Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Third Sunday before Advent Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Third Sunday before Advent Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Third Sunday Before Advent Jonah 3.1-5, 10 Hebrews 9.24-28 Mark 1.14-20 ‘Once, only once, and once for all.’ The hymn that starts thus withdraws with the left hand some of what it gives with the right, hinting that Christ’s unique sacrifice is still somehow present in the e…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - The Thessalonians' Faith
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - The Thessalonians' Faith
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Thessalonians’ Faith Thessalonians 1.6-10 ‘Well,’ I said last week when my son came home from a movie, ‘did you enjoy it?’ I knew the answer as I asked the question. The movie was OK, but not that great. If he’d really enjoyed it, I wouldn’t have had to ask. He would have com…
Matthew for Everyone Part 2 - The Temple Tax
Matthew for Everyone Part 2 - The Temple Tax
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Temple Tax Matthew 17.22-27 Jesus told them they were going to be fishers of men, not of money (4.19)! This is one of the most peculiar little stories in the whole New Testament. What on earth does it mean? One day the bishop parked his car, as usual, outside his house. He kn…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year A - The Third Sunday of Easter Year A
Twelve Months of Sundays Year A - The Third Sunday of Easter Year A
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Third Sunday of Easter - Year A Acts 2.14a, 36–41 1 Peter 1.17–23 Luke 24.13–35 Today’s readings bubble over with the excitement of the new moment that has dawned in Israel’s story, in the world’s story, with the resurrection. It isn’t merely that God is offering a new kind o…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year A - Third Sunday of Advent Year A
Twelve Months of Sundays Year A - Third Sunday of Advent Year A
by SPCK - N T Wright
Third Sunday of Advent - Year A Isaiah 35: 1-10 James 5: 7-10 Matthew 11: 2-11 One of the recently edited Dead Sea Scrolls (no. 521 of the Cave 4 collection, if anyone out there wants the reference) contains a portrait of the coming Messiah that, like Matthew 11, looks back to Is…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Work of the Spirit
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Work of the Spirit
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Work of the Spirit ROMANS 8.5-11 Imagine rummaging around in an old attic and coming upon what looks like a standard lamp. It has a very strange type of bulb, but an elegant stem; and the shade, though a bit dusty, is quite attractive. You bring it down into the house and con…
Acts for Everyone part 1 - The Words of This Life
Acts for Everyone part 1 - The Words of This Life
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Words of This Life Acts 5.17-26 When our second child was born, we had decided on names. If it was a boy, it would be Oliver; if it was a girl, it would be Emily. Well, it was a girl (we got our Oliver later); but when we looked at her, we both knew she wasn’t Emily. Who was …
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - The Word that Goes to Work
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - The Word that Goes to Work
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Work that Goes to Work James 1.19-27 Human wisdom regularly produces proverbs. ‘A stitch in time saves nine.’ ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss.’ And so on. One of the proverbs I learned very early in life went like this: ‘Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will n…
Hebrews for Everyone - Tho Old Tebernacle Points Forward to the New
Hebrews for Everyone - Tho Old Tebernacle Points Forward to the New
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Old Tabernacle Points Forward to the New Hebrews 9.1-10 The taxi driver was resigned to things being this way for a long time. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘we’ve just got to put up with it. Boston will be a great city if they ever get it finished.’ We were stuck in what seemed like an im…
Mark for Everyone - The Yeast of the Pharisees and Herod
Mark for Everyone - The Yeast of the Pharisees and Herod
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 8.11–21 The Yeast of the Pharisees and Herod... ...Think of your schooldays. What was your worst subject – the one you always dreaded, the one you longed to give up? Now try (if the memory isn’t too painful) to remember what it was like sitting in a desk wi…
Mark for Everyone - True Greatness
Mark for Everyone - True Greatness
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 9.30–37 True Greatness... ...I don’t know whether Mark wants us to feel sorry for the disciples at this point, but quite frankly I do. Earlier in the gospel Jesus said things to them in code, and they didn’t get it. The parables were secret, hidden messages…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Two into One Will Go
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Two into One Will Go
by SPCK - N T Wright
Two into One Will Go Ephesians 2.11-16 We lived for four years by the banks of the Ottawa river, north-west of Montreal. It is a great river, already over 400 miles long by the time it passed our village. By the time it reached us it was over a mile wide. Not far downstream, howe…
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - True and False Wisdom
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - True and False Wisdom
by SPCK - N T Wright
True and False Wisdom James 3.13-18 It all began with a wrong diagnosis. I came upon the obituary of a famous actress in the newspaper just the other day. She wasn’t particularly old – in her early 70s, quite young these days. Her doctor hadn’t seen the early warning signs. By th…
Mark for Everyone - Two Extra Endings
Mark for Everyone - Two Extra Endings
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 16.9–20 Two Extra Endings... ...These are the two ‘extra’ endings of Mark. They are not found in the best manuscripts, but are added in to several others in a bewildering variety of ways. The shorter, first one (in double square brackets) doesn’t have a ver…
New Testament Wisdom for Everyone - True and False Wisdom
New Testament Wisdom for Everyone - True and False Wisdom
by SPCK - N T Wright
1 THE WISDOM OF THE SPIRIT TRUE AND FALSE WISDOM James 3: 13-18 It all began with a wrong diagnosis. I came upon the obituary of a famous actress in the newspaper just the other day. She wasn’t particularly old – in her early 70s, quite young these days. Her doctor hadn’t seen th…
New Testament Wisdom for Everyone - Watch Out For Dangers
New Testament Wisdom for Everyone - Watch Out For Dangers
by SPCK - N T Wright
4 THE PATH OF THE DISCIPLE WATCH OUT FOR DANGERS! Hebrews 12: 12-17 ‘It was a moment of madness.’ The politician stood shamefully before the press. He had been caught out soliciting for sexual favours in a notorious part of town. His character was in ruins, his reputation in tatt…
Hebrews for Everyone - Watch Out for Dangers!
Hebrews for Everyone - Watch Out for Dangers!
by SPCK - N T Wright
Watch Out for Dangers! Hebrews 12.12-17 ‘It was a moment of madness.’ The politician stood shamefully before the press. He had been caught out soliciting for sexual favours in a notorious part of town. His character was in ruins, his reputation in tatters. He would not now get th…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Warnings Against Compromise