It feels like we have been stuck in Good Friday for two and a half years. While we wait for Easter morning there are resources to be gained even in this dark place.
If the people stop singing praises, the stones will shout. It can be dangerous to use your voice when standing on occupied territory. Even Good News is threatening to people who are benefiting from the status quo. But what can we do? The stones will speak up if we don't.
Time to think again about Mary of Bethany and women like her. The Gospel writers venerate her Jesus cried when she was sad and admired her so much that he followed her example. Judas thought he had a right to correct and constrict her. His second biggest mistake!
Has it ever occurred to you in the story of the Prodigal Son that the father is the only one having any fun? He's cooking fatted calfs, playing dress-ups, putting up streamers and blowing up balloons, but his sons are barely able to live with their grief, anger, regret and shame. Repentance is hard Grace is Messy
Rev Pam Hynd's sermon for Lent 3
As we look to Jesus in a time when Russia's invasion of Ukraine has filled us all with anger, grief and dread, we find ourselves dealing with a man who is uncompromisingly critical of unjust leaders, and at the same time unwaveringly committed to non-violence. Like a hen protecting her chicks, he faced down the power of empire with nothing but his own body to shield the ones he loves. Do we dare follow him on this path?
How do you resist evil without using the same tools that evil employs? There is a way. But it means following the hard road that Jesus walked. Welcome to Lent.
When they curtain is pulled back and we see Jesus as he really is, do we see his divinity with the humanity stripped away? Or do we see the full, glorious humanity that is our destiny?
Rev Pam Hynd's sermon for Epiphany 7
In Luke 6 Jesus pushes his hearers to reflect on what it means to be blessed