Colourful Dreamer

This sermon can be listened to here   Gate Pa – 22 August 2021 in Level 4 Lockdown 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time Readings: Psalm                          Psalm 84                                                                  First Reading:              1 Kings 8:22-30, 41-43   Second Reading:        Ephesians 6:10-20         Gospel:          ...

What a week it has been, overseas and here. Covid has sniffed the edges and kept us a little anxious for a while. And now she is back in our midst, reshaping our lives once again. For now, we hunker down, wear our masks, wash our hands, stay safe, and wait. For the last five Sundays we have circled around Jesus “the bread of life”.   It began on a Passover with Jesus feeding the 5000 in an outrageous act of uncalled for generosity. This whole section is set at Passover – the foundational celebration of God’s liberation of these once slaves – with the hope of liberation from all current oppressors with the ultimate hope of liberation for all people and all creation. We have slowly walked from there to this week’s reading, circling around and reworking this story of feeding so many and God’s feeding mana in the desert. It culminates with “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats (gnaws at) this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give fo...

Week five of some very heavy theology about Jesus – Christology. It all began with Jesus feeding a very large crowd at Passover, and they wanted more. And Jesus begins making sense of that for them using the exodus, and the mana which God gave to God’s newly liberated and grumpy people. He interprets his action with God’s generosity in the wilderness, while those people learnt how to live with God in their midst, and how to live God’s liberation and generosity for all. But now Jesus is taking them and us deeper. It feels complex and convoluted. How are we to understand “I assure you, unless you eat the flesh of the Human One and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” [1] It’s hard and tricky and a little uncomfortable. It began way back in chapter 1. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…. Everything came into being through the Word, and without the Word nothing came into being. What came into being through the Word was life, and the l...

This sermon can be listened to here   Gate Pa – August 8 2021 Readings: Hebrew Scripture:           2 Samuel 18: 5-9, 15, 31-33 Psalm:                              130 Epistle:                            Ephesians 4: 25-5:2           Gospel:                            John 6: 35, 41-51               What I want to say: Note Friday Hiroshima Peace Memorial Ceremony– acknowledge brutality and cost of western war machine Parts Aust...