It isn’t only bodies that can be crippled. Hearts, souls and minds can be crippled too.

Crippled by stress, loneliness, doubt, loss, sadness, fear…. The list goes on.

In today’s gospel reading Jesus heals a woman who had a crippled back, but the intriguing thing is that he proclaims her healed before there’s any sign that it had actually happened. It’s like he knew what was going to happen to this woman (healing), and was proclaiming as a reality it in the present.

What if that little individual story actually represents the big story of the human race? What if forgiveness, healing and fullness of life is where we’re headed, but we can begin to live into the reality of those things now, through faith? What if everything that holds us back was dealt with at the cross, and all we need to do is claim that wholeness and live in the light of what Christ has already done for us?

Deep waters for an all age service, but that’s where we went swimming today!

A cat kept wandering into the temple as the guru taught his disciples, so he had it tied up so as to avoid distracting everyone. Over time, people forgot the origins of this practice and by the time a century had passed, learned scholars were writing essays on the religious and theological significance of having a cat tethered to a pillar during worship.

Today we’re looking at an argument Jesus had with the religious leaders over handwashing rituals and using that story to think about our traditions in the church. We’re reflecting on the benefits of our traditions – the way they ground us and give us a sense of belonging, but we’re also highlighting two pitfalls: making them too important (and inhibiting change) or getting too familiar with them (and robbing them of their significance).

She was powerless. He was powerful and held her fate in his hands, but didn’t care one thing about her situation. There was nothing in it for him.

The only thing she had going for her was her persistence. So she kept getting in his face – at his work, on the golf course, even at his home. Day after day after day, she finally wore him down to the point where he cracked and promised to give her what she wanted – the justice she deserved.

God isn’t like that, says Jesus in today’s parable.

He doesn’t need his arm twisted to do what’s right; and though our prayers might not always be answered at the time or in the way we hoped for, we can always trust in God’s character. We can know for sure that he cares about what’s right and helping those who have right on their side.

https://youtu.be/yDcZRRH7p4U

Two sisters welcome an important guest and his entourage into their home. One of them thinks the most important thing she can do is sit with him and hear what he’s got to say. The other feels caught up in the business providing hospitality and is soon feeling hassled and harassed in the kitchen. ‘It’s not fair’ she complains to her guest and her sister – and she was probably right! - but the answer she got back wasn’t at all what she was expecting.

This is the story of Mary and Martha as we find it in Luke’s gospel and it’s got a lot to say to us today about how we make our choices and how we prioritise the important things in the midst of all the urgent things that we feel need done.

Hope you can join us.

We know the story of the Good Samaritan and what it teaches, but today we’re going a little deeper and seeing the story in a new way. This isn’t just a story about the need for people to get on and help even those who are their enemies; it’s a story that teaches the amazing truth that God, in Christ, has reached out to the whole human family to bring our ultimate healing and restoration.

A desperate father whose young daughter is dying on the cusp of womanhood. A chronically ill woman whose life has been overshadowed by her condition. Jesus brings healing into both situations in this morning’s reading, but how do we read and understand these stories in the light of our own experiences with illness and death? Does God not heal today, or does our understanding of what makes for healing need to grow?

A word that touches all our lives from the gospel this morning.

She was childless. And in the culture of her day, a childless wife was no wife at all.

Hannah was her name and she was in serious danger of letting her infertility have the last word on her identity.

Today we’re thinking about the tendency we all know to let our hardest, most personal struggles overtake us and become the place we live out of. Grief, loss, illness, sadness. All of us have difficult times and experiences, but it’s never a good idea to pitch our tents there and make them our home. We are more than our present experience, no matter how hard it may be. We are beloved children of God, whatever it is that we happen to be going through, and that realisation helps shed some eternal light on our real, but temporal problems.

Today at Father’s Day All Age worship we spent some time thinking about what makes for a good dad and realised just how many of those things apply to God as well. It’s no accident that when Jesus teaches us about God, his main metaphor is that of a good Father. And in terms of his relationship with us, God’s Fatherhood comes first and modifies everything else:

“He creates as a loving Father, he exercises his power as a loving Father, he oversees and manages things as a loving Father. He bears with us, as a loving Father; he guides and warns and punishes when he has to, as a loving Father; and he’s committed to us from beginning to end, as a loving Father.”

So as well as remembering our human dads, we remembered our heavenly one too and gave thanks that we know we’re part of his family.

This was also our Sunday School prizegiving service, and a big thanks to all the volunteers who help with Sunday School and Kirk Klub during the year.

https://youtu.be/0lItSmVUU3w

This morning was our annual memorial service where we remember the folk who’ve passed on within our church community over the past year. As part of that service we light candles in their memory and we remember the scripture promise that the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never overcome it.

https://youtu.be/0JGoskkIPEM

This morning we had our annual elders’ service, led by Francois, Mark and Laura, and the group looked at three themes that coalesced on this particular Sunday – Pentecost, Jubilee and our Presbytery Mission Plan discussions.

Thanks to everyone who took part, and to the Welcome team and the bakers for a very special Jubilee spread afterwards.

https://youtu.be/qtM27-GPzks