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Luke for Everyone - Pilate Pressured by the Crowd
Luke for Everyone - Pilate Pressured by the Crowd
by SPCK - N T Wright
Pilate Pressured by the Crowds Luke 23.13-26 Shakespeare peopled his plays, as Charles Dickens did his novels, with fascinating minor characters. Each has his or her own tale to tell; none is a mere cardboard figure. Even the bear in A Winter’s Tale is important. Among the Evange…
2 Corinthians - Please Have the Gift Ready!
2 Corinthians - Please Have the Gift Ready!
by SPCK - N T Wright
Please Have a Gift ready! 2 CORINTHIANS 9.1-5 I knew there was something wrong the moment I walked into the shop. I used to go in two or three times every week, and knew the regular assistants quite well. But this morning the one I saw behind the counter looked as though she was,…
Matthew for Everyone Part 1 - Piety in Secret
Matthew for Everyone Part 1 - Piety in Secret
by SPCK - N T Wright
Piety in Secret Matthew 6.1-6 Once, when living in the Middle East, I went out for a walk in the afternoon. On my way home, feeling slightly hungry, I bought a bar of chocolate at a wayside stall. I got back home, went to my room, made a cup of tea, unwrapped the chocolate and br…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Prayer for Wisdom and Gratitude
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Prayer for Wisdom and Gratitude
by SPCK - N T Wright
Prayer for Wisdom and Gratitude Colossians 1.9-14 We watched, holding our breath, as the mother duck left the pond at the head of her brood. There were seven ducklings in all: four black ones and three yellow ones. They were lively and squeaky, scuttling to and fro. For days they…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Prayer and Peace
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Prayer and Peace
by SPCK - N T Wright
Prayer and Peace Ephesians 6.18-24 Imagine an eagle with clipped wings. Imagine a great oceangoing liner stuck in the Sahara sands. Imagine a basketball player with his ankles tied together. Imagine a railway locomotive in a ploughed field. Now imagine an ambassador wearing chain…
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Praying in the Faith
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Praying in the Faith
by SPCK - N T Wright
Praying in the Faith James 5.13-20 There are many things in life which look extremely odd to someone who doesn’t know what’s going on. Imagine watching someone making a musical instrument if you’d never heard music in your life. What, you might think, can such an object possibly …
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - Recognizing the Body
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - Recognizing the Body
by SPCK - N T Wright
Recognizing the Body 1 Corinthians 11.23-34 I once witnessed a moving reconciliation scene, and the most moving thing about it was that no words were necessary. A lay minister had been storing up resentments against the clergyman who was the senior pastor in the church where they…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Redeemed from the Law's Curse
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Redeemed from the Law's Curse
by SPCK - N T Wright
Redeemed from the Law’s Curse Galatians 3.10-14 I sat in the traffic jam for two hours. The road signs told me I was pointing in the right direction. From what I knew of the road it looked as though I was in the right place. But nothing was moving. The clock ticked slowly on; I w…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Requests for Prayer
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Requests for Prayer
by SPCK - N T Wright
Requests for Prayer 2 Thessalonians 3.1-5 Among all the strange dreams that visit us at night, one of the most frustrating – which happens to me quite frequently – is the dream of trying to run and discovering that it’s impossible to do so. My legs feel like lead: they become hop…
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Roman Citizenship Comes in Useful
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Roman Citizenship Comes in Useful
by SPCK - N T Wright
Roman Citizenship Comes in Useful Acts 22.23-30 CAN YOU PROVE IT? The sign in the shop selling alcohol challenges all and sundry. I was once buying a drink in one of the small bars in O’Hare Airport in Chicago and was astonished, as a bald and bearded middle-aged man, to be asked…
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - Scandal and Judgment
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - Scandal and Judgment
by SPCK - N T Wright
Scandal and Judgment 1 Corinthians 5.1-5 When I was a boy, studying Greek and Latin classics, the texts we were given to study often had bits cut out. There were lines missing from poems, and sometimes entire sections; in one case (in the Roman writer Juvenal, I recall) a whole p…
Revelation for Everyone - Sealing God's People
Revelation for Everyone - Sealing God's People
by SPCK - N T Wright
Sealing God’s People Revelation 7.1-8 Just when you think you are nearly at the top of the mountain, you crest a ridge and there . . . is another ridge half a mile ahead, steeper than the one you’ve just climbed. That is how it feels to get to this point in the sequence of the ‘s…
Matthew for Everyone Part 1 - Sheep among Wolves
Matthew for Everyone Part 1 - Sheep among Wolves
by SPCK - N T Wright
Sheep among Wolves Matthew 10.16-23 I went to the fairground with my daughter. We stood in line for over an hour for one of the biggest rides; it looked fun, and everyone was excited and happy to wait for their turn. Finally we boarded the car. Up it went, up and up, higher and h…
Luke for Everyone - Teachings on Stewardship
Luke for Everyone - Teachings on Stewardship
by SPCK - N T Wright
Teachings on Stewardship Luke 16.10-18 Luke for Everyone 10‘Someone who is faithful in a small matter’, Jesus continued, ‘will also be faithful in a large one. Someone who is dishonest in a small matter will also be dishonest in a large one. 11If you haven’t been faithful with th…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Thanksgiving For Gospel's Work
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Thanksgiving For Gospel's Work
by SPCK - N T Wright
Thanksgiving For Gospel’s Work Colossians 1.1-8 When Susan bought the house, there wasn’t much growing in the garden. A few tatty little shrubs; a mouldy rosebush or two; a tree that had been bent sideways by a storm and left to grow crooked. It was a depressing sight. A few days…
Luke for Everyone - Temptation in the Wilderness
Luke for Everyone - Temptation in the Wilderness
by SPCK - N T Wright
Temptation in the Wilderness Luke 4.1-13 Jesus was not Superman. Many today, including some devout Christians, see him as a kind of Christian version of the movie character, able to do whatever he wanted, to ‘zap’ reality into any shape he liked. In the movies, Superman looks lik…
Luke for Everyone - Teachings on the Sabbath
Luke for Everyone - Teachings on the Sabbath
by SPCK - N T Wright
Teachings on the Sabbath Luke 6.1-11 A relative of mine likes to tell of an occasion when he flew, with some business friends, to Ireland to watch a rugby match. When they got off the plane, there were no customs officers waiting to receive them. So two or three of them went into…
The Pastoral Letters - The Character of a Bishop