Sermons And Gubbins

This sermon was given at our morning Zoom service on Sunday 29th November, the first Sunday of Advent 2020. It was given in the wake (watch for that word) of the 2020 US Presidential elections and also news of three vaccines to help fight the spread of Coronavirus, but also whilst the whole country was in its second lockdown of 2020, with the threat of re-strengthed tiers of restrictions for much of the country when lockdown ended, with tier 3 for Greater Manchester being very very similar to full lockdown itself. The gospel for this Sunday was Mark 13:24-37 . I think we’re all sick of it now; the waiting. You can tell when you talk to people; when you queue next to them in those queues outside shops that threaten to go on forever (the queues, not the shops), or when you see parents and children winding each other up in the park, or even when you talk to your own family and loved ones; people are getting fractious and snappy. I know I am. Maybe you’re of better temperament tha...

  This homily was given at our Remembrance Sunday service on 8th November 2020. Apart from being the first ever lock-down Remembrance Day, it was also the day after Joe Biden was eventually named as the President elect of the United States of America. The gospel was John 15:9-17 . I'm not going to preach for long today. Today's service has more than enough in it without a lengthy sermon from me too. And I think that's right, because some things are more important than words. Today is an auspicious day. There has never been a Remembrance Day like this before. In over one hundred years, the day has been about taking part in an act of public remembrance. That cannot happen today, for obvious reasons. Some people have even been unable to buy a poppy this year. No; today cannot be about a public show. Instead then, let us make it a private resolution. And I mean that word not in the sense we use it at New Year; an objective to be tried and given up as a failure within a few ...

  This sermon was preached at our Sunday morning worship within church and on Zoom on Sunday 4th October. The Gospel that morning was Matthew 21:33-46 . What is there to say about today's Gospel? It really does seem so obvious doesn't it? Centuries of Christian teaching has, it seems, cemented its clear meaning in our collective conscience. In the parable that Jesus tells us, often known as the Parable of the Wicked Tenants, we have come to know that the landowner is God, the vineyard is the kingdom of heaven, the wicked tenants are the Jewish people, and the new tenants are us Christians. Done, dusted and simple. A nice comfortable parable that helps us feel good about ourselves. But I don't think Jesus was particularly into telling comfortable parables. I think there must be something other going on here. We didn't have it this morning, but if we had heard the alternative Old Testament reading for today, we would have realised that Jesus was actually telling an...

  This sermon was given at our Holy Communion services on Sunday 13th September. The Gospel that morning was Matthew 18:21-35 . St Peter gets a bad rap, doesn't he? He always seems to get the wrong end of the stick in his interactions with Christ. Looking back, with the benefit of hindsight, we can see he often just doesn't understand what seems obvious to us, or he drops clanger after clanger. Nowhere is this more obvious than at Easter when he cries out his unwavering commitment to never betray his friend and saviour, only to do exactly that three times after Christ's arrest.  It's even more ironic, then, that we find it is Peter who is questioning the limits of forgiveness in our Gospel this morning. I wonder if he looked back upon this conversation on forgiveness when he heard that cockerel crowing that day?  I think sometimes though that hindsight can be unhelpful. Sure, it can help us see the irony in a situation such as this, but also, I think it can cloud ...