Category Archives: The mission of Jesus Christ

This is the last of a series of sermons on the mission of Jesus Christ. Scroll down to start with the first one.

Today’s readings emphasise very much that Christ’s death and resurrection are events which are meant to involve us. They aren’t just done on our behalf so that we can sit back and read about them. But they’re supposed to turn our lives inside out and get us doing things in a new way. We can’t truly appreciate them from the armchair. Continue reading →

Being a human being can be a difficult matter. I often have visitors sitting on the sofa in my study, describing their anxieties and their confusion about their lives, and saying, ‘How did I end up like this?’ Or surveying an uncertain future, with no idea of what choices to make. People who look very confident on the outside are often plagued by self-doubt inside. Or worried about the consequences of the decisions they might make. Continue reading →

I had an interesting conversation recently with someone who thought that Christianity is a collection of lovely stories. She said that when she managed to suspend her disbelief, as she sometimes did when enjoying a film at the cinema, then she was able to enjoy the lovely stories of Christianity. I asked how the crucifixion fitted into this view of Christianity, along with the persecution of Christians described in Acts, the martyrdom of Stephen, and Jesus’ call for us to take up our crosses and follow him. And she fairly quickly moved the conversation in a different direction. Continue reading →

Arthur Conan Doyle enjoyed suggesting that every person had some kind of guilty secret, no matter how good and righteous they seemed to be. He claimed that he and some friends had once played a trick on a man who was regarded as an upright Christian gentleman, trusted and respected, a pillar of society. They sent him a telegram saying: ‘All is discovered; flee at once.” According to Conan Doyle, the man disappeared the next day and was never heard of again. Continue reading →

There’s a small network of relationships even within God himself, according to the Christian understanding of God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. A divine community of love which seeks to welcome us in. And in Jesus Christ, God makes it possible for us to know him and to have a relationship with him. Continue reading →

The good news, or the gospel (it’s the same word in Greek), is something which Christians often refer to. But I’m not convinced that we always use the word the way that it’s used in the New Testament. When Jesus proclaims the Gospel, what he’s talking about is the kingdom of God. Continue reading →