Talks, Sermons and Reflections

Luke 14:25-33 [There was a baptism in this Sunday service] Well, having heard that reading, you must wonder what on earth you are about to do in having your daughter baptised It seems that Jesus is saying that if she is to be a follower of him, she will need to hate you, give up all her possessions, hate her own life and end up being crucified (or the modern equivalent)! It is very stark. He certainly makes us sit up and take notice. The audio of this talk can be found here But Jesus is not saying that we must reject our family or live as homeless and virtually naked beggars. What he says here needs to be balanced by what he says elsewhere. So, for instance, he upholds the fifth commandment ‘to honour your mother and father’, and elsewhere the bible teaches us that we should work to earn so that we can support ourselves, our family and those dependent on us, and be able to give. And Jesus clearly enjoyed the hospitality of people like Lazarus, Martha and Mary who opened their home to h...

I’ve been speaking with several people over the past few months about the supernatural. They say something like this: “I am drawn to Jesus’ teaching – about loving your neighbour as yourself and doing to the other what you would want them to do to you, the so-called golden rule – but I struggle with the talk about God, and things like the   virgin birth and the resurrection, and that Jesus is the Son of God in a unique way. Of course, I would like to think that there is something after death, but I can’t because this world is all that there is.” I have huge respect for people who think like that. They have an intellectual integrity which overrides any wishful thinking. It is difficult to know how we can answer the person who cannot believe in anything that cannot be ‘proved’ scientifically through observation. I might shrink from the deterministic universe that their thinking presupposes, where everything that happens must have a physical cause. I might proclaim that I am more ...