Tag Archives: reading the Bible
Sermon: In a boat battered by the wind and waves
I said that the Bible remained important to me, but I did not think I could just pick a verse, “like Matthew 14:27,” I said, making up a verse at random, and have it mean something for my life. A little later in the conversation my flatmate and I decided just to have a look and see what Matthew 14:27 said, and we found that Matthew 14:27 is the verse I just quoted. It could not have been more relevant to a discussion in which I had confessed that I was finding the one holy catholic and apostolic church deeply problematic as I learned more of its history, but that I could not bear to leave Christianity because if I did “I would miss Jesus”. Continue reading
Sermon: Introducing David, episode two of the soap opera
Augustine wrote that, ‘anyone who thinks that he has understood the divine scriptures or any part of them, but cannot by his understanding build up the double love of God and neighbour, has not yet succeeded in understanding them’. The Scriptures are complicated and contradictory; let us ensure that our reading of them always builds up love. Amen. Continue reading
Sermon: Some mental exercise for lockdown
Reflection for North Balwyn Uniting Church6th of June 2021 1 Samuel 8:4-11 16-20 Here we are again: our second Sunday in our fourth lockdown. When I prepared this Reflection we had been in lockdown for less than a week, and … Continue reading
Sermon: A psalm of hate
Another gift of the Psalter is the permission it gives us to share everything with God, even those emotions of which we are ashamed. The psalms show us that there is nothing that human beings can think, feel, say, or do, that we need to hide from God. Continue reading
Sermon: Slavery and Biblical Literalism
If Christians were satisfied with simply ‘believing in the Bible’ we might still be approving slavery. Continue reading
Sermon: Hannah sings a new song
As we remember the anniversary of Kristallnacht and grieve the murder of worshippers at the Tree of Life synagogue we remember that we Christians are the younger sisters and brothers of the Jewish people and we should offer them the love and respect that older siblings deserve. Continue reading
Sermon: The importance of good biblical interpretation
Bad Biblical interpretation has been used by Christians to justify the most appalling crimes against humanity: slavery; the Holocaust; apartheid. We must read the Bible carefully, in context, and through the lens of Jesus’ commands that we love God and neighbour because the alternative is terrifying. Continue reading
Sermon: So, you want to have a king …
In the same way that we can be certain that the author of Samuel was wrong to attribute a desire for genocide to God, we can be certain that there are things that we believe about God today that will later be revealed to be wrong – because we are human and, as the Apostle Paul wrote, we currently only ‘see in a mirror, dimly’. Continue reading
Rev Doc Geek 