June 22, 2025

Confirmation Sunday is an extraordinary day in the life of our young people, and in the life of the congregation or congregations who support them. We all get to look back at the journey that has brought us all here and ask, as we look into the future, what will each of us need as we journey forward from this point. And it’s not like we invented this reflection and projection process. It is all through the scriptures, notably we heard two of those kinds of stories this morning.

The reading from 1st Samuel today arises out of disappointment and sadness over mistakes or missed opportunities with a younger generation. The hard truth for the priest Eli, is that his sons who should have been learning how to be priests in the temple, instead were acting scandalously. They were doing the very opposite of everything that would have pleased their father. But like many a loving parent, Eli felt helpless to encourage them to make better choices. So, instead of them, the boy Samuel is brought to the temple to assist Eli and to learn how to care for the temple which was the centre of their faith. This caring also includes caring for the almost blind Eli.  Something his sons should have done.

June 15, 2025

I listened to a gentleman recently talking about visiting his adult son who was gravely ill in hospital. After several days of keeping vigil, he realized that he would need to change the way he “fathered’ his son. He said, he’d have to be more mothering. I asked what he meant by that, and he responded. “You know, hold his hand, talk to him, just let him know I’m there for him”. 

It made me think of the Father in the story read to us this morning by Tisha about the Prodigal son. It could have been called the Prodigal Sons, plural. Or even the Father of the two sons because the story really does speak of all of them even though we’re used to referring to only the one son, You know the guy, the one who runs off with his inheritance and blows it all on fancy cars, fast living and gambling, and comes to the realization one day, half-starved and living off of the scraps of the plates he was washing in the fancy restaurant that he could be doing manual labour for his Father and be better off. So why not make amends and head back home.

And of course, the son who had remained responsible and steadfast with his father’s property was furious when his no-good brother shows up and Dad hands him the Ferrari keys and leather jacket. I heard a preacher on this story say, when the Father greets his lost son, he runs to him, slippers on and bathrobe flying he’s so eager to greet him, to hold him, to shower him with love because he didn’t know if he’d ever be able to do that again. The preacher said, he ran to him like a “mother”. In the Middle East in those days, patriarchs did not run in public, certainly not appear dressed so shabbily nor show PDA’s (public displays of affection). 

June 1, 2025

The Gospel of John reading is problematic because the writer of the gospel of John can get quite circular and confusing in his explanations. 

The version you heard today was the cleaned up one from the Message translation of the Bible. In my opinion the most important line goes like this, “just as God is one in me, and I am one in you, therefore we are all one in God and God is in us.” 

The Acts reading is also problematic because the slave woman with the prophetic spirit is almost immediately forgotten. Even though it is her faithful proclamation that starts the whole story in motion. Her witness leads directly to the baptism of the jailor and his family, but she remains unnamed. But on this baptism morning it is essential that we break open these two passages because I believe they speak to the very heart of why we bother with baptism at all.

Let’s start with the story from Acts. 

May 25, 2025

I don’t know about you but most of my TV viewing these days is through streaming services like Netflix or Britbox or a sports channel.  Which usually means no commercials. But if I switch to a regular news channel, particularly news or sports, I’m always struck by how many commercials there are for pharmaceuticals. These days the popular one is Ozempic. If you have an ailment, they have a pill. Even if you don’t have a condition, they have a pill for something that you might have in the future or promise that their product will protect you from some dreaded condition. 

May 18, 2025

THE BIRTH OF THE METHODIST MOVEMENT

The Methodist movement did not grow out of some general movement like the Protestant Reformation; it began as a movement within the Church of England.  It came out of the deep religious experience and heroic labours of a group of men, the most prominent being John Wesley and his younger brother, Charles.

May 11, 2025

I was watching a comedian that could easily have been a preacher. He said you know in life we only really have two problems. Are you healthy or are you sick. If you’re healthy, you have no problem but if you’re sick, you have two problems. And they are, am I gonna get better or am I gonna die. If you get better then you’ve got no problem But, if you’re gonna die, you got two problems. You’re either gonna go to heaven or you are  gonna go to hell. If you go to heaven, you got no problems. But if you go to hell, you’ve only got two problems. Are you going to be original or extra crispy?