Last week we celebrated Epiphany: the revelation to Gentiles just like us, that God fulfilled his promise to gather all nations to him by sending his Son into the world. We see in his birth that Jesus comes not merely as God, but is born a true human infant who will grow into a true human man. And this leads us to the strange episode of Jesus’s Baptism we hear in today’s Gospel lesson. Why on earth would God’s Son Jesus, who of course is God himself, be baptised by John, a me

Like most of us, the Jews we hear about in today’s Gospel were likely going about their daily routines, working, focusing on the political and social events of the day, conversations with friends and neighbours, frustrations with this or that person or situation, going about their regular worship routines. In the midst of these things, we often develop habits to harden ourselves against challenges to our expectations because they throw us off our routines; moreover, they ofte

One of the greatest illusions we all seem to share is that our lives are our own. That we can fully see and control our circumstances, that with just the right research and planning, with warding off those people and ideas, those rules and regulations and impositions of others on us, that we can determine not only our own fate, but that of others as well. The peril in believing this is that it keeps us from allowing the one who created us - God himself - to be borne in us.  W

The story from Matthew’s Gospel this morning, of Mary’s pregnancy, seems quite matter of fact, shorn of the mystery and descriptive nuance that some of the other Gospels use in telling the story. And yet Matthew stripping the event down to its core reveals the central point clearly: obedience. Joseph’s obedience to God announced by his angel in Matthew’s Gospel, parallels Mary’s own, which we find in other Gospel tellings of Jesus's birth.  We hear very matter of factly that

Advent is a penitential season of self examination. But that penitence isn’t intended to create despair. In fact, it is intended to clear the way for hope to take hold of us so that joy might ensue. But it’s important to understand that it’s God’s joy, and not the world’s joy that we’re seeking. The joy we experience in this world is often fleeting, and limited. But Paul’s joy springs from his recognition that Jesus isn’t just a prophet telling us about a future event, or a t

You brood of vipers - don’t presume that your traditions will save you; that your possessions or knowledge, or capacity, will save you. Don’t approach God like Adam and Eve, caving to the Serpent’s temptation to imagine yourself holy and righteous. Don’t think that just because you have your butt in a pew on Sunday or that you can spout off this or that doctrine, or that because you’re ‘nice,’ that you are righteous before God. No my friends: repent, for God is coming into th

Today is of course the first Sunday in Advent. Last Sunday you saw the colour white on my stole, and on all the altar hangings, and covering the chalice. White is intended to signify God’s peace in recognition that in Christ, God has completed his redemptive plan and now we are seeing the fruits of the Holy Spirit enfolding or drawing all things to God the Father, in his Son, Jesus Christ. As you see now, though, everything is draped in purple (or some churches, light blue).

Next Sunday we will begin Advent, in which we’ll once again recall Christ’s birth and anticipate the fruit of his faithfulness in awaiting his return to judge and reconcile us to him. But today, we celebrate the end of the Christian year. We are not simply recognizing another year gone by; in fact, I’d say that it’s essential to stop right here, to think of this day - this Sunday where we celebrate the reign of Christ - as God’s sabbath; that is, the completion or fulfillment

“By your endurance you will gain your souls,” we hear right at the end of our Gospel reading this morning. Endurance in what you might ask? In faith of course. Persisting in a core set of beliefs that utterly transforms the world, handed on to us as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:1-3: “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the

One of my favorite things about the Sadducees we encounter so often in the Gospels, is just how much we see them as, ‘the bad guys,’ in the story, when, on closer examination, it turns out that we are just like them.  Remember the story of David and Bathsheba. Remember the story Nathan, one of God’s prophets, tells David? The story is about a rich man who stole a poor man's single, beloved lamb to give to a guest, instead of using one of his own many animals. When David heard