Commemoration of George Augustus Selwyn, first Bishop of New Zealand, 1878 Is it not plain that all spiritual apathy read more

Commemoration of George Augustus Selwyn, first Bishop of New Zealand, 1878 Is it not plain that all spiritual apathy comes not from over-trust but from unbelief, either doubting that sin is present death, or else that holiness is life and that Jesus has a gift to bestow, not in heaven, but promptly, which is better to gain than all the world? Therefore salvation is linked with faith, which earns nothing but elicits all, like the touch that evokes electricity but which no man supposes to have made it.

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 That is where they meet, the Upper Room, scene of read more

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 That is where they meet, the Upper Room, scene of the Last Supper, scene of the Resurrection appearances when the doors were shut, scene now of their waiting for the Spirit. Whose is it? The clue lies in Acts 12, where St. Peter, strangely freed from Herod's prison, knows at whose house they will be gathered for prayer. He knocks, startles the gate-girl Rhoda. It was "the house of Mary the mother of John whose surname was Mark" -- the young man who was to write the earliest of the gospels. The first meeting place of any Christian congregation was the home of a woman in Jerusalem. Something of the sort happens everywhere. The church in Caesarea centres upon Philip the Evangelist. "Now this man had four daughters, virgins, which did prophesy." ... Joppa church depends on Tabitha, "a woman full of good works and almsdeeds which she did". Follow St. Paul about the Mediterranean. He crosses to Europe because he dreams of a man from Macedonia who cries, "Come over and help us". But when he lands at Philippi it is not a man, but a woman. "Lydia was baptized and her household" -- his first convert in Europe, a woman. Everywhere women are the most notable of the converts, often the only ones who believe. In Thessalonica there are "of the chief women not a few"; Beroea, "Greek women of honourable estate"; Athens, only two names, one of them, Damaris, a woman. At Corinth Priscilla and Aquila come into the story, the pair always mentioned together, and four times out of the six with the wife's name first, a thing undreamed of in the first century. Why? Because she counted for more in church affairs -- hostess of the church in her houses in Corinth, Ephesus and Rome, chief instructress of Apollos the missionary, intimate of the greatest missionary of all, St. Paul. Six times in the Epistles greetings are sent to a house-church, and in five cases the church is linked with a woman's name.

Commemoration of Francis Xavier, Apostle of the Indies, Missionary, 1552 As long as I see any thing to be read more

Commemoration of Francis Xavier, Apostle of the Indies, Missionary, 1552 As long as I see any thing to be done for God, life is worth having; but O how vain and unworthy it is to live for any lower end!

Few realize how much injury the dogma that baptism is necessary for salvation, badly expounded, has entailed. As a consequence, read more

Few realize how much injury the dogma that baptism is necessary for salvation, badly expounded, has entailed. As a consequence, they are less cautious. For, where the opinion has prevailed that all are lost who have not happened to be baptized with water, our condition is worse than that of God's ancient people -- as if the grace of God were now more restricted than under the Law!

Feast of Peter & Paul, Apostles Christ did not throw about that great word Salvation. But once, in the read more

Feast of Peter & Paul, Apostles Christ did not throw about that great word Salvation. But once, in the heart of an angry crowd, their enthusiasm soured suddenly into a growling muttering. He applied it confidently to a man who, under the inspiration of His friendship, had broken with his sorry past and his old selfish, unclean ways, and was doing what he could to put things right. Now that, He said, is what I call a saved man. Very solemnly He tells us that on the Day of Judgement we shall not be asked the questions we are expecting, but others that will puzzle and startle us. Those folk on the left hand were, as far as we hear, respectable folk; their business books were straight, their home life was kindly, they themselves were clean-living men and women: nothing whatever is laid to their charge excepting this, that they lived in a world needing their help and were too absorbed in something -- what it was, we are not told; it may have been their souls -- to give what aid they could.

Feast of Timothy and Titus, Companions of Paul Commemoration of Dorothy Kerin, Founder of the Burrswood Healing Community, 1963 read more

Feast of Timothy and Titus, Companions of Paul Commemoration of Dorothy Kerin, Founder of the Burrswood Healing Community, 1963 What knowledge of Jesus Christ and His teaching lay behind the flash of enlightenment it is now impossible for us to say: but it is clear that the God whom Paul met was the "Father" of Jesus' own Gospel parables, the Shepherd who goes after the one sheep until He finds it. It was the God, in fact, whom the whole of the life of Jesus set forth, to the astonishment of those among whom He moved. Loving still, He brought God to men in the same unmistakable way. The divine love that through Jesus had found the public an Zacchaeus had now through the risen Christ found Paul the Pharisee. Hence forward the central facts of life for Paul were that while he was yet a sinner God had found and forgiven him, and that this was the work of Jesus Christ, in whose love the love of God had become plain.

Common experience declares how momentary and how useless are those violent fits and gusts of endeavours which proceed from fear read more

Common experience declares how momentary and how useless are those violent fits and gusts of endeavours which proceed from fear and uncertainty, both in things spiritual and things temporal, or civil. Whilst men are under the power of actual impressions from such fears, they will convert to God, yea, they will turn in a moment, and perfect their holiness in an instant; but so soon as that impression wears off (as it will do on every occasion, and upon none at all) such persons are as dead and cold towards God as the lead or iron, which but now ran in a fiery stream, is now when the heat is departed from it.

Every time the words "contrition" or "humility" drop from the lips of a prophet or psalmist, Christianity appears.

Every time the words "contrition" or "humility" drop from the lips of a prophet or psalmist, Christianity appears.

If people gathered to a political meeting, and the chief speaker spoke to them only for some quarter of an read more

If people gathered to a political meeting, and the chief speaker spoke to them only for some quarter of an hour, they would be annoyed, would feel with some resentment that he had not taken them seriously, had dealt much too cavalierly with the question of the hour, an Ulster boundary, or such like. But the things of the soul are far more momentous, and to be asked to deal with huge, unfathomable facts like the Cross in a few minutes, means that people are not really interested in these things. This is, of course, a snippety age, with a snippety press, and snippety novels. But must we preachers follow and be snippety, too?