By Not Known Today's services of Lessons and Carols follow a well-established traditional pattern. It is a good pattern, for it sets the coming of Jesus into a wide Biblical perspective. Let's think about today's Scripture lessons. We start with a passage that reminds us why Jesus had to come (Gen 3:22,24). Our rebellion against…
By Not Known The Christian message is about Jesus – pure and simple. Jesus is the theme of the Bible (Lk 24:27,44-45), the ‘yes‘ to all God’s promises (2 Cor 1:18-20) and the highest form of God’s self-disclosure to humanity (Heb 1:1-3). The two greatest festivals in the Christian calendar respectively celebrate his birth and…
By Not Known This is a day for celebration as we receive new members by Baptism, Confirmation and Transfer. It is also a day that links together the Advent season, Missions Sunday and the membership service. How do these three things link together? Let’s start with Advent. As explained last Sunday, Advent is the time…
By Not Known Today is the first Sunday of Advent. ‘Advent‘ is an old word that means ‘coming‘. In Christian use, it refers to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ The coming of Jesus has two time frames. The first is his past coming. As John records it: ‘The Word became flesh and tabernacled…
By Not Known The balance between humanity and the physical earth is a pressing issue. Thus we hear warnings about irreversible environmental damage and witness the emergence of the Greens as a significant force. The Bible speaks with balance and practicality on this issue. On the one hand, humanity and the physical earth are united.…
By Not Known Our focus today is on the physicality of God’s creation. God made a world of dirt, rocks, water, plants, animals and people who are physical in nature. Some have a problem with this physicality of the creation and oppose it to the spiritual. This is not Biblical, but it is very common.…
By Not Known Today we begin a series of sermons and Bible studies from the early chapters of Genesis. These haven a battleground ever since the 1859 publication of Charles Darwin’s book, The Origin of the Species. Perhaps these chapters confuse some of us. Perhaps some still think that the whole Bible is debunked because…
By Not Known We will hear the Christian message today. It is a message about Jesus. It is a message that Jesus is God’s Son who came, lived, died and was raised so that we can be saved and belong to God in the fullest and richest sense. Some may ‘tune-out’ and decide not to…
By Not Known Bigoty of all kinds is out of fashion presently, especially when it comes in a religious guise. Having strayed into the abyss of strongly held and intolerant opinions, the civilised world rightly says 'no thanks'. Some get confused at this point. They confuse truth and tolerance and act as though the only…
By Not Known The young sometimes complain that their parents are obsessed about making money and need to enjoy themselves more. Parents sometimes complain that their young are obsessed about having a good time and need to settle down and be serious about career and savings. Both complaints have their points and both are connected.…