Posts

Showing posts from February, 2018

The Full Measure

Image
Sermon for the London Diocesan Senior Staff  26 February 2018 Readings:  Daniel 9:4-10 ; Luke 6:36-38 The church  of which I am Rector in the city of London uses only the Book of Common Prayer of 1662. This has reacquainted me with the regular use of the rite which I knew in my youth. It is famous for his bloodcurdling confessions. We are to “acknowledging and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness.” And to acknowledge that we have “offended against thine holy laws, done those things which we ought not have done”, and to recognise that that “there is no help in us.”  In this Cranmer is channelling Daniel who, in the context of the exile of the people into Babylon was clear that the cause of punishment was the failure of righteousness, treason against God, sin. Daniel’s lengthy prayer, a portion of which we had for our first reading this morning, cries out to God in sorrow and penitence. All good stuff for Lent. The Altar S Andrew by the Wardrobe Should we accuse ou

The Sign of Jonah

Image
Sermon at the Licencing of Andrew Tyler as the Director of the S Marylebone Healing & Counselling Centre Sickness not a punishment for sin Jonah was sent to the great city of Nineveh to call it to repentance and to bring it healing from sin. We have it on the authority of the Lord himself that sickness is not a punishment for sin. Remember the man born blind, and the crowds asked him “who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind?” And Jesus replied that he was blind not because of his sin, nor the sin of his parents but in order that the glory of God might be revealed in him. S Marylebone Parish Church Called to reveal the glory of the Lord All of us, in sickness and in health, are called to be those in whom of the glory of the Lord is revealed. For that glory to be revealed in Jonah, he had to be cured of his disinclination to do the will of God, of his fear, and as we know, also of his self-righteousness. We all know the story. Jonah tried to run