The Lord is Risen! Weeping, turning, witnessing

The Lord is Risen A sermon for Easter Day 20th April, 2014 John 20.1-18 It’s a privilege to welcome you today to our renewed and re-ordered Cathedral. The work is not finished yet and will go on for some months.  But it’s a magnificent…
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The Lord is Risen! Weeping, turning, witnessing

The Lord is Risen A sermon for Easter Day 20th April, 2014 John 20.1-18 It’s a privilege to welcome you today to our renewed and re-ordered Cathedral. The work is not finished yet and will go on for some months. But it’s a magnificent…

Lift up your hearts: a sermon at the Chrism Eucharist

Lift up your hearts A Sermon at the Chrism Eucharist 15th April, 2014. 1 Samuel 3.1-10; Luke 7.36-50 The Lord be with you And also with you Lift up your hearts We lift them to the Lord About two years ago, this particular phrase in…

Hope for the Future: fighting the giant of climate change

Hope for the Future A Presidential Address to the Sheffield Diocesan Synod 8th March, 2014 In the 1940’s, William Beveridge and William Temple spoke of five giants.  They were referring to the evils which would have to be fought by the…

Listening and the conversion of St Paul

Five years ago today, on the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, I was consecrated Bishop of Sheffield.  It was on a freezing cold Sunday morning in York Minster with over 2,000 people present in that great church from all over the Diocese…

Uncomfortable words

“Harden not your hearts” The Psalm now commends to us something we need to avoid if we are to hear God’s voice today as we attend to scripture in private prayer and public worship.  Something more than stillness and attention is required. We…

The Voice

Today if you will listen to his voice This final part of the psalm presumes an ongoing conversation between the LORD and his people, between the LORD and each person who will hear him.  This is the conversation which began in the story…

God speaks

Today if you will listen to his voice We will look tomorrow at what it means to listen. But today we need to pause and think about the clearest and most profound truth which underlies these words: the presumption on which they are based. The…

Today if you will listen to his voice

Today if you will listen to his voice At the end of verse 7, Psalm 95 changes gear[1].  The final section of the psalm makes it unique in the psalter.  95.1-7a is a beautiful hymn of praise but like many others in the Psalms (see Psalm…