Book: Luke

Jesus is heart-broken when we refuse his call to gather with him in a place of powerlessness, vulnerable to the hostility of a power-hungry world.

Whether we think of the devil as a personal being or as a metaphor, our call to put our trust in Jesus to strengthen our resistance to the temptation of expedient short-cuts is the same.

Jesus calls us in a new direction, full of strangers and dangers and turmoil and wonder. And in that vision of a new way, a new future leaping with silvery hope, we will find the courage to leave everything.

We grow into the likeness of Christ as we model ourselves on him, and he is a model of growth rather than a model of static perfection.

Understanding Mary as a god-bearer opens up new possibilities, for we can all be god-bearers, carrying God’s love and longing for justice into every place that we go.

In an us-and-them world, people hope to find a way to get God on their side, but Jesus confounds our expectations of God siding against others.

The refining fire made known in Jesus is not targeting “morality” issues, but our hatreds, hostilities and inhospitableness.

In the fact of the climate apocalypse, we hold on to our hope: hoping and working for the radical, impossible change that is necessary.

Love is our purpose; we are not abandoned, not fearful, judgemental or self-righteous, for we are made in the image of God, who is gentle and wise, witty and loving, generous, forgiving, compassionate and kind.

We shall be ourselves when we are able to surrender ourselves to Christ and say ‘not my will, but yours’.

To grow up well, children need to be anchored to a broad community with shared values, which nevertheless allows for individual differences.

We are welcoming a baby born into occupied territories to a fiercely holy young woman, and we are recognising in that baby the hope of liberation.