Tag Archives: Advent

Sermon: Peace Sunday

Posted on December 3, 2022 by Avril Hannah-Jones

I suspect that the people of Israel heard this prophecy as true for the same reason that we are hearing it in church two thousand years after the birth of the one we Christians believe is the Messiah. Prophecies of the peaceable kingdom speak to our deepest longings. They describe what we believe, in the core of our hearts and our guts, God’s good creation should be. Continue reading →

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Sermon: Jesus’ female ancestors

Posted on November 26, 2022 by Avril Hannah-Jones

I lived through a ‘think of the children’ scare campaign as a young gay woman; I do not appreciate politicians, political candidates, and neo-Nazis replaying it with trans people today. Continue reading →

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Sermon: Hope in a time of pandemic

Posted on November 27, 2021 by Avril Hannah-Jones

As we realise our vulnerability, we are offered reassurance. When we are tempted to despair, we are given hope. Continue reading →

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Sermon: The faith and generosity of Hannah

Posted on November 13, 2021 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Both Hannah’s and Mary’s songs are deeply political songs about the way God wants the world to be; a world in which the hungry are ‘filled with good things’ (Luke 1:53), in fact the ‘hungry are fat with spoil’ (1 Samuel 2:5); a world in which God lifts the needy from the ash heap to sit with princes (1 Samuel 2:8) while the proud are brought down from their thrones. (Luke 1:52) Both Hannah and Mary sing of a world overturned. Continue reading →

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Reflection: Rejoice!

Posted on December 12, 2020 by Avril Hannah-Jones

One hundred and six years earlier Charles Dickens wrote of the reborn Scrooge, who had become ‘as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew,’ that ‘it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge’. Keeping Christmas well does not just mean rejoicing ourselves, as the prophet Isaiah reminds us. Continue reading →

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Reflection: Called to make peace

Posted on December 5, 2020 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Perhaps this year, 2020, is the year when comfortable middle-class Australians like me are most aware that the grass withers and the flowers fade and that we, human beings, are grass. Continue reading →

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Reflection: Hope at the End of the World

Posted on November 28, 2020 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Reflection for North Balwyn Uniting ChurchAdvent One, 29th of November 2020 Isaiah 64:1-9Mark 13:24-37 Happy New Year! And to those of you here, in the nave, welcome back to worshipping in the church building after months of lockdown. In previous … Continue reading →

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Sermon: Love Sunday

Posted on December 22, 2018 by Avril Hannah-Jones

In Jesus’ birth, as in Jesus’ death and resurrection, God is defeating death and hopelessness. Continue reading →

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Sermon: Joy Sunday

Posted on December 15, 2018 by Avril Hannah-Jones

God is not well-behaved! Continue reading →

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Sermon: Hope Sunday

Posted on December 1, 2018 by Avril Hannah-Jones

The creation story speaks of light and order and life not because it is ignoring the reality of darkness and chaos and death but in response to it. Continue reading →

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