Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Advent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Advent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Advent Isaiah 64.1–9 1 Corinthians 1.3–9 Mark 13.24–37 A monk comes to his abbot, seeking enlightenment. He questions the abbot eagerly and impatiently, firing questions at him. But the abbot says, ‘Just look.’ The monk is very disappointed, ‘I’m always lookin…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Last Sunday After Trinity Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Last Sunday After Trinity Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Last Sunday After Trinity (proper 25) Job 42.1-6, 10-17 Hebrews 7.23-28 Mark 10.46b-52 Three very different prayers. Whatever we think of the ending of the book of Job (some scholars, inevitably, suppose it a later addition; some in our gloomy culture think it spoils the stor…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 24 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 24 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 24 Job 38.1-7 [34-41] Hebrews 5.1-10 Mark 10.35-45 ‘Were you there,’ asks the old song, ‘when they crucified my Lord?’ ‘Were you there,’ the Lord enquires of Job, ‘when I laid the foundation of the earth?’ Both questions receive the answer ‘No’, but for different reasons; …
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Day of Pentecost Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Day of Pentecost Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Day of Pentecost Acts 2.1-21 Romans 8.22-27 John 15.26-27; 16.4b-15 The Holy Spirit has been in danger in recent years of becoming the soppy one of the Trinity. Think about it for a bit – the Holy Spirit doesn’t go off and do uncomfortable and challenging things like getting cruc…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Christmas Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Christmas Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday of Christmas Jeremiah 31.7–14 Ephesians 1.3–14 John 1.1–18 At the heart of the Christian proclamation of God is the belief that before time, before creation, before the existence of anything but God, God is already love. God’s very nature is the love that flows …
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Christ the King Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Christ the King Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Christ the King Daniel 7.9-10, 13, 14 Revelation 1.4b-8 John 18.33-37 Philip Pullman’s brilliant His Dark Materials trilogy ends with the words ‘and then we’ll build . . . The republic of heaven.’ This is the vision that Lyra holds out to us after all she has learned and suffered…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Easter Day Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Easter Day Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Easter Day Isaiah 25.6-9 Philippians 15.1–11 Mark 16.1-8 After all the horror, and the crowds and the noise of the day of Jesus’s crucifixion, this chapter of Mark’s Gospel starts quietly. We have already seen these women at the crucifixion scene, but we hardly noticed them there…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Christmas Day Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Christmas Day Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Christmas Day Isaiah 62.6–12 Titus 3.4–7 Luke 2.1–20 In these verses from Isaiah there is a great sense of subdued excitement, of restlessness, of purposeful movement a little distance away, as the dawn breaks. Actually, this would probably describe almost any household with chil…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Epiphany Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Epiphany Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday of Epiphany 1 Samuel 3.1–10 Revelation 5.1–10 John 1.43–51 The beginning of chapter 3 of 1 Samuel says, in a very matter-of- fact way, ‘the word of the Lord was rare in those days.’ 1 Samuel has already begun to paint a picture – centred round Eli and the once-f…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Christmas Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Christmas Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Christmas Isaiah 61.10—62.3 Galatians 4.4 –7 Luke 2.15–21 Galatians is one of the most moving of all Paul’s epistles. Paul is fighting for his calling in this epistle. The fight is partly for himself, because if he is wrong, and God has not called him to be an…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Epiphany Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Epiphany Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Baptism of Christ - The First Sunday of Epiphany Genesis 1.1–5 Acts 19.1–7 Mark 1.4–11 What is nothingness? We have no concept of it. Our image of it consists of the absence of things that we can picture and describe, which is very different from the nothingness before creati…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fifth Sunday of Easter Acts 8.26-40 1John 4.7-21 John 15.1-8 The writings of John, both in the Gospel and the epistles, are bafflingly determined not to come down on one side or the other of the ‘chicken or egg’ question. Which comes first, love of God or love of our neighbou…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Easter Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fourth Sunday of Easter Acts 4.5-12 1John 3.16-24 John 10.11-18 Today’s readings are deeply challenging. Christian mission has sometimes been done as though determined to prove that we are right and everyone else is wrong, whereas all of today’s writers think that Christians …
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday of Lent Genesis 17.1–7, 15, 16 Romans 4.13–25 Mark 8.31–38 The Old Testament readings for Lent this year are encouraging us to think about covenants. Last week we had the covenant with Noah, this week we have Abraham, and next week – let me give you a sneak prev…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Third Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Third Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Third Sunday of Lent Exodus 20.1-17 1 Corinthians 1.18-25 John 2.13-22 Are Exodus and 1 Corinthians in direct conflict with each other? Do they give wholly irreconcilable pictures of the nature of God and our response to it? The God of the Ten Commandments is, surely, a God w…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Lent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The First Sunday of Lent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Lent Genesis 9.8–17 1 Peter 3.18–22 Mark 1.9–15 When God makes his covenant with creation after the flood, it is a covenant not just with Noah and his family, or even with all future human beings, but with ‘every living creature that is with you’ (v. 10). What…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Third Sunday of Epiphany Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Third Sunday of Epiphany Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Third Sunday of Epiphany Genesis 14.17–20 Revelation 19.6–10 John 2.1–11 We are created to praise God. We cannot trulynd our existence in any other way, and neither can the created world, which longs to re-echo to the sound of human voices raised in songs of praise to their c…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Epiphany Year B