Talks, Sermons and Reflections

The big event for the Church this year has been the 1700th anniversary of the Nicene creed. Those are the words we say when we begin ‘I believe’ in every communion service. In 325 Emperor Constantine brought together all the bishops, the church leaders, many of whom had, until a few years earlier, been persecuted for their faith. He wanted them to come to an agreement on who Jesus really was. Was he human, or was he God-human? It was a passionate debate.  It was so passionate that even Santa Claus got locked up in a cell for the night. Nicholas the bishop of Myra, who later became St Nicholas, Santa Niklaus, was so impassioned that he punched his opponent in the face and was taken to the cell to cool off for the night. I guess that year he was on the naughty list. But at the heart of it was a discussion about Christmas, and the baby lying in the manger. Who was he? The people on the human side of the debate said that Jesus was born of a virgin, that he was the greatest and most Go...

We had a Christingle this afternoon. This is my Christingle. It looks like one of those old sputniks The key thing about the Christingle is the candle – signifying Christ the light of the world. But it got me thinking. If the orange represents the world, how many oranges would I need to fill the real earth? And the answer is 5 septillion, where a septillion is 1 with 24 0’s after it – give or take one or two! And if we had 5 septillion oranges we would need 5 septillion candles. They would produce as much light as the entire global energy output for one year multiplied by a trillion times. That is quite a long way short of what the sun produces, but it would still make the earth quite a bright bauble in the celestial sky, which could be seen from 15 trillion miles away John writes that in the Word, in Jesus Christ, was life and the life was the light of all people. I guess John is remembering the opening chapter of the Bible.  ‘In the beginning God created ..’  And the wind of...

Christingle 2025 I loved the school nativity play.  It was about Bethlehem – and the imagined police force in Bethlehem. They had a problem. There were so many people coming for the census that there was no room in the town. So the police force were trying to keep people out Joseph and Mary were OK – because they had come for the census But the shepherds – no, and the wise men – definitely no, and the angels – a categorically definitely loud no no no! We hear about Bethlehem in Christmas readings We sing about Bethlehem: O little town of Bethlehem It was an old town. Its name means 'house of bread', so probably there were lots of bakers there. I wonder whether they had any shops selling oranges? But when people thought about Bethlehem, they didn't think about three wise men, but two wise women. There was Rachel.   She lived a long time before Jesus, Mary and Joseph and the wee donkey. Rachel was one of the mothers of the Jewish people. One quarter of the nation looked back ...

In Fra Angelico and Fra Filippo Lippi’s Adoration of the Magi, a rather chubby baby Jesus sits on Mary’s lap and blesses the wise man who kneels at his feet. Fra Angelico and Fra Filippo Lippi, The Adoration of the Magi , c. 1440/1460 I don’t think it was like that. The audio of this talk can be found here Not because the wise men were not blessed by coming to Jesus, nor because it requires a rather unimaginable precociousness for the baby to raise his hand (but then we speak of a virgin birth, so anything could happen!), but because at the heart of the Christmas story, God really does become one of us and makes himself vulnerable. The newborn Jesus was just like any other newborn baby: unable even to hold up his own head. He was totally dependent on Mary and Joseph. That is astonishing. God, who is all those omni-words: omni-present, omni-potent, omni-scient, who lacks nothing and needs nothing, chooses to become a helpless baby. George Macdonald wrote: “They all were looking for ...

James 5:7-10 “Strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is near” Images from the west side of St Marys Westgate, Burnham Market parapet. The first arch shows the attendant carrying the head of John the Baptist, and the second shows Herod and Herodias, sitting at table on which are dishes, while Salome is tumbling tête à terre before them. Photos taken by drone, courtesy of Sowerbys (and the lightning conductor cable across the attendant has been erased courtesy of AI!). When James says ‘strengthen your hearts’, he is saying set your hearts on a firm basis. The audio of this talk can be found here I think of a post in the ground. It has become a bit wobbly.  The post James wants us to knock in deeper is this conviction: the Lord is coming. V7: be patient ‘until the coming of the Lord’ V8: ‘for the coming of the Lord is near’ V9: ‘see the judge is standing at the doors’ Our conviction is that one day the Lord Jesus will return. It is something that we say every time we have a...

Matthew 3:1-12 John was a wild man. The Assembly of the Holy Prophet St John the Baptist , Old Believer Icon, C19th Nevyansk school, Urals. All the people of Jerusalem go out to John to be baptised. Notice the lion, camel, unicorn and deer in the wilderness (on the left). He lived wild He dressed wild. He preached wild. The audio of this talk can be found here He was part of a tradition that went back many years. He was a prophet - and the prophets were God's shock troops, God’s disrupters. There was a man in the Old Testament called Saul. He was searching for lost donkeys. But he meets the prophet of Israel, a man called Samuel. Samuel tells him that he is going to become king of Israel. And the Spirit comes on him and ‘he fell into a prophetic frenzy’ (1 Samuel 10:10). Or there was Elijah. There are strong echoes of Elijah in John the Baptist. He wore hairy clothes and had a leather belt and spent much time in wilderness. He was the one who challenged the 700 or so prophets of Ba...