Sharing some thoughts

From time to time most of us will get rather depressed about the state of the Church today – we look around and often see large Church buildings with very few worshippers, and many of them seem hopelessly divided. Pessimistically people talk of the demise of the Church, and perhaps even of a society where there would be no Churches. We worry about money, we worry about buildings, we worry about a lack of children in Church, we worry about all kinds of things ! But this evening in the New Testament reading (Acts 7:44 -50), I think Stephen, who would become the first Christian martyr, had a message for the Church today. Just to recap a little bit, Stephen had gone about preaching the gospel. We are told that he was full of grace and power, and did great wonders and signs among the people. But like many people who fight to do good, and offer a good news message, he had upset some people, and this had resulted in his arrest. He was a threat to the Jewish religious order and systems...

I was listening to the radio this week, and one of the guests was talking about an internet website called ‘Second Life.’ On the site real people actually live out a virtual life – buying and selling property, shopping, going to restaurants, arguing, getting married, even having affairs all in a virtual world. When the guest was talking about the site he made the point that many people are really not totally happy in their lives, and that this provided a way out for them, where they could be what they wanted to be and do what they wanted to do. I looked at the site to get some more information, and there were very nearly 3 million people registered – apparently there are also similar sites offering this escape from reality as well. There are real places and even a Reuters news agency. Also on the second life site there are a number of churches – there is the Church of the night, The Pirate Church, The Church of Doug, The Church of Elvis, as well as some more conventional Church...

Today we find ourselves about half way through the week of prayer for Christian unity. Perhaps it’s suitable therefore that the readings actually fall in with that principle of unity very well. In the reading from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians (12:12-27) he writes of the fact that the Church is made up of many members, all part of one body, and that all are equal in the sight of God, and all are useful for the proclamation of the good news of Jesus. And then in the gospel (Luke 4:14 -21) we have the account of Jesus speaking in the synagogue and reading out the passage from the prophet Isaiah, ‘The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.’ In short, what Jesus was reading out in that passage was the duties of every Christian person, regardless of denomination, bac...

Recently there seem to have been a lot of celebrity programmes on television – singing, dancing, or just generally making fools of themselves. One of the programmes on a little while ago was ‘I’m a celebrity, get me out of here’. I didn’t watch any of this series, but I did watch some of the last one. The group of celebrities lived in the jungle for 16 days, surviving on very little food, doing horrible tasks and so on. Anyone who watched can’t have failed to notice how difficult many of the people found living in such difficult conditions – their complaints often bordered on the spoilt child mentality. The sad thing is that I don’t think I would have found it any easier. Today we live in a very materialistic society, expecting reasonable food and living conditions, and I think this comfort has become very important to us. But in tonight’s reading from the gospel of Luke (12:13-34) Jesus brings us down to earth a little bit – he tells of a man who produced a rich crop and then ...

There are lots of things to think about regarding the gospel reading that we have just heard (John 2:1-11). It is the well known account of the water being turned into wine at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee. One certainty that we have is that this was a good party, with the best wine kept until last – in the verse that follows the section we heard, we are told that after the feast Jesus, his mother, his brothers and his disciples all returned to Capernaum for a few days, and you get the sense that a good rest was needed ! But one of the things I’ve often wondered about this account is what people thought of Jesus when he arrived at the wedding. This is his first recorded miracle, so did the guests know him just as a friend, perhaps a family friend as Mary the mother of Jesus had also been invited, or did they know him as a teacher, as a potential leader, or as something more than that which they couldn’t actually put their finger on ! And then there would have been the sm...

I was reading recently about a New Testament professor from Princeton Seminary who visited a high school youth group. After the professor finished speaking about the significance of Christ's baptism as a revelation of God's presence in Jesus, one of the students said without looking up, "That isn’t what it means." Glad that the student had been listening enough to disagree, the professor asked, "What do you think it means?" "The story says that the heavens were opened, and the Spirit of God came down, right?" "That's right." The boy finally looked up and leaned forward, saying, "So it means that God is on the loose in the world. And it is dangerous." After his baptism, Jesus went into the wilderness, and it was dangerous. Jesus taught in the temples, and it was dangerous. Jesus healed on the Sabbath, and it was dangerous. Jesus confronted the authorities and turned over the tables, and it was dangerous. I suspec...

There was a minister in a really big Church who often said in the middle of the service, or his sermons, or the prayers, ‘The Lord be with you’, and the congregation would dutifully reply, ‘And also with you’. This became such a habit that many people didn’t really listen to a lot the minister said, but whenever there was a slight pause they would assume the minister had said, ‘The Lord be with you’ and respond, ‘And also with you’. One day the minister was having trouble with his microphone and said, ‘I think there must be a problem with the microphone’, after a slight pause the congregation replied, ‘And also with you’. Yesterday in the Church calendar was the Feast of Epiphany, the day on which we remember the Magi visiting the baby Jesus and bringing him their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. We know very little about the Magi – we don’t really know how many of them there were, or even whether they were men – although as they have taken on the title of ‘Wise’ I suspect th...