Category: Sermons

A journey into the unknown

Sermon St John the Baptist, Mildenhall
Advent Sunday, 1st December 2019

“But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” In this Gospel reading from Matthew’s Gospel set for the first Sunday of Advent, Jesus is speaking about the end of the age, also known as the second coming or the day of judgement. It is a reminder to us that during this season of Advent we are not only preparing for Christmas, for the celebration of God becoming one of us some two-thousand years ago, but we are also preparing for the end of the age, the day about which no one knows. How we can prepare for that day, and how we can do that in such a way that we do not fear, but instead anticipate with readiness and joy, the unknown of God’s judgement?

AdventWreath1

Last week, I was visiting someone in hospital. She had just received the diagnosis of a terminal illness. Although we talked about Christmas, it was clear that for her it was very uncertain what this Christmas would look like. For her, this season of Advent would be a time to prepare in a very real way for the day and hour that we will all face, but of which no one knows. Continue reading “A journey into the unknown” →

How to celebrate

Sermon 24^th November 2019, St Andrew’s Church Uxbridge
Christ the King and Admission to first Communion
Colossians 1.11-20 & Luke 23.33-43

It is very good to be here with you this morning, especially as we are here to celebrate the first Communion of a number of young people of this parish, and their families. It was particularly nice to be welcomed by a lovely breakfast, and it fits rather well with what today’s service is all about!

I’m sure that in your preparation sessions you have been thinking already a lot about Holy Communion and what it means, so I may be repeating some of what you already know. So as you are the experts in a way, I’d like to start with a question to you specifically, but it is also a question to all of us: what do you do when you celebrate something? What do you do when there is a birthday, or Christmas or Easter, or maybe a wedding or a Baptism?

last-supper

I would like to suggest that there are four key elements to each celebration: gifts or presents, food – like this morning –, stories and other people. These four aspects are not a bad way to understand Holy Communion too, so let’s look at them briefly.

Continue reading “How to celebrate” →

Children of God

Homily St George’s Preshute, Remembrance Sunday 10th November 2019
Luke 20.27-38

cenotaph Today we are joining people throughout our nation to mark Remembrance Sunday. In our Act of Remembrance that follows this Communion service, we bring to mind those who have lost their lives fighting for peace and freedom. As we hear the names of those of this parish who died during the two Great Wars, we are once more reminded of the scale of loss that this country, and other nations, suffered.

Remembering is at the heart of our Christian faith. It is what Jesus told his disciples to do, every time they eat the bread and drink the wine: do this to remember me. The act of remembering is not just a mental exercise of calling to mind those things in the past, but it is a collective act of bringing to the fore those events and people who have shaped us into who we are.

Continue reading “Children of God” →

Be a blessing to others

Sermon 3^rd November 2019, All Saints’ Church Stanton St Bernard
All Saints’ Sunday: Ephesians 1.11-end, Luke 6.20-31

Today the Church celebrates All Saints’ Sunday, so it is lovely to be here with you in All Saints’ Church. When I took a school assembly for All Saints Day last week, I asked the children how they thought that they might recognise a saint. The first answer was that saints may be dressed in robes, which is a fair point if we look at a lot of traditional paintings and artwork. The second answer was that a saint is someone who does ‘good’ for other people. Maybe my favourite one was someone who answered that you could ask the person themselves. Although I’m not sure what a person would need to say to convince me.

all saints

Of course the question, in a way, was the wrong one to begin with, as the most accurate Christian definition of a saint is someone who the Church trusts to be in heaven after having lived a holy and virtuous life. So that means we can only know who were saints in their life-time, not those who are. Continue reading “Be a blessing to others” →

Thank you, please

Sermon St Mary’s Upavon & St Matthew’s Rushall, 6^th October 2019
Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity
Lamentations 1.1-6, 2 Timothy 1.1-14 & Luke 17.5-10

Saying ‘please’, ‘thank-you’ and ‘I’m sorry’ is probably what most people learn from a very young age. It is showing respect to one another to acknowledge that someone has done something for you, or when you’ve made a mistake. However, when and how often we say these things, is partly cultural.

I grew up in the Netherlands, where we definitely say these things less often than here. If, for example, you would say ‘thank-you’ to a bus driver on leaving the bus, chances are that you have terribly offended him or her. After all, driving you safely to your destination is surely just their job? So on a very basic level, I can emphasise with Jesus’ words in the Gospel reading today, when he tells us not to expect any gratitude after completing what we ought to have done in the first place.

St Matthew’s Rushall: not a bad place to think about thankfulness!

Continue reading “Thank you, please” →

Renewing our sense of the sacred

Homily St Mary’s Marlborough, 29^th September 2019
St Michael and All Angels: Genesis 29.10-17 & John 1.47-51

Today, on the 29^th September, the Church celebrates the Feast of St Michael and All Angels. A belief in angels, I suspect, is one of the more problematic Christian beliefs in an increasingly secular society.

angel A few years ago, I read what I thought was a helpful book about approaching a belief in angels (Earth Angels : Engaging the Sacred in Everyday Things by Shaun McNiff) . Its first chapter starts by saying that “Angels are a way of looking at the world, infusing life with creative vitality and renewing our sense of the sacred”. It may be a bit too ‘spiritual’ rather than orthodox religion, but I do feel that this way of looking at the world and God’s presence within it, is valuable, as it can help us to reflect on the importance of material objects and places.

Indeed, our own Bishop Andrew uses the reading from the Old Testament that we just heard as a starting point for his theology of place (Parish: An Anglican theology of place by Andrew Rumsey). A theology of place and objects is ultimately an exploration of the relationship between God, people and the world around us. Places, such as churches or pilgrimage destinations; objects, such as the water in Baptism, and the bread and wine at the Eucharist, only gain their significance in as far as they are essential in the expression of God’s being and our relationship with him.

Continue reading “Renewing our sense of the sacred” →

From crisis to blessing

The parable of the dishonest manager

St Mary’s Marlborough, 22^nd September 2019
Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity: 1 Timothy 2.1-7 & Luke 16.1-13

crisis If you feel that this morning’s parable in Luke’s Gospel is a little bit confusing, you are certainly not the only one. For centuries, Christian theologians have been puzzled by the structure and meaning of the story of the dishonest manager. I even consulted my German compendium on Jesus’ parables, which doesn’t happen very often, witnessed by the eight-year old bookmark I found … Some themes are obvious: the parable has something to do with honesty and our attitude to wealth, but its overall message is by no means entirely clear.

It is even not clear where the parable ends. In the translation we heard this morning, the parable ends at verse 8, concluding the story by saying that the dishonest manager is commended by his master. However, an alternative, equally plausible, translation could be that the parable ends a verse earlier, and that the Lord, in other words Jesus himself, comments on the actions of the manager.

Continue reading “From crisis to blessing” →

God’s economy

Sermon St George’s Preshute, 15^th September 2019, 8am
Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity: Luke 15.1-10

In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus tells us two familiar parables: the lost coin, and the lost sheep. Deliberately trying to provoke, or at least to startle, He starts by saying “Which one of you would not …”. I’m not sure about you, but when I’ve lost something not so essential, I usually just wait for it to turn up again. If I can’t find the pen I was using, I’ll grab another one lying around. Unlike the woman in our reading this morning, I would certainly not spend hours looking for a missing coin, if I had nine others lying around.

This also applies for the shepherd. We may understand someone going to look for a vulnerable, fluffy, lamb. However, in the time that the parable was written and originally heard, shepherding was a profession like any other. It was part of the job to lose a sheep here and there, and certainly not something worth risking a whole flock, as it meant risking one’s livelihood.

Continue reading “God’s economy” →

Setting each other free

Homily St John the Baptist Mildenhall, 8^th September 2019
Twelfth Sunday after Trinity: Philemon 1-21 & Luke 14.25-33

onesimus-mosaic Paul’s letter to Philemon, which we hear this morning, is one of the shortest books of the Bible. We have just heard most of it, apart from the final few verses. Most scholars agree that the letter is authentic and written by Paul in prison, either in Ephesus or in Rome.

The letter is addressed to Philemon, who has been assumed to live in Colossae, given the overlap of personal names in this letter and Paul’s letter to the Colossians. The traditional and most common interpretation of the letter is a literal one, in which Paul appeals to Philemon on behalf of his slave, Onesimus, whom Paul has met in prison. Onesimus has run away from his master, and been baptised by Paul in prison, and is writing to Philemon to welcome him back, not as a slave but as a brother.

Continue reading “Setting each other free” →