Choral Evensong
Sunday 3rd April at 6pm at St Matthew’s, Otterbourne
Morning Service for Lent 5 2022
Worship is an odd and puzzling concept, it just means to ‘give worth,’ but of course it’s much more than that. It is the start of relationship; it is the beginning of communication, it is the first “I am here”, that gives God a chance to in turn respond to us. Of course, that means that worship implies an openness of mind, a conscious vulnerability to God; and we know from our human relationships that it is only by making ourselves vulnerable that deep and significant relationships can be made.
MORNING Service for Mothering Sunday – 2022
In so many operas it’s the arias that we remember – those brilliant flashes of song and melody, moments of magic which stay in the mind for days and months and years afterwards. In the opera of the Gospels the parable of the prodigal son is an aria of the highest quality, and the greatest wisdom, we all know it so well that we could pretty well recite it completely. And we should know it that well, it has so much to teach us – and not just as children hearing it the first time it in Sunday school or at an assembly, it can and should inform every stage of our lives. For at different stages and on different occasions, we can see the story from each different point of view
A Morning Service for the Third Sunday of Lent 2022
Rarely have events in the world been so coincidently related to the Gospel reading appointed for the day – or so horrific.
Rather than the cruelty of a tyrant like Pilate or the random destructiveness of a tower of Siloam, we have the bombardment of cities full of children and the elderly. We have the work of evil, and just as they did 2,000 years ago, people ask ‘Why?’ ‘Why? What did they do to deserve this aggression?’
Morning Service for the Second Sunday of Lent 2022
What a metaphor to choose, a mother hen! Where’s the biblical precedent for that? Wouldn’t the mighty eagle of Exodus, or Hosea’s stealthy leopard been far more appropriate, or how about the proud Lion of Judah? Compared to any of those a mother hen that does not inspire much confidence. But a hen is how Jesus chose to describe the way that he would relate to the people of Jerusalem. They longed for a champion, they longed for somebody who would take matters in hand, lead them to death or glory. How disappointing to be offered a hen.
St Matthew’s, Otterbourne Coffee Morning
Monday 7th March in the church room from 10am-11.30am. Everyone welcome.
A Morning Service for the First Sunday of Lent 2022
Shrove Tuesday was St David’s day. St David was born around 520 AD and his lifetime’s work was the establishment of some 12 monastic communities, including Glastonbury and Menevia, now known as St David’s. His regime was specially strict, based on the Egyptian monastic model. The life of his monks consisted of hard manual labour – they kept no oxen to help them plough, a frugal diet of bread and water and vegetables, and much prayer and study.
A Morning Service for the Sunday before Lent 2022
Do you remember, the Beatles sang:
Help.I need somebody
(Help) not just anybody
(Help) you know I need someone, help .
A Morning Service for the 2nd Sunday before Lent 2022
Beware, beware, beware – there’s danger about. Danger from too much knowledge, and too little sense, too much learning and too little understanding, too much talk and too little thought. Danger from a thousand years of mistranslation and biased interpretation. Watch out there’s Genesis about.
A Morning Service for the 3rd Sunday before Lent 2022
St Luke’s gospel contains much the same material as Mark’s and Matthew’s. Luke and Matthew clearly added to Mark’s efforts material they found in another source, but on top of that they each seem to have their own material and each uses what they have in common in different ways, in different contexts and with differing ideas of what they mean. That is what makes the synoptic gospels so endlessly interesting – their similarities and their differences are a cause of endless fascination.
February 2022 Magazine letter
One way or another the last couple of years have given many of us a bit of a battering. So what restores you? What feeds your inner man or woman? What gives you the heart to face the new day? What energises you? What keeps you going?
Morning Service for Candlemas 2022
Why do we make a fuss of this passage in Luke’s gospel, why do we give it a special day, light lots of candles and keep the crib out till now? Because this is the last story of Jesus’ infancy and with it we turn from considering Jesus’ birth towards Lent and the journey to the cross. Simeon’s words were prophetic as he holds the baby he foresees the suffering to come, and so do we.
St Matthew’s, Otterbourne Coffee Morning
Monday 7th February in the church room from 10am-11.30am. Everyone welcome.
Morning Service for Epiphany 4 2022
In his first letter to the Corinthians, St Paul has just listed all the gifts that a group of Christians might possess, from healing and prophecy to tongues and teaching, but now he tells his friends of something he calls ‘a more excellent way’ – the way of love. A love not of desire but of gift, a love that seeks nothing in return, that flows in one direction freely, unconditionally, from the giver to the given. This, for Paul, is the highest expression of humanity.
Wisdom and Unity……….
“And soul by soul and silently her shining bounds increase,And her ways are ways of gentleness, and all her paths are peace” (Cecil Spring-Rice) “How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!” (Psalm 133:1)
Morning Service for Epiphany 3 2022
Someone from somewhere else. Someone different. What to do about it?
I spend quite a lot of time recently searching genealogy. From time to time in say 18th century parish registers there was someone buried who is described as a stranger – someone just passing through, who no one knew and who had died there in that village; even the name of the stranger might have been unknown, he or occasionally she, was someone who was not local.
New beginnings…..
“But you have kept the good wine until now.” John 2:10 “God gives the solitary a home” Psalm 68 v6
Morning Service for Epiphany 2 2022
John’s account of the marriage at Cana in Galilee is a problem. It obviously has huge symbolic significance for John – he calls it Jesus’s first sign – the serious theological markers are everywhere, but he makes it all so homely – disturbingly so.
Respond…….
“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.” Isaiah 60:1 “There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.” Psalm 46:4
St Matthew’s Otterbourne Coffee Morning
Monday 10th January in the church room from 10am-11.30am. Everyone welcome.