Filter menu

Sort

Sermon Trinity Sunday 2025 15th June 2025
So today is Trinity Sunday, the day all ministers try and explain the Trinity! Yet, trying to do that can mean that we start thinking about the Trinity being this separate entity in itself! I think instead of focusing on the concept of the Trinity, we should think of today maybe as know God better Sunday. So let’s think about how we can know God better. One of the ways is by reading scripture. Through it, we read the stories of God’s relationship with us and in the New Testament we have the significant acts of God through his Son Jesus Christ.

In Luke’s gospel we learn how God became incarnate of the Virgin Mary and humbled himself by becoming human. Through this miracle God draws us into relationship with him, so that we can relate and understand God’s love for us through human relationships.

Each gospel tells the story of Easter, how Jesus Christ set us free from sin by sacrificing himself on the cross. The gospels tell us the intimate details of his last moments on earth being both human and divine and how only God could die and suffer and yet be resurrected fully.

Last week was Pentecost, where the book of Acts describes how the Holy Spirit came among the disciples, this helps us to understand that the Holy Spirit has and is always among us.

Yet this Sunday is not a specific story in the bible or a book, it is fully dedicated to understanding our experience as a Christian community of who God is.

Throughout the New Testament, the idea of the Trinity is hinted at. This morning’s reading from Romans talks of God the Father whose grace we have obtained through our Lord Jesus Christ and how God’s love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

It is not just in the New Testament that God is talked about in different ways and having different characters. In this morning’s reading from Proverbs chapter 8 verse 27 onwards, ‘When he established the heavens, I was there, when he drew a circle on the face of the deep, 28 when he made firm the skies above, when he established the fountains of the deep, 29 when he assigned to the sea its limit, so that the waters might not transgress his command, when he marked out the foundations of the earth, 30 then I was beside him, like a master worker; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing before him always, 31rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race.

From a Christian perspective this reading can be seen to be referring to the Holy Spirit, rejoicing in the inhabited world and delighting in us, God’s children.

To help the early Christian community to understand how God could be human yet divine, many discussions and debates took place until the meeting at Nicaea in the year 325AD, which brought about the Nicene Creed.

We believe in one God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is seen and unseen.

God is the Father who is our creator and the creator of everything.

We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ the only son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made.

I like this part of the creed and the way it describes Jesus. Jesus was divine yet human, who came on earth through the miracle of the incarnation of the Virgin Mary and lived among us as a human. He suffered for us on the cross as a human yet was resurrected and redeemed us from our sins through his divinity.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.

The Spirit of truth who is with us and has been with us from the beginning and sustains us.

Rather than seeing the Trinity as some puzzle that needs solving so that we can comprehend God, we need to think about the Trinity as the way God is in relationship with us. He is in relationship with us like a Father or Mother are, watching over us and guiding us without controlling our lives. God is Jesus, a God that loved us so much that he came down from heaven humbling himself, not just to be with us, but to experience what it is to be human and then sacrifice himself for our sins. God is the Holy Spirit; she has been among us from the beginning and continues to be with us enabling us to feel God’s presence with us.

Scripture is our human testimony of God; it is people speaking of what they know and have experienced of God on earth.

Throughout scripture the nature of God is described for us, so we can understand God more fully. If God was completely understandable then God would no longer be God.

I understand the need to use analogies or ice cubes or fidgets to help children understand how God can be three but still one, but I think instead of seeing Trinity Sunday as a puzzle that we need to figure out, we should see this Sunday as know God better Sunday, or maybe even God is here Sunday.

Cynthia Rigby said in her book Holding Faith that, the doctrine of the Trinity undoes any concept of God that keeps God and creation at a distance from us. Instead, the Christian confession that God is Triune invites us to participate in the beautiful dance of God's actions in the world. (Page 20 Holding Faith, Cynthia L. Rigby)

The Bible shares the testimonies of people describing how much God loves us and wants to be in relationship with us. The triune aspects of God bring us on a journey of relationship between God and God's people that help us understand more fully the nature of God. God meets us and claims us and is with us as all aspects of the Triune God, not to confuse us or make God more complicated, but actually to make God more knowable and understandable.

&nbsp;So on this know God better Sunday, let us give thanks for God, Father, Mother, Jesus, Holy Spirit, creator, redeemer and sustainer.

Amen

Stained glass window depicting religious scene with many figures.

St Mary Church, Banbury

Sermon Trinity Sunday 2025 15th June 2025

So today is Trinity Sunday, the day all ministers try and explain the Trinity! Yet, trying to do that can mean that we start thinking about the Trinity being this separate entity in itself! I think instea...

Sermon Trinity Sunday 2025 15th June 2025

Pentecost 8th June 2025

&nbsp;Acts 2. 1-21 Day of Pentecost
Gospel John 14. 8-17

&nbsp;

Living God, Take these all too human words and anoint them with your Spirit so that in their hearing we may each encounter the living Word, Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray.

&nbsp;

What a selection of texts we have today. It’s overwhelming. It’s hard to know where to begin. One of the challenges with this selection is sometimes we leave talk of the Spirit to days like Pentecost and the preacher feels they have to say it all in one go. That would not be possible or helpful.

&nbsp;

There is a prior question, though, why don’t we talk about the Spirit more? Sure, we make reference to it frequently but why don’t we talk about who the Spirit is or what the Spirit does as much as Jesus?

&nbsp;

There could be lots of reasons for this, but I think one of the main ones is that the church has always had a bit of an uneasy relationship with the Spirit. Concepts like Father and Son are easy for us to compute – but Spirit, which in Greek means wind – is much less tangible or less obviously relational. It evokes a sense of freedom and newness which is hard to pin down.

&nbsp;

How to gender the Spirit has also been difficult. Often the Spirit is given female pronouns, but some feminist theologians have argued that this reinforces the maleness of the father, and of course Jesus, over and against and leaves us with two blokes and a bird. They argue for a more fluid recognition that there is no gender in God, God is Father and Mother. There is a strong medieval tradition of talking of Jesus as a mother also. Much more could be said about this, but the point is the Spirit doesn’t fit our categories as easily.

&nbsp;

Throughout the history of the church, the Spirit has often been a cause of controversy. The sense of freedom and newness means talk of the Spirit can be vulnerable to nefarious claims for new action by God, which are harmful. There have been numerous heresies declared in the name of the Spirit.

&nbsp;

This speaks to the fragility of discernment but this freedom, this risk, is also fundamental to what is to be church. Without the newness and freshness of the Spirit the church would be a historical reenactment society, we’ve got the fancy dress box for it for sure. And the bible would become a rule book to be copied out to the letter in every situation, regardless of relevance – is this sounding familiar?

&nbsp;

It is the freshness wind of the Spirit that keeps the church alive and gives it breath fresh life. It’s what makes it possible for God to say something new. But this new thing must be consistent with the Gospel, the Gospel of Christ, the Gospel of love, if it is to be truly of the Spirit. The Spirit is, most fundamentally, the Spirit of Christ. So, if a claim contradicts what we know to be true of Jesus then it is not of the Spirit. However, we can still be challenged as to whether we’ve understood Jesus by what the Spirit is saying or doing – do you see the challenge?

&nbsp;

In our Gospel passage, Jesus talks about going away but that the Father will send another, the Spirit of truth, who will be – the Greek word is Paraclete. This is sometimes translated as comforter, sometimes as advocate, helper or intercessor. The Spirit fulfils the same role Jesus did in his earthly ministry – the Spirit is God close to us, with us, closer to us than we even are to ourselves. Again, without this, Jesus is gone, and the Bible is about the past. The presence of the Spirit means God is with us and the pages of the Bible breathe, they are about today and tomorrow as much as about the past.

&nbsp;

We see in our reading from Acts that what the Spirit does it does publicly – as Jesus did. This is not the private spirituality of the modern imagination. This is not spiritual but not religious. It’s free and open but it’s a fresh interpreter of a tradition, a way of life – the way of the people of God. It adopts people into that family as Paul says in our Romans passage.

&nbsp;

Our Acts passage is one of the most famous passages in the New Testament and the whole bible. Unlike John, it doesn’t tell us who the Spirit is, it shows us what the Spirit does. The whole passage is an echo and inversion of the Tower of Babel story from Genesis 11. This time, multiple languages do not bring confusion, instead, diversity brings unity within the Spirit.

&nbsp;

People could hear the good news for themselves in their own culture. They didn’t have to give up who they are to hear from God or become Children of God. This is the fulfilment of Joel 2:28-29. It’s a barrier-breaking moment, God spoken through whatever language was necessary to communicate the good news. There is obviously a lesson here about our own assumptions about where and how God speaks and to whom. We all have biases after all. A clear implication of this passage is that differences of culture or ethnicity, or indeed other types of human difference, are no obstacle or barrier to God and are actively embraced by God. And this again is another reason why the Spirit has sometimes been perceived as threatening and shied away from in the Church. The ‘Spirit blows the B&hellip;.. doors off’ and interrogates who we think are in and out.

&nbsp;

There is a kids’ song that goes, Our God is a great big God&hellip;’ It’s always bothered me because God obviously has no physical mass. God is neither Big nor small. God is close. But beyond that pedantry, it makes God sound scary – a great big God might be a bully. But our God is a dangerous God and a surprising God. Our world is turned upside down, we may end up doing what we least expect – a few weeks ago, we heard how God sent Anais to break bread with Paul, who was a persecutor and enemy of Christ and the Church. What we know is that we don’t know where the Spirit will lead, and nothing is out of bounds – so our only choice is to get comfortable with uncertainty and to pray for courage to follow.

&nbsp;

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,

Amen

Sunset viewed from airplane window with clouds below

Pentecost 8th June 2025

Acts 2. 1-21 Day of Pentecost

Gospel John 14. 8-17



Living God, Take these all too human words and anoint them with your Spirit so that in their hearing we may each encounter the living Word, Jesus Christ, in whose name...

Pentecost 8th June 2025

Sermon Easter Sunday 2025
Acts 10. 34-43 summery of Jesus’ death and resurrection

John 20. 1-8 Mary Magdalen discovers Jesus, and he says her name

Lent course diving deeply into Baptism

God calls us.
Over lent we have been exploring baptism and what that means to us as Christians. We are each on our own journey of faith with God. For some that might look like coming to church most Sundays and being part of a Christian community. For others, their journey of faith may have meant a time away from being part of a community of faith or never having been part of one at all. However often something inside will draw us back to God. As Augustine says, our hearts are wrestles until they find their rest in you.

During our Lent course we have been considering earth, water, wind and fire and how these elements relate to us as God’s children. On Ash Wednesday the cross of ash is put on our foreheads and the pray ‘you are dust and to dust you shall return, turn away from sin and stay faithful to Christ,’ is said. We are all created from the dust of the earth and through baptism our sins are washed away by water. We are putting an end to our sinful selves and accepting the life that God wishes us to have. A life where we are sustained by God’s living water shared with us by the working of the Holy Spirit. The work of the Spirit moves among us like the wind that blows. Sometimes it is a gentle breeze and at other times is a strong wind that encourages us to move one way or the other. When we listen to the spirit, sometimes we will feel the warmth of its fire within us, sustaining us in our conviction of God’s call on our lives. The fire that is within us is not so strong that we will be consumed by it, like the burning bush that Moses saw is not consumed, but the fire will give us the strength to do the will of God.

On Easter Day as we celebrate Jesus being raised from death to new life, we have an opportunity to each be raised from our sinful lives into a new life with Christ. We renew our baptism promises and are reminded of Jesus life giving water and pray that this will sustain us throughout the year. As Christians we know what joy comes from our belief in God and how Jesus’ life and resurrection saves us from the death of sin and brings us to new life. However, for others to experience this joy takes courage and a leap of faith. It takes someone to listen to that still small voice within them but also to be welcomed into a community of faith. As disciples of Christ, we are called to share the good news of Jesus’ life and death with others and to welcome all who come wanting to know more about Jesus and God. This is one of the reasons why here at St Mary’s we are trying to open this building more often, to offer people the opportunity to come into this place. To see the story of God in the stained-glass windows, to see the people of faith in this building helping and supporting people. Being part of a community of faith brings a sense of belonging and support, but to those who aren’t part of that community, it can make people feel excluded and unsure. If we think about the language of our services, they clearly talk to those who are already members of the family of God. This is why offering other opportunities to come into this space and feel welcomed are so important.

I was talking to another priest recently and they said that they loved the secret language that we have as Christians that develops over time. I do understand what they meant, when you get into a habit of talking to God, reading scripture and worship you become familiar with the language that other Christian’s use. However, I challenged them and said that I felt it was this that sometimes made people not feel welcome. We can easily slip into patterns of behaviour where we assume everyone knows what’s happening, or what is being said, when actually the opposite is true.

When Jesus gathered his disciples around him, he didn’t ask people who were Pharisees or scribes to follow him, he asked tax collectors and fishermen. Each of us, no matter how long we have been a Christian, or whether we profess not to be a Christian, is of infinite value to a Christian community. We need to be open and welcoming enough to enable all voices to be heard and valued. How can we share the good news of the gospels afresh for each person who comes into this place? The answer is within you. What is the Holy Spirit whispering or maybe even shouting at you to do to share Jesus’ story?

Today, we are celebrating that Jesus lived and ministered to all people, that he welcomed the marginalised and unappreciated to be his followers. That he opened his arms of love and died for them and for all of us on the Cross and finally that he defeated death and rose to new life. Let us as God’s children recognise that we are all made equally in the image of God and ask God how we can help others come to know more about Jesus Christ. Let us all listen to that still small voice within each of us, no matter whether we come to church ever Sunday or have never been before. Is that voice warming your heart and kindling a flame within you? Let us have hope that on this Easter Day our sins are washed away by the ever-living water that Jesus brought to us through his life. Let us have courage and trust that God is here among us and welcomes us all to his table.

&nbsp;

Amen

Sermon Easter Sunday 2025

Acts 10. 34-43 summery of Jesus’ death and resurrection

John 20. 1-8 Mary Magdalen discovers Jesus, and he says her name

Lent course diving deeply into Baptism

God calls us.

Over lent we have been exploring baptism a...

Sermon Easter Sunday 2025

Maundy Thursday sermon 2025
Exodus 12. 1-4, 11-14 Passover

Psalm 116 1, 10 end

1 Corinthians 11. 23-26 explanation of the last supper

John 13. 1-17, 31b-35 Washing of the disciples feet and last supper

Atonement

Our first reading this evening is from Exodus. The story of the Passover. I have always found this story difficult to hear. I remember watching a feature film about the exodus and the angel of death is depicted as this black mass that drifts over each household in Egypt and you then hear the cries from people as the first born son is discovered to be dead. It is quite brutal, and I have often struggled to relate to a God who would kill. Yet, over Holy Week we are recalling Jesus’ last moments on earth and his death, which we must assume was the will of God.&nbsp; The idea of Jesus’ death atoning for our sins is a big question but central to our faith as Christians. Did Jesus have to die? What was the purpose of his death?

Throughout scripture we read how God is trying to establish a good relationship with us, his children. We were created as beings with free will and choice. At the beginning God said to Adam and Eve not to eat from the tree of Knowledge, yet they chose to disobey and broke the relationship between God and his children. From then onwards God has been journeying with us trying to help us restore our relationship back to God. Yet how can we do that when we turn away from God? If you think about all the main stories in the Old Testament, they are all about us turning away from God in some way or other God trying to help us back or in other words God saving us. We cannot bring God’s Kingdom on earth on our own, we need God’s help and salvation.

In our gospel reading this evening, Jesus and his disciples are together celebrating Passover. They are celebrating that they as Jewish people, were Passed over by the angel of death and saved by the blood of a lamb. They obeyed God’s instructions upon them and were saved, not just from death but also from slavery. God intervened and saved them from death and slavery and brought them to a promised land. This story of the Jews being saved from slavery is our story too. Without God, we are slaves to the evil in our world, the evil of greed and injustice, selfishness and all manners of evils that bring pain and suffering to ourselves and to others. We need God not only to help us see and understand these evils but also to avoid being tempted by them. We need God’s strength, and the work of the Holy Spirt to deliver us from evil and help us see that sometimes following the will of God is not the easiest path. The Israelites wondered in the dessert for forty years, not because they were lost, but because they didn’t always follow the will of God. Mistakes happened along the way, which meant the path to the promised land wasn’t straight forward.

Just as the journey to the promised land is not straight forward, neither is understanding why Jesus died on the cross. For the early church, debates raged, and councils met to decide on WHO Jesus was, how he could be both human and divine. Yet even though councils created The Apostles Creed so that we had a clear affirmation of faith, yet the question of WHY Jesus had to die is not something that has not actually been clearly decided. For centuries the question of why Jesus came on earth, what is he saving us from and for who, have been debated and through these debates, the term atonement has evolved. Atonement or at onement, describes how our separation from God when we turn away from him is reconciled. How we are brought back to God. But the theory behind how we are reconciled to God is not one straightforward idea, it has evolved into different atonement theories, three of which have emerged as the most prominent. However, a sermon is not the space to give a detailed account of each atonement theory, so we are just going to explore some of the themes of salvation which lead to Jesus’ death on the cross.&nbsp;

One clear theme of Salvation is the idea of the sacrificial lamb. Throughout scripture there are stories of the lamb being sacrificed for our sins. In Genesis 22, God tests Abraham’s faith by commanding him to sacrifice his only son Isaac and only at the last minute intervenes by providing a ram to be sacrificed as a burnt offering. Then we have the Passover story in Exodus where the blood of the lamb saves them from the angel of death. It would therefore seem to be obvious that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb that takes away our sins. It is what we say as part of our Eucharist services, so isn’t this therefore what we believe? Well, yes but also no. The problem with solely believing that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb is that we begin to have to question God. Can God not forgive us unless his only son is killed? How can we believe in a loving God who required the death of his son to appease him in some way? Was the only purpose of Jesus’ life to die on the cross for us? If Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross is not the only thing that helped us be reconciled to God, we must also consider Jesus’ life. The Orthodox church, believe that the act of the incarnation, God becoming human, is the act of salvation. God being in relationship with us and experiencing all aspects of life, pain and death, is how we are reconciled back to God. God loves us so much that he wants to be with us and Jesus represents us and obeys the will of God, even if it leads to death. However, believing that Jesus’ life and experience is enough to reconcile us back to God, does not acknowledge the depths of our sins. We are not capable of being reconciled to God on our own, just by following Jesus’ good example, we need something more. Some theologians such as Luther and Wesley, believed at the fall, Satan entered the snake that led to the broken relationship between us and God. Since then, God and the forces of Satan have been at war. Jesus opposes the forces of evil during his life but at his death he is defeated by Satan. However, when Jesus is resurrected from death, he brings the ultimate victory and defeat upon Satan. We cannot defeat evil on our own, we need Jesus to intervene for us to defeat the power of sin in the world. The problem with solely believing that Jesus was victorious over Satan, gives the idea that there was a possibility that God could have been defeated, which would make Satan on a par with God.

So, as we can see, the atonement or our ability to being reconciled to God is not straightforward, there are many themes around our salvation and reconciliation to God to consider when thinking why Jesus came to live among us and die on the cross. On this Maundy Thursday as we experience Jesus’ last moments with his disciples, it is good to ponder why Jesus lived on earth, died on the cross and was raised to new life on Easter Day. You might want to consider how you feel reconciled to God. What aspect of Jesus’ saving grace given to us through his life, death and resurrection draws you to having a closer relationship with God?

(The sacrifice of God is a broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart, God will not despise.)

&nbsp;

Amen

A stone sculpture of a bearded man carrying a cross.

Maundy Thursday sermon 2025

Exodus 12. 1-4, 11-14 Passover

Psalm 116 1, 10 end

1 Corinthians 11. 23-26 explanation of the last supper

John 13. 1-17, 31b-35 Washing of the disciples feet and last supper

Atonement

Our first reading this evenin...