Sermon Archive (Page 30)

Lessons and Carols

Well, it’s not exactly a sermon but the lessons and carols speak for themselves.

Good News Hunting

When I was a kid I loved the puzzles where you have to see how many umbrellas or chipmunks or words you can find hidden in the picture. I was reminded of this by this morning’s gospel which ends with the words, “So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people.” It left me wondering where exactly the good news is hiding in this account of John’s preaching. It seems that he was mainly talking about…

Make Space for God

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on unsplash.com If you’re about the same age as me, this gospel reading with its quotation from Isaiah immediately brings to mind the beginning of Godspell with its haunting “Prepare the Way of the Lord.”  Yet I wonder why the Lord needs the way prepared. Yesterday, members of the altar guild cleaned all our sacred pots and pans in preparation for Christmas. We do this two or three times a year – before the two big…

Raise your Head

Luke 21:25-36 There are two quite different ways of looking at this week’s Gospel. One is that terrible things are going to happen and we should be prepared less we be trapped; and the second is that actually terrible things happening means that redemption and God’s reign are very near and we should be hopefully expectant. Looking at this textually, the ambiguity seems to come from the fact that we are reading Luke’s gospel.  Both Luke and Matthew took Mark’s…

The Reign of Christ

Revelation 1:4b-8 John 18:33-37 I am glad to be home after a rapid visit to my family in the UK. Of course, one person I did not see was my brother Richard who died quite a while back. Every Christmas, Richard faithfully sent out a Christmas letter with the normal kind of information about his family’s activities.  But Richard was not an optimist. Every year he told us that things were so bad that the end of the world was…

Hannah pours out her soul, by Berkeley Johnson

Photo by Steven Su on Unsplash 1 Samuel 1:4-20 Mark 13:1-8 Good morning! It is wonderful to be here with you, once again, and to have the opportunity to share the Good News with you, especially on a day where a woman has a central role in fulfilling God’s plan. When Caro+ asked me to preach, she told me this is a different service where we only have two readings, and a slightly longer time for the sermon (lucky you).…

Even though you die, you live

Photo by Dawid-Zawila on Unsplash John 11:32-44 The gospel about Lazarus that we just heard is far too short. John’s narrative starts several verses earlier and is important because the raising of Lazarus cannot, I think, be separated from the teaching about the resurrection and life which precedes it. But there is another perhaps more significant problem. Why was Jesus greatly disturbed in spirit? Jesus was in another place when Lazarus became sick. Bethany is very near Jerusalem, and, apparently,…

Could the Blind lead the Blind? – Carol Brubaker Walton

Photo: The Blind Leading the Blind by Lee McLaughlin Text: Mark 10:46-52 As I began this sermon, I was reminded that keeping oneself informed about world, national and local news can be exhausting.  One theologian (prior to the computer age) said preaching needed to happen with the Scriptures in one hand and a newspaper in the other.    I’m sure some of you will recall the name of that theologian.  If so, you are invited to call it out now.  [pause]…

The Cup

Photo by Jametlene Reskp on Unsplash Mark 10:35-45 Not so long ago in a time not unlike this, people thought that there was only one point of view, only one way to see things. Then they found that it was possible to read the same thing but understand it in a number of different ways. So now, when we read the Bible we need to take into account the perspective from which we come. This is called the hermeneutic. For…