A lifeline.

It’s a loaded word, because, when a lifeline is all you have, it becomes the single most important thing around.

A lifeline keeps you safe. It keeps you alive. It pulls you out of danger. It can rescue you out of a certain catastrophic end. It becomes your “best friend.”

Much like that rope that runs down the middle...

Over the last couple of Sundays, we’ve been focussing our attention on the Gospel of John chapter 6 which is full of rich, symbolic and metaphorical language about who Jesus is, what he’s all about, and what his life’s purpose and mission is.

And, to be honest, this passage can raise a lot of questions.

For example: What does...

This morning I want to share some of my thoughts on the Gospel reading – John 6:1-14 – that we just heard, about how Jesus takes the little boy’s meagre five loaves and two fish, and out of that, creates enough food, an abundance of food, enough to feed five thousand people.

In this story, we’re once again given a glimpse...

In the Gospel reading in Mark 6, the word that pops out and resonates for me, is the word “rest.”
Mark 6: 31: “[Jesus] said to them [the Apostles], “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while….”

Rest. What a wonderful concept. Am I right?

And yet, as we all know, true rest is often...

Mark 3: 20-35, 2 Corinthians 4:13- 5:1

A phrase that jumped out for me from today’s scripture readings, is in the 2nd reading, in the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.

“So we do not lose heart.”
What wonderful, supportive, encouraging words to the Corinthian Church!

“So we do not lose heart.”

Paul is...

Jesus commands us to love.

Now, some may hear Jesus’ words in this passage from the Gospel of John as a bit heavy, and top-down.

That’s because today, the word “commandment” has a more negative than positive connotation.
“I command you to do this….”
We’d often hear these words in a loud,...

I recently met Mark, a Chippewa of Rama First Nation elder, when he spoke to us last weekend as a guest speaker at a meeting of Bishops, Ministry Directors, Deans and Synod Council on the eastern shores of Lake Couchiching outside Orillia.

Mark spoke to us about how difficult decisions are made in his aboriginal community, when there are many...

I can still hear that loud pounding of the nails, piercing the silence, echoing, resounding, throughout the large room.

A Good Friday tradition observed in my first parish at Resurrection Lutheran Church in Halifax involved, at one point in the worship, the invitation to the congregation to come forward, and with a hammer and nails which were...

Was anyone listening?

Was anyone really paying attention, noticing what was going on as Jesus entered Jerusalem in the way he did: riding a colt (or donkey as other Gospel versions have it)… on a simple, humble, unadorned, yet-untrained, colt….

Who was really paying attention?

Of course, human nature being what it is, in every time...

I still remember a conversation I had with a friend at a backyard barbeque party, years ago now when I was in my early twenties.

And it was about suits.
The right kind of suit to wear, to an upcoming university graduation or convocation or year-end party; or some such event like that – I can’t remember for sure.

But I do remember the...