Text: John 8:31-36
Reformation Day (Observed), 2020
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Freedom.” It is hard to miss the theme of freedom in our text from John. Freedom is also a slippery word. It can mean a many different things for many different people. For some the mention of freedom is closely tied with the political realm. Freedom is about democracy and the ability to elect our own representatives. Others will link freedom closely to the economic sphere. Freedom is about the free-market, and the great range of choices before many consumers. Some people use the language of freedom to speak about their right of self-determination. Freedom is about the ability to do whatever you want, to gratify your own desires, without being hindered or controlled. And since this is Reformation Sunday, it’s useful to remember that freedom was a major concern for many of the Reformers. They wanted freedom from certain traditions and superstitions which Rome was commanding apart from God’s Word. The Reformers insisted that many of Rome’s precepts and regulations did not earn forgiveness or favour with God. One of Martin Luther’s most famous writings is “The Freedom of a Christian,” which he wrote in 1520 just before he was excommunicated. In fact, in our text, Jesus talks about this last kind of freedom, Christian freedom, the freedom offered by the Gospel.
Read MoreText: Psalm 147:1-11 (LXX Psalm 146) & Luke 10:1-9
Text: Gradual Psalm for the Feast of Saint Luke, Evangelist
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Have you or someone you know been seriously sick and refused to get help or medical treatment? Why do some of us just refuse to see the seriousness of our sickness and get help for it? It comes down to pride. Sometimes it’s a confidence in our own strength. When faced with sickness, we often just like to “power through it”. We don’t want to ask for help. Asking for help means admitting weakness and that’s humiliating! Of course, this can be very harmful. If you try to ignore the sickness and “power through it” you could be wasting valuable time. If you catch the illness soon enough, the doctors may be able to save you, but try to “power through it”, and it could be too late. That’s the point of course. If you have a serious disease, the earlier you seek medical attention, the better your chances, the more hope you have.
Text: Matthew 6:25-33
Thanksgiving Day, 2020
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Many, if not all of us, simply cannot wait until 2020 is over. Events have been unpredictable and the situations we’re facing are new to most of us. We’re in the midst of this worldwide epidemic, with many places partially shut down, others struggling to reopen safely. There are areas where the coronavirus infection rates are getting worse and restrictions are increasing again. Others areas are bracing for what may come next. All of us have been watching the headlines and wondering, “When is this going to end?” For many, it’s that uncertainty which surrounds coronavirus that is the hardest thing to handle. We still don’t know exactly how this will impact us personally. We don’t know just how bad the economic fallout will be. We have no idea how long this is going to last, or how bad things might get. And that makes it all too easy for us to spiral into overwhelming dread and panic. It is hard not to be anxious. We are anxious about abiding by the proper health and safety precautions. We’re anxious about our jobs and livelihoods. This makes caring for our normal everyday necessities all that much more complicated. Some people have become so addicted to worry that if they haven’t got anything to be anxious about they worry that they’ve forgotten something. Certainly there are some have anxiety due to a medical issue, and God has provided medical professionals to help deal with that type of anxiety. That’s not exactly the type of anxiety we’re dealing with. But even in the face of this unique crisis—Christ provides us with three remedies for our anxiety and a reason to be truly thankful this Thanksgiving.
Read MoreText: Philippians 3:4b-14
Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost / Proper 22, Series A
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
A story is told of the nineteenth-century Anglican pastor, poet and theologian John Keble. As a young Oxford don in the early years of the century, he held at one point the office of college bursar. Few clergy then, or now for that matter, were trained in the art of balancing columns of figures; and in one particular year Keble’s accounts were stubbornly out of balance by nearly two thousand pounds. Eventually he figured out why the ledger was out of balance. He noticed that the date written at the top of the page was an exact match for how much the books were out. He had accidentally added the number of the year—it must have been somewhere near 1820—into one of the columns of figures.
There are many methods of creative accounting, but normally balancing the books is a matter of putting together a certain number of items on the credit side, a large number of items on the debit side, and calculating them to see how close they come. That’s the picture Paul is working with in our epistle reading.
Read MoreText: Matthew 21:23-32
Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost / Proper 21, Series A
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
We are often told that the parables of Jesus demonstrate that he was a marvellously storyteller. The parables are not really designed to entertain us, but to get us to think. The parable in our Gospel reading this morning reminds me of a common occurrence in my household involving my two sons. It will be time for dinner, and I’ll call the boys to come sit down and eat. One of them will joyfully come to the table and patiently sit. The other boy will refuse to come to the table at all. He only arrives at the table with much wailing and physical resistance. But then, once the dinner is actually served, the boy who came to the table will cheerfully and without hesitation refuse to actually eat his dinner, while the boy who was only brought to the table kicking and screaming, eagerly gobbles his food up. One put on a show of listening, the other changed his mind. In a similar fashion, Jesus tells the chief priests and the elders a parable about two sons. This parable is intended to demonstrate both the religious leaders spiritual shortcomings, and also their need for repentance. Read More
Series: Romans / Romans 14:1-12
Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost / Proper 19, Series A
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
There are things which God commands, and there are things which God forbids. That’s fairly obvious. What are some things which God commands? God commands us to fear, love, and trust in him above all things and to love our neighbours as ourselves (Lk 10:27). He commands us to to preach his word, and proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sins in his name (Lk 24:45-47). He commands us to baptise and teach (Mt 28:18-20). He commands us to receive Christ’s Body and Blood with bread and wine (1 Co 11:23-29). The list goes on. What are some things which God forbids? We know that God forbids murder and theft (Ex. 20:13, 15). He forbids sexual immorality (1 Co 6:18). He forbids drunkenness, jealousy, and quarrelling (Gal 5:19-21). Of course there are more. What about that grey area? What about the things which God has neither commanded nor forbidden? People can use different liturgies in their worship. They can have different hymnals. Some sing old hymns and some sing new hymns. Pastors can wear different types of gowns in worship services. Some bow and some don’t. Some can’t drink alcohol; others do so without guilt. Some fast for Lent, and others don’t.
Things that don’t matter: that’s where Christians tend to fight each other. Curiously, the things that don’t matter seem to matter to us much more than they matter to God. It was things that didn’t matter that became a point of contention in the Church in Rome. The way St. Paul the Apostle addressed the situation in the first century can help us when we start fighting about things that don’t matter. Read More
Series: Romans / Romans 13:1-10
Fourteenth Sunday After Pentecost / Proper 18, Series A
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
What do you owe? To whom do you owe it? When I ask that question, most assume I’m speaking about money. According to the Bank of Canada, the average Canadian owes over $1.70 for every dollar of income they earn per year, after taxes. For most Canadians debt is a fact of life, at least at some point. We borrow to buy houses, cars, smart phones, food, medicine, clothes, appliances. College students take on staggering debts to finance their education. Churches borrow immense sums to erect buildings. Debt can be a tool that allows people to smooth out their spending throughout their life. Besides monetary debt we recognise that there are other types of debt. Consider personal debt for instance. If someone does you a favour, you may reply by saying, “I owe you one!” Or, the opposite might happen. They may tell you, “You owe me one.” Debt comes in various forms. St. Paul in our epistle reading talks about a certain debt that all humanity owes. There is a massive debt which is always owed and can never be settled. In fact, our Christian life and conduct, and our duties to society have their basis in this debt which we owe. Read More
Series: Romans / Romans 12:9-21
Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost / Proper 17, Series A
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The headline said one word, in thick black letters right across the top of the front page: REVENGE. The story was a classic tale of spurned love. A woman’s husband had cheated on her and went off with her best friend. She bided her time, waiting for her opportunity and then killed them both, not instantly but in a way which allowed her to extract maximum satisfaction by giving them maximum terror. It was a nasty, sorry, sordid story. But I think the reason why it made the front page was because deep down a lot of us know someone we would like to ‘get even with’. Even more troubling, at any given moment there is likely someone who would love to take revenge on us. The desire for revenge is like a deep itch somewhere right down inside. The media knows that if we can’t scratch that itch ourselves we like hearing about someone else who could and did. Read More