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Mark for Everyone - The Syrophoenician Woman
Mark for Everyone - The Syrophoenician Woman
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 7.24–30 The Syrophoenician Woman... ...Not just another healing, more a political incident. This very odd story has all the trappings of a dangerous event for Jesus, and Mark helps us to understand it by the way he’s linked it to what went before. We’ve jus…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 2 - The Weak and the Strong
Paul for Everyone Romans part 2 - The Weak and the Strong
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Weak and the Strong ROMANS 14.1-6 We have a friend whose son is a vegetarian. She was describing to us today how she has learned to cook special meals for him – and what sort of compromises with the code he has been prepared to make. In today’s Western world, vegetarianism ha…
How can God, condemned, be hanging?
How can God, condemned, be hanging?
by Andrew Pratt
How can God, condemned, be hanging? False messiahs meet such ends, and the ones then testifying, have no need to make amends. Educated folk were laughing, they foresaw what was to come, saw disciples hiding, crying, feeling both distraught and numb. Verses 2-3 follow Tune: CALON …
Hymn: Held in the arms of God's love and compassion
Hymn: Held in the arms of God's love and compassion
by Andrew Pratt
Held in the arms of God's love and compassion, Jesus had kept them right up to the end, these his disciples, now named as Apostles, each of these strangers now counted as friend. Jesus had taught them by word and example, shared times of suffering, illness and grief. Spell-bound …
Hymn: This is God, a human baby
Hymn: This is God, a human baby
by Andrew Pratt
This is God, a human baby, offered into human hands, hands to comfort, feed and nurture, hands that follow hate's commands. Then disciples, stunned and puzzled, couldn't make sense of his word, theologians down the ages, seek to juggle the absurd. Man, Messiah, Lord and Master, h…
Much brighter than a thousand suns
Much brighter than a thousand suns
by Andrew Pratt
Much brighter than a thousand suns, the source of life, eternal grace; light of the cosmos and this world now shining from a saviour's face. Upon the mountain’s towering height they saw transfiguration's light. This man, this Jesus, they had known, who called them once by Galilee…
Hymn - Who shares this wine? Who dips this bread
Hymn - Who shares this wine? Who dips this bread
by Andrew Pratt
Who shares this wine? Who dips this bread? Was Judas hesitant or calm, the moment Jesus sent him out to raise that awful, crazed alarm? The others looked around, askance, not sure what this might sign or seal. They whispered, questioned; all too soon resumed this fated, final mea…
Hymn: Lost in human expectation
Hymn: Lost in human expectation
by Andrew Pratt
Lost in human expectation, cannot grasp the reason why, love in human incarnation, has to suffer, had to die. Yet it seems our understanding, narrowed by our self-concern, makes us even more demanding, yet less able to discern. Verses 3-4 follow Tune: ALL FOR JESUS, STUTTGART Met…
Hymn: Total life! Too much to swallow?
Hymn: Total life! Too much to swallow?
by Andrew Pratt
Total life! Too much to swallow? We should all be one with Christ, share the living and the dying: is this challenge over-priced? But if we have grasped the message, life is more than human gain, then perhaps the risk is worth it - never be the same again? Verses 3-4 follow Tune:…
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Human Inventions and Divine Instructions
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Human Inventions and Divine Instructions
by SPCK - N T Wright
Human Interventions and Divine Instructions Acts 5.27-42 We stared at the parcel as it lay on the floor inside the front door. Nobody had heard the delivery man. Nobody knew why it had arrived at this time of the day. The parcel was bulky, somewhat misshapen, with various semi-le…
Mark for Everyone - Jairus’s Daughter and the Woman with Chronic Bleeding
Mark for Everyone - Jairus’s Daughter and the Woman with Chronic Bleeding
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 5.21–34 Jairus’s Daughter and the Woman with Chronic Bleeding... ...We really should take this passage with the next one, since in Mark’s mind they are all part of the same story. But both are so full of interest that it’s worth holding them apart for the m…
Mark for Everyone - Jesus Is Anointed at Bethany
Mark for Everyone - Jesus Is Anointed at Bethany
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 14.1–11... ...If the storm clouds are gathering over Jerusalem in chapter 13, in chapter 14 they are coming together over the head of Jesus himself. The parallel between the two is important: the fate Jesus has predicted for the Temple (destruction at the h…
Mark for Everyone - Jesus Heals a Blind Beggar
Mark for Everyone - Jesus Heals a Blind Beggar
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 10.46–52 Jesus Heals a Blind Beggar... ...It took some weeks of persuasion before they came to see me. The grown-up son was desperate to get his ailing and depressed mother into some kind of a home where she would be properly cared for. As long as she lived…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - Jesus' Death Reveals God's Love and Guarantees Final Salvation
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - Jesus' Death Reveals God's Love and Guarantees Final Salvation
by SPCK - N T Wright
Jesus’ Death Reveals God’s Love and Guarantees Final Salvation ROMANS 5.6-11 I have heard it said – one hears all sorts of strange things in church – that John’s gospel is all about the love of God, but Paul’s letters are all about law, justice and hard, sharp things like that. W…
Mark for Everyone - Peter’s Declaration of Jesus’ Messiahship
Mark for Everyone - Peter’s Declaration of Jesus’ Messiahship
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 8.22–30 Peter’s Declaration of Jesus’ Messiahship... ...It’s quite a walk from Bethsaida to Caesarea Philippi. Even in a car, on modern roads, the trip takes an hour or two. Bethsaida is near the north shore of the Sea of Galilee; Caesarea Philippi is away …
Mark for Everyone - Teachings on Divorce
Mark for Everyone - Teachings on Divorce
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 10.1–16 Teachings on Divorce... ...In Britain during the early 1990s, from time to time a journalist would telephone a bishop or theologian to ask about divorce. It happened to me once. It’s a question every church, every member of the clergy, has to think …
Mark for Everyone - The Death of Jesus
Mark for Everyone - The Death of Jesus
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 15.33–39 The Death of Jesus... ...There are times when I envy musical composers, and this is one of them. If I were capable of setting this brief but shocking story to music, I know how I would start. Darkness at noon: low chords on the heavy brass, a brood…
Mark for Everyone - The Feeding of the Four Thousand