One Man's Web
Key Post: A Deeper Healing, 10 October 2022
Perhaps the deepest healing we need is to know that we belong, and that we are loved. What does it mean to belong? What does it mean to be church? How can church and belonging become the image of God which we are created to be; indeed, what does it mean to be human? For me, these questions have coalesced in the controversy about the role of our sexuality in our relationship with God, and each other, a controversy which has occupied the church since before I was ordained. I offer on this page a number of reflections in this area. You will see that I have concluded that our differences over sexuality are symptoms of something far deeper... Read on >>>>
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The Sermon Draft: Sheep and Other Mamils - John 10:1-19, 12 May 2011
The woman was thin and unkempt. Pain and starvation were etched upon her. Her eyes were almost dead, except that fear lurked in there. She was not someone in a survivor’s photo from Auschwitz, although she could have been. She was in my local shopping centre. She looked like a bruised and frightened sheep, immobilised on the back of a semi, unaware she was on the way to the slaughterhouse. I can't forget her. I can't explain how I am not her. And sometimes my fragility frightens me.
We are all born into a sheepfold. There is a place that is home; a place where we begin. For some of us it is safe, and almost idyllic. Others are born into a living hell. The thieves and the robbers have come over the walls, and are living off the sheep... Read on >>>>
I want life, and to have it abundantly. I am greedy for understanding. I thirst for knowing what life is about. I long for some peace, some satisfaction. I wish my hunger could be filled and that the emptiness, the uncertainty and the plain unknowing, and the absolute aloneness did not drag hollow and aching, eating me from the inside out. If only I were not so tired, and had some reasonable hopes of being content, of being filled, of being satisfied!
Jesus said the thieves and the bandits have climbed into the sheepfold, and that they have come to steal and kill and destroy. Sometimes it feels to me that all my good fortune and affluence does not matter. There have been few of the thieves, and few of the wolves, that invade other lives, but what good is that to me? The sheep fold is empty and sterile. I surely need a shepherd who will call me out, who will call my name and lead me to good pastures.
I simply want him to call my name.... Read on >>>>
The reading from Luke could be written like this: While two of them were going home, Jesus appeared to them.
That is the key action of the event. That’s what happened. You don’t need 24 verses of the Bile to tell you. It only takes 11 words: While two of them were going home, Jesus appeared to them.
Everything else in the reading we heard then, falls into one of two categories.
Either it adds meaning and significance to the event,
or it is padding.
Padding is what kids in school do when they have to make up a word limit, but have nothing of substance to add to their essay.
The gospels are not padded documents. Every word is chosen.... Read on >>>>
According to my school English teachers the reading above could be written like this: While two of them were going home, Jesus appeared to them.
That is the key action of the event. That’s what happened. Everything else falls into one of two categories. Either it adds meaning and significance to the event, or it is padding. Padding is that practice of students everywhere who have to make up a word limit, but have nothing of substance to add to their essay. It is supposed to be more subtle and less obvious to the teacher, than filling two pages by increasing the font size, or the margin width... Read on >>>>
