Sharing some thoughts

At a church meeting a very wealthy man rose to give his testimony. "I'm a millionaire," he said, "and I attribute it all to the rich blessings of God in my life. I can still remember the turning point in my faith, like it was yesterday: I had just earned my first pound and I went to a church meeting that night. The speaker was a missionary who told about his work. I knew that I only had a pound and had to either give it all to God's work or nothing at all. So at that moment I decided to give all the money I had in the world to God. I believe that God blessed that decision, and that is why I am a rich man today." As he finished it was clear that everyone had been moved by this man's story. But, as he took his seat, a little old lady sitting in the same pew leaned over and said: "Wonderful story! I dare you to do it again!" It’s very easy to risk everything when we have little to lose – time and time again history has shown us that it is the peop

There’s an old and rather horrible story of a father who took his young son out and stood him on the railing of the back porch. He then went down, stood on the lawn below, and encouraged the boy to jump into his arms. "I'll catch you," the father said confidently. After a lot of coaxing, the little boy finally made the leap. When he did, the father stepped back and let the child fall to the ground. He then picked his son up, dusted him off, and dried his tears. "Let that be a lesson," he said sternly. "Don't ever trust anyone." It’s a sad lesson to learn but one that many people actually believe today – trust is in short supply – the attitude of many people towards politicians at the moment seems to sum this up – without doubt, as there are in all occupations, there are politicians who have been dishonest, but most deserve to be trusted… And trusting is something that we all need to do at times – for God has created a world where, as well as being

A speaker once began his address by saying, ‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. You’ll be glad to know that when I asked my secretary to type this address out for me, I asked her to eliminate anything that was dull or confusing… so, in conclusion…’ Preaching today could be a little bit like that because it’s very easy, by thinking about the readings to concentrate a little too much on doctrine, and doctrines rarely make interesting sermons or good celebrations in our services ! There’s an awful lot in the readings about right and wrong, about sin and forgiveness – and ultimately about the grace and mercy of God – and I just want to pick out some thoughts from the gospel reading from Luke (7:36-8:3). During this season of Trinity in which the Church finds itself, we think about our spiritual growth – we think about our need to get ever closer to God day by day… We think of the forgiveness – a forgiveness which is unconditional – all God asks is that we approach him and say sorry… the f

I don’t know about you, but I really enjoy reading Church notice board bloopers. Some I have read recently include:- A notice board which read instead of “evening message at 6:00pm; evening massage at 6:00.” Another read “Due to the rectors illness Wednesdays healing services will be cancelled until further notice.” The final one “The minister will preach his farewell message, after which the choir will sing “break forth into joy.” Mistakes make good reading, but occasionally you can also see some interesting notice boards, and one which appeared recently in Bridgend, I think relates to our readings today:- “There is no sorrow on earth that heaven cannot heal.” The readings this morning record some incredible things, they record moments when the sorrows on earth are healed by heaven. We saw in the reading from the first book of Kings that through Elijah God helped a widow by restoring her child to life. In the reading from the gospel of St.Luke we heard of Jesus helping the widow at Na

Hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunami waves – all these things seem to fascinate us. Their destructive force seems to come out of nowhere to wreak havoc. Television gives us the chance to watch their devastation from a safe distance, so that they can often mean only fantastic images rather than real things which affect real people. A different experience obviously comes to those subjected to any of these natural forces first hand. For them there is a new respect for the immense power of nature, real and dangerous – a power that before had no meaning or existence, is suddenly real and in many cases completely life changing… In an instant the world is turned upside down by the tremendous release of energy through water, air, fire, and earth. An unrecognizable landscape and devastated communities are left in its wake. Science helps us to understand the systems behind this release of energy. But the world continues to be caught by surprise, and such surprises cont

Jeremiah Wright who is the rather controversial pastor of Barack Obama’s former Church in Chicago said that the cross of Christ has two arms – one is vertical, representing the relationship between us and God, and the other is horizontal, representing the relationship between us and other people. This illustration reminds us that the Christian faith is built on relationships – relationships that are two way – between us and God and between us and other people. In the reading from the letter of James (1:22-end) we heard the words ‘be doers of the word and not hearers only…’ This too reminds us that as Christians we have responsibilities – responsibilities to be in the world and be part of the world but also to be a part of the kingdom of God. The vertical arm of the cross points upwards to God from us on the earth, but it also points in the other direction. For our part we are to commit our lives to God, and every part of our lives – we are to recognise that it is God who is the very so

Today marks the last day of something happening in our services, at least for some time ! Before people get alarmed, I am not about to make some major change in the type of service we have, but today for the last time until Easter next year, we began our Sunday services with the words – ‘Alleluia ! Christ is risen ! He is risen indeed ! Alleluia !’ And we will end our service with the words ‘Go in peace to love and serve the Lord. Alleluia, Alleluia’ to which the response comes back, ‘In the name of Christ. Alleluia ! Alleluia !’ On Thursday we celebrate Ascension Day, the day when Jesus ascended into heaven – entrusting his work to his followers, but assuring them of his strength and his power with them always. And as the Easter season officially ends so do those words, ‘Alleluia ! Alleluia !’ – but they hopefully only end as part of our formal liturgy – in our thoughts and in our minds, and maybe even from our lips at times, we hope to feel the need to shout these words – because, as

If we all remember back to Good Friday – that rather rainy day when we remembered once again the crucifixion of Jesus, and think of things that have happened since we will probably all recall different things – perhaps personal events or milestones, or perhaps big news stories – perhaps a Cardiff Blues European Challenge Cup Semi Final win or perhaps the election debates, or the rather unfortunate microphone incident suffered by Gordon Brown…. Then there was also of course the ash crisis preventing flying for so many… However, whatever has happened to us or even in the world around us doesn’t remotely compare with the changes brought about in the lives of some of Jesus’ followers… following the arrest of Jesus most of his followers went into hiding – locked away in a room afraid of the future and confused about the past… Life was cheap at that time and executions were common place so it was only natural that these people should have been frightened… for 3 years they had followed a grea

Martin Luther King said once that the church is like a great extended family that receives a tremendous bequest: they receive an inheritance of a wonderful, beautiful, spacious, luxurious home to share. There is only one stipulation. All must live in it together. And throughout the history of mankind that has proved a very difficult task ! There’s the obvious history of wars, the injustice of the haves and have nots throughout different parts of the world, there’s the arguments and jostling for positions of power – arguments which we have seen all too clearly even in our own country in recent weeks. And that election campaigning shows perfectly how difficult it is to live together with a plan upon which everyone can agree ! But above simple agreement Jesus asks for more – he asks for love – and he asks for a compassion which displays a true concern for everyone… Both in the reading from Leviticus (19:1,2, 9-18) and in the Gospel of John (13:31-35), we receive the command to love – and

Numbers can be tremendously powerful things – this week in the election campaign we heard of lots of different tax and national insurance equations once again, we heard lots of talk of deficits and even the occasional surplus – we heard the Conservative Party claim that 102 promises from the last Labour manifesto had been broken – perhaps the most astounding fact of all is that someone counted ! Because numbers, whilst sometimes being tremendously powerful can also be a little boring at times – I’m sure it’s not true but accountants who of course deal with numbers most of the time have some rather mean jokes about them – for example, An accountant visited the Natural History museum. While standing near the dinosaur he said to his neighbour: "This dinosaur is two billion years and ten months old". "Where did you get this exact information?" "I was here ten months ago, and the guide told me that the dinosaur is two billion years old." Or perhaps, A patient w