Colourful Dreamer

This Sunday marks the final day of this year’s Season of Creation, and we read this well-known and deeply troubling gospel story (Matthew 21:33-46). Bad tenants doing bad things to the landowner’s slaves who came for the rent. And then they kill the son. All a great metaphor for what was about to happen to Jesus and the Jews. All the bad people get what they deserve in the end. Stories like this have left us   “Gentile Christians” feeling smug and have been used to justify horrendous violence against our Jewish brothers and sisters. Maybe we need to put the story back and ask where we are in the story. Jesus came to Jerusalem and caused a stir in the Temple. The next day he returns, cursing a non-fruit bearing fig tree on the way. The Chief Priests and leading Pharisees ask, “Show us your credentials. Who authorized you to teach here?” These are the Judean elite who are profiting from their alliance with Rome. This is the third part of Jesus’ response. Talking to these absentee l...

  “Show us your credentials. Who authorized you to teach here? Who gave you permission to cause this ruckus” Big questions that keep coming up. Moses faced it in the wilderness. Paul faced it repeatedly due to his radical ideas. He claimed his authority came from the risen Christ. Jesus pointed to his faithfulness to God, whose own authority rests on the covenants to restore humanity and renew creation. True authority is found in actions. Matthews’s gospel as a whole and this week’s reading in particular is all about these questions. In telling this story Matthew wanted to show both where Jesus’ authority came from and the nature of that authority. To put this week’s reading back, Jesus has arrived in Jerusalem and has already tipped over tables. Next day he is back in the temple, having grumpily dried up a non-fruit bearing fig tree. He is at once confronted by the wealthy, entitled elite religious leaders who used religion to justify their wealth while abandoning their responsi...

Over the last few weeks, we have heard Jesus teach his disciples, Matthew’s community, and us, how to hold good community together. When asked by his disciples “who the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven”   Jesus responds by placing a child in their midst. It was not about their status. Instead Jesus reminded them that good community places the most vulnerable—like children, the marginalized, and those named in the Beatitudes —at its very centre. Good community has a common story that holds it together and gives it purpose. It is built on God’s deep love seen in the Exodus story and lived out in Jesus. Good community is not about us, but us living God’s deep love for creation and all who share this home with us. Last week in the gospel reading Jesus taught that true community is about mirroring heaven on earth through common purpose, deep commitment to each other, as Paul’s letter to the Romans, and the honesty required to face conflict. . Matthew 18:18 is often read to mean that wh...

Last Tuesday was ‘The Feast of Creation in Christ’, an Eastern Orthodox gift . This has long marked the beginning of their new liturgical year, commemorating the great mystery that everything was created through Christ . In 1989 the Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios I offered this day to the wider church as a Day of Prayer for Creation. The World Council of Churches has since extended this celebration to October 4th, the Feast Day of St. Francis of Assisi in what is now known as The Season of Creation. This ecumenical season calls us as followers of Christ worldwide to reflect on our common role as caretakers of God’s creation, to see that our wellbeing is interwoven with its wellbeing, and to unite in prayer and action to care for our common home. The theme for 2026 is "Living Water"  and is inspired by Ezekiel’s vision of a life-giving river flowing from God , urging us to focus on ecological healing, hope, and the deep interdependence of humanity and nature.   Thi...

One of the names given to Jesus at time is Jesus our Liberator. This is a sermon/reflection based on the gospel reading ( Matthew 16:21-28 )  for this Sunday - 22nd in Ordinary Time where I put that reading back in the whole gospel.    W hat we are liberated from and what we might be liberated into The Sermon     1.      Matt’s Jesus Story Previously on Matt’s Jesus Story Jesus is born in Bethlehem -         City of David -         Of the line of David o    King and liberator Family forced to flee to Egypt in face Herod the Great’s paranoia -         Where God liberated the people from slavery through Moses When they return at Herod the Great’s death Take no chances and go to small village in Galilee -Nazareth -         Jesus grows up   Much later Baptised by John Baptise...