Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 17 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 17 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 17 Luke 14: 1, 7-14 Gaze on a very common social situation – everyone arrives at a ‘do’, and there are several round tables laid up with glittering candles and vases of freesia and crisp white napkins. People are hovering about, for none wants to be the first to be seated,…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 16 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 16 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 16 Luke 13: 10-17 Gaze on the woman, bent double from her youth. Slowly her shoulders curved. Left behind by sisters who married, she remained alone, ridiculed, and treated as an outcast. Children shouted ‘Hunchback!’ at her. She made friends with ants and caterpillars and…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 18 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 18 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 18 Luke 14: 25-33 Gaze on a woman baking a fruit cake for a celebration. The ingredients take up half a page in the recipe book. She checks them off one by one – butter, sugar, flour, raisins, sultanas, cherries . . . Smell the fruit, and the pungent spices! But she has no…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 19 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 19 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 19 Luke 15: 1-10 Gaze on the hunt for a set of lost keys. Your panic rises as you riffle through your handbag or pockets, searching for the door key. You’re locked out and it’s cold and wet. What can be worse than that?...
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 21 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 21 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 21 Luke 16: 19-31 Gaze on an icy landscape. The glacier is solid, twenty, forty, sixty feet (six, twelve or eighteen metres) deep, and so white it is somehow blue. But a chasm has opened up, wider than a person’s leap. Look down into the freezing darkness. Gaze on a gorge …
John for Everyone part 2 - Glorify the Son
John for Everyone part 2 - Glorify the Son
by SPCK - N T Wright
Glorify the Son John 17.1-8 Shakespeare’s play Hamlet is full of action. Ghosts, murders, love scenes, plots, accidental killings, betrayals, recriminations and more plots. The play highlights the indecision of the hero when faced with huge problems, and this results in pauses he…
John for Everyone part 2 - Jesus Prays for His People
John for Everyone part 2 - Jesus Prays for His People
by SPCK - N T Wright
Jesus Prays for His People John 17.9-19 In the newspapers recently a mother was punished by the courts. She had left her two young children entirely by themselves, while she went off for a foreign holiday with her new boyfriend. (The father, it seems, was nowhere to be found.) It…
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 5 Year A
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 5 Year A
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 5 - Year A Meditation on Matthew 9: 9-13, 18-26 Gaze on Matthew, sitting in his tax booth. He’s snappily dressed in the latest trend, ooks like a city trader with designer shades hiding his eyes, a wide tie round his neck; a striped suit and Italian leather shoes complete…
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 7 Year A
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 7 Year A
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 7 - Year A Meditation on Matthew 10: 24-39 Gaze on yourself in a mirror. If you are young, your face is open, unlined, your skin fresh and clear, and your eyes are bright. Whether you wear your hair long or cropped, bobbed or short, it is thick and glossy. Do you see the f…
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 6 Year A
Gazing on the Gospels Year A - Proper 6 Year A
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 6 - Year A Meditation on Matthew 9: 35 – 10.8 Gaze on the harassed and helpless, the dislocated and forgotten of our societies – like commuters without a train, milling around on the platform, tired after a long day standing on their feet serving in a shop for not much mor…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 9 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 9 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 9 Luke 10: 1-11, 16-20 Gaze on yourself as you arrive in a town for the first time. Have you booked your hotel room ahead, or are you leaving it to chance? Recall the strange street signs, the one-way system that confuses and traps you, and the difficulty in finding a plac…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 5 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 5 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 5 Luke 7: 11-17 Gaze on a funeral scene in Britain – everyone is in their best clothes, dark, sombre and formal. People make an effort to contain their emotions and no one wants to ‘break down’ in public. We put on a brave face and give thanks for the life lost. If it is a…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 8 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 8 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 8 Luke 9: 51- 62 Gaze on the sort of journeys we make today, on all the preparation and paraphernalia we acquire. We need tickets and passports, hotel reservations, luggage and currency. We surround ourselves with so much security, and so much comfort, and find it hard to …
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 7 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 7 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 7 Luke 8: 26- 39 Gaze on all that is unclean in this story: the man himself, the tombs he lived in, and the pigs feeding on swill, caked with mud. Gaze on the vagrants of our cities today: the men stretched out on newspaper in the shop doorways; bag ladies pushing trolleys…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 6 Year C
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - Proper 6 Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 6 Luke 7: 36- 8: 3 Gaze at the dinner party and all the guests reclining on couches, facing the table, their legs stretched out behind them. This is how it is that the woman can stand behind Jesus at his feet, bathe them with her tears, dry them with her hair, and smother …
Gazing on the Gospels year c - The Second Sunday of Advent Year C
Gazing on the Gospels year c - The Second Sunday of Advent Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Second Sunday of Advent Luke 3.1-6 Gazing on the Gospels year C Gaze on a lone hiker, setting out on a long distance walk in the Lake District, or Scottish highlands, perhaps. Imagine it’s you, dressed in the latest Gore-Tex® to keep out the wind and rain, waterproof trousers…
Gazing on the Gospels year c - The Second Sunday of Easter Year C
Gazing on the Gospels year c - The Second Sunday of Easter Year C
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Second Sunday of Easter John 20.19-31 Gaze on the faces of the disciples, their jaws clenched, eyes half shut, pictures of defeat. So far we have been gazing on expressions of fright and grief, of doubt and confusion. They’ve seen the stone rolled away, and they’ve seen the e…
Gazing on the Gospels Year C - The Second Sunday Before Advent Year C