Sharing some thoughts

  It’s great to be here this evening to celebrate Christmas! Whatever December has looked like for you, whether it has been really busy, really quiet, full of carol services and or parties, shopping or trying to get work done by the end of the year, trying to calm excited children, or perhaps spending time reflecting on Christmases of the past with whatever memories you have of them, we’ve reached Christmas.  Through December the church calendar follows the season of Advent when we wait and look forward to the celebration of Jesus’ birth and all that event meant and means. But now the waiting is over and into whatever is going on around us, Jesus is born…  We’ve just heard a very famous Christmas reading from the Gospel according to John (1:1-14) – it begins, “In the beginning was the Word and the word was with God and the word was God…” but in a modern adaptation of the Bible, it says rather more plainly, “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighbou...

  Today is a strange Sunday in many ways. Christmas is nearly here – most of the shopping has been done and most of the cards delivered, and you may well have attended carol services or Christmas plays, but in the church calendar we’re not quite there. And our readings today call us to spend a little more time in Advent, a time to reflect again on what it’s all about.  In the Old Testament we heard from the prophet Micah (5:2-5a) with the incredible promise that it was in this town of Bethlehem that the Saviour would be born. Much of the Book of Micah is a book about injustice, even judgement. It’s about people who claimed to believe in God but whose lives didn’t show any evidence of it making a difference.  But from Bethlehem God would reveal once again his incredible power with a child born to change the world. God didn’t need grand palaces, he didn’t need to use political power or wealth. He simply showed his love in offering a relatio...

  Oliver Wendell Holmes was a member of the United States Supreme Court for 30 years. At one point in his life, Justice Holmes explained he may have chosen a different career but said: "I might have entered the ministry if certain clergymen I knew had not looked and acted so much like undertakers."   This may be a picture that you recognise or perhaps not, but it certainly does remind us that as clergy, and actually for every Christian, there is a duty to look like people who believe and live out what we profess.  Advent though is a funny season. We have the constant dilemma of being in a season of preparation and reflection in the church calendar while all around us people are partying… and it’s difficult not to join in because actually it’s a chance to remind people of what they’re actually partying about when many of them won’t have thought of that!  So we have this strange mix of spiritual and secular running through advent, that is until today. Today is known...

  One of the great spiritual disciplines that I’m not very good at is silence! Some people get great value from silence, some even go on silent retreats, but it’s something I’ve always struggled with a bit!   I like some sound, whether it be talking or music or just general noise…. Whether you like silence, or quiet or not, words and sounds certainly can make a big difference and that is something that was well known around the time of our gospel reading today (Luke 3:1-6). The Jewish people had relied on prophets sharing the word of God with them for many years and the words of these prophets had been shared down from generation to generation, but it seemed that God had been silent for around 400 years since the work of the prophet Malachi. There were no prophets speaking…    And people were desperately waiting for a voice, but it seemed there was silence. And then along came John the Baptist. In our reading we’re told, ‘The word of God came to John son of Zech...