Sharing some thoughts

Today we celebrate the Feast Day of St Peter and St Paul. It’s the day when we remember them especially but more importantly consider their example to the Church and to us today. Eugene Petersen a theology scholar wrote, ‘Among the apostles, the one absolutely stunning success was Judas, and the one thoroughly grovelling failure was Peter. Judas was a success in the ways that most impress us: he was successful both financially and politically. He cleverly arranged to control the money of the apostolic band; he skilfully manipulated the political forces of the day to accomplish his goal. And Peter was a failure in ways that we most dread: he was impotent in a crisis and socially inept. At the arrest of Jesus he collapsed, a hapless, blustering coward; in the most critical situations of his life with Jesus, the confession on the road to Caesarea Philippi and the vision on the Mount of transfiguration, he said the most embarrassingly inappropriate things. He was not the companion we w...

We now have a 3 year cycle of readings, meaning that the same things come up at least every 3 years. I can remember when today’s readings came up 3 years ago that someone said to me on the way out of Church, ‘You chickened out of preaching on the gospel reading then ?’ My memory is not usually that good, but that struck home and I remember because I realised at the time that it was probably the truth. Today’s gospel (Matthew 10:24-39) does not make easy reading at all. Jesus begins by speaking about a disciple not being above a teacher, a slave not being above a master. He then goes on to suggest that God sees everything – nothing can be covered up that can’t be uncovered, and then there is the wonderful truth that God loves us, every one of us equally – ‘Are not two sparrows sold for a penny ?’ says Jesus, ‘and not one of them will fall to the ground unperceived by God’. We’re then told that we are more precious than the sparrows, that even the hairs on our head are numbered (and ...

Today’s gospel (Matt.9:35-10:8) is one of the great addresses to the Church throughout the world. In the reading we heard something of the remarkable power of Jesus – power to heal, to preach and teach, power to proclaim good news in everything he did and said. And as a Church the great adventure is that we are challenged to follow his example, to follow into his footsteps as we seek to try and do the things he did, and we are commissioned to do so by Jesus himself. We are called by name to serve Jesus, and to proclaim his message, ‘The Kingdom of heaven has come near’. And yet proclamation, speaking out about our faith, sharing good news with others is not something we find easy. There’s a story about a church treasurer who was ecstatic one day. “Look at this,” he yelled. “We just got a cheque here for £200,000.” “Who is it from?” asked the minister. “Oh. Wait a minute,” said the treasurer, taking another look at the cheque. “It says, ‘You will notice that I have not signed th...

I’d like to begin by explaining that Helen is away for a few days on a course, and that information is very relevant when you take into account what I am going to say next ! I read recently that because a woman's vocal cords are shorter than a man's she can actually speak with less effort than he can. Shorter vocal cords not only cause a woman's voice to be more highly pitched, but also require less air to become agitated, making it possible for her to talk a lot more with less energy expended. Obviously I wouldn’t want to personalise that statement in anyway !! However it’s hard when you’re perfect like myself to understand sometimes the thought process of a woman – yes sometimes means no and no sometimes means yes, indecision can sometimes reign supreme, and I’ll be in a lot of trouble when Helen hears what I have said tonight… So I wont say any more on that…, but let’s not even get started on subtle hints about clothes they’d like ! Anyway now I have alienated all ...

Tonight’s gospel is the well known parable of the sower (Luke 8:4-15). You will all have heard sermons about it many times before. Tonight I would like to promise something new but I’m not sure that is the purpose of this parable at all. With some of the stories of Jesus they are open to different interpretations, they will have different meanings for people at different stages of their life or experiences, and Jesus deliberately left them open-ended for us to think about. But with this parable he spoke very clearly, and then even included for us a translation of the parable. We were supposed to remember it ! There was to be no doubt about its meaning. And that meaning partly concerns our preaching of the gospel, our sharing of the good news of Jesus with others, but it is also concerned with our listening to God’s word. One of the greatest gifts that God has given us in life is the gift of listening. Listening is the key to success and perhaps even survival in most relationships. ...

During the Bible study discussion this week we talked a lot about the need for growth in our Churches. We talked about ways in which this could happen, and we talked about reasons which may prevent growth or even sometimes encourage decline, and through the discussions there was one comment which perhaps captured some of the meaning of today’s gospel (Matthew 7:21-29). That comment was that we had spent a lot of time talking about the Church but actually one of the biggest problems was that we try to build lives and share a message about the Church, when we should be doing those things based firmly on God. Most people know the story of the wise man who built his house upon the rock, whilst the foolish man built his house upon the sand. When the storms came, the wise man’s house stood strong, and the foolish man’s house fell flat. The car maker Henry Ford asked the electrical genius Charlie Steinmetz to build the generators for his factory. One day the generators ground t...