Sermon delivered at New College, Christ the King, 24 November 2019
If you’ve watched any adverts recently, you’ll have noticed that the advertising team at BT are suffering from flashbacks to their A-levels. In their ad, a schoolgirl walks across town, intoning Dickens: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”
In a bizarre twist, its backing track is Stormzy’s Blinded by your Grace, in a Dickens/God mash-up that feels entirely appropriate for a New College sermon, because the liturgy for today’s festival of Christ the King is all about these contrasts. On the one hand, the reading from Jeremiah is about God sending a King to gather the lost sheep of Israel, and the Psalm and the anthem are about God defending his chosen people; while on the other hand the Gospel reading is about God failing to show up to rescue Jesus at the crucifixion, as the thieves on either side also die painfully on their crosses. Read More
