Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

This sermon was preached on 30/10/2011 The next piece of armour that Paul mentions is the helmet, which he says depicts salvation. The Roman helmet was designed obviously to protect the head. It was made of bronze, covered his head, with a front piece coming down on the face to protect the eyes and nose. In using this illustration Paul is saying that salvation is the particular doctrine that will protect the believer’s mind and vision. Paul has already mentioned the Christian use of the mind when he wrote that the Christian soldier has to gird up his loins with the belt of truth, which we noted had both an objective and a subjective application. Objectively it means the body of truth found in the Bible and subjectively it means a truthful or sincere character. These features are necessary before we begin to put on the armour. Paul means that we have to know the Bible and have a holy character before we can fight a successful warfare. Of course, he does not mean that the onl...

This sermon was preached on 30/10/2010 This encounter of two travellers with Jesus on the road to Emmaus is also mentioned briefly in Mark 16:12: ‘After these things he appeared in another form to two of them, as they were walking into the country.’ Mark’s reference may help explain why the two disciples did not recognise Jesus for it describes his appearance as ‘in another form’, which may simply mean that he looked different from his previous appearance or that he interacted with them in a way that they had not experienced previously. The order of events The two disciples seem to have left Jerusalem before news of Jesus’ appearances to the women had become widely known. They are aware of two details from the events of that morning: (1) the women went to the tomb and were informed by angels that the tomb was empty; (2) two disciples [Peter and John] had gone to the tomb. But they do not mention the Saviour’s appearances to Mary Magdalene or to the group of women. As was suggested in...

This sermon was preached on 27/10/2011 Benefits of Baptism (1 Peter 3:21-22)   In the previous verses Peter had referred to angelic beings who had disobeyed God prior to the flood, with their disobedience being connected to the building of the ark by Noah. The exact nature of their disobedience is not specified. Peter’s mentioning of the flood, however, is followed by a reference to baptism. The common feature, according to Peter here, in the flood and in baptism is salvation: at the flood Noah and his family were saved because they were in the ark that Noah built; baptism saves Peter’s readers because it somehow brings them into contact with Jesus. What does Peter mean by his statement that ‘baptism now saves’? His other writings make it very clear that he does not mean baptismal regeneration. So what does he want us to realise about baptism?   Of course, we have to realise that our thinking about baptism can be affected by how it takes place in our contemporary world. In ...

This sermon was preached on 23/10/2011 Several female followers of Jesus had gone to the tomb with the intention of anointing the dead body of Jesus. When they arrived, they discovered that the stone had been rolled away, that the tomb was empty, and they were then instructed by an angel to go and tell the disciples that Jesus was risen. Mary Magdalene had gone quickly to tell Peter and John and had followed them back to the tomb, where shortly later Jesus appeared to her (John 20:1-18). This had occurred while the other women were still on the way to tell his remaining disciples, and it is on this journey that Jesus meets them. We are told who some of the women were who gathered at the tomb: they included Mary the mother of James, Salome (the mother of James and John), and Joanna (the wife of Herod’s steward). Previously they had shown great devotion to Jesus throughout his life (Luke 8:1-3) and at the time of his death (Luke 23:55). Now they were gathering to perform a final act of...

This sermon was preached on Sunday, 16/10/2011 Daniel is one of the great heroes of the Old Testament. He was a Jew who spent his life in Babylon; there he rose to the highest levels of power, yet remained committed to the God of his fathers. He survived the transition from one leading world empire (Babylon) to its replacement (Persia), functioning as a counsellor in both. How was he able to do this? Part of the secret lies in how he began his career as a civil servant in a pagan regime, and that story is told in the first chapter of the Book of Daniel. Yet he was only a teenager when the story begins. As part of the background to Daniel 1, it is helpful for us to know that Nebuchadnezzar invaded Judah three times, and each is referred to in the Old Testament. The first occurred in 605 BC, is the one referred to in Daniel 1:1-2, and resulted in Judah becoming a tributary of Babylon; among the captives were Daniel and his friends. The second occurred in 597 BC and during it the ...

This sermon was preached on Sunday, 16/10/2011 The first human to whom the risen Jesus appeared was Mary Magdalene. She had originally come to the tomb with other ladies to anoint the body of Jesus. Matthew says that Mary was accompanied by another lady called Mary; Mark’s account says that she was accompanied by Salome and Mary the mother of James; Luke adds that Joanna and other women were also present as well as Mary the mother of James; she is not alone in John’s account because she says ‘we’ (20:2). Mary Magdalene is the only woman to appear in each of the Gospels’ accounts of the resurrection. When they arrived at the tomb they saw that the stone had been rolled away. An angel told them that Christ was risen from the dead and that they should go and tell his disciples that they were to go to Galilee to meet him (Matt. 28:5-7; Luke 24:5-7). It seems that the women split up in order to go and tell the disciples, with Mary Magdalene going to tell Peter and John. They then ru...