The Narrow Path

  Monday, 1 December, 2025 Psalm 74 Isaiah 40:1-17 1 Thessalonians 1 Observance: Andrew, apostle and martyr [ Transferred from November 30 ] Not In Word Only (1 Thessalonians 1:5a) ...because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake. What kind of men must they have been? What is St Paul talking about, when he says that he came not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction? There is a type of religion that is all head. We know the doctrines; we know the meaning behind the phrases of the ancient creeds. But if it has not penetrated into the heart; if it does not have what St Paul describes as “full conviction”, then it is nothing. Too much mysticism is much the same thing. If we are all about feelings, emotions, spiritual experiences, and wanderings of the imagination, then there is...

    Saturday, 29 November, 2025 Psalm 69:1-16 2 Kings 25:21-30 Mark 3:20-35 Out Of His Mind (Mark 3:21) And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying, “He is out of his mind.” There is a lot of rivalry between Christian denominations that can be safely ignored. Things like who puts on the best spread at functions (Anglicans, obviously), or who has the richest musical tradition (again, Anglicans). But there is one that does cause me to shuffle uncomfortably in my seat – the accusation of religious stuffiness. We don’t seem to have much time for religious enthusiasm. There is the benefit that we have this cultural safety-guard in place; we do want to marry zeal to wisdom, after all. But in today’s second lesson, Jesus has obviously gotten a little too enthusiastic. His family tries to drag him home, claiming he is “out of his mind”. When it comes to religious zeal of our own, what are we worried about? ...

  Friday, 28 November, 2025 Psalm 71 2 Kings 25:8-21 Mark 3:7-19 Observance: Ember Day He Gave The Name (Mark 3:16-17) He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter); James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James (to whom he gave the name Boanerges, that is, Sons of Thunder) Nicknames can be fickle things. Usually they are fairly dull and harmless; perhaps a reduction of syllables, and maybe a “zz” or “za” stuck on the end, depending on your gender. Two places, completely opposite in every other respect, provide the best nicknames: English grammar schools and Australian construction sites. Nicknames from those places tend to be both creative and humorous. On top of this, they are usually pretty accurate, too. St Mark gives us a list of Jesus’ apostles, and adds in a couple of nicknames. St Peter gets a pun for “rock”, while Saints James and John are “sons of thunder”. We can immediately form an image of what type...

  Thursday, 27 November, 2025 Psalm 68:1-20 2 Kings 24:10-25:7 Mark 2:18-3:6 Observance: Ember Day They Were Silent (Mark 3:4-5) And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. It feels so good to be right! But something I have noticed about that feeling is that it only works if there is someone else who is wrong – that is, to feel good about being right, it requires someone else to “lose”. Internet arguments are notorious for this sort of thing. Debaters seem less concerned with presenting a convincing argument as they are about “winning”. And if there are winners, there are also losers. Jesus found himself in the midst of a group of people like this. They were arguing about some irrelevan...

  Wednesday, 26 November, 2025 Psalms 65; 70 2 Kings 23:31-24:9 Mark 2:1-17 Observance: Ember Day In Need Of A Physician (Mark 2:17)   And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” A wounded conscience is a terrible thing. I think all of us have some memories would rather forget – indeed, some memories that make us physically recoil. Just like a medical malady, we can either try to ignore it, or actually do something about it. And just as someone who refuses medical treatment is in a sorry state, so too the one who refuses spiritual healing for the conscience from their heavenly Physician. So if we want the cure offered by Christ, what is the medication? How do we take it? Well, Christ’s words today come off the back of his forgiveness of sins. Our sins caused the disease in our conscience; he extracts those sins...

  Tuesday, 25 November, 2025 Psalms 62; 63 2 Kings 23:16-30 Mark 1:40-45 Observances: Ember Day; James Noble, pioneer Aboriginal deacon (d. 1941) If You Will (Mark 1:40) And a leper came to [Jesus], imploring him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean.” Here in our second lesson we read the first of many instances of what some call the “Messianic Secret”. Jesus, upon healing the leper, sternly tells him not to tell anyone. What a conundrum for theologians with too much spare time on their hands to think about! Context (as always) helps us here. Instead of going around and making a big deal of it, Jesus wanted rather this man follow religious protocol: to show himself to the priest, be approved as cleansed, and worship God in an unrestricted way. This seems more like what Jesus wants: for every human being to approach God in free and full confidence. Just as John the Baptist pointed to Christ, Christ points us to t...

  Monday, 24 November, 2025 Psalms 56; 57 2 Kings 23:4-15 Mark 1:29-39 Observance: Ember Day Reduced To Dust (2 Kings 23:15) Moreover, the altar at Bethel, the high place erected by Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, that altar with the high place he pulled down and burned, reducing it to dust. He also burned the Asherah. The thing about these Old Testament historical narratives is that we can usually tell if the author approves or disapproves of what are writing about. With Josiah, it seems pretty obvious that all this defilement is seen as a good thing. In our modern pluralistic society we might find it all a little confronting. Surely ancient Israel was a beacon of progressive inclusivity? Then comes along this nasty, close-minded king who only wants his religion to be followed – it isn’t terribly democratic of him. Two aspects of the religions banned by Josiah are mentioned here: prostitution, and burning children alive. I ...

  Saturday, 22 November, 2025 Psalm 51 2 Kings 22:12-23:3 Mark 1:14-28 The Time Is Fulfilled (Mark 1:15) [Jesus said] “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” It really is helpful having both an Old Testament and a New Testament reading side-by-side. In this way we get both the before and after shots on the same slide. Particularly so since slogging through some of the Old Testament history can make one a bit melancholy after awhile. Over the last couple of days we have read about a small flicker of light in Judah’s history: King Josiah and his reforms. Even though the prophetess has indeed confirmed Josiah’s worst fears, that the curses of God will come on the people, there is still a little more time until that happens. But don’t get too comfy: the time will come. Then we flick over to our second reading and read these words from Jesus: the time is fulfilled. The time of curses and disobed...

  Friday, 21 November, 2025 Psalm 50 2 Kings 21:19-22:11 Mark 1:1-13 The Beginning (Mark 1:1) The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Going back to the start of a Gospel is always a bit of a thrill. The Gospel of St Mark especially so; he has none of the preamble of St Matthew or St Luke, with all the background information about the Holy Family, angels singing to shepherds, or cattle lowing. Neither does he present any dense metaphysic like St John, with his philosophical poetry on the Word being God. No, our mate St Mark jumps right into things and lets us know right from the start where his gospel, and our relationship with Jesus, begins. Yes, Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee – he was a man. And he was the Christ, the beloved and only Son of God the Father, anointed by God the Holy Spirit – he is God. And where do we begin, if we want to start out with Jesus with the right line of thinking? He was spoken of by the prophets...

  Thursday, 20 November, 2025 Psalm 48 2 Kings 21:1-18 Matthew 25:31-46 You Did For Me (Matthew 25:40) And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ I once heard a man who played trumpet with the Air Force Band comment that the hardest gig he ever had to play was the Last Post. The tune itself is not very difficult – in fact, it is very similar to the basic warm-up most trumpet players do every day before they practise. The difficulty comes from the fact that you are standing up there, by yourself, playing alone. Brass playing is, as they say, a “team sport”, and so there is something especially tough going it alone. Christianity, or perhaps shall we say, the intended way for humanity to exist with their God, is a team sport too. God made us as a race, the human race. And the Lord Jesus Christ came to earth, died, and rose again so that all may come to him and live as ...

  Wednesday, 19 November, 2025 Psalm 45 2 Kings 20 Matthew 25:14-30 Observance: Elizabeth of Hungary, princess & philanthropist (d. 1231) Faithful Over Little (Matthew 25:21) His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ One of the wonderful things about following Jesus is that there is always something to look forward to. He gives us comfort, and peace, an abundance of love, and all those other things that keep us encouraged in the day-to-day. But he also gives us things to keep us busy, and they are never things that are a waste of time in his eyes. While the jobs he gives us to do are of infinite worth in themselves (because he who assigned them is infinite), he also promises rewards afterwards. In this parable, he speaks about being faithful over a little – and considering how much needs to be done in this world, our per...

  Tuesday, 18 November, 2025 Psalms 41; 44:1-9 2 Kings 19:20-37 Matthew 25:1-13 Determined Long Ago (2 Kings 19:25) Have you not heard     that I determined it long ago? I planned from days of old     what now I bring to pass, that you should turn fortified cities     into heaps of ruins, The sovereignty of God over all things is such wonderful comfort to the Christian. We rest in God; we find peace in God; we ask him to look after us and care for us and to finally bring us into his everlasting kingdom. And we know we can ask God these things confidently, because he is sovereign over all things. Whenever the darkness threatens to overcome; whenever we feel trapped with no way out; whenever we can see the way out, but no the path to get there: God is in control, and God is good. We will get there, because God is sovereign. Spurgeon once made the claim that everyone is a Calvinist ...

  Monday, 17 November, 2025 Psalm 40 2 Kings 19:1-20 Matthew 24:32-51 Observances: Hilda of Whitby, abbess (d. 680); Hugh, bishop of Lincoln (d. 1200) Delivered To The Lord (2 Kings 19:14) Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; and Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord . We sometimes get letters delivered to our house that are intended for the previous owner. Often we don’t realise it until we open it, because it will have on the front of the envelope “To The Resident”. And so we open it, and start reading, and realise – hang on, this has nothing to do with us. Better send it on. Hezekiah did the same thing with the message from the king of Assyria. I’m sure the Assyrian king thought he was talking to Hezekiah when he had those words written down. But since he was taunting the God in whom Hezekiah trusted, he was actually talking to God. And so Hezekiah received the letter, read i...

  Saturday, 15 November, 2025 Psalm 37:1-17 2 Kings 18:17-37 Matthew 24:15-31 The Lightning From The East (Matthew 24:27) “ For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” We’ve been getting some pretty good thunderstorms recently, but they seem to be coming from the west and moving east, so when I read these words from Jesus, I have to remember that, as an Australian, I have to think upside-down compared to the rest of the world. Even so, there is nothing like a good sub-tropical thunderstorm. There’s no missing it! Wind howls, rain spatters, thunder cracks – and the lightning lights up the sky. Clouds roil with shades of colour you never see otherwise, and we remember: Jesus is coming back one day. But how do we think of the return of the Son of Man? Will we, like the tribes of the earth, mourn at his coming? Or will the blast of the trumpet be the sweetest sound of all? ...

  Friday, 14 November, 2025 Psalm 34 2 Kings 18:1-16 Matthew 24:1-14 Lawlessness And Love (Matthew 24:12) And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. “Love” is one of those words that has been made to mean whatever we want it to mean. But just because we want something to be so, doesn’t make it so. In the context of Jesus teaching his disciples to not worry about the specific calendar date of the new creation, he makes this comment about the relationship between lawlessness and love – or, more precisely, how the two are mutually exclusive. If this seems strange, then that probably has something to do with the fact that we live down-stream of the “free love” movement: that idea that suggests love is true when it is unbound. But Jesus seems to imply the opposite. There is some sort of consistency between lawfulness and love, and when one is lost, so too goes the other. I suppose it comes back to the paradox ...

  Thursday, 13 November, 2025 Psalm 35:1-17 2 Kings 17:21-41 Matthew 23:29-39 The Hen And Her Brood (Matthew 23:37) “ O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!” Hearing tough truth is not easy. How much do any of us enjoy hearing other people point out our faults? This, I think, is the attitude we ought to have when reading today’s first lesson, of the tragic history of Israel. The pre-incarnate Christ would have gathered them together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, having sent to them prophet after prophet, even after the Assyrians had carried off most of them into exile. While we can read about the awful things they did in their pursuit of their false gods and think to ourselves how much more enlightened we are in this modern age, we none the less have the same h...

  Wednesday, 12 November, 2025 Psalm 31 2 Kings 17:1-20 Matthew 23:16-28 Observance: Charles Simeon, priest and evangelist (d. 1836) Yet The Lord Warned (2 Kings 17:13) Yet the Lord warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and every seer, saying, “Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes, in accordance with all the Law that I commanded your fathers, and that I sent to you by my servants the prophets.” We are way past the feast of Pentecost at the moment, and are getting ready to prepare ourselves for Advent. None the less, it is always a good time to reflect on the wonderful gift of God the Holy Spirit, and his presence within us. The example of the Israelites – from their liberation from Egyptian slavery, to their exile by the Assyrians – is recorded for us so that we can see ourselves in them, and see how Christ worked with them, and see how Christ therefore works with us. And today we get this wonderful blend of th...

  Tuesday, 11 November, 2025 Psalms 28; 29 2 Kings 16 Matthew 23:1-15 Observances: Martin, bishop of Tours (d. c. 387); Remembrance Day All Cry “Glory!” (Psalm 29:9) The voice of the Lord makes the deer give birth     and strips the forests bare,     and in his temple all cry, “Glory!” I am a big fan of Sunday School Theology. It is a term I have just invented now; maybe it will catch on. The idea is this: if you grew up in the church, chances are that you received some sort of Christian teaching targeted towards younger minds. And if this teaching was any good, it usually revolved around a few central themes: God is really big, God loves you, and Jesus is God. They say the classics are classic for a reason. And nothing is more classic than these three ideas. Today’s second Psalm, the twenty-ninth, holds them all, focusing especially on the first. God is really big, and we start really big: the ...

  Monday, 10 November, 2025 Psalm 25 2 Kings 15:23-38 Matthew 22:34-46 Observance: Leo of Rome, bishop and teacher (d. 461) The Paths Of The Lord (Psalm 25:10) All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness,     for those who keep his covenant and his testimonies. There are various ways we can consider our soul and its relationship to the Lord God. Specifically, with regards to sin. Thoroughly drenched as we are in Western Christianity, we may be most familiar with the moral aspect of it: right and wrong, good and evil, justice and mercy. This perspective is thoroughly biblical, and a treasured inheritance of our Reformed Catholicity. If we were to turn our eyes to the churches of the East, we find a slightly different perspective. Sin is a disease, and Christ as our Heavenly Doctor offers us the cure. Flicking through the pages of our Bible furnishes us with plenty of references to this idea as well. Today...

  Saturday, 8 November, 2025 Psalms 20; 21 2 Kings 15:8-22 Matthew 22:15-33 Observance: Saints, martyrs, missionaries and teachers of the Anglican Communion Desire And Request (Psalm 20:4; 21:2) May he grant you your heart's desire     and fulfill all your plans! You have given him his heart's desire     and have not withheld the request of his lips. A little while ago we noticed how, in the Psalms, we often come across this character described as “the righteous man”. Another main character often referred to is the “king”. The righteous man is, it appears, to be a prophetic reference to Jesus; then, as now, it is difficult to disagree with the conclusion that this king is the same Jesus. The Psalms are given to us as a way of having a conversation with God. And they are also an insight into the conversation between the Persons of the triune God. Both are true: for in the incarnation of our Lord, he ...

  Friday, 7 November, 2025 Psalm 19 2 Kings 14:17-15:7 Matthew 22:1-14 More To Be Desired (Psalm 19:10) More to be desired are they than gold,     even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey     and drippings of the honeycomb. There seems to be, to my observation at least, a bit of a revival amongst young adult men in the pursuit of wisdom. It is a far cry from my own early days and those of my peers – but we won’t go into that now. Some of the classics are coming back out again, which is fun to see – one of my personal favourites was a work written during the decline of the Samurai in Japan, called “The Way Of The Samurai”, which reminded me of useful Christian habits like washing your face in the morning, saying your prayers, and devoting the majority of your headspace to the interests of your Master. Of course, as any studious Bible reader knows, the concept of wisdom itself is far more cosmic tha...

  Thursday, 6 November, 2025 Psalm 18:1-31 2 Kings 14:1-16 Matthew 21:33-46 Speaking About Them (Matthew 21:45) When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus’ parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. The parables of Jesus have such wonderful ambidexterity. They are instantly memorable; they are relatable across time and space; they have never-ending depths of wisdom; and, most wonderful of all, they cut straight into our hearts and make us think about ourselves. The chief priests and the Pharisees had been condemned before by Jesus, and will be condemned yet. They are hypocrites; they are proud; they are selfish. In today’s parable, they are condemned because they did not give proper credit for what they had, and what they had was nothing less than God himself. If you are reading or hearing these words, you are probably one who has been given a fair amount of spiritual light. We have the Bible in our own language; we ha...

  Wednesday, 5 November, 2025 Psalms 15; 16 2 Kings 13:14-25 Matthew 21:23-32 Change Your Mind (Matthew 21:32) Jesus said, ‘For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him.’ One of Jesus’ favourite messages is his call for us to repent. Repentance is one of those words that is only really used by Christians, and even we seem to have differing opinions on its meaning. But here in this parable I think we get a nice down-to-earth idea of it. Jesus seems to suggest that we could think about repentance as being asked to do something, initially refusing, but then changing our mind, and doing it. And he praises those who do this, as opposed to those who say they will do it, but in fact had no intention at all of following through. It also really cuts to the core of the idea of hypocris...

  Tuesday, 4 November, 2025 Psalms 11; 12 2 Kings 13:1-13 Matthew 21:14-22 Observance: Day for Anglicans and Roman Catholics to pray for one another [General Synod 2001] Wonderful Things (Matthew 21:15) But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that Jesus did, and the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” they were indignant. What kind of frame of mind does one have to be in, in order to be indignant at someone doing wonderful things? When a wonderful thing happens, do we join in the wonder? Many who are in ministry will tell you that, when walking alongside someone else in their spiritual discernment, a good question for reflection begins with the words, “I wonder”. It could just be a common turn of phrase, meaning the idea of questioning in a general sense. But deeper than that is the idea of being in wonder. God is doing things in and around us all the time, and when God revealed hi...