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A Bit Like Jesus - Jesus and the disabled woman
A Bit Like Jesus - Jesus and the disabled woman
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 2 Hypocrisy Jesus and the disabled woman Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. When Jesus saw her,…
A Bit Like Jesus - Learning from hypocrisy
A Bit Like Jesus - Learning from hypocrisy
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 2 Hypocrisy Learning from hypocrisy Gene Robinson, the elected Bishop of New Hampshire, was not invited to attend the 2008 Lambeth Conference of Bishops. It was considered that his committed but gay partnership would make his presence too offensive to others within the Angli…
A Bit Like Jesus - Life Stories
A Bit Like Jesus - Life Stories
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 1 Stories We Value Life stories On my shelves I have an inherited collection of original Henty novels. Written for boys in Victorian England they remained popular in the early twentieth century and are still collectable today. G. A. Henty was a self-taught historian who wrot…
A Bit Like Jesus - Moral passion
A Bit Like Jesus - Moral passion
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 4 Care Moral passion There is one feature common to these different examples of care. It is passion. Care is not seen as just a part of one’s job, something that can be codified, or (even worse) as an arbitrary life-style choice. This is passionate care, driving remarkable p…
A Bit Like Jesus - Morris Cerullo's healing mission to London
A Bit Like Jesus - Morris Cerullo's healing mission to London
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 6 Humility Morris Crullo’s healing mission to London In the early 1990s a great deal of publicity was given to the work of the American evangelist Morris Cerullo. Many in England at the time were unfamiliar with the so-called Prosperity Gospel, according to which if you are …
A Bit Like Jesus - Practise what you preach
A Bit Like Jesus - Practise what you preach
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 2 Hypocrisy Practise what you preach Those who regularly deliver sermons in church should live in fear of this proverb. It might have been designed for us. Do we really live up to what we preach? A common factor in many of the uses of the word ‘hypocrite’ in the first thre…
A Bit Like Jesus - Preface
A Bit Like Jesus - Preface
by SPCK - Robin Gill
Preface The picture on the cover by the Indian artist Jyoti Sahi captures wonderfully well what this short Lent Book is struggling to achieve. I bought the original collage on a visit to his ashram near Bangalore. He depicts the Parable of the Sower. Yet it is an Indian Jesus who…
A Bit Like Jesus - Religious hypocrisy
A Bit Like Jesus - Religious hypocrisy
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 2 Hypocrisy Religious hypocrisy This accusation against religious people is especially strong in the first three Gospels. Within the New Testament the term ‘hypocrite’ is found only in these Gospels. It is always found on the lips of Jesus himself. And it is typically direct…
A Bit Like Jesus - Reversing the Prosperity Gospel
A Bit Like Jesus - Reversing the Prosperity Gospel
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 6 Humility Reversing the Prosperity Gospel One of the dinner guests, on hearing this, said to him, ‘Blessed is anyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!’ Then Jesus said to him, ‘Someone gave a great dinner and invited many. At the time for the dinner he sent his slav…
A Bit Like Jesus - Stories We Value
A Bit Like Jesus - Stories We Value
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 1 Stories We Value Understanding Stories Forty years ago our family spent a year in Papua New Guinea living in a remote area without roads. I was teaching in the theological college and Jenny was working in the local hospital. Our son was a toddler and our daughter just a ba…
A Bit Like Jesus - The faith of a Gentile
A Bit Like Jesus - The faith of a Gentile
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 5 Faith The faith of a Gentile When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, ‘Lord, my servant is lying at home paralysed, in terrible distress.’ And he said to him, ‘I will come and cure him.’ The centurion answered, ‘Lord, I am not worthy…
A Bit Like Jesus - The founder of the Samaritans
A Bit Like Jesus - The founder of the Samaritans
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 4 Care The founder of the Samaritans Chad Varah, Rector of St Stephen, Walbrook and founder of the Samaritans, died aged 95 on 8 November 2007. The very next day The Times published a full-page obituary. There cannot be many Anglican clergy, other than archbishops, who might…
A Bit Like Jesus - The parable of the prodigal, his brother and their compassionate Father
A Bit Like Jesus - The parable of the prodigal, his brother and their compassionate Father
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 3 Compassion Healing and compassion Then Jesus said, ‘There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.” So he divided his property between them. A few days later the younger son gathe…
A Bit Like Jesus - The Policeman's Dilemma
A Bit Like Jesus - The Policeman's Dilemma
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 3 Compassion The Policeman’s Dilemma Five years ago I served on a panel of religious representatives giving evidence to a Select Committee on Assisted Dying. One of the committee members asked us all to respond to the following story: An armed policeman chanced upon a bad ro…
A Bit Like Jesus - The story of the Caring Samaritan
A Bit Like Jesus - The story of the Caring Samaritan
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 4 Care The story of the Caring Samaritan Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all you…
A Bit Like Jesus - Touching the stigmatized
A Bit Like Jesus - Touching the stigmatized
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 4 Care Touching the stigmatized Many have found an important precedent here for how we should care properly for those with AIDS. As seen in section 10, some early responses to AIDS were inept and even hypocritical. Today many religious agencies working among those living wit…
A Bit Like Jesus - Values from stories
A Bit Like Jesus - Values from stories
by SPCK - Robin Gill
WEEK 1 Stories We Value Values from stories Why did Jesus not give us a set of moral laws? I suspect that for many of us it would have been so much easier had he done so. Imagine for a moment that the Gospels were full of moral laws, dos and don’ts, like parts of Leviticus in the…
A Bit Like Jesus - What is faith?