Sermons

Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost Job 1.1, 2.1-10 Psalm 26 Hebrews 1.1-4, 2.5-12 Mark 10.2-16                                                 ©Suzanne Grimmett Anyone who has raised children may have suffered through the toddler time where suddenly everything seems up for debate. “Why?” asks the three year old…whether that be when asked to brush teeth or put on a jacket or simply as they observe you going about your normal tasks but want to know the reasons for everything. One of the reasons for this is a whole-hearted desire to learn; to know about this wonderful world they are encountering, even when they do not have … Read more

 Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost Proverbs 31:10-31 Psalm1 James 3:1-12 Mark 9:30-37 Sunday 22 September 2024                               ©Lauren Martin The reading from Proverbs 31 begins with the question, who can find a capable wife? With the description of what is a capable wife following this question in Proverbs. It’s no wonder she is not easy to find! Ralph Milton wrote, who would want to be married to such a whirling dervish? She sounds exhausting to be around and somehow able to successfully live without taking any time to care for herself, including time for sleep. At first glance this passage … Read more

Address by Leanne Wood Anglicare Manager for Research, Evaluation and Advocacy Thank you for the invitation to join you today, on Anglicare Sunday. I’ve worked for Anglicare for over a decade, and without a doubt, these have been the most challenging – and satisfying – and – years of my career. They’ve been challenging because day in and day out I’m confronted with the evidence and, via our service delivery staff, the lived reality of much of what is wrong with the world: homelessness, domestic and family violence, poverty. Many of the people Anglicare works with have few channels to … Read more

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost James 1.17-27 Mark 7.1-8, 14-23 1 September 2024                                        ©Suzanne Grimmett The great theologian Paul Tillich described “self-integration” as one of the most basic functions of our life. He is responding to the texts we have in our scriptures and the many words on the lips of Jesus which address hypocrisy. Of all the many different forms hypocrisy can take, I believe religious hypocrisy to be the worst because it has the power to hide what is most profane in the guise of what is most sacred. It takes what is most true and good and … Read more

14th Sunday after PentecostEphesians 6.10-20 John 6.56-69 Sunday 25 August 2024                                  ©Suzanne Grimmett “Pray that I may declare it boldly” says the evangelist in the closing words of this letter to the Ephesians, “as I must speak.” What do you feel so strongly about that you would feel compelled to speak? What are the things that you believe to be so centrally true and vital that they shape the greatest decisions of your life…and would, if you were ever put in such an extreme situation, give you the courage to be imprisoned for, perhaps even die for? It is … Read more

John 6: 51-58 Sunday 18th of August 2024                                        ©Suzanne Grimmett Gandhi once said, “There are so many hungry people in the world that God could only come into the world in the form of food.” In these weeks we have heard over and again from the Gospel of John that Jesus is the bread of life. While we naturally associate the symbols of bread and wine with Eucharist, we need to remember also that the 6th chapter of John’s Gospel begins with the feeding of the five thousand. All of these words about Jesus as bread follow an experience … Read more

Marian Free In the name of God, whose ways are not our ways and whose thoughts are not our thoughts. Amen. I don’t know about you but every now and then I find that I am a little disappointed in God, or at least in the simplistic idea of a ‘fix-it’ God that has somehow remains in my brain – despite all attempts to remove that image.  I am guilty, for example, of wondering why, if we had to have COVID, God didn’t allow some truly awful people to die from it? And there are times, I confess, when I … Read more

                                                ©Suzanne Grimmett Is transformation of the human heart possible? With the rise of fake news, disinformation and the division between people increased through the silos of social media, we might wonder if there is any possibility of people listening to one another again. The reading from the letter to the Ephesians describes the way for us to grow together in Christ as to ‘speak the truth in love’. This could well prompt us to ask in this age, “What is truth?” and at this time we may also wonder, “And where is love in its speaking?” We also know … Read more

Ephesians 3:14-21 John 6: 1-21 Sunday 28 July 2024   ©Suzanne Grimmett What actually is the Good News? The feeding of the five thousand appears in all four Gospels, so that is a clue to how central a story it is to the Jesus tradition. In this narrative of thousands gathering where hunger was met with a miraculous abundance, we may imagine that the crowd encountered very good news indeed. It is the kind of hope that we hear in the beautiful blessing from the letter to the Ephesians (in a slightly different translation); that God, who can do infinitely more … Read more

9th Sunday After Pentecost 2024 ©The Rev’d Dr John Rolley +In the Name of God, Loving Creator, Compassionate Christ, and the Healing Spirit. Amen. I would like to commence with a poem from Malcolm Guite, an Anglican priest/poet titled, Christ among the refugees. That fearful road of weariness and want, Through unforgiving heat and hate, ends here; We narrow sand-blown eyes to scan this scant And tented city outside Syria. He fled with us when everything was wrecked As Nazarene was blazoned on our door, Walked with the damaged and the derelict To where these tents are ranked and massed, … Read more

2 Samuel 5.1-5, 9-10 Psalm 48 2 Corinthians 12.2-10 Mark 6.1-13Sunday 7th July 2024                   ©Suzanne Grimmett “I am the patron saint of mediocrity” says the character of Antonio Salieri in the 1984 movie, Amadeus, afictionalised biography of Mozart. Salieri as created in the screenplay is a man of some musical talent, but whose real genius lies in perceiving genius, and he is awe-struck by the prodigy that is Mozart. The character of Salieri complains to God that he has only been given ‘the ability to recognise the incarnation’ and not the ability to create that same beauty himself. Woody … Read more

Today we have two stories, that although different, are both equally horrifying. In the story of David and Goliath, we hear how David will cut off Goliath’s head and how they will leave the bodies of the Philistine army for animals to scavenge, ‘so that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.’[1] The Psalm also contains this theme of sacred violence as proof of God’s favour. This Psalm attributed to David portrays his cause as righteous with his enemies, who conveniently also happen to be God’s enemies. How do we look at these texts?