Search Results
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 7 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 7 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 7 1 Samuel 17.[1a, 4-11, 19-23] 32-49 2 Corinthians 6.1-13 Mark 4.35-41 Right from the start in Mark, Jesus is up against it. Tempted by Satan in the wilderness; shrieked at by benighted souls in the synagogue; criticized by the self-appointed religious experts. Now the se…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 8 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 8 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 8 2 Samuel 1.1, 17-27 2 Corinthians 8.7-15 Mark 5.21-43 Mark folds one story inside another, like someone tucking a second letter inside a first. (A Markan sandwich, some say; but food is important within the story itself, so let’s not confuse the issue.) As in 2 Samuel, a…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday Before Advent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Second Sunday Before Advent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday Before Advent Daniel 12.1-3. Hebrews 10.11-25 Mark 13.1-8 All of today’s readings are set against the background of a disintegrating world, and all see that as something joyful. Daniel and Mark seem to be talking about the future, though there is no indication a…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 5 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 5 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 5 Mark 3: 20-35 Gaze on the family of Jesus, his mother Mary and his brothers, worried out of their wits by rumours reaching them high in their mountain home in Nazareth. Not only is Jesus upsetting the authorities, but he’s not even looking after himself. ‘He’ll make hims…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 4 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 4 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 4 Mark 2:23- 3:6 Gaze on a wheat field, glowing under the sun, ready for harvest. The stalks are bowing down almost in prayer, ready for reaping. The field is so full and sturdy and dense that all the footpaths that run across it are hidden. So Jesus walks straight through…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 8 Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Proper 8 Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Proper 8 Mark 5: 21-43 Gaze on a crowd in a big city. Picture the platform at the tube station, where everyone is determined to catch the next train home and they all push and shove. Once on, they stand squashed together unable to breathe, and cannot avoid clinging to each other’…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Christ the King Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Christ the King Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Christ the King John 18: 33-37 Gaze on the gaudy colours of the luxurious Imperial Palace, the wealth of velvet and silk, armour and flags, which decorate the towers and gates that keep the people out. Gaze on the hierarchy of officials and servants, there to make visible the Emp…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Day of Pentecost Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - Day of Pentecost Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
Day of Pentecost John 15.26-27 16.4b-15 Gaze on the disciples at the back of the room, ones we don’t hear much about, Alphaeus or Thaddeus for instance. They’ve long stopped concentrating, and they give each other secret glances of puzzlement. Is it blasphemy to suggest they are …
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Easter Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fourth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Fourth Sunday of Easter John 10.11-18 Gaze on the desolate mountains, the stony ground where sheep must scavenge for food, and the scant grass that only blazed in brief spring. Other dangers abounded, snakes lurked and wolves prowled and threatened the flocks and who was ther…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Fifth Sunday of Easter John 15.1-8 Gaze on a hillside covered in vines, their arms stretched out in rows, the branches clasped and intertwined. The bunches of grapes are pendulous, plump, ready to be picked. It is a glorious evening, and the scent of fruit is on the air. The …
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Trinity Sunday Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Trinity Sunday Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Trinity Sunday Isaiah 6:1-8 Romans 8.12-17 John 3:1-17 John Donne, the great seventeenth-century Anglican poet, said in his Litanie that the doctrine of the Trinity is ‘Bones to Philosophy, but milk to faith’.1 Bones and milk are both provided by today’s readings. The belief that…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday before Advent Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - The Fourth Sunday before Advent Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fourth Sunday Before Advent Deuteronomy 6.1-9 Hebrews 9.11-14 Mark 12. 28-34 Person A: Do I love God? Well, why should I? What’s God ever done for me? I’ve worked hard all my life and nobody’s ever given me a thing. There are people out there born with everything they’ll ever…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Second before Advent Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Second before Advent Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Second Sunday before Advent Mark 13: 1-8 Gaze on the stones that are all that remains of the Temple today. They are huge slabs, glaring in the sun, lying there as a heap of blocks, tilted and abandoned where they fell. It is easy to imagine the massive walls and the moulded c…
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Sixth Sunday of Easter Year B
Gazing on the Gospels Year B - The Sixth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - Judith Dimond
The Sixth Sunday of Easter John 15:9-17 Gaze on a page of the Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript from around ad 800; study the Celtic knots and intricate spirals that adorn it. See the way the threads twist and loop together without end or beginning, how hard it is to unrav…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 21 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 21 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 21 Esther 7.1-6, 9-10 James 5.13-20 Mark 9.38-50 The ancient world was full of stories in which the threatened hero or heroine is rescued at last, and the people who had almost overcome them are condemned instead. David kills Goliath. Homer’s heroes – some of them, anyway …
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 22 Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 22 Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
Proper 22 Job 1.1; 2.1-10 Hebrews 1.1-4; 2.5-12 Mark 10.2-16 Angels are one thing; angels as God’s heavenly council, discussing policy, are another; ‘the Accuser’ (the word ‘Satan’ is a title before it is a proper name) as himself an angel, a celestial Director of Public Prosecut…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - The Fifth Sunday of Easter Year B
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Fifth Sunday of Easter Acts 8.26-40 1 John 4.7-21 John 15.1-8 If you like evangelism, you’ll love Philip’s story. A spirit-led meeting with a court official, who happens to be reading Isaiah 53 and asking the right questions. There is time to converse at leisure; there is wat…
Twelve Months of Sundays Year B - Proper 9 Year B