Talks, Sermons and Reflections

John 14:15-21 Why? Why do you come to church? Why do you seek to keep the commandments: say the 10 commandments (or at least some of them!): no stealing, murder, adultery, lying or coveting? Jesus intensifies that to no hating, lusting, swearing – or perhaps more positively forgiving, exercising self discipline, speaking words of integrity. Why do you give? Why do you try to forgive? Why do you want to try and love other people even those you don't like or who don't like you? Why might you try to say some prayers, or the Lord's prayer, when you are on your own? The audio of this talk can be found here Because it is a habit, or what we have been taught we should do, or it is familiar or comfortable, or because it is useful in life? I suggest that somewhere within us, whatever other reasons we do those things for, we do them – rather than other things - because there is a spark of love for God in us. Jesus says, ‘If you love me you will keep my commandments’ (v15). ‘They wh...

John 10.1-10 , Psalm 23 Forgive a very basic sermon today, but I hope one that will live with you. I’ve brought along a visual aid. My hand. Your hand. Listen to an audio of this talk here The thumb. Look at your hand. Just for a moment. Now try to imagine it without your thumb. It still works but not very well. The thumb is an amazing organ. It is the digit that each of the other fingers – the pointing finger, the middle finger, the ring finger and the little finger – relate to. Without the oppositional structure of the thumb, they can work together, grasp and hold but they cannot really do anything precise. The thumb in my illustration stands for the Lord Jesus, my shepherd. He is the one closest to me. He is the one who has come to us, who calls us – you and me – by name. “He calls his own sheep by name .. the sheep follow him because they know his voice” We think of him in the garden after his resurrection. Mary is distraught. The body of Jesus has disappeared. She sees what she th...

Luke 24:13-35 Jesus says to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: ‘Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?’ They had been there with the others on the first Easter Sunday, but they had decided to call it a day. It was all too confusing and depressing. An audio of this talk can be found here They had thought that Jesus was the Messiah; that he would set Israel free from Roman occupation and bring in God’s reign of abundance and security and justice. They didn’t know how – perhaps he was going to provoke an uprising and raise an army. Or perhaps God would step in, as he had done in the past, and wipe out the Romans overnight. But they trusted this man, and they had put their hope in him. But it had all gone so wrong. Jesus had been arrested and crucified. Even the crowd had chanted for his death. And now, three days later, the women were saying that an angel had told them that Jesus was alive. Some of the disciples had been to t...

Matthew 28:1-10 This was a sermon preached at a family service when we created a living model of this image. An icon of the myrrh bearing women. Prosopon school. Painted/written by Alison Rogers The icon above shows the women who came to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body Or maybe you have been given an artist’s impression of a potential crime scene! And here on the ground we have a coffin marked out by our forensic experts. I would like us to visualise this scene and see how it helps us understand what we read in Matthew 28 Our witnesses are three women Mary Magdalene, another Mary (Mark and Luke tell us that she is Mary the mother of James – in other words, they are saying, you may not know her, but you know James and she is his mum). And there is a third woman mentioned by the other writers. They come to the tomb of Jesus. They know it is his tomb. They had seen where his body was laid. They had seen the stone rolled across the entrance. But when they get there, they find that the bod...

Hebrews 10.19-25 This passage seems to be addressing a problem we don’t have. It is talking to people who are afraid of praying, of coming into the presence of God. Most people – if they believe that God exists – don’t have that problem. They may have a problem about coming into a church for a service – in the same way that I might feel awkward going into a night club. It is just not my world. But we have been taught that we can come to God as we are; that we can pray to him wherever we are; that we don’t need to use special words. And yet this passage assumes something very different: that people tremble to come into the presence of God. They knew something that we have largely forgotten. They had a concept of God as totally other, as holy, as set apart, as awesome. He is eternal – we are mortal He is the creator – we are the creation. It is the difference between a fruit fly and a human being. All the wisdom of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Kant, Hume, Weil, Einstein, Wittgenstein put ...

Matthew 21:1-11 How do you take over a country – especially one that does not want to be taken over? Do you take out the leadership, a le Trump? Do you use military might – shock and awe? Do you use economic muscle and sanction your enemy into submission? Or – do you find a donkey, throw some rags on it, ride it into the capital claiming that you are God’s King. The audio of this talk can be found here Jesus enters into Jerusalem. A contemporary mural from the Anafora Coptic Cathedral, Egypt. The movement is from right to left rather than left to right.  It is a bit of a joke. It is Monty Python-esque It is a sure way of getting yourself crucified And it is the way that Jesus chose to come into Jerusalem So what is going on here? 1. Jesus is leading a revolution. He is now finally openly declaring himself to be the Messiah, God’s king. He is very deliberately choosing to fulfil the prophecy of Zechariah. “Look your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on...

Mark 10:46-52 I’ve been reflecting for the last couple of weeks on this story – of the healing of blind Bartimaeus. 1. Bartimaeus has heard rumours of Jesus . He is blind. All he has to go on is what other people are saying. Perhaps he asked people, ‘What does this Jesus say?’ Christ healing the blind man. The Andrews Diptych, a 9th-century Carolingian ivory artwork And they will have told him, ‘He speaks about the Kingdom of God – that it is very close. He speaks of the reign of God that was promised in our writings – when his Messiah, his King, will come and bring peace and justice. There will be no more war or fear or oppression. There will be security, abundance and laughter. There will be no more suffering or death. We will be free to become together the people who God made us to be: full of love and joy.’ And Bartimaeus will have asked them, ‘What does this Jesus do?’ And they reply, “He seems to do Messiah stuff. People are healed. Others have been set free from evil spirits. P...

John 4.4-42 We seek the things of this world. At the very basic we seek water and food Jesus here asks the Samaritan woman for a drink. He is tired and thirsty. His disciples ask him if he wants something to eat because they think he is hungry But there is another kind of hunger. A hunger for spiritual food. A hunger and thirst for righteousness, for the Kingdom of God, for God himself. I guess we could say that there is the water and food which washes and refreshes and feeds us on the outside – and the water and food which washes and refreshes and feeds us deep on the inside. So, when his disciples ask Jesus if he wants something to eat, he says to the disciples that he has other food – real food – which is to do the will of his Father And Jesus says to the Samaritan woman that just as he has asked her for physical water, so she should be asking him to give living water – water which is the gift of God, which will never run out and which will satisfy us for eternity. And...

Matthew 15:21–28 The woman in our story is desperate.  She is a Gentile yet she comes to a Jew, and not just any Jew. She recognises him as Messiah, 'Son of David'.  She is shouting. She is going to get his attention She keeps on shouting even when Jesus' followers try to get rid of her.  She persists when Jesus says nothing: 'But he did not answer her at all' (v23) She even persists when Jesus tells her bluntly that he was not sent for people like her. He calls her a dog. To put it in context, this is a rabbinic exchange: sharp but opening up the conversation and not ending it. It invites a response. What I love about this woman is that there is no attempt at self-justification. She does not bristle at what could be taken as a racial slur She does not argue for rights. She asks for mercy.  She simply recognises that she is coming with nothing and she is asking for gift.  Yesterday I was speaking with someone who was struggling to understand why the Ch...

Letter for the March 2026 Burnham Magazine There were rumours among some journalists that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was going to be moving to Burnham Norton. I think they got their Marsh Farms muddled up. But I began to wonder what I would say if the press approached me. The simple solution is also the correct solution. I would never talk about parishioners to the press without their permission. But there is one other thing that I may have said - if I had had the courage - and it feels particularly appropriate as we begin this season of Lent. Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery.   Vasily Polenov. 1888 Lent began with our Ash Wednesday service on 18 February. One of the readings for the day tells of the woman caught in adultery ( John 8.1-11 ). She may well have been a victim; she may have been set up to trap Jesus. She alone was dragged before him - and not the man - and the crowd demanded of Jesus that, because she had committed what was then an unforgivable sexual offence, s...

John 3:1-17 Nicodemus comes to Jesus in the night. Perhaps he comes in secret. Perhaps he is wisely cautious Nicodemus Visiting Jesus , by Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1899 But John tells us it was night – and in John night is more than a time of day Night is when we cannot see Night is when we stumble (11:10) Night is when we catch nothing (21:3) And when Judas leaves the last supper and the presence of Jesus and goes out to betray him, we are told: ‘it was night’ (13:30) Nicodemus comes in the night – yet he comes seeking light. Many of us find ourselves in the spiritual night. We may think we see clearly – yet remain blind to God Or we stumble through life, overwhelmed by emotions of anger or resentment or frustration, living unfulfilled lives that seem to mean nothing We grasp at things that promise life but they leave us colder, harder and darker. So how, with Nicodemus, do we move from the night to the day, from darkness into light? Four things from our passage. 1. We need to be bo...