In a few moments, we are going to sing a hymn that many of us know well.     How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord, Is laid for your faith in God’s excellent word! What more can God say than to you hath been said, To you that for refuge to […]

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  Well, a Happy New Year to all of you.  The old year is gone, the new year has begun and, as usual in the rhythm of the church year, we find ourselves, once again, beginning the year on Epiphany Sunday.   Although there was a time when our Presbyterian ancestors avoided the various church […]

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  Introduction to the Readings from Scripture   As most of us know, in the church year there are twelve days in the season of Christmas.  Most of us became aware of this first when we sang about a partridge in a pear tree, five golden rings, ten ladies dancing, etc.  In the western church, […]

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  It was a cold night.  Cold and dark with only the stars shining through the black sky.  Snow had fallen as it did almost every year at this time, in this part of the world.  It was piled up around our houses. Inside the fires and the furs kept us warm. It was a […]

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  “And the glory of the Lord shone around them…”   I always enjoy it when I sit down to read the Christmas story, and find my mind engaged by some word or phrase that I have never really pondered before.   Which is what happened, a few weeks ago, when I sat down to […]

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  Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones; So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus Hath told you Caesar was ambitious: If it were so, it was a […]

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  It is a time of preparation.   After all, in case any of you are counting the days, there are now only 9 days left until Christmas.   It is a time of preparation in so many of our lives – preparations to see friends and family members, preparations for grocery lists and plans […]

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Welcome to the season of Advent.   It seems appropriate, in a way, that we have had a chance to celebrate a baptism on this particular Sunday.  After all, the season that begins, today, will lead us into the celebrations of another birth, albeit one that happened a long time ago.   In a few […]

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  Introduction to the readings.   We have come to the final Sunday in the Church Year.  Next week will be the first Sunday of Advent when we start all over again.  In the year we are completing today, the focus has been on readings from Mark’s gospel.  In the coming year, the focus will […]

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