Tag: discipleship
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prayer, obedience, and growth
Biblical Text: Mark 6.44-52 Today’s lectionary reading comes from Mark’s Gospel, a text that barely pauses to take a breath as it describes Jesus’s ministry. Mark doesn’t give us any birth narrative, but starts with John the Baptist proclaiming Jesus, and then wham, Jesus is here. Baptised, tempted, and beginning his ministry. Miracle follows miracle,…
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when temptation comes…
Biblical Text: Matthew 4.1-11 The spiritual life is not a string of mountaintop experiences. Anyone who tells you that is lying or in a cult…or perhaps both. You don’t need to read much scripture to realise this, but it is tempting to believe it nonetheless. Our faith points us to Jesus, the Son of God…
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knock knock…
Biblical Text: Luke 11v1-13 We talk a lot about prayer as Christians, so I want to take a moment to consider one of Jesus’s brief mentions of prayer in the Gospels, specifically Luke 11. It’s worth noting that although prayer is clearly important for Jesus – he teaches his disciples to pray, he goes away…
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what would you give?
Biblical Text: Matthew 13.44-52 £15 million pounds. That was the advert I saw from the National Lottery. But this lottery draw was different, because someone was guaranteed to win. Someone in the UK has ended their week £15 million pounds richer. So, let’s try a brief thought experiment. Imagine I have that winning ticket in…
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worthless slaves?
‘Who among you would say to your slave who has just come in from ploughing or tending sheep in the field, “Come here at once and take your place at the table”? Would you not rather say to him, “Prepare supper for me, put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; later…
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forks in the road…
Biblical Text: Luke 9.57-end There’s a theme throughout the book of Luke, and indeed the gospels as a whole. It’s the invitation to follow Jesus. I say, invitation, but that’s not quite right. Sometimes Jesus invites others to follow, and sometimes others seemingly make the first move. Our reading today has both. Two people say…
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take nothing…
Biblical Text: Luke 9.1-6 Sometimes it can be hard to know what to make of a gospel passage. What does this brief story in the life of Jesus say to us in the 21st century? Jesus’ sending out of the twelve in Luke comes just after he has healed a woman from her bleeding and…
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choose life
Biblical Texts: Deuteronomy 30v15-20; Psalm 1; Luke 14v25-33; Philemon 1-21 You may remember when the first Matrix film came out. At the time it was groundbreaking. A movie with an intriguing plot coupled with mind-bending special effects, the legacy of which we still see in films today. But aside from the effects, one part of…
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stepping out in faith…
Biblical Texts: Hebrews 11:29-12:2; Luke 12:49-56 Can’t we all just get along? You’ve probably have heard others say this before…perhaps you’ve said it yourself. If you’ve been a Christian for any length of time you’ve surely thought it. And there’s certainly a Christian wisdom to this wish. At the start of the Sermon on the…
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not hearers only…
Biblical Text: Matthew 13v1-9, 18-23 A couple of years ago, while we were still living in Durham, I joined a thousand or so others, and ran a 5k through the city. If you’d been near the finish, you might have caught a glimpse of me, trying to stay upright as I careened down the hill…