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Sentence

Repent, and be baptised every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Acts 2:38-39

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

O God, your Son made himself know to his disciples in the breaking of bread:
open the eyes of our faith, that we may see him in his redeeming work; who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Acts 2:14a, 36-41
• Psalm 116:1-4, 11-18
• 1 Peter 1:13-25
• Luke 24:13-35

• Next Week:

• Acts 2:42-47
• Psalm 23
• 1 Peter 2:1-10
• John 10:1-10

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A Thought to Ponder

Easter 3 – Luke 24:13-35
Jesus meets the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: “While he was sitting with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and the recognized him . . . ”

Today’s Gospel begins on the afternoon of that miraculous Easter Sunday. Having just completed the observance of the Passover Sabbath, two disciples of Jesus (one identified as Cleopas) are making the seven mile trip to the village of Emmaus. By identifying them as disciples, Luke is emphasizing that these two were more than just impartial observers of the events of Holy Week.
Luke writes that their exchange was “lively” – we can well imagine! As well as anger at the great travesty of justice that had taken place, they must have felt emotionally shattered at what had befallen their revered Rabbi Jesus. The two are suddenly joined by a stranger who asks the subject of their “lively” conversation. The stranger then explains, to their astonishment, the meaning of each of the events of the past week. When they reach the village, the two disciples ask the stranger to stay with them. And, in the words from Luke’s Gospel that we have come to treasure, the two disciples “come to know (the Risen Christ) in the breaking of the bread.”
Luke’s Easter night story parallels our own experience of the Eucharist: We come to the Lord’s table feeling angry, hurt, despairing, alone – but at this table, coming to “know him in the breaking of the bread,” we can experience the peace and presence of the Risen Christ.
It has been said that true friendship begins when people share a memory. Like the two disciples who recognize Jesus in the breaking of bread, we, too, are bound as a Church by the same memory of the Risen One. In the word we hear together and the bread we share together, God’s love is both remembered and relived, giving us hope and direction and meaning in the course of our individual journeys.
As the two disciples discover on their journey to Emmaus, Christ is alive and present in our midst in the love, charity and goodness we give and receive, in the sacrament of his body and blood, in moments of grace and prayer.
Like the disciples journeying to Emmaus, we are disciples are on a journey, a journey reaches its zenith in the great Paschal journey from crucifixion to resurrection. As the disciples traveling to Emmaus discover, the journey is not ended. It continues through the wilderness and is marked by the cross. But God is still very much present to us along the way.
God travels with us on our own roads to Emmaus; God is present in the broken bread of compassion and healing we offer and receive from our fellow travellers. Easter faith is to recognize God in our midst: in our wanting to understand, in our struggle to make things right, in our brokenness. May this Easter season open our hearts and spirits to recognize Christ among us in every moment of our lives, in both the bright promising mornings and the dark, terrifying nights.

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Sermon

You can read the Pew Sheet here

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Sentence

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. 1 Peter 1:3

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Almighty and eternal God, the strength of those who believe and the hope of those who doubt:
may we, who have not seen, have faith and receive the fullness of Christ’s blessing; who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Acts 2:14a, 22-32
• Psalm 16
• 1 Peter 1:1-12
• John 20:19-31

• Next Week:

• Acts 2:14a, 36-41
• Psalm 116:1-4, 11-18
• 1 Peter 1:13-25
• Luke 24:13-35

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A Thought to Ponder

Easter 2 – John 20: 19-31
“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you. And when he said this he breathed upon them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit . . . ” Jesus said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your
hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”
Scene 1 takes place on Easter night. The terrified disciples are huddled together, realising they are marked men because of their association with the criminal Jesus. The Risen Jesus appears in their midst with his greeting of “peace.” John clearly has the Genesis story in mind when the evangelist describes Jesus as “breathing” the Holy Spirit on his disciples: Just as God created man and woman by breathing life into them (Genesis 2: 7), the Risen Christ re-creates humankind by breathing the new life of the Holy Spirit upon the eleven.
In scene 2, the disciples excitedly tell the just-returned Thomas of what they had seen. Thomas responds to the news with understandable scepticism. Thomas had expected the cross (see John 11: 16 and 14: 5) – and no more.
The climactic third scene takes place one week later, with Jesus’ second appearance to the assembled community – this time with Thomas present. He invites Thomas to examine his wounds and to “believe.” Christ’s blessing in response to Thomas’ profession of faith exalts the faith of every Christian of every age who “believes without seeing”; all Christians who embrace the Spirit of the Risen One possess a faith that is in no way different less than that of the first disciples. The power of the Resurrection transcends time and place.
We trace our roots as parish and faith communities to Easter night when Jesus “breathed” his spirit of peace and reconciliation upon his frightened disciples, transforming them into the new Church.
The “peace” that Christ gives his new Church is not a passive sense of good feeling or the mere absence of conflict. Christ’s peace is hard work: the peace of the Easter Christ is to honour one another as children of the same Father in heaven; the peace of the Easter Christ seeks to build bridges and find solutions rather than assigning blame or extracting punishment; the peace of Christ is centred in relationships that are just, ethical and moral.
The “peace” that the Risen Christ breathes into us at Easter shows us a way out of those tombs in which we bury ourselves; the forgiveness he extends enables us to get beyond the facades we create and the rationalisations we devise to justify them.
Jesus’ entrusting to the disciples the work of forgiveness is what it means to be the church: to accept one another, to affirm one another, to support one another as God has done for us in the Risen Christ. What brought the apostles and first Christians together as a community – unity of heart, missionary witness, prayer, reconciliation and healing – no less powerfully binds us to one another as the Church of today.
While today’s Gospel has been read by the Church as Jesus instituting the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the whole Christian community possesses the power to “forgive” and “retain,” and the grace to “bind” and “loosen.” The Risen
Christ gives to every one of us the “power,” the “authority,” the grace to forgive and to bind one another in love.
All of us, at one time or another, experience the doubt and scepticism of Thomas: While we have heard the good news of Jesus’ empty tomb, all of our fears, problems and sorrows prevent us from realising it in our own lives. In raising his
beloved Son from the dead, God also raises our spirits to the realisation of the totality and limitlessness of his love for us.
We all have scars from our own Good Fridays that remain long after our own experiences of resurrection. Our “nail marks” remind us that all pain and grief, all ridicule and suffering are transformed into healing and peace in the love of God we experience from others and that we extend them.
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Sermon

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Sentence

This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. Luke 24:34

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Glorious Lord of life, by the mighty resurrection of your Son you overcame the old order of sin and death to make all things new in him:
grant that we, who celebrate with joy Christ’s rising from the dead may be raised from the death of sin to the life of righteousness; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Acts 10:34-43
• Hymn to the Risen Christ
• Colossians 3:1-4
• Matthew 28:1-10

• Next Week:

• Acts 2:14a, 22-32
• Psalm 16
• 1 Peter 1:1-12
• John 20:19-31

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A Thought to Ponder

Easter Day – John 20:1-9
On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them “They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they put him.”

John’s Easter Gospel says nothing of earthquakes or angels. His account begins before daybreak. It was believed that the spirit of the deceased hovered around the tomb for three days after burial; Mary Magdalene was therefore following the Jewish custom of visiting the tomb during this three day period. Discovering that the stone has been moved away, Mary Magdalene runs to tell Peter and the others. Peter and the “other disciple” race to get there and look inside. Note the different reactions of the three: Mary Magdalene fears that someone has “taken” Jesus’ body; Peter does not know what to make of the news; but the “other” disciple – the model of faithful discernment in John’s Gospel – immediately understands what has taken place. So great are the disciple’s love and depth of faith that all of the strange remarks and dark references of Jesus now become clear to him.
While the Easter mystery does not deny the reality of suffering and pain, it does proclaim reason for hope in the human condition. The empty tomb of Christ trumpets the ultimate Alleluia: that love, compassion, generosity, humility and selflessness will ultimately triumph over hatred, bigotry, prejudice, despair, greed and death. The Easter miracle enables us, even in the most difficult and desperate of times, to live our lives in hopeful certainty of the fulfilment of the resurrection at the end of our life’s journey.
The Risen Christ is present to us in the faithful witness of every faithful follower of Jesus who shares the good news of the empty tomb, who seeks to bring resurrection into this life of ours: to rise above life’s sufferings and pain to give love and life to others, to renew and re-create our relationships with others, to proclaim the Gospel of the empty tomb.
Today we stand, with Peter and John and Mary, at the entrance of the empty tomb; with them, we wonder what it means. The Christ who challenged us to love one another is risen and walks among us! All that he taught – compassion, love, forgiveness, reconciliation, sincerity, selflessness for the sake of others – is vindicated and affirmed if he is truly risen. The empty tomb should not only console us and elate us, it should challenge us to embrace the life of the Gospel. With Easter faith, we can awaken the promise of the empty tomb in every place and moment we encounter on our journey through this life.
In Matthew’s Easter Gospel, the Risen Jesus instructs the stunned Mary and her companion to “go tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.” Galilee is the place where Peter and the others were first called, where everything began — to return there means to see everything they experienced in following Jesus in the light of the cross and the empty tomb. Returning to Galilee transforms the horror of the past week into the new, radiant light of Easter — and, in that new light, their lives and ours are forever made new and whole. This Easter, may we make our way back to the Galilees of our life, to meet again God’s Risen One in the reconciling and healing peace of this holy season.
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Sermon

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Sentence

At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:10-11

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Everlasting God, in your tender love for the human race you sent your Son to take our nature, and to suffer death upon the cross:
in your mercy enable us to share in his obedience to your will and in the glorious victory of his resurrection; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Isaiah 50:4-9a
• Psalm 31:9-18
• Philippians 2:5-11
• Matthew 26:14-27:66

• Next Week:

• Acts 10:34-43
• Hymn to the Risen Christ
• Colossians 3:1-4
• Matthew 28:1-10

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A Thought to Ponder

Blessing and Procession of Palms: Matthew 28:1-11
Matthew’s account of Jesus’ entry into the city of Jerusalem is framed by the prophecy of Zechariah (9:9). The Messiah will come, not as a conquering warrior astride a noble steed, but in lowliness and peace, riding on an ass. The Messiah king is one with God’s just: the poor and lowly of the world. Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem in such a public and deeply symbolic way (which is followed immediately in Matthew’s text by the routing of the money changers from the temple) sets up the final confrontation between Jesus and the chief priests and scribes.
The Passion: Matthew 26:14 – 27:66
While the Blessing and Procession of Palms commemorates Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem, the Liturgy of the Word focuses on the passion and death of the Messiah. In his Passion narrative, Matthew frames his account in the context of the First Testament prophecies concerning the Messiah. Matthew portrays a Jesus who is totally alone, abandoned by everyone, but who is finally vindicated by God (the portrait of the Messiah depicted in Isaiah and Psalm 22).
Scripture scholars believe Matthew (and Luke) adapted their material from the evangelist Mark, whose Gospel is generally believed to be the first to be written. Almost 80 percent of Matthew’s Passion account is identical in vocabulary and content with Mark. Matthew, however, adds several details not found in Mark’s Gospel, including the death of Judas, Pilate’s washing his hands of responsibility for Jesus’ death, Pilate’s wife’s dream (in Matthew’s Gospel, divine guidance is often revealed in dreams – Joseph’s dream to take the child and his mother to Egypt, the magi’s dream to flee Bethlehem), the posting of guards at the tomb after Jesus’ burial.
Matthew is writing his Gospel for Jewish Christians who themselves have suffered at the hands of the Jewish establishment. Many have been expelled from their synagogues and the temple for their insistent belief in Jesus as the Messiah. Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin (the most controversial aspect of the Passion narratives historically) is pivotal in Matthew. Matthew is the only Gospel writer who names Caiaphas as high priest during the proceedings and describes in great detail the chief priests’ manipulation of Pilate and the crowds. Matthew presents to his Jewish Christian community Jesus as a model of suffering at the hands of the Jews (it is Matthew’s Passion account that includes the troubling line spoken by the crowds, “Let his blood be upon us and our children”). The tearing of the sanctuary veil symbolises for Matthew’s community a break with their Jewish past.
As is the case throughout Matthew’s Gospel, Gentiles and not the people of Israel first recognise the truth about Jesus: only Pilate and his wife recognize the innocence of the condemned Jesus.
Reading 1: Isaiah 50: 4-7
Reading 1 is taken from Deutero-Isaiah’s “Servant songs,” the prophet’s foretelling of the “servant of God” who will come to redeem Israel. In this third song, Isaiah portrays the servant as a devoted teacher of God’s Word who is
ridiculed and abused by those who are threatened by his teaching.
Reading 2: Philippians 2: 6-11
In his letter to the Christian community at Philippi (in north-eastern Greece), Paul quotes what many scholars believe is an early Christian hymn (Reading 2). As Christ totally and unselfishly “emptied himself” to accept crucifixion for our sakes, so we must “empty” ourselves for others.
There is a certain incongruity about today’s Palm Sunday liturgy. We begin with a sense of celebration: we carry palm branches and echo the Hosannas (from the Hebrew “God save [us]”) shouted by the people of Jerusalem as Jesus enters the city. But Matthew’s account of the Passion confronts us with the cruelty, injustice and selfishness that lead to the crucifixion of Jesus. We welcome the Christ of victory, the Christ of Palm Sunday – but we turn away from the Christ of suffering and of the poor, the Christ of Good Friday. These branches of palm are symbols of that incongruity that often exists between the faith we profess on our lips and the faith we profess in our lives.
The Gospel calls us to take on what Paul calls the “attitude of Christ Jesus”

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Sermon

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Sentence

‘I am the resurrection and the life,’ says the Lord; ‘whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.’ John 11:25-26

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Life-giving God, your Son came into the world to free us all from sin and death:
breathe upon us with the power of your Spirit, that we may be raised to new life in Christ, and serve you in holiness and righteousness all our days; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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Readings

This Week:

• Ezekiel 37:1-14
• Psalm 130
• Romans 8:6-11
• John 11:1-45

• Next Week:

• Isaiah 50:4-9a
• Psalm 31:9-18
• Philippians 2:5-11
• Matthew 26:14-27:66

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A Thought to Ponder

Lent 5

Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, tied hand and food with burial bands, and his face wrapped in a cloth. “Untie him and let him go.”
As was the case in John’s account of the healing of the man born blind (last Sunday’s Gospel), the raising of Lazarus is more than just a sign of Jesus’ love and compassion. Each of the seven miracles that John includes in his Gospel (“the Book of Signs,” as this section of John’s Gospel is titled) is dramatized by the evangelist to underscore some dimension of the redemptive nature of Jesus’ work. Today’s Gospel, the climactic sign in John’s Gospel, is presented in five distinct, self-contained scenes: Jesus receiving the news of Lazarus’ death, the disciples’ protesting Jesus’ return to Judea, Martha’s pleading with Jesus, Jesus’ emotional arrival at the tomb, and the miraculous raising of Lazarus.
The raising of Lazarus is clearly intended by John to demonstrate Jesus’ power over life and death. The raising of Lazarus plays like a rehearsal for the events next week’s liturgies will celebrate.

As Jesus called out to Lazarus to be untied from the wrappings of the dead and to be free to live once again, so we are called to be free from those things that keep us too busy from loving and being loved.
Resurrection is an attitude, a perspective that finds hope in the hardest times and uncovers life among the ruined, that reveals light in the darkest night. To each one of us belongs Jesus’ work of resurrection at Lazarus’s tomb: to help others free themselves from their tombs of dark hopelessness and the fear and sadness that bind them.

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Sermon

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Sentence

‘I am the light of the world,’ says the Lord; ‘those who follow me will have the light of life.’ John 8:12

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Gracious God, in order that we children of earth might discern good from evil you sent your Son to be the light of the world:
as the light of Christ shines upon us, may we learn what pleases you, and live in truth and goodness; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• 1 Samuel 16:1-13
• Psalm 23
• Ephesians 5:8-14
• John 9:1-41

• Next Week:

• Ezekiel 37:1-14
• Psalm 130
• Romans 8:6-11
• John 11:1-45

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A Thought to Ponder

Lent 4

The healing of the man born blind: “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Neither he nor his parents sinned; it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him … “I came into this world for judgment, so that those who do not see might see, and those who do not see might become blind.”
In his accounts of Jesus’ “signs,” the writer of the Fourth Gospel displays great skills as a dramatist. His story of the healing of the man born blind is really a play with six scenes: the blind beggar’s healing with the mud Jesus mixes on
the Sabbath; the townsfolk’s reaction to his cure; the beggar’s testimony before the Pharisees; the testimony of the blind man’s parents; the beggar’s second appearance before the Pharisees (resulting in his expulsion); the beggar’s return to Jesus.
While his synoptic counterparts recount Jesus’ miracles as manifestations of his great love and compassion, John “stages” Jesus’ miracle to reveal the deeper meanings of Jesus’ mission of redemption as the Messiah. The healing of the blind beggar heightens the tension between Jesus and the Pharisees. The teaching of this itinerant Rabbi threatens the structured and exalted life of the scribes and Pharisees. They seek to discredit Jesus – and this miracle gives them the opportunity. In using spittle, kneading clay and rubbing it on the man’s eyes, Jesus breaks the strict rules prohibiting any kind of manual labour on the Sabbath. The miracle itself becomes secondary; the issue becomes Jesus’ breaking of the Sabbath. Jesus’ teachings and healings so threaten the comfortably ordered lives of the Jewish leaders that they seek some way to discredit what he has done, so they condemn Jesus’ mixing of the mud as a clear violation of the Jewish prohibition of any kind of work on the Sabbath.
The inquisition of the blind man and his parents and his expulsion from the temple are important parts of Jesus’ story for the evangelist and his readers. John and his community of Jewish-Christians are experiencing the same rejection: many of them have been expelled from their synagogues and the temple for their belief in Jesus as the Messiah.
Our faith, our embracing of the Spirit of God, demands that we see things not with the eyes of practicality, self-interest and profitability alone, but with the eyes of Christ’s selflessness and humility: to see beyond appearances and
superficialities and look deeper to discover the timeless and profound truths of the human heart. To see the world in the light of Christ empowers us to recreate our world, to shatter the darkness of injustice and hate with the light of
justice and compassion.
Jesus says that the man he heals was born blind “so that the works of God might be made visible through him.” In his blindness, the man’s healing becomes the manifestation of God’s goodness and grace for his family and neighbours. Christ calls all of us to such an understanding of faith: that the moments of greatest hurt and difficulty in our lives — the crosses laid upon our shoulders — can become manifestations of God’s grace through understanding compassion, and patient forgiveness.

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Sermon

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Sentence

‘The water that I will give,’ says the Lord, ‘will become in you a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’ John 4:14

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

O God, the fountain of life, to a humanity parched with thirst you offer the living water that springs from the Rock, our Saviour Jesus Christ:
stir up within your people the gift of your Spirit, that we may profess our faith with freshness and announce with joy the wonder of your love. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Exodus 17:1-7
• Psalm 95
• Romans 5:1-11
• John 4:5-42

• Next Week:

• 1 Samuel 16:1-13
• Psalm 23
• Ephesians 5:8-14
• John 9:1-41

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A Thought to Ponder

Lent 3

Jesus meets a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well: “…whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst, a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Many of the Samaritans of that town began to believe in him because of the word of the woman who testified, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have done. Could he possibly be the Christ?”
Jesus’ meeting the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well illustrates the principal role of Jesus as the Messiah: to reconcile all men and women to the Father. As a Samaritan, the woman is considered an outcast by the Jews; as a known adulteress, she is scorned by her own village. With kindness and dignity, Jesus reconciles her to God.
This Gospel has long had a special place in baptismal catechesis: In revealing himself as the Messiah to the Samaritan woman, Jesus speaks to her of the fountain of water he will give — the life-giving waters of baptism. From Jacob’s well springs forth the living waters of the Messiah Christ.

The Samaritan woman is, for the evangelist John, a model of a disciple’s experience of faith: In a personal encounter with Jesus, she confronts her own sinfulness and need for forgiveness; she then comes to realize the depth of God’s love for her; reconciled with God, her life is transformed; she is then sent forth to share with others her “faith story” of what she has seen and heard of this Jesus.
Water is the predominant symbol in today’s readings: As water sustains life and cleans away the grime and filth that can diminish and destroy life, in the waters of baptism, the sins that alienate us from God are washed away and we are reborn in the Spirit of compassion and community.
All of us who have encountered Jesus are called to be reconcilers, not judges; we are called to lift people up, not drive them to their knees. In so many ordinary ways we can help one another realize new life and hope in Christ if we are willing to tear down the walls that divide us, to reach over the distances between us, to build bridges over chasms of mistrust and prejudice.
Easter transformation begins with a recognition of our sins and failings. As Jesus confronts the woman at the well with the reality of her own sinfulness and brokenness, we must confront our own sinfulness and, in doing so, realize our need for God. Sin is a reality in the lives of each one of us; but through Christ, forgiveness, reconciliation and rebirth, are just as real and possible.


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Sermon

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Sentence

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. John 3:16

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

God of mercy, you are full of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger, rich in mercy, and always ready to forgive:
grant us grace to renounce all evil and to cling to Christ, that in every way we may prove to be your loving children; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Gen 12:1-4a
• Psalm 121
• Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
• John 3: 1-17

• Next Week:

• Exodus 17:1-7
• Psalm 95
• Romans 5:1-11
• John 4:5-42

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A Thought to Ponder

Lent 2


Jesus’ encounter with Nicodemus: “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

The Pharisee and teacher Nicodemus comes to Jesus in the middle of the night (in John’s Gospel, night / darkness symbolizes the lack of faith/light). A man of learning, Nicodemus is one of the Jewish elites who were favourably disposed toward Jesus but were struggling to grasp the full meaning of his teachings. For the writer of the Fourth Gospel, Nicodemus represents exactly the kind of timid disciple the evangelist seeks to persuade to come forward and openly profess his/her faith in Jesus as the Christ.
In their exchange, Jesus explains that the kingdom of God he proclaims transcends time and place, that God’s reign is a state of being: to enter the realm of God demands an interior transformation in the Spirit. Invocating the image of Moses’ staff of a bronze serpent raised to save the Israelites from the bite of poisonous snakes (Numbers 21:9), Jesus foretells his own crucifixion, when he will be “lifted up” for the glory of God and the salvation of humankind. And, in one of the most famous verses in John’s Gospel, Jesus speaks of a God who is motivated by love so great that the Father has given the world his own Son not to condemn but to save.
Despite our own life’s experience, wealth and status, we are incomplete and lost until we are “reborn in water and the Spirit”: to be immersed in the Gospel principles of justice and reconciliation, to be transformed in God’s spirit of humility and compassion.
To be “born in the Spirit” is to see things with the eyes of God, to honour what God honours, to love as God loves us. The kingdom of God that Jesus speaks of in the Gospel transcends boundaries and labels, stereotypes and traditions, the colour of flags and the colour of skin. In God’s eyes, we are all his children; in God’s heart, we are all brothers and sisters to one another.
While we tend to see God as the great cosmic Ruler, a mysterious Being totally detached from us and removed from the human experience, Jesus reveals God as a loving Father who created us and our world out of love and seeks to restore his beloved creation through an even greater act of love: God’s becoming human himself in order that his beloved humanity might realize God’s dream of becoming holy and sacred.

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Sermon

You can read the Pew Sheet here

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Sentence

We do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Matthew 4:4

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

Almighty God, whose Son fasted forty days in the wilderness, and was tempted as we are, yet did not sin:
give us grace to direct our lives in obedience to your will, that, as you know our weakness, so we may know your power to save; through Jesus Christ our Redeemer, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Gen 2:15-17, 3:1-7
• Psalm 32
• Romans 5:12-21
• Matthew 4:1-11

• Next Week:

• Gen 12:1-4a
• Psalm 121
• Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
• John 3: 1-17

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A Thought to Ponder

Lent 1


Jesus was led by the Spirit in the desert to be tempted by the devil.

In Matthew’s account of Jesus’s 40-day desert experience, Jesus is confronted with several choices. All of the tempter’s offers would have Jesus sin against the great commandment of Deuteronomy: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength.” (Deuteronomy 6:5). The tempter offers comfort, wealth and power, but Jesus chooses, instead, the course of humble and prayerful servanthood that the Father has chosen for him. All of Jesus’ responses to the devil’s challenges are found in Deuteronomy (8:3, 6:16, 6:13).

The Spirit who called Jesus to the wilderness calls us, as well, to a 40-day “desert experience,” a time to peacefully and quietly renew and recreate our relationship with God, that God might become the centre of our lives in every season.
This First Sunday of Lent confronts us with choices: personal profit, comfort and glory or the life of God. The season of Lent calls us to embrace God’s Spirit of truth that we may make the choices demanded by our complicated and complex world with courage, insight and faith.

Lent is the season for meaningful fasting: fasting not just for the sake “of giving something up” but fasting from whatever derails or hampers our relationship with God and alienates us from others, fasting from everyday distractions in order to put our time and energy into the things of God.

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Sermon

You can read the Pew Sheet here

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Sentence

Suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him!’ Matthew 17:5

                                                                                                                             

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Collect  

O God, in the transfiguration of your Son you confirmed the mysteries of the faith by the witness of Moses and Elijah, and in the voice from the cloud you foreshadowed our adoption as your children:
make us, with Christ, heirs of your glory, and bring us to enjoy its fullness; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

                                                                                                                                                      

Readings

This Week:

• Exodus 24:12-18
• Psalm 2
• 2 Peter 1:16-21
• Matthew 17:1-9

• Next Week:

• Gen 2:15-17, 3:1-7
• Psalm 32
• Romans 5:12-21
• Matthew 4:1-11

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A Thought to Ponder

Transfiguration of Christ


Jesus was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light.

On this Sunday before the beginning of Lent, we hear Matthew’s account of the extraordinary transformation of Jesus that Peter, James and John witness on Mount Tabor.

Matthew’s account of the “transfiguration” (which takes place six days after his first prediction of his passion and his first instructions on the call to discipleship) is filled with images from the First Testament: the voice which repeats Isaiah’s “Servant” proclamation, the appearance of Moses and Elijah, the dazzling white garments of Jesus. Matthew’s primary interest is the disciples’ reaction to the event: their awe at this spectacular vision will soon wither into fear at the deeper meaning of the transfiguration — a meaning that they do not yet grasp. As the disciples will later understand, the transfiguration is a powerful sign that the events ahead of them in Jerusalem are indeed the Father’s will.
The use of the Greek word “transfiguration” indicates that what the disciples saw in Jesus on Mount Tabor was a divinity that shone from within him. This coming Lenten season (which begins on Wednesday) is a time for each of us to experience such a “transfiguration” within ourselves – that the life of God within us may shine forth in lives dedicated to compassion, justice and reconciliation.

Peter’s reaction to the Christ of the Transfiguration contrasts sharply with his reaction to the Christ of Good Friday: While totally taken with the transfigured Christ in today’s Gospel, Peter is afraid to even acknowledge knowing the condemned Christ. Lent calls us to descend Mount Tabor with Jesus and journey with him to Jerusalem and take up our cross with him, so that the divinity we see in the transfigured Jesus may become in us the Easter life of the Risen Christ.

© Connections/MediaWorks. All rights reserved

Sermon

You can read the Pew Sheet here