Talks, Sermons and Reflections

Luke 14.1,7-14 One of the big themes of Luke’s gospel is that in the Kingdom of God the exalted will be humbled and the humble will be exalted Listen to the audio of the sermon here Mary praises God when she is told that she is to be the mother of Jesus: She speaks as if the Kingdom of God has already come on earth. ‘He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly’ (Luke 51.2) At the beginning of his ministry Jesus proclaims his manifesto: he has come for the poor, the captive, the blind and the oppressed (Luke 4.18f) Later Jesus says, ‘Woe to you who are rich, who are full, who laugh now’ and ‘Blessed are you who are poor, who are hungry, who weep now’ (Luke 6.20ff). On several occasions he says how in the Kingdom of heaven, the order of this world will be transformed, turned upside down. ‘The first will be last and the last will be first’ And he tells his disciples that the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven will not be the person who lords it over others,...

Luke 13.10-17 We are very quick to turn what is meant to be a blessing into a curse. Click here to listen to the audio of the talk That is what happened with the Sabbath The Sabbath was the seventh day of the week in the Jewish calendar. According to Genesis, God created the world in six days and he rests on the seventh. So he blessed the seventh day and made it holy. For the Jewish people, the Sabbath – the day of rest (Sabbat means rest) – was/is Saturday. Although according to the Hebrew calendar, the day began/begins on the evening of the preceding day, so the Sabbath began at 6pm on Friday and finished at 6pm on Saturday. And one of the ten commandments is about observing the Sabbath: Exodus 20.8-11 Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 10 But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your town...

Luke 12.49-56 Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem – his 'exodus', death on cross Click to listen to this sermon here There is an urgency about his teaching He is teaching about the kingdom of God. He is calling people to repentance and to live as citizens of the coming Kingdom And in particular, in Luke 12, he is calling people to see clearly and to judge rightly. The chapter begins and ends with Jesus warning the people against hypocrisy. ‘Krites’ literally means ‘judgement’, and ‘hypokrites’ means ‘judgement over’. In Luke 12.2, he says to the crowd, ‘Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees, that is, their hypocrisy’. Beware of their teaching – of the judgements that they make And here in 12.56 he accuses the crowd of hypocrisy, of being able to make judgements about things like the wind, but not seeing deeper. Jesus has not just come to bring fuzzy, spiritual feelings, or to give advice about how we can live more successful or fulfilling lives. He has not come to simply bring comf...