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1 and 2 Kings for Everyone - Will God Really Dwell on Earth?
1 and 2 Kings for Everyone - Will God Really Dwell on Earth?
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Will God Really Dwell on Earth? 1 Kings 8:10-30 An hour or two ago I was sitting not at my desk, as I am now, but in my recliner chair, where I start off the day with my coffee, reading the Bible just for my own benefit and praying for people, and I sometimes picture God sitting …
Exodus and Leviticus - You Know the Feelings of an Alien
Exodus and Leviticus - You Know the Feelings of an Alien
by SPCK - John Goldingay
You Know the Feelings of an Alien EXODUS 22: 15- 23: 19 There are aliens who freely choose to live in a foreign country, and there are aliens who felt they were driven to do so (and then there are the aliens who come on spaceships). I am an alien and that occasionally causes me a…
1 and 2 Samuel for Everyone - You Can't Mess with the Covenant Chest
1 and 2 Samuel for Everyone - You Can't Mess with the Covenant Chest
by SPCK - John Goldingay
You Can’t Mess with the Covenant Chest 1 Samuel 5: 1- 7: 1 When I used to read Bible stories to my young sons, they would sometimes ask, “Did that really happen?” As far as I remember, they did not ask that question about big events like the Israelites’ crossing of the Reed Sea (…
John for Everyone part 2 - The Spirit and the World
John for Everyone part 2 - The Spirit and the World
by SPCK - N T Wright
The Spirit and the World John 16.1-11 I once saw a film based on one of Charles Dickens’s novels. The film was about poverty and the degrading effect it has on people. One of the most depressing scenes was in a lawyer’s office, as the relatives of a man imprisoned for debt were d…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Citizens of Heaven
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Citizens of Heaven
by SPCK - N T Wright
Citizens of Heaven Philippians 3.17-4.1 The word ‘colony’ today is not exactly popular. It rings of the old days of imperialism, when several European countries were expanding their influence in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and were vying with each other to see who could grab …
Paul for Everyone Romans part 2 - Commending Phoebe, Greeting Friends
Paul for Everyone Romans part 2 - Commending Phoebe, Greeting Friends
by SPCK - N T Wright
Commending Phoebe, Greeting Friends ROMANS 16.1-16 A farmer in the English Midlands was ploughing a field when the plough struck a solid object. Thinking it was a large rock, he stopped to move it. But it wasn’t a rock. It was an ancient chest, dating (so the museum told him when…
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Children of the Light
Paul for Everyone: Galatians and Thessalonians - Children of the Light
by SPCK - N T Wright
Children of the Light Thessalonians 5.1-11 The story is told of a minister who dreamed that he was preaching a sermon, and woke up to find it was true. One can hardly imagine that happening to St Paul – although there is the famous story of the lad who nodded off during one of Pa…
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Closing Thanks and Greetings
Paul for Everyone The Prison Letters - Closing Thanks and Greetings
by SPCK - N T Wright
Closing Thanks and Greetings Philippians 4.14-23 Sometimes when you get to the end of a novel or short story, there is a moment when something is revealed that makes sense of a mood, a motive, a feeling that has been in the narrative all along. At last we understand why that man …
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Confusion in Lystra
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Confusion in Lystra
by SPCK - N T Wright
Confusion in LystraActs 14. 8-20 I have a sneaking sympathy for the medical profession. Two or three generations ago, everybody knew that there were all kinds of diseases that the doctors couldn’t cure. They would do their best with what was available. They would offer sympathy…
The Pastoral Letters - Continue in the Scriptures
The Pastoral Letters - Continue in the Scriptures
by SPCK - N T Wright
Continue in the Scriptures! 2Timothy 3.10-17 There was once an American professor who went for a year to Oxford as a visiting academic. When he and his wife arrived, they were looking round one of the older parts of the college of which he was to be a member. Amid what appeared t…
Matthew for Everyone Part 2 - Condemnation of Scribes and Pharisees
Matthew for Everyone Part 2 - Condemnation of Scribes and Pharisees
by SPCK - N T Wright
Condemnation of Scribes and Pharisees (1) Matthew 23.13-22 I once preached a sermon in a church in America. I spoke particularly of the way in which the ancient pagan gods and goddesses were starting to infiltrate our culture once more, and how as Christians we should learn to re…
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Contend for the Faith
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Contend for the Faith
by SPCK - N T Wright
Contend for the Faith Judah 1-4 In my teens and my early twenties, one of my passions was rock-climbing. I wouldn’t say I was an utterly fearless climber; I had a proper respect for danger, and didn’t try to do things which were too far outside my competence. But I relished the c…
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Confirm Your Call
Early Christian Letters for Everyone - Confirm Your Call
by SPCK - N T Wright
Confirm Your Call! 2 Peter 1.1-11 My grandson, aged one and a half, was taken the other day into a big toyshop. It was a riot of exciting things, all in bright colours. From floor to ceiling, from one end of the shop to the other, and all over the tables and stands in the middle,…
Hebrews for Everyone - Danger! God's Word at Work
Hebrews for Everyone - Danger! God's Word at Work
by SPCK - N T Wright
Danger! God’s Word at Work Hebrews 4.11-13 I washed the kitchen knife, put it down for a moment and then picked it up to dry it. As I did so, I felt what seemed like a slight tickle at the end of one finger. I looked down, and to my surprise and alarm saw blood spurting out of a …
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Bring on the Barristers
Acts for Everyone Part 2 - Bring on the Barristers
by SPCK - N T Wright
Bring on the Barristers Acts 24.1-9 Jokes about lawyers are unkind, ungrateful, uncharitable – and often uncannily accurate. I remember listening in horror as a clever and unscrupulous young lawyer, in a meeting of a college governing body, constructed a rhetorically powerful arg…
2 Corinthians - Boasting of Weaknesses
2 Corinthians - Boasting of Weaknesses
by SPCK - N T Wright
Boasting of Weaknesses 2 CORINTHIANS 11.21b-33 You can see the war memorial from the other side of the valley. It stands on the slope just below the main school buildings, a simple but elegant cloister of grey stone, containing the names of boys from the school who died in the gr…
John for Everyone Part 1 - Children of Abraham - Or of the Devil
John for Everyone Part 1 - Children of Abraham - Or of the Devil
by SPCK - N T Wright
Children of Abraham – Or of the Devil John 8.37-47 The famous psychologist Carl Jung published, among his many works, a picture-book illustrating the main points of his thought about the strange ways in which the human mind works. One of the most striking pages is a picture of Ad…
2 Corinthians - Boasting in The Lord