Scripture for Sunday: Genesis 28.10-19a (Jacob’s ladder); Psalm 139.1-11, 22-23; Romans 8.12-25; Matthew 13.24-30, 36-43 (parable of weeds) Jesus told a lot of agricultural parables, and perhaps sometimes the meaning gets a little lost today. One can imagine critics of today’s parable asking, “What kind of person could be bothered to go to the trouble of […]
Archive | Themes
Theme of each week.
Theme for Sunday, 16 July
Scripture for 16 July: Genesis 25:19-34; Psalm 119:105-112; Romans 8:1-11; Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23 The temperate rainforest in British Columbia is littered with the trunks and stumps of dead trees, but is also lush with new life. It is an illustration of the way in which nature sows seeds: liberally, abundantly, profligately. It contrasts markedly with the […]
Theme for Sunday, 9 July
Scripture for 9 July: Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67; Psalm 45:10-17; Romans 7:15-25a; Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 Anyone who has experienced a gifted child will understand that their point of reference for ability is not the same as for others. It takes time for them to come to terms with the idea that their excellence is not the normal […]
Theme for last Sunday, 2 July
Scripture for Sunday, 2 July: Genesis 22.1-14; Psalm 13; Romans 6.12-23; Matthew 10.40-42 Can we learn from our children? Do we sometimes discount their words because we know them too well – or think that we do? What is it that familiarity breeds? Having just returned from a holiday during which we spent time with our […]
Theme for the Week – 28 May 2017
Scripture for the seventh Sunday of Easter: Acts 1.6-14; Psalm 68.1-10, 33-36; 1 Peter 4.12-14; 5:6-11; John 17.1-11 This seventh Sunday of Easter is an in-between place, after Ascension and before Pentecost. If we put ourselves in the place of the first disciples, we find ourselves in a position of waiting, perhaps sharing in their duty […]
Theme for the Week – 21 May 2017
Scripture for the sixth Sunday of Easter: Acts 17.22-31; Psalm 66.7-18; 1 Peter 3.13-22; John 14.15-21 After the recent internet ransom attack that took many organisations’ computer files hostage, I heard the Rev. Lucy Winkett, rector of St James, Piccadilly, comparing our relationship to computer networks to our ancestors’ relationship to agriculture. She observed that as […]
Theme for the Week – 14 May 2017
Scripture for the fifth Sunday of Easter: Acts 7.55-60; Psalm 31.1-5,15-16; 1 Peter 2.2-10; John 14.1-14 In the 1980s some whales were trapped in ice in the Arctic. The Russians and Americans, before the end of the Cold War, cooperated to break the ice and give them a path to freedom. I mentioned how encouraging this […]
Theme for the Week – fourth Sunday of Easter 2017
Scripture for the fourth Sunday of Easter (also Good Shepherd Sunday): Acts 2.42-47; Psalm 23; 1 Peter 2.19-25; John 10.1-10 In the middle of the film Michael, in which an unlikely group, including an angel, travel from Iowa to Chicago partly to redeem a couple of news reporters’ careers, one of the characters sings a song […]
Theme for the Week – the Road to Emmaus
Reflection on Luke 24.13-35 Is Emmaus a real place – and does it matter? I read a commentary on Luke’s account of the road which said that nobody knows where Emmaus was – it might not even be a real place. So does it matter whether Emmaus exists as a place or whether, indeed, it’s just a […]
Theme for the Week – 23 April 2017
Scripture for Easter 2: Acts 2.14a,22-32; Psalm 16; 1 Peter 1.3-9; John 20.19-31 (Jesus & Thomas) The encounter between Jesus and Thomas is so important that we read it every year after Easter – not just one in three. It is for us, who “have not seen and yet have come to believe;” and who need […]