he pretty clearly was a Jew who wanted to convince his Jewish sisters and brothers at a time after their Temple had been demolished and the Romans had taken over completely that Jesus had indeed been the long-awaited Messiah. They needed to get on board with the program.

Same for the writer we now call “John.” His Gospel version wasn’t published, nor maybe even written, until close to the very end of the first century, possibly not even until the early second century. Likewise, as with Matthew, John had his own special reasons (and particular audiences) to tell the Jesus stories the way he did. And those reasons were different from the reasons of Matthew, as were the reasons of all the gospel writers different from one another.

So why don’t preachers ever say this when and as they hold forth?

Is it any wonder that youth, young adults, and even older folks say “Huh?” when they hear these stories read then expounded in sermons? And is it any wonder that so many of them leave, educated as they are in the physical sciences and scientific methods?

Now, please know that I’m not slinging accusations toward preachers about things I never did from the pulpit. At least, I hope I’m not. Looking and checking back, I did it much the same way. But I shouldn’t have, and I wish now I hadn’t.

I did, however – or most always did – introduce the gospel readings for the service as “The Gospel according to…” whomever. And I generally tried, best I could, to offer some context and a bit of background before I read the lesson for the day.

Still, I wish I had done more. Because nowadays I’m thinking it’s critically important. Else the people in the pews who are saying “Huh?” leave and never come back, and the Church and other faith-based institutions — which are the only institutions I can think of that carry values such as civility, decency, loving- kindness, and fairness forward to the next generation and the next – shrink from irrelevance into oblivion.

Then where will we be?

Sorry to end on a bummer note on a Monday-after-Easter morning. Just saying.

Thanks as always for listening.