Why the haste? Was Mary bursting to tell the news? A young pregnant unmarried mother with her story of a divine conception? If so, why the rush to go to her kinswoman’s house some distance away? It was surely a story worth telling firstly to her Nazareth relations and neighbours? But no, Mary chose to […]
URC Daily Devotion 19th December 2018
I don’t know about you, but I’ve often wondered exactly what Mary was doing when Gabriel turned up that day. Of one thing I am sure – she didn’t expect what happened. The angel arrives and tells her that her whole life is about to turn completely upside down. Perplexed doesn’t begin to cut it […]
Daily Devotion 18th December 2018
Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write an orderly […]
St Luke’s Gospel
Dear <<First Name>> We have now finished our long journey through the Saul – David – Solomon saga. Well done for sticking with the story, the long readings and, I hope, the interesting practical reflections on them. We try to alternate between Old and New Testament and mix various styles of writing. When looking at the […]
Daily Devotion 16th December 2018
I cried aloud to God for help;I prayed that God would hear.When I was plunged in deep distress,I sought the Lord in prayer. At night I stretched untiring hands,relief my soul refused.Rememb’ring you, O God, I groanedwith longing as I mused. In my distress I could not speak;from sleep you kept my eye.I thought about […]
Daily Devotion 15th December 2018
The plot thickens The warning given to Solomon was crystal clear. If you stay on track then the Temple will be hallowed and the succession is secure. If not then the House, the Temple and the Dynasty will fall. Actions have consequences. And here is the unfolding of that warning. Jeroboam is an outsider and […]
Daily Devotion 14th December 2018
King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the Israelites, ‘You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you; for they will surely incline your heart to follow their gods;’ […]
Daily Devotion 13th December 2018
Seldom, it seems, has a woman, about whom we know so little, caught the imaginations of so many. If we pare back the myths that have grown up around her we have left a core of information which is, nonetheless, very significant. She is a woman of some personal resource whether a queen in her […]
URC Daily Devotion 12th December 2018
This is a huge bargain that the Lord is offering to Solomon. The Lord is saying that if Solomon is faithful to him and keeps his commandments he will consecrate the Temple for all time. The continuance, however, is conditional on maintaining the worship of God there and not turning away to worship other gods. […]
Daily Devotion 11th December 2018
Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the ancestral houses of the Israelites, before King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, which is Zion. All the people of Israel assembled to […]