Hark, the glad sound - the Saviour comes!

This was my sermon for Lent 2 - but although it's a Lent sermon (and a very Lent sermon in some ways) it's not one that should stay in Lent. And the last couple of weeks - Windrush, anti-immigration rhetoric - seem to have some resonance with the "othering" I was subtly challenging here. What do you want in a Saviour? What does your Saviour want of you? Sermon preached at St John the Baptist, Lent 2 25/2/18 Gen 17: 1-7, 15-1 6,  Romans 4: 18-25,  Mark 8: 31-35 What do you want in a Saviour? Imagine you’re living in a world which is bleak. You can never be sure you’ll make enough money to feed your family. There’s no welfare safety net. No NHS. No food banks. And decades ago, your country was invaded. The government gave in. And ever since, you’ve been an occupied nation. People in uniforms speaking a different language, far better off than you, lounging around barking orders at you and there’s nothing you can do to stop them. What would y...

Shalom... and Syria? Sermon preached at Lincoln Cathedral, Easter 3 15/04/18 Acts 3: 12-19 1 John 3: 1-7 Luke 24: 3 6-48 Jesus stood among his disciples and said: Peace be with you. It’s a greeting that the risen Jesus uses frequently and it’s a greeting that we, his followers, take over in our liturgy. Bishops use it exclusively – they never say “The Lord be with you,” the normal Christian greeting, but always “peace be with you.” The Subdean will use it later this morning: as we finish our focus on Jesus revealed in the words of Scripture, he will use Jesus’ words to invite us to greet him revealed in the faces of our brothers and sisters. Peace be with you. And like most of the phrases we use very often, we don’t always think about what it means. The word “peace,” for example. It’s a cliché to point out that the Greek and Hebrew concept of “peace” was much richer and fuller than the war-versus-peace dualism we associate with the word, but it’s a c...