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Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Second Sunday of Advent Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Second Sunday of Advent Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Second Sunday of Advent Isaiah 40.1–11 2 Peter 3.8–15a Mark 1.1–8 If John the Baptist was going to raise up the valleys and flatten out the mountains, he started in the right place. Jericho lies a long way below the road-sign that says ‘sea level’; Jerusalem, a long way abo…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Easter Day Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Easter Day Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Easter Day Isaiah 25.6-9 1 Corinthians 15.1-11 John 20.1-18 This Gospel reading is not, as one writer has suggested, ‘a sanitized story about a trip to a garden and a lovely surprise’. If Easter is in any sense the happy ending after a sad story, that is the least important thing…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Second Sunday Before Lent Proverbs 8.1, 22–31 Colossians 1.15–20 John 1.1–14 Eyebrows will be raised at the reappearance of John’s prologue so soon after Christmas. But our surprise at the lectionary’s turns and twists is nothing to that launched upon the world by John’s fa…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Seventh Sunday of Easter Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Seventh Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Seventh Sunday of Easter Acts 1.15-17, 21-26 1John 5.9-13 John 17.6-19 What would you like people to pray for on your behalf? What is your most usual – truthful – prayer request? Does Jesus’s prayer for his disciples match your expectations in any way? This prayer comes as Je…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 9 Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 9 Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Proper 9 Ezekiel 2:1-5 2 Corinthians 12: 2-10 Mark 6: 1-13 ‘This passage of 2 Corinthians has caused enormous speculation down the ages. It is tantalisingly full of hints about Paul, which may have made sense to his readers but which we can only fill out with hyperactive imaginin…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 20 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 20 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 20 Mark 9: 30-37 Gaze on the disciples, a ragged band trudging along and always on the move. So often they are confused by their leader, yet always in awe of him and often afraid to ask, afraid to look the fool. Now he’s made that frightening prediction about ending on a v…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 6 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 6 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 6 Mark 4: 26-34 Gaze on a vegetable patch at the bottom of the garden, or better still a full-sized allotment, with the gardener’s rickety shed in one corner, a watering can outside the door. Gaze on the rows of neat plants: pale lime-green lettuce leaves, baby leeks like …
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 10 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 10 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 10 Mark 6: 14-29 Gaze on all the Herods of this world and all the gratuitous violence they unleash. Gaze on all the ethnic cleansing that has gone on down the ages – innocents massacred, women raped and the elderly displaced, staring at us every day from our newspapers, dr…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Second Sunday of Easter Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Second Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Second Sunday of Easter John 20.19-31 Gaze on Jesus. He looks exhausted and worn out, as if he’s been on a long journey. But there is no mistake, it is certainly him. He’s appeared when he was least expected. Gaze on the disciples, nervous and jittery. What a state the discip…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 20 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 20 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 20 Proverbs 31.10-31 James 3.13-4.3, 7-8a Mark 9.30-37 Fortunately, Jesus stopped the disciples in their tracks before they acted out James 4 as well as James 3. Envy and selfish ambition, yes; but covetousness had not yet led to murder. The internecine strife in Jerusalem…
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Look Upon Their Threats
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Look Upon Their Threats
by SPCK - N T Wright
Look upon Their Threats Acts 4. 23-31 In the early summer of 1989, I went to Jerusalem to teach, and to work on a couple of books, one of which was about Jesus himself. One day, sitting in my borrowed room at St George’s Cathedral, I was struggling with a few pages I was trying t…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 9 Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 9 Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Ordinary Time Proper 9 Zechariah 9.9–12 Romans 7.15–25a Matthew 11.16–19, 25–30 The first half of chapter 11 of Matthew’s Gospel is Jesus’s tribute to John the Baptist. John is in prison, longing to know if he has stepped aside for nothing, aching …
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 12 Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 12 Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Ordinary Time Proper 12 1 Kings 3.5–12 Romans 8.26–39 Matthew 13.31–33, 44–52 With this piling up of images of the kingdom, I think you need first of all to listen to them and get an overall feel, and then to start trying to tease out some of the p…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 19 Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Proper 19 Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Proper 19 Isaiah 50.4-9a James 3.1-12 Mark 8.27-38 The disciples are quite enjoying the discussion, to begin with. Every- where they’ve been with Jesus, they have heard speculation. People must have asked them, over and over again, ‘Who is your master? Where does he get his power…
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Restoring the Twelve
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Restoring the Twelve
by SPCK - N T Wright
Restoring the twelve Acts 1.15-26 The older I get, the more I dislike trying to follow the complicated instructions that come with new technology. I’m not what they call technophobic. On the desk where I am working there is a computer. It is linked to a cell phone which includes …
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 21 Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 21 Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Ordinary Time Proper 21 Ezekiel 18.1–4, 25–32 Philippians 2.1–13 Matthew 21.23–32 ‘Don’t forget the bring-and-buy sale next week; the ladies’ group will meet on Thursday to continue their excellent work on the worn-out hassocks; and by the way, don…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Christ the King Year B