Second Sunday before Advent,17.11.19 Malachi 4: The Great Day of the Lord & Luke 21: 5-19: The Destruction of the Temple Foretold Today Jesus tells it as it is – something we can be poor at in religious life, full as we often are of ‘shoulds’ and ‘oughts’. The invitation to look at the wonders […]
(this better be good!) Luke 16.1-13 . Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 So I thought – on my last Sunday with you all – that I would like to do three things. To speak from the heart about my time with this wonderful and inspiring congregation; to speak about creation season and water … and if I was […]
Religion and Anxiety What is religion for? I know there are some Christians who don’t like to describe themselves as religious (‘they have a relationship with God, not a religion’) but I think it is a useful term. The root of the word ‘religion’ may mean to bind up again (the same root gives us […]
Luke 14:25-33, Deuteronomy 30:15-20, Jeremiah 18:1-11 So a few weeks ago, I gave a sermon riffing on two readings; one from Luke with a very angry-sounding Jesus, and the other, a challenging part of Jeremiah, speaking of false prophets. And afterwards I thought to myself.. “thank goodness I won’t have to do anything like that […]
Jeremiah 2:2-13, Luke 14:1,7-14 There can be few more painful experiences than that of a broken marriage. I am very aware that there are people sitting here today who have had exactly that experience. Those of us who are still married, or who are single, can imagine the grief and heartbreak, or have seen it […]
Jeremiah 23:23-29 Luke 12:49-56 This week, amid the many depressing items on the news, came the rather bizarre (though no longer surprising) story of a much older man publicly bullying a much younger woman, (almost still a girl). Arron Bank’s ‘joke’ about Greta Thunberg having a “freak yachting accident” as she sailed the Atlantic to […]
Luke 11:1-13, Year C, 7th Sunday after Pentecost (*names changed for privacy) Let me tell you a story. Once upon a time there was a young woman. Life had been difficult for her. Her first husband had gone and she yearned for a new start. She wondered if life would provide it. Now, the woman’s […]
Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31, John 16:12-15 It’s a double whammy today. As well as the church celebrating Trinity Sunday.. that apparently fearsome preaching Sunday for wary (or over-zealous) curates. It’s also Father’s Day… (happy father’s day!) So to first wish you a happy Father’s Day I’ll begin with a suitable ‘Dad Joke’…. I think I want […]
Before we begin today, can i invite you to join me in closing your eyes and takes some moments to attend to the action of breathing.. . The Hebrew tradition considers the breath (inhaling and exhaling) is the same as making the sound ‘Yah-weh’ of the first inhaling breath “I will bless the LORD (YHWH) […]
Waking up and getting up has never been easy I wonder what wakes you up in the morning, what inspires you to rise and get on with the day? For this late night traveler, posting on twitter, who’d fallen asleep at the bus stop, it was this…! Today is the fourth Sunday of Easter.. and […]