Category: Faith stuff
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The Purpose of the Nativity stories
The Nativity stories of Matthew and Luke are not competing biographical accounts, but ‘theological forewords’ to their books.
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No heartless innkeeper, no cold and lonely stable
What if the ‘traditional’ understanding of the Nativity is mistaken?
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Thoughts on the Nativity
What if the inn of the Nativity story was actually a guest room?
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Hymn of the day
JESUS comes with all his grace, Comes to save a fallen race, Object of our glorious hope, Jesus comes to lift us up! Let the living stones cry out! Let the seed of Abram shout! Praise we all our lowly King, Give him thanks, rejoice, and sing! He has our salvation wrought, He our captive…
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Christmas Expectations
Expectations are hard things to live with. In a culture increasingly driven by “targets”, the expectations we have of ourselves and others can be a source of great hurt and confusion. This is especially true when our expectations do not match those of others. And it has to be said that there are many times…
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Hey Jesus! (A Christmas Sketch)
Format is (ahem!) borrowed from the Iona Community… Peter: Hey Jesus! Jesus: Yes Peter? P: What starsign are you?
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The truth of Genesis
I was talking to someone recently about the evolution ‘debate’. He got very troubled when I spoke of the first chapter of Genesis as a myth. “If Genesis 1 isn’t true, how can we trust anything the Bible says?” he asked. Imagine yourself in one of those photobooths that takes passport pictures. When you collect…
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The “4 All’s” of Methodism
This is a more-or-less complete service I wrote for our Circuit, for use when no preacher was available. It is based around the “4 all’s”, the slogans which have been used to summarise the distinctive emphases of Methodist theology. I’m sharing it here for the same purpose, and of course if anyone wants to use…
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John Wesley’s “Catholic Spirit”
One of my favourite of John Wesley’s sermons — compulsory reading for Methodist preachers — is the one entitled “Catholic Spirit”. In the original 18th century language, there is no denying that Wesley can be heavy going though! Here’s my abridgement of that sermon, in something like modern english.