Thursday, 26 March 2026
Blasphemy or Truth? – Thursday of the fifth week of Lent
“Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day; he saw it and was glad.” Then the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.” So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple. (John 8:56-59)
Abraham was a successful Middle Eastern businessman. But for all his success in business, there were two things he lacked that mattered ultimately in the culture he knew – children of his own and a land of his own. In his culture, you lived on beyond death in your children…
Wednesday, 25 March 2026
Speaking Her Word of Faith – THE ANNUNCIATION OF THE LORD
Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” The angel said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” Then Mary said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” (Luke1:34-38)
Gabriel appears out of the blue to Mary. Or does he? There’s nothing in the way the story is told to suggest that Mary ever sees Gabriel. She certainly hears him, and the whole episode is set in a strongly aural key. It’s much more about the ear than the…
Tuesday, 24 March 2026
The Cross Heals the Wound of Death – Tuesday of the fifth week of Lent
They said to him, “Who are you?”… Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things as the Father instructed me.” (John 8:25, 28)
Whinging in the wilderness is very much part of the repertoire of the children of Israel once they leave Egypt, make it through the Red Sea and then out into the desert. They begin to whinge because they think that God and Moses have led them astray. They feel betrayed…
Monday, 23 March 2026
A Liberating Word – Monday of the fifth week of Lent
When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, sir.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.” (John 8:7-11)
Two women stand before us. Both are vulnerable; one is innocent, the other is not. Susanna is falsely accused and finally vindicated. Her innocence looks to the innocence of the crucified Jesus, about which the Gospels leave no doubt: if he was executed, it wasn’t because he was guilty. The…
Sunday, 22 March 2026
Triumph of Life over Death – 5 LENT
When he had said this, he [Jesus] cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.” (John 11:43-44)
In these latter days of the Lenten journey, death is in the air. The prophet Ezekiel prophesied at the time of the Babylonian exile, which he saw as a kind of death. In his vision of the return from exile he sees the return as God opening the graves of…
Saturday, 21 March 2026
Blinded by Our Expectations – Saturday of the fourth week of Lent
Then the temple police went back to the chief priests and Pharisees who asked them, “Why did you not arrest him?” The police answered, “Never has anyone spoken like this!” Then the Pharisees replied, “Surely you have been deceived too, have you? Has any one of the authorities or of the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd, which does not know the law— they are accursed.” (John 7:45-49)
The religious leaders, with one exception, are blinded by their own expectations. They can’t see Jesus as the Messiah because they think they know when and how the Messiah will come, and Jesus doesn’t fit their bill. They are the all-knowing elite who regard others as a rabble who know…
Friday, 20 March 2026
Growing in Knowledge – Friday of the fourth week of Lent
Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, “You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him. I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.” Then they tried to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him, because his hour had not yet come. (John 7:28-30)
Seeing is important in Scripture, but so too is knowing. For the Bible, the prime difference between God and the human being is that God knows everything and the human being doesn’t. The human being’s prime task, therefore, is to grow in knowledge without ever thinking we will attain the…
Thursday, 19 March 2026
Saying Yes to God, However Strange – SAINT JOSEPH, SPOUSE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY
But just when he [Joseph] had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” … When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him. (Matthew 1:20-21, 24)
Joseph never speaks in the Gospels. God speaks and Joseph listens. But what he hears from God is strange and overturns all the plans he may have had. He’s told that his fiancée has conceived by the Holy Spirit; he hears Simeon prophesy that the child will be rejected; he’s…
Wednesday, 18 March 2026
Those Who Listen to the Voice of God ll Live – Wednesday of the fourth week of Lent
“Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life. Very truly, I tell you, the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself; and he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man.” ( John 5:24-27)
Those who want to kill Jesus are signing their own death warrant. They think they are sending him to death, but it is themselves they are sending to death, because they refuse to listen to the voice of Jesus. Those who listen to his voice, even the dead, are raised…
Tuesday, 17 March 2026
Bringing the Power of the Gospel – SAINT PATRICK
After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. He said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest. Go on your way. See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves. (Luke 10:1-3)
The man we know as St Patrick was probably the greatest Christian missionary since St Paul. This was because he took the Gospel beyond the bounds of the Roman Empire. The Romans had conquered much of Britain, though Scotland was always a bridge too far. But if Scotland was a…