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Lectionary Reflections Year A - The First Sunday of Christmas Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The First Sunday of Christmas Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Christmas - Year A Isaiah 63:7–9 Hebrews 2:10–18 Matthew 2:13–23 Isaiah and Hebrews show us God’s way of being in the world, a way that should be blindingly obvious to us at Christmas. Isaiah is reminding the people of all that God has done for them throughout…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Third Sunday of Advent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Third Sunday of Advent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Third Sunday of Advent - Year A Isaiah 35:1–10 James 5:7–10 Matthew 11:2–11 In last Sunday’s Gospel reading (Matthew 3. 1–12), John the Baptist arrives to herald the beginning of Jesus’s adult ministry. He is incredibly rude to the people who flock to hear him preach their ju…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Christ the King Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Christ the King Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Sundays Before Advent Christ the King Ezekiel 34.11–16, 20–4 Ephesians 1.15–23 Matthew 25.31–46 Matthew 25 is all about preparedness. First of all, there are the foolish bridesmaids, who ran out of oil and so missed the wedding; then there is the s…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The First Sunday of Advent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The First Sunday of Advent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The First Sunday of Advent - Year A Isaiah 2:1–5 Romans 13:11–14 Matthew 24:36–44 Reflection on the first Sunday in Advent year A In The Magician’s Nephew, one of his Narnia books, C. S. Lewis describes a wood, which the children reach by magic. It is a kind of no-place, which Po…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Second Sunday of Advent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Second Sunday of Advent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday of Advent - Year A Isaiah 11:1-10 Romans 15:4–13 Matthew 3:1–12 Paul’s letter to the Romans is the most formal that he wrote. He is writing to a church that he does not know, and in whose setting up and history he has not played a part. But he is writing as one …
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Fourth Sunday before Advent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Fourth Sunday before Advent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Sundays Before Advent The Fourth Sunday Before Advent Micah 3.5–12 1 Thessalonians 2.9–13 Matthew 24.1–14 ‘That was a really depressing morning,’ said one disciple to another, leaning back in the sparse shade of the olive tree to keep out of the mi…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Fourth Sunday of Advent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Fourth Sunday of Advent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Fourth Sunday of Advent - Year A Isaiah 7:10–16 Romans 1:1–7 Matthew 1:18–25 Why won’t King Ahaz ask God for a sign? The reason he gives sounds like a good religious response, but the tone of the story makes it clear that it isn’t. What he says is ‘I will not put the Lord to …
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - The Second Sunday Before Lent Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
The Second Sunday Before Lent - Year A Genesis 1.1–23 Romans 8.18–25 Matthew 6.25–34 Today’s Gospel reading reminds us how important it is not simply to take all passages of Scripture and apply them directly to ourselves, as though they had no original context and no intervening …
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Christ the King Year C
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Christ the King Year C
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Christ the King Jeremiah 23.1–6 Colossians 1.11–20 Luke 23.33–43 Today’s passages might, on a superficial reading, simply be making the fairly standard point that Christ’s kingship and authority are a challenge to most human understandings of power. That’s a good and important po…
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 24 Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 24 Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Ordinary Time Proper 24 Isaiah 45.1–7 1 Thessalonians 1.1–10 Matthew 22.15–22 The question as weapon is one of the oldest techniques in controversy. You will hear it used to perfection most mornings on the radio. The art is to find the question to …
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 6 Year A
Lectionary Reflections Year A - Proper 6 Year A
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Lectionary reflections - Year A Ordinary Time Proper 6 Exodus 19.2–8a Romans 5.1–8 Matthew 9.35—10.8 Christians know that, through the work of God in Christ, made real to them by the Holy Spirit, the world is a different place. We are, to use Paul’s characteristic phrase, ‘justif…
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 Reflection Year C - Palm Sunday Year C
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Palm Sunday Year C
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Palm Sunday Isaiah 50.4–9a Philippians 2.5–11 Luke 23.1–49 Luke’s account of the trial and death of Jesus revolves around images of judgement, and images of truth and falsehood. At the start of the chapter, one trial – the trial conducted by the chief priests and scribes of Israe…
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Palm Sunday Year B
Lectionary Reflections - Year B - Palm Sunday Year B
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Palm Sunday Isaiah 50.4–9a Philippians 2.5–11 Mark 14.1—15.47 It is as though there are any number of parallel stories in Mark’s account of the trial and death of Jesus. The characters in each story are largely unaware of the others, though they may interact with each other to so…
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Proper 1 Year C
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Proper 1 Year C
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Proper 1 Isaiah 6.1–8 (9–13) 1 Corinthians 15.1–11 Luke 5.1–11 The question of the correct posture for worship – should we sit or should we kneel – is a perennial one. Well, if anything can make us less sedentary, it should be today’s readings. They are none of them conducive to …
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Proper 11 Year C
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Proper 11 Year C
by SPCK - Jane Williams
Proper 11 Genesis 18.1–10a Colossians 1.15–28 Luke 10.38–42 From the beginning, human beings have been image-makers, instinctively, compulsively making sense of their world through imagining it. In lives governed by the harshest necessity just to survive, primitive people still…
Lectionary Reflection Year C - Proper 10 Year C