In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Given the growth and spread of Christianity throughout the last two millennia Given Christianity’s status as a world religion Given its presence and its position in our culture, As well as the privileges, perils and problems that appertain thereunto […]
Sermon Topic: Miracles
Ten Lepers made Whole
In the time of Jesus’ ministry, there were all kinds of ailments and diseases, as there are today. And we might meditate on what it might be like to live in a time without anything quite like hospitals or doctors, as we know them. Now there were highly developed traditions of all sorts of healing […]
‘Then shall the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.’
“When all things were in quiet silence and night was in the midst of her swift course, thine almighty Word, O Lord, leaped down from heaven out of thy royal throne.” Words from the Wisdom of Solomon that form the old introit for the First Sunday after Christmas. On this third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete […]
Ephphatha: Be opened.
These past weeks have filled our minds, and our lives, with desperate scenes of people wading through water, sorting through debris for remnants of a lost home, sitting or standing on bus seats just so they do not get swept away, and of course people clinging to planes in the hope that they may be […]
Unbind him and let him go.
“Unbind him and let him go”. The story of the raising of Lazarus is not just a miracle. If it were simply about raising the dead then we could feel cheated; it just doesn’t happen that often – if at all – our own loved ones are rarely brought back from the dead. I don’t […]
Signs of Glory
Our Old Testament lesson, today, relates to the Gospel story but it is helpful to look underneath the text and discover the subtleties of the prophecy. The image of marriage is used time and time again in the Old Testament to describe the covenant relationship between God and his chosen people. Through it, God’s glory […]
It Is Not Easy to be Jesus' Disciple
Many people have a romantic notion of what it would have been like to be a disciple of Jesus. They imagine: you were with Jesus every day, and you got to see the miracles and you got to hear his teaching, and it was easy. To which I say: rubbish! Exhibit A is today’s gospel. […]
King Jesus
Do you know this beloved, old-fashioned prayer for blessing food before meals? Christ in the wilderness 5000 fed, With two small fishes and five loaves of bread. May he who multiplied that division Bless and hallow this provision. It is a good thing to pause before eating to bless the Lord from whose hand all […]
Elijah: Prophet of Christ
In the Name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost. Amen. For months now we have reading about the history of ancient Israel in our Evensong Old Testament lessons. There was Moses at the Exodus and the trek through the wilderness. Then Joshua and settling in the Promised Land. Then […]
Now is the Time
The prophet Isaiah counsels that if the people of Israel would put off the yolk that was about their neck, the Lord would bless them. (Isaiah 58.9ff) One day Jesus was teaching in a synagogue when he spied a woman stooped over. A variety of diseases or conditions might cause someone to be in such […]
