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Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Paul's Distress Over the Galatians
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Paul's Distress Over the Galatians
by SPCK - N T Wright
Paul’s Distress Over the Galatians Galatians 1.1-9 Imagine you’re in South Africa in the 1970s. Apartheid is at its height. You are embarked on a risky project: to build a community centre where everybody will be equally welcome, no matter what their colour or race. You’ve design…
2 Corinthians - Paul's Plans and God's "Yes"
2 Corinthians - Paul's Plans and God's "Yes"
by SPCK - N T Wright
Paul’s Plan and God’s “Yes” 2 CORINTHIANS 1.15-22 One of my students once arrived very late for a tutorial. I was working on an extremely tight schedule, and I wasn’t amused at having the day disrupted. I thought the student needed to know how far out of line his behaviour was. I…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Paul's Fatherly Concern
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Paul's Fatherly Concern
by SPCK - N T Wright
Paul’s Fatherly Concern Thessalonians 2.9-12 Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Paul’s missionary work is that when he arrived in a new town the people there had quite literally never seen anything of the sort before. They had seen other travelling teachers, but none like th…
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 12 Year C
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 12 Year C
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 12 Hosea 1.2–10 Colossians 2.6–19 Luke 11.1–13 Part of the prophetic vocation seems to have been to carry the pain of the message in one’s own soul. Thus it was, at least, with Hosea. Married to a prostitute, he felt not only the pain of Israel but also the pain of God, …
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 20 Year C
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 20 Year C
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 20 Jeremiah 8.18—9.1 1 Timothy 2.1–7 Luke 16.1–13 The first thing to get clear about the ‘parable of the wicked mammon’ is that it is precisely a parable. It is not advice about financial management: Jesus is not telling people to cheat their bosses. It makes sense within …
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 21 Year C
Twelve Months of Sunday year c - Proper 21 Year C
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 21 Jeremiah 32.1–15 1 Timothy 6.6–19 Luke 16.19–end Among the many symbolic actions Jeremiah was commanded to perform, this one stands out as a sign, not of judgement, but of hope: hope for God’s restoration the other side of judgement. Resurrection hope, if you like. He i…
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Ransomed by Grace
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Ransomed by Grace
by SPCK - N T Wright
Ransomed by Grace 1 Peter 1.10-21 John went into a junk-shop the other day, in a little town not far from here. He was looking for something in particular, and after wandering around for a while he thought he saw just the thing. It was a bowl, about eight inches across. Someone h…
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Publicy Vindicated
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Publicy Vindicated
by SPCK - N T Wright
Publicly Vindicated Acts 16.35-40 One of the most famous cases in ancient Roman law was the one brought by the young upstart barrister Cicero against the rich, aristocratic proconsul Gaius Verres. Verres, like many Roman aristocrats of his generation, had discovered how to play t…
John for Everyone Part 1 - Rivers of Living Water
John for Everyone Part 1 - Rivers of Living Water
by SPCK - N T Wright
Rivers of Living Water John 7.31-39 ‘A pint of water every hour, and don’t forget!’ I was setting off into the desert, and my host was understandably anxious. Coming as I did from a cool and damp climate, I might easily forget how important it was to keep drinking plenty of water…
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Signs of the New Covenant
Acts for Everyone part 1 - Signs of the New Covenant
by SPCK - N T Wright
Signs of the New Covenant Acts 4. 32-37 Some politicians’ phrases pass into folk legend. I am old enough ( just) to remember Harold Macmillan saying, ‘You’ve never had it so good.’ Some Americans can remember Roosevelt talking about the ‘New Deal’. And generations to come will st…
John for Everyone Part 1 - Sower and Reaper Rejoice Together
John for Everyone Part 1 - Sower and Reaper Rejoice Together
by SPCK - N T Wright
Sower and Reaper Rejoice Together John 4.27-42 I was telephoned this morning by a colleague who was writing a piece about George Frideric Handel’s masterpiece, Messiah. We agreed that it has a unique place in the affection not only of Christians, and of serious music-lovers, but …
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - The Apostle's Freedom - to be Enslaved to Everyone
Paul for Everyone 1 Corinthians - The Apostle's Freedom - to be Enslaved to Everyone
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Apostle’s Freedom – to be Enslaved to Everyone 1 Corinthians 9.19-23 One of the greatest thinkers and statesmen of the Roman world a century before Paul was Cicero. He was a sophisticated philosopher, a brilliant lawyer, a politician, and above all a passionate believer in th…
John for Everyone part 2 - The Arrest of Jesus
John for Everyone part 2 - The Arrest of Jesus
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Arrest of Jesus John 18.1-14 He came, looking for someone. He came on the evening breeze, came as he had always come. Came because they knew each other, and used to spend time together. Came to the garden, because that’s where they always met. That’s where he was at home. And…
New Testament Prayer for Everyone - That They May Be One
New Testament Prayer for Everyone - That They May Be One
by SPCK - N T Wright
PART 2 PRAYERS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT PRAYERS OF JESUS THAT THEY MAY BE ONE John 17: 20-26 This afternoon I looked on the Internet for a website about an electric appliance that’s gone wrong. I’ve lost the instruction booklet and was hoping to find relevant information through the …
Mark for Everyone - The Authority of Jesus Is Questioned
Mark for Everyone - The Authority of Jesus Is Questioned
by SPCK - N T Wright
Mark For Everyone MARK 11.27–33 The Authority of Jesus Is Questioned... ...It is a busy Friday afternoon, in the middle of the city rush- hour. The traffic has built up for some time, and now there is gridlock. Nobody can move. Horns are blaring, taxi-drivers swearing. Hot and ti…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Badge, the Name and the Meaning
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Badge, the Name and the Meaning
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Badge, the Name and the Meaning ROMANS 2.25-29 From time to time one of the big supermarket chains decides to try to pass off its own products as though they were made by one of the regular manufacturers. I remember one store a while ago which sold breakfast cereal with a pac…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Call to Holy Living
Paul for Everyone Romans part 1 - The Call to Holy Living
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Call to Holy Living ROMANS 6.12-14 We ended the last section with a picture of someone moving house, changing from one landlord to another. Let’s extend that a bit, and imagine that I am a smallholder living out in the countryside, about a thousand years ago. My little farm s…
Paul for Everyone Romans part 2 - The Divine Purpose, and Limited Role, of Ruling Authorities