Sunday's coming!

That's Ezekiel, of course, not Elijah - in my own defence I was writing the sermon & simultaneously baking two cakes for a visiting choir!

I'll come back to this tomorrow, I hope - but I think it's getting there... Pentecost (Ezekiel 37: 1-14, Romans 8: 22-27, Acts 2: 1-21) I have to confess that there are certain films that I still think of as ‘Sunday afternoon’ films – the ones that seemed to be on time and time again on Sunday afternoons in my youth. Even when I watch them today, many years later, I can almost taste the tongue sandwiches and tinned peaches. One of these films is Jason and the Argonauts – which is packed with truly fantastic sequences, thanks to Ray Harryhausen’s stop-frame animation. One of the most memorable scenes is where Jason & his men fight skeletons brought to life by the baddy with the beard. Perhaps when you heard the story of Elijah and the valley of bones you were imagining something like that – I know I always do. God tells the prophet to prophecy to the bones, and they come together as whole skeletons, and then the breath of God – God’s spirit - comes into them and they are ...

Readings will be: Acts 2: 1-4 Ezekiel 37: 1-14 Romans 8: 22-27 Acts 2: 1-21 No I've not made a mistake putting the Acts reading down twice - the idea is that while the children are still in the service they hear the story of the coming of the Spirit, and join in with streamers... We have a 'coming together of congregations': 7 churches of 2 different denominations, who are exploring how to work together across 5 villages. After all that complicated maths, I want to preach on unity in diversity - many tongues, many different people and different walks of life (and in Ezekiel many bones come together in one army) BUT - one Church, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one Spirit... There's lots to organise, too: readers, music, a walk of witness at the end with banners to say who we are to the cricketers on the green, fizzy wine. Come Holy Spirit!

The problem with this Sunday's readings are that they are dealing with the rather strange time between Ascension and Pentecost - they have a sense of waiting for something bigger and better - and quite right too. However, I have a baptism at one of my churches on Sunday, and trying to explain about Ascension AND Pentecost AND the fact that we're in-between the two seems a bit tough on all of us, so I've gone for celebrating Ascension, and linking this in to the Baptism, whilst also trying to prepare from next week's Pentecost service. So the readings are Acts of the Apostles (1.4-11) Luke 24.44-end And for the sermon I'm taking the Radio 2 campaign for this week 'Love where you live' from three different angles: Love where you live can be about celebrating where you are - the Radio 2 campaign is about community involvement and talking to your neighbours. But as well as celebrating the specific place where you are, we can celebrate the world into which we hav...

As you'll see, I went in the end for a straight-forward sermon about the love of God. Here it is: Easter 6 There is no doubt that both our readings have a lot to say about love. Perhaps the greatest statement is that of Jesus, saying ‘There is no greater love than this, that someone should lay down his life for his friends’. To give your life is the ultimate in self-sacrifice, it is true. It would be a faithful friend indeed who would offer their life for another. Just yesterday on the radio there was a programme giving the result of a survey that the average Briton has 3 really close friends. You might like to think about your own friends, and wonder whether any of them would give their life for you – or whether you would give your life for them. But of course the symbol of Christ’s death on the cross is not only a symbol of a man laying down his life for his friends, but the ultimate symbol of God’s vast love for us. We might sing or talk of Jesus stretching out his arms in love ...

Lectionary readings are: Acts 10:44-48 1 John 5:1-6 John 15:9-17 My first thoughts are that these are very similar readings to last week's - Acts deals with conversion and adult baptism; John's letter talks of love for God the Father, jesus the Son & our brothers and sisters in Christ; and in John's gospel Jesus continues to talk about abiding in Him & loving one another. It might seem very basic but I'm wondering about focussing on what it means to love God. Why would God need our love anyway? What can we give God that God does not already have? What difference does it make to our lives to love God? Think I need time to think about this!

The Vine John 15:1-8 We are used to the image of the vine in our lives as Christians – our beautiful pulpit reminds us each week that we celebrate Jesus in the fruit of the vine. In our gospel reading today Jesus tells his followers that he is the vine & they are the branches. So what does it mean to be part of the vine? In my last manse I had a vine growing against the wall – it was South-facing and in the spring and summer it grew like mad – if I didn’t prune it back it would have covered up all the windows. So I learnt quite a lot about vines as I went and did battle with my secateurs. The first thing is that a vine isn’t like a tree – if Jesus had said ‘I am the trunk, you are the branches’ that would have meant one thing, but saying ‘I am the vine, you are the branches’ says another things altogether. The branches aren’t just one part of the vine – the whole vine itself is made up of branches – if there were no branches there would be no vine. It’s very like St Paul’s pictur...