Hitchhikers guide to God

Bartimaeus - a forgotten hero of Easter He was one of the forgotten heroes of the Easter Bartimaeus went from being blind Begger in the dust outside Jericho - to a committed and sighted follower of Jesus – two weeks before His crucifixion and resurrection  Today are going to see what he saw – and how he inspired the Jesus Prayer Jericho more than 800 feet below sea level.  It is often an unbearably hot dusty city at the head of the Dead Sea – the lowest place on earth with summer temperatures often in 40s What were the major events of Bartimaeus’s calling   When he heard Jesus coming, he called out “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”  When told to be quiet he Bartimaeus persisted. When Jesus restored his sight, it was life was changing event for him.  The first person he saw was Jesus!  He abandoned everything immediately followed him – he did not look back.  He lived through the two weeks which changed the world – full of major events What h...

  The Raising of Lazarus!  Signs were a key part of Our Lords Ministry.  They proved that he was the Messiah.   Our Lord raised the dead three times either out of spontaneous compassion or ‘for the Glory of God’ which was a sign.  Lazarus was raised for the Glory of God.   The first time our Lord raised the dead was when he raised the 12-year-old daughter of Jairus, a synagogue leader. This was to reward Jairus's faith and demonstrate Jesus’s authority over death (Mark 5:21–43).   The second case was the raising of the son of the Widow of Nain. He was a young man whom Jesus encountered during his funeral procession. Crucially he was his mother’s only source of social support.  Widows were often reduced to gleaning in fields for food.  (Luke 7:11-17):  In this instance Jesus was moved by pure compassion   The last time was the raising of Lazarus (John 11:1-44): He was a close friend and the brother of Mary and Martha. He had to be de...

  Are times ripe for the Messiah's Second Coming? What I like about Christianity is that it is grounded. Those offered to read the opening verses of St Matthew’s Gospel usually make excuses not to!  The passage contains the complete genealogy of Jesus - from Abraham - 42 generations! Did Matthew really need to do this? Yes simply because the birth of Messiah was so ungrounded - so incredible – so unbelievable – yet it happened Everything about the extraordinary birth of the Messiah had to be announced and   prophesied multiple times throughout Jewish history. The Jews needed to be expecting the advent of the Messiah.  These prophesies began with Genesis 3:15 written around 1400 BC probably by Moses. Around 500 years later came Isaiah’s great prophesies text of one which we have just read. The sequence of key accurate prophesies included: The location of the Messiah’s birthplace in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2) The fact that the Messiah is to be born of a virgin. (Anothe...

World peace - can it ever happen?  I would suggest that World Peace can happen and is in fact inevitable This year we are celebrating the end of World War II 80 years ago – VE Day and VJ Day mark our entry into 80 years of no world wars – an extraordinary achievement!  We will relate this to the wisdom of Our Lord scriptural guidance which seems idealistic but is in fact world changing practicality. World War I was called "the war to end all wars". It was not.  It generally is acknowledged that that treaty Versailles was the tinder which led the blazing inferno of the Second world war.  World War I produced World War II What was difference between WW1 and WWII? It was way the victors treated the vanquished. The treaty which ended WW1 was signed in the Palace of Versailles in France 28th June 1919. There was no forgiveness in that treaty. There was no compassion - only demands for crippling levels reparation. It was the forgiveness, compassion and the desire for unity...

  What is the true gift of Harvest? So what is the value of harvest in our lives? What harvest are we celebrating? Are we celebrating just the physical harvest which is wonderful but perishes or the eternal harvest inside us all   Life is like going to university. We go to university to learn. University is not the goal – it is a means to the goal – it is to build muscles   We have physical, mental, spiritual muscles. ·         The more physical exercise we do the physically stronger we become. ·         The more intellectual exercise we do the stronger our intellectual muscles become. ·         The more we read, the more we reflect, the more we pray, the more we love the greater our spiritual muscles become. What is the HARVEST - it makes life easier – more joyful – more peaceful. If we practice the Beatitudes, we do indeed improve our lives. We do indee...

  Did Jesus bring fire and division, not peace within families and nations   Firstly, was Our Lord really anti-family? Secondly what was the wider impact of Christianity on communities and nations – If the Jews had accepted Our Lord’s teaching could the Temple have been saved from destruction and the Jewish nation from a dispersal? The context was that Our Lord was a Jew. He not only fulfilled the Jewish Law but built on it. He not only followed the Ten Commandments but he built on them.   However, the Fifth Commandment is "Honour your father and your mother." Surely this commandment focuses on the importance of loving respecting our parents?  Then again we remember that, when Jesus’s mother and brothers came to see Him in Capernaum (a nine hour walk from Nazareth!), they were unable to reach Him because of the crowd. When Jesus was told that his family were outside waiting to see him he replied, “My mother and brothers are those who hear the word of God and car...