Sermon: The Beatitudes. Part 1

Sermon for Lancefield Uniting Church

The Fourth Sunday of Epiphany, 30^th of January 2011

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Matthew 5:1-12

Today, as we continue our Epiphany journey through Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, we hear one of my favourite descriptions of what it is that we’re on about in the church: “For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1 Cor 1:22-24). That’s a perfect description of today’s gospel reading, because today the lectionary takes us to the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, and the foolishness and the wisdom of the beatitudes.

Sermon: “I belong to Christ”

Sermon for Romsey/Lancefield

23^rd of January, 2011

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

In last week’s reading from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, Paul started his epistle on an extremely positive note: “I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind … so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ.”[1]

A day in Charlton

I spent yesterday in Charlton, halfway between Melbourne and Mildura, two and a half hours north of where I live in the Macedon Ranges. The water has receded, leaving mud over everything, with tide marks on the walls showing how far the flood climbed. Furniture sits outside houses: in the garden if there’s a chance of it being dried out and used again; on the nature strip if it’s ruined. Trucks constantly circle the streets collecting the rubbish.

Sermon: Being the (Uniting) Church

Sermon for transfer of Kyneton to Port Phillip West Presbytery

16^th of January 2011

Isaiah 49:1-7
1 Corinthians 1:1-9

It’s a rather strange service, this, a service to transfer the oversight of a congregation from one presbytery to another. It might seem more of a bureaucratic matter than a theological or liturgical one, but as Andrew Dutney once wrote, it doesn’t matter: “whether we are together to worship, to study or to make decisions about property and finance … we just are the New Testament church”.[1]