Two donkeys? A donkey and a colt? Palm Sunday 2026

March 28, 2026

Palm Sunday – 2026

Matthew 26:14-27:66 (21:1-11)

Marian Free

In the name of God whom we label and misunderstand at our peril. Amen.

On this day, we have a surfeit of readings as we combine a Litany of the Palms with a reading of the passion – almost two chapters of Matthew’s gospel.  This was not the tradition of my childhood, when Passion Sunday (the fifth Sunday of Lent) marked the beginning of Passiontide and Palm Sunday (the sixth Sunday) focussed solely on Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. It is only in more recent decades, that the church reverted to an ancient tradition in which the Passion was read on the Sunday before Easter, as something of an “overture” to the events of Holy Week[1] and as a way of tempering the elation associated with Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem with the shadow of the cross. 

My habit on Palm Sunday is to preach on Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, in part because the Passion reading itself brings us down to earth and reminds us that the excitement of the crowd was short lived, and in part because we will hear the story all over again on Good Friday.

We are led to believe that Jesus riding a donkey into Jerusalem is a sign of humility, but in fact, Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem is quite deliberate. It is staged if you like. Jesus doesn’t walk with the crowds of pilgrims as would be expected. Instead, he rides a “borrowed” donkey, the owner of which appears to have no say in the matter. Jesus has simply sent two disciples into a village (unnamed) telling them to: “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, ‘The Lord needs them.’ And he will send them immediately.” The owner is expected to make no objection.

Then there is the matter of the donkey and the colt. Why both? and why/how would Jesus have managed to sit astride both together? Matthew’s text is quite clear – “the disciples brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them.” (Mt 21:6) According to Matthew Jesus sat on both animals, animals which were presumably of different heights, and which may well have walked at two different speeds, after all one is a colt that may never have been ridden before. It would have been extremely awkward, not only for Jesus, but surely for the animals as well.  

Of the four gospels, only Matthew has two animals. Mark and Luke have only a colt and John has a young donkey. Given the awkwardness of the situation this has to be a deliberate addition by Matthew. Yet, this is probably not an example of Matthew’s propensity to double up (two demoniacs, two blind men) but something else entirely. There is a reason why Matthew doesn’t follow Mark but adds a second beast of burden. 

I have been puzzled less by the fact that there are two animals, and more by the fact that Jesus rides them both. It was therefore with some relief that I read Catherine Sider Hamilton[2] this week. Like me, she finds the image of Jesus riding on them to be “impossible, even ridiculous.” The text in Zechariah, which is often read as part of the Litany of the Palms reads: “behold your king comes to you, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (Zech 9:9) and it is often assumed that this quote is behind Matthew’s doubling up, but it is clear from the text that there is only one animal in Zechariah[3].  

A key characteristic of Matthew’s gospel is his determination to demonstrate Jesus’ fulfilment of Old Testament texts. It should come as no surprise then, that in this instance, Matthew wants to make it absolutely clear that Jesus is the promised king (messiah). To do this Matthew takes us all the way back to God’s promises to the patriarchs – Genesis 49:10-11. In these verses, Jacob blesses his eldest son, Judah saying in part: “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,” Jacob says. “Tying his foal to the vine and the colt of his donkey to the choice vine, he washes his garments in wine …” As Hamilton points out, the Genesis text refers to two animals in a text which promises that the sceptre (rule) will never pass from Judah. By the first century this text was an important part of the messianic expectation. There would always be a king of the tribe of Judah – David was of the line of Judah, and the messiah was to be of the line of David.

By including both the donkey and the colt, Matthew weaves the text from Genesis together with the text from Zechariah. The promised King arrives in Jerusalem riding a donkey and a colt. By combining the two texts Matthew makes it clear that the promised king announced by Zechariah, is in fact the messianic king – descended from David of the tribe of Judah. Indeed, it would appear that the crowd have made the connection because in Matthew (and only in Matthew) they greet Jesus as the Son of David .

This, the most Jewish of the gospels reaches back into the scriptures, to make it clear that Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem demonstrates that – whatever was to follow and no matter how unlikely the events of the Passion – Jesus was the one promised by God.

Ironically though, the crowds fail to fully see the significance of their declaration of Jesus as Son of David. Instead of proclaiming him as king they simply declare him to be: “the prophet, Jesus from Nazareth.” It is presumably this failure to recognise Jesus for who he really was that allowed them to turn their backs on him and to call for his death within a week.

With the benefit of hindsight we know who Jesus is or do we? May this Holy Week be for all of us a time for reflection and re-examination, a time to let go of our preconceptions and to open our hearts and minds that we might more fully know Jesus the Christ, so that we might share in his sufferings and participate in his glory.

[1] It is difficult to find a simple explanation of the traditions, but you might like to read further here: https://liturgy.co.nz/why-read-the-passion-on-palm-sunday

[2] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sunday-of-the-passion-palm-sunday/commentary-on-matthew-2711-54-7

[3] The doubling up is as Hamilton points out an example of Hebrew parallelism something that Matthew, given his familiarity with the Jewish text, would have known.

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Life from death creating something from nothing

March 21, 2026

Lent 5 – 2026

John 11:1-45

Marian Free

In the name of God who from nothing brought all things into being. Amen.

If asked, many of us would say that the fourth gospel is our favourite. The mystical nature of the gospel seems to draw us in and transform us. Yet even though we are aware that this is the most spiritual of the gospels we are not immune from the temptation to take the gospel literally and in so doing to miss the symbolism that makes John’s gospel so mysterious. 

The author of the fourth gospel does not simply report events but makes meaning out of them. For example, when Nicodemus visits Jesus, the author uses imagery of night/dark verses day/light to highlight not only to Nicodemus perceived need for secrecy, but also to allude both to Nicodemus’ failure to understand what Jesus is saying and his refusal (at this point in time) to believe in Jesus. When John tells us that Jesus opens the eyes of the man born blind, the language of seeing and not seeing exposes the “blindness” of the Pharisees. When Jesus feeds the 5,000, John’s focus is not so much on the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves, but on what it means for Jesus to be the bread from heaven. 

This is a gospel that needs to be mined for its deeper meaning – a meaning that is obscured – at least to Jesus’ opponents and dialogue partners. The Jesus of the fourth gospel speaks in riddles.  In the case of would-be followers, the riddles are intended to make his dialogue partners think and to change their way of thinking. So in this gospel Jesus tells Nicodemus that he must be born from above. (Nicodemus doesn’t understand but does engage in conversation.) Jesus tells the woman at the well that he can give her living water.  She is confused but engages Jesus in debate and comes to faith. The blind man receives the ability to see, but also the inner sight which enables him to recognise who Jesus is when no one else has the courage to admit to the possibility that Jesus has been sent by God.

Some see and believe, some see and come to a partial understanding, but the Pharisees are both blind and deaf to Jesus’ presence. They refuse to “see” the miracle of sight. They refuse to grasp what Jesus’ actions and words say about who he is. The Pharisees close themselves off both from miracle and teaching. Instead of trying to understand, they confront Jesus and challenge both his actions and his teaching. Claiming superior knowledge and wisdom they seem to be convinced that there is only one way to see the world and only one way to relate to God – their way. The symbolism and deeper meaning behind Jesus’ actions is completely lost on them.  

John’s gospel records only seven miracles, each more dramatic than the last. Water is turned into wine, the son of a royal official is healed, a lame man walks, bread is multiplied, Jesus walks on water, and a blind man sees. Today we encounter the last, the climactic miracle – the raising of Lazarus.

Like so many of the stories John records, this too is filled with riddles. Lazarus’ sisters send a message to let Jesus know that their brother (Jesus’ friend) is unwell. There is only one reason to tell Jesus and that is that the sisters fear that Lazarus will not recover. However, instead of making his way to Bethany at once, Jesus delays for two days saying: “This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” The problem is, Lazarus does die. 

We are not told how Jesus finds out about the death of Lazarus (maybe he simply intuits it). Regardless, it appears that when Jesus finally makes up his mind to go to Bethany (which is only two miles away from Jerusalem where Jesus’ life is in danger), Lazarus is already dead. Jesus speaks in riddles telling the disciples that Lazarus is asleep before finally telling them plainly, “Lazarus is dead. For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”

This account is puzzling on so many levels. It is possible to read in such a way as to conclude that Jesus deliberately delays his journey so that Lazarus will die, that Jesus plans the death of Lazarus so that he can reveal his most powerful party trick, one that will ensure his disciples will believe. “This illness is for God’s glory.” “I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe.”

Just as last week we saw that we would be mistaken to attribute to God  a kind of callous disregard that makes unborn children blind just so that Jesus can give them (or one of them) sight, so it is a mistake to conclude that Jesus allows Lazarus to die just so that Jesus can demonstrate that he has the power to bring someone back from the dead. What sort of capricious God would deliberately deprive someone of life in order to show people just what God can do? What sort of cruel and arrogant God would cause Mary and Martha so much grief just to show how powerful God is? Certainly not the God who would take on human form and share human existence. Not the God who, in Jesus would allow himself to be nailed to a cross.

The raising of Lazarus is not a simple miracle story revealing what God can and cannot do (after all God doesn’t raise all people from the dead or give sight to every person born blind). We have to be careful not to take Jesus’ language too literally for to do so causes a great deal of damage to the image of God and leads us to miss the deeper meaning of what is going on here. 

As with so many of the Johannine accounts of Jesus’ life it is the symbolism that is important. The raising of Lazarus is a reminder to those who might need it that God can bring life from death (whatever that looks like). God can transform life-denying circumstances into life-giving circumstances. God can wring things that are from things that are not. When we are locked in a tomb of grief or despair or when it seems that health or security or joy are beyond our reach, the raising of Lazarus, the giving of life to dead bones (Ezekiel 37) are a reason for hope an encouragement to hold on when holding on seems impossible.

Faith doesn’t protect us from suffering, but God does not capriciously inflict suffering on anyone. Faith is an anchor in the storm, a hope for the future and a confidence that whether we live or die, we are God’s.

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Opening our eyes to possibility

March 17, 2026

Lent 5 – 2026

John 9:1-41

Marian Free

In the name of God Source of all Being, Living Word, Giver of Life. Amen.

“Who sinned? This man or his parents?” In the face of inexplicable or unbearable loss it is easy to come up with trite, seemingly pious explanations. (“They are in a better place.” “God must have wanted another angel.”) In our effort to make sense of the senseless, we attribute to God characteristics that have little to do with God and more to do with our own need to understand. In so doing, we not only trivialise the pain and the grief of another, we also diminish and trivialise God. 

When someone dies after a long and painful struggle, it might be appropriate to express the view that they are now at peace or with God, but when a young person is tragically killed in an accident or slowly dies from cancer, it is tempting, but irrational to attribute to God a reason for the death, or to try to minimize the pain. To assume that God allows a person to die because heaven does not yet have enough angels is a gross presumption that we know what God needs – or even to assume God has needs. 

Human life is precarious and what happens to one or another person is often completely random – natural disaster, reckless driving, genetics – are all things which (with the possible exception of the last) cannot be predicted or protected against. God certainly doesn’t visit suffering on the unsuspecting for some bizarre self-seeking motive.

The question of human suffering, especially in relation to accidents of birth, was a matter of concern to people who did not have our medical knowledge. Why someone might give birth to a child with epilepsy, or a child without sight, and another might not was a complete mystery to our forebears. In the absence of understanding people looked for someone to blame. God was not exempt from this desire to attribute a cause for suffering. Indeed, a refrain that runs through the Old Testament is that “the iniquity of the fathers will be visited on the children.” In their their original context these words referred specifically to the consequences that idolatry and the disobedience of the whole nation would have on future generations. In fact, sin generally referred to the nation and their propensity to abandon God. It did not refer to individual wrongdoing.

In today’s account of the man born blind, Jesus points out that there is a flaw in the kind of thinking that blames a parent, or grandparent for the suffering of a descendant (no matter how distant). God does not and will not inflict suffering on the innocent as a consequence of the actions of the guilty. 

Unfortunately, Jesus does not go on to undo the false thinking that has grown up around unexplained suffering and inexplicable impairment. Having dismissed the misconception, Jesus goes on to attribute an alternative meaning to the man’s blindness. He suggests that in this instance the man’s condition of blindness provides an opportunity, not only for Jesus to give the man the gift of sight, but also for him to reflect on what it means to be blind and what it is to really see[1]. To really see Jesus claims, would be to know that he was sent by God and that all that he says and does comes from God.

Jesus’ healing of the blind man is disruptive on many levels. As a consequence of receiving his sight, the life of the blind man and his family is irrevocably changed. The man has to decide what to do with his sight. He only knows what it is to beg and to be dependent on others. What can he do now? He has no skills, but presumably he cannot continue to beg. His family have to adjust to living with someone who no longer needs the sort of support the man has needed his whole life. Hopefully a family’s love will find a way to rejoice and move forward, even so the future is unknown and will have to be navigated in a new way. 

If the family are confused, the Pharisees are more so. Not only are they confused, but they are also threatened. who have more to lose. Who is this man who heals on the Sabbath, who doesn’t follow the rules, and who gains the attention and loyalty of the crowds? They do all they can do discredit Jesus, and to dissuade the crowds from taking him seriously. 

As we have seen throughout the gospel, the Pharisees simply cannot allow their imaginations to be stretched. They have found a way to limit and contain their relationship with God. They have made it manageable. If Jesus is who he says he is, then what becomes of the structures and rules that they have built up? What happens to all their preconceptions about God and about the Messiah? Unlike the man born blind, they simply cannot allow a crack to form in their carefully constructed system of belief. Jesus does not fit their preconceived image, so he cannot possibly be who he claims to be. 

In the face of such dissonance, the refuse to allow their eyes (minds) to be opened, and they hold even more firmly to their cherished beliefs.

The account of the man born blind is more about understanding who Jesus is, than it is about the miracle of sight, more about seeing with our hearts than with our eyes. It challenges us to ask what cherished beliefs and practices have we allowed to come between ourselves and God? What beliefs and practices have we set in stone as if we already know all there is to know about God? What is it about God that makes us so uncomfortable that we have blinded ourselves to the possibility that God is more than we can ever know and will reveal more than we are ready for?

If God were to open our eyes, would we be grateful or terrified?

[1] It is a mistake to assume that God made the man blind just so that Jesus would have an entry point for his discussion, for that would not move the debate any further forward.

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International Women’s Day – voices of women in John

March 7, 2026

Lent 3 – 2026

John 4:5-42

Marian Free

In the name of God whose choice of disciples is not limited to gender, nor is it constrained by stereotype or social norms. Amen.

Those who prepare our lectionary will not have planned this, but what a wonderful gospel reading for International Women’s Day! In the account of the woman whom Jesus meets at the well, we are presented with an illustration of an intelligent woman with an enquiring mind, a woman who has the confidence to engage a stranger in a conversation about theology, a woman who is the first to whom Jesus reveals his identity,  and one of the first evangelists. The story of the woman of Samaria also tells us about the role of women as leaders in the community for whom the fourth gospel was written. 

One of the distinctive features of the fourth gospel is the significant role played by women. Indeed, the prominence of women suggests that in the latter part of the first century women continued to exercise leadership in the community behind the formation of this gospel. Unlike the Synoptic gospels in which the accounts of women are few and are often retold in such a way as to limit their authority and to emphasise their passivity, John’s gospel features many women who confidently engage with Jesus and who are empowered to share the good news with others. At a time when women were beginning to be written out of the story of the Jesus’ movement, the author of John’s gospel continues to recognise the roles women played, their conversations and confrontations with Jesus as well as their capacity to share the gospel with others and to bring them to faith.

The gospel begins with the wedding at Cana in which we meet the mother of Jesus. Here Mary takes it upon herself to let Jesus know that the wine has run out and tells the servants to do whatever Jesus asks them to do. Though Jesus’ initial reaction suggests he will ignore his mother, he responds by turning water into wine. Later, when the author of the gospel is recounting the story of the raising of Lazarus, it is Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, who exercise key roles. This suggests that they hold positions of leadership within that community. It is significant that neither Martha nor Mary are afraid to berate Jesus for his tardiness and that they have no hesitation in blaming Jesus for the death of their brother. Martha even questions Jesus’ wisdom in opening the tomb. In this gospel it is Martha, not Peter, who identifies Jesus as the Christ: “you are the Christ”, she says: “the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” 

A few days later the same Mary, takes expensive oil and anoints Jesus’ feet, modelling a form of servanthood that Jesus himself will adopt when he washes the feet of the disciples. Martha and Mary are not silenced as they are in the gospel of Luke. In John’s gospel they are revealed as women of significance in the community who are at the centre of Jesus’ circle and who are confident in themselves and in their relationship with Jesus.

In John the women at the foot of the cross are named –  the three Marys – and finally, to cap off a gospel in which the intelligence, insight, wisdom and confidence of women are celebrated, it is Mary Magdalene who not only sees the risen Christ, but who is commissioned to tell the disciples that she has seen him. Magdalene then is the apostle to the apostles, the first among the apostles. 

The women of John’s are not passive, compliant or anxious women who are worried about social norms or about what others might think. They are women who are confident of their own worth, of their right to engage with and even to challenge Jesus and of their commission to share the gospel with others.

From the way in which stories of women are recorded, it is possible to surmise that the communities which gave birth to the Synoptic gospels had begun to limit the roles that women were able to play (listeners and housekeepers) and that as a result the Jesus’ story is told in such a way that diminishes their contribution to the Jesus’ movement. In the same way, it possible to conclude that the community behind the fourth gospel continued to celebrate (and even elevate) the women who followed Jesus. This observation leads to the conclusion that women continued to have leadership roles in the Johannine community well into the late first century.  (That is, they couldn’t be written out of the story because they were part of the continuing story.) 

In this morning’s gospel Jesus is returning to Galilee from Jerusalem and has chosen to take the direct route through Samaria. On reaching the outskirts Sychar he sends his disciples to buy food while he rests at a well. When a woman comes to draw water, Jesus initiates a conversation and, even though social norms dictate that the two should not speak to each other (or share utensils), the woman responds. As with his encounter with Nicodemus, Jesus uses imagery that has a double meaning, but in contrast to Nicodemus who goes away confused, the woman of Samaria enters into a discussion, a discussion that moves beyond the initial misunderstanding into a debate about the practice of faith and the coming of the Christ. 

Unfortunately, an obsession on the number of husbands and the fact that the woman came to the well at noon have led to assumptions about her morality and about her status within her community. As a result, we have tended to lose sight of her wit, her intelligence, her confidence, her agency. Seen without our blinkers, we can see that her influence in her community meant that rather than being ostracized, she was considered sufficiently trustworthy by her fellow townspeople that they did not question her report but accepted that she may have seen the Messiah and they immediately left the city to see Jesus for themselves.  

On this International Women’s Day, let us celebrate the women who refused to be defined and limited by cultural norms and whose confidence, intelligence and wisdom have continued to inform, encourage and to inspire us in our own journeys of faith.

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Being reborn – with Nicodemus

February 28, 2026

Lent 2 – 2026

John 3:1-17

Marian Free

In the name of God who calls us out of darkness into light. Amen.

“He dunks me. He leans me back into the darkening water and I go under.

I feel like I’m drowning but I know I’ve got breath. There’s something choking me, something’s trying to get out. I start to panic, and with the water flowing over me, I cough up this ball of darkness and pain and regret– this wad of sorrow and sadness, that holds every dumb thing I ever did and more – and I spit it into the water with the last of the air in my lungs. And I know I’m gonna die. The water’s gone black and I don’t know where the surface is. I got nothing left and I just want to drift away like a leaf in the current.

Then he lifts me out of the water, and I’m hacking for breath and wondering why I’m alive and I just laugh. Laugh like I’ve never laughed in my life – or not since I was a kid. Like a dam breaking. Like a chain snapping. Like a kid who’s just heard the words he’s been longing to hear all his life. 

Stephen Daughtry, in his Lenten Study Holiday – Stories of Jesus set in an Australian Landscape, imagines what it might feel like to have been baptised by John the Baptist.  For his character, baptism was a dramatic, wrenching, life-changing experience – a movement from dark to light, from death to life, a form of rebirth which changes him forever[1].

For some people, meeting Jesus or experiencing the Holy Spirit for the first time is like being hit by a train. It is an overwhelming experience – like having one’s eyes opened, seeing oneself clearly (the bad and the good) and, most importantly, knowing for certain that God’s love overlooks all their faults and that they are held, now and forever in God’s loving arms. No wonder such people talk about being born again. They have left behind the person they once were and have stepped forward into a new life in which God (Father, Son and Spirit) is the centre and the guiding force.

Not all of us have such a powerful beginning to our faith. Those of us who were born into Christian families and who were baptised as infants (without our knowledge or consent) may not have a sensational conversion experience or be able to point to a specific time and place when we knew for sure that we believed and that we were loved, it may have come upon us gradually or it may be that there was never a time when you did not believe.

For all of us though, those who have a sudden conviction that they are loved by God, those who come to that belief over time and those who always knew, faith is not a one-off event, but a journey, a growing into the fulness of Christ which involves a series of rebirths as we constantly shed our old selves, allowing ourselves to be renewed so that we might become more truly children of God.

Abram is a good example of this step-by-step growth in faith. Abraham was minding his own business in Ur, almost certainly worshiping the gods of his own people. Out of nowhere God, Yahweh, asks him to pick up everything – his wife, his servants, his animals and all his goods – and to leave behind everything that he knew and loved – his family, his friends, the customs of his people – and to travel to God knew where. Without question (at least as the story tells it), Abram does just that – a form of re-birth.

Over time Abram’s confidence wavers. He fathers a child with Hagar instead of trusting that God will bless Sarai with a child. God appears to Abram and makes a covenant with him, giving him a new name – if you like, a second re-birth. There are many twists in the story, but a constant is Abraham’s faith and his continual dying and rebirth.

Another character who illustrates the idea of faith as a journey, or as a gradual unfolding, is Nicodemus whom we meet in John’s gospel today. Even at this early stage in the gospel Nicodemus recognises that Jesus comes from God, but he is not willing to commit. He has yet to understand that faith in Jesus must be wholehearted. It means letting go of his past ways of thinking and allowing himself to be guided by the Spirit. In other words, as Jesus says, he must be born again. 

Thankfully, that is not the end of the story, Jesus has made an impression. Nicodemus might be puzzled, but he can’t dismiss Jesus. We meet him again in chapter 7. Jesus is in Jerusalem. His influence on the crowds and the content of his teaching is causing the Chief Priests and Pharisees a great deal of anxiety (it contradicts what they teach, and the enthusiasm of the crowds might capture the attention of the Romans). He must be stopped! So they send soldiers to arrest him. Only Nicodemus speaks for Jesus, reminding his peers that the law does not judge people without giving them a trial. (Nicodemus has moved from secretly meeting Jesus at night, to publicly defending him – a form of rebirth.)

We meet Nicodemus for the last time on the evening of the crucifixion. Joseph of Arimathea has received permission to take Jesus’ body away. He is met by Nicodemus who brings with him about a hundred pounds of myrrh and aloes – in today’s terms $150-200,000 worth of spices! By now he is fully committed – another rebirth. No doubt Nicodemus experiences many more rebirths before his final birth into eternal life, but we do not know the end of the story.

One way of looking at Lent is to see it as a preparation for rebirth, as a letting go of the things that hold us back so that we can restart our relationship with God, released from the burdens that have kept us apart. Whatever discipline we have taken up for Lent we have done so in the hope that we will emerge at Easter as a people who have been changed and renewed. Whether we have chosen to give something up, to let something go, to expand our minds through reading, or to deepen our understand through prayer; we will come to Easter with new insights about ourselves and about our relationship with God that will enable us to embrace more fully the life that God gives us and to be formed more completely into the image of Christ.

On Good Friday we can say ‘goodbye’ to the person we were when Lent began so that on Easter Day, we can be born again into resurrection life. And we will do this again and again, every Lent, every Good Friday, every Easter Day as day by day, year by year, we are reborn, transformed into children of God. 

[1] Daughtry, Stephen. 2025. Holiday Stories of Jesus set in an Australian Landscape. Sydney: A Mission Australia publication. The Anglican Board of Mission.

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Lent 1 – competing with God

February 21, 2026

Lent 1 – 2026

Matthew 4:1-11

Marian Free

In the name of God, Source of all being, Word of life, Enlivening Spirit. Amen.

All around the world scientists and other professionals are doing research and offering advice to third world countries in the belief that they can help reduce food-scarcity, increase access to clean water and provide cheap, easy to construct housing that will withstand cyclones. One such programme developed bananas that contained a vitamin that was lacking in the diets of some populations in East Africa. Another produced amazing results simply by delivering salt to an isolated population in the Himalayas. The absence of salt in their diet had led to stunted growth and the early loss of teeth.  When salt was added to the diet the effect was phenomenal.

Such achievements are all well and good, but it is not always easy to predict all the consequences of these sorts of interventions. Many years ago, I watched a documentary on the effects of aid in third world countries and in particular on the unintended results. I no longer remember the country involved, but I clearly remember that the crop that was genetically enhanced was rice – the staple food of the local people. Scientists were able to develop a rice that produced a much higher yield than the rice that was traditionally grown and they were very successful in encouraging farmers to grow it. Unfortunately, while the rice produced abundantly in good years, in bad years it produced barely any grain. Before the introduction of the “new improved” rice farmers had sown a variety of rice seeds with the result that at least some of them produced a crop even in bad years. Now they no longer had those native seeds they were, at times, even worse off.

Human curiosity and the desire to push the limits of what we learn and what we can do knows no bounds, but humans have their limitations and we cannot always see the end result of what at first seems like a lifesaving, world-changing discovery.

No matter how clever or wise we think we are, only God has access to the full picture. Only God really knows what will really work long term and what will not. Only God can see the unintended domino effect that an action in one place might have in another place and time. Only God can see the length and breadth of human history and the impact of humans on the world and its peoples.

Two of this morning’s reading address the issue of the arrogance of humans who, in their desire to know and their longing to make a difference live in constant competition with God.

In both Genesis and Matthew, the devil (serpent, Satan, tempter) (1) offers human beings what appears to be a really good idea (or ideas).  In Genesis the serpent encourages the woman to eat from the forbidden tree so that she, like God will have the knowledge of good and evil. Surely it would be useful to be able to distinguish good from bad? Thousands of years later, in the desert, the devil makes a number of suggestions to Jesus, all of which have the potential for good, the potential to solve the problems of the world – bread to feed the hungry of world, power to govern justly and wisely, authority to eliminate poverty, violence and oppression and fantastic displays of God’s intervention so that the world might have absolute certainty in the identity of Jesus.  

The reactions of the humans in the two stories are polar opposites. In Genesis, Adam and Eve are seduced by the serpent.  Surely the knowledge of good and evil is just what they need to create a safe and secure community on earth? If they have the wisdom of God, what on earth could go wrong?  God’s reaction in the story indicates that God thinks that things could go very wrong indeed. God knows, as most of us do not, that knowledge in the wrong hands is a very dangerous thing. God knows too well the limitations of humankind and that humanity, represented by Adam and Eve is not ready to know all there is to know.  Indeed, there are few, if any, who have the foreknowledge, the insight and selflessness to see clearly the end results of even good intentions, few who have the maturity to understand that sometimes holding back is of more value than rushing headlong to solve a problem, or to condemn a person who does not conform and few who have the wisdom to know that power, even if used benignly has the potential to oppress and confine.

Jesus’ interaction with the devil is the exact opposite of that of Adam and Eve because Jesus, understands too well the dangers of believing that only good can come from the devil’s suggestions.  He knows that good intentions are not enough, that the issues at hand are much more complex than giving the hungry food (think of the rice), or taking it upon oneself to make changes for the better rather than empowering others to create the change they need, and that dramatic and showy interventions are more convincing than faithful, steady actions that prove one is who they say they are.

Faced with the temptation to take up the devil’s offer of short cuts to recognition, power and a world in which no one is hungry, Jesus responds with the wisdom that demonstrates that he understands that there is no magic wand. He knows that what to the devil, look like obvious solutions may create more problems than they solve.

There is only one way to bring about heaven on earth and that is to follow the example of Jesus, to entrust ourselves and the future to God and to encourage others to do the same. It is only when (like Jesus) we submit ourselves to the greater wisdom, power and foresight of God, and only when we stop trying to compete with God that God’s kingdom will come and God’s will be done.

Lent is not simply about whether or not we can spend forty days going without, it is more about what we learn about ourselves when we give up trying to be in control.

May this Lent be a time, when we see ourselves for who we really are and let go of those things that put us in competition with God.

 

  • I have used the words used in scripture, but I believe these are just ways of expressing the human desire for power, independence and control which prevent us from being in relationship with God. It is a sign of our unwillingness to take responsibility for our behaviour that we attribute our failings to an external source.

 

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Ash Wednesday – Lent

February 17, 2026

As I write this, I am conscious that my calendar announces that today is the beginning of Ramadan, the time of fasting observed by Muslims. From today practicing Muslims will not consume food or drink between sunrise and sunset. This may mean rising at 4am for breakfast and then eating and drinking nothing until 8pm. I know this because my visit to Israel in 2015 coincided with Ramadan. In Old Jerusalem a canon was fired to indicate the beginning of and the end of the fast and the empty streets in the Palestinian districts filled with food carts only. after 8pm. Ramadan and its concluding celebration of Eid are now well-known in the Western world. The ABC news site has even published recipes for Ramadan. In my childhood, newspapers and magazines would. have featured recipes for Lent. Today Ash Wednesday and Lent do not even warrant a mention on my calendar!

Image of smoke from canon. Jerusalem 2015

Culturally Lent has become irrelevant and in the churches we seem to have lost the sense of solidarity that came with giving something up for Lent. This is due in part to the increasing secularisation of our society, but also relates to a more relaxed attitude in the church and the trivialising of the practice by making it a test of will-power rather than a freedom to focus on God and not on oneself.

I don’t have a solution, just a sense of grief that the traditions which enriched our faith and which were evident to the culture around us seem to have lost their place and we haven’t yet found something which unites us as followers of Christ.

The purpose of fasting is to pare down our lives to what is essential such that we can pay attention to God’s provision and can fully appreciate what we do have. We try to give up those things that prevent us from focussing on God. This might include meal plans that are less extravagant and easier to prepare – freeing us from the distraction that food can be in our lives. Equally, it might be useful to give up the self-absorption that reveals itself in resentment, self-pity, envy, ingratitude. If instead we practice gratitude and forgiveness, joy in other’s successes, we will (over time), rid ourselves of the negativity and bitterness that cause us to look inward rather than outward into the world and into God’s creation. We will make room for God and the fruits of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control – will be evident in our lives and be visible to the world.

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Transfiguration – coming down from the mountain top

February 14, 2026

Transfiguration – 2026

Matthew 17:1-9

Marian Free

In the name of God who knows what it is to be fully human. Amen.

Two years ago, Michael and I were privileged to visit the Segrada Familie in Barcelona. We had seen it some twenty years previously when the interior was far from finished. This time we were utterly transfixed. Not only is the church beautiful it is, as Gaudi intended, filled with a sense of peace. After spending some time there, we literally had to force ourselves to leave.  We knew that no matter how long we stayed it would not seem to be enough and we knew that life awaited us beyond its walls.

Today is Transfiguration Sunday. On this day I particularly like to sing the hymn “Tis good Lord to be here”. Quoting Peter’s words in Matthew 17:3, the author of the lyrics, J. Armitage Robinson draws us into the scene on the mountain and imagines its impact on us – we see our redemption and the promise of the kingdom and we long to stay. In the final verse we sing: “Tis good Lord to be here! Yet we may not remain; but since you bid us leave the mount, come with us to the plain.” These final lines have a poignancy that always hits me. “But since you bid us leave the mount, come with us to the plain.” 

Interestingly though, nowhere in the accounts of the Transfiguration does Jesus suggest leaving the mountain – Luke doesn’t even bother to mention the descent. Leaving the mountain is just the logical next step – having gone up, one has to go down.

While they may not reflect the biblical text, Robinson’s lyrics articulate a temptation that is common to all – the desire to hold on to moments of pure joy, moments of transcendence, moments that take us out of our pain or our humdrum existence. He knows how hard it can be to tear oneself away from a moment or place that inspires awe and wonder,  how tempting it is to want to remain in a place where one experiences a feeling of being above and beyond the pressures of life, of being removed from the mundane, and the stressful and being in the presence of the eternal. Why would one ever seek to leave a place in which one felt safe, happy and at peace? Why would one ever want to leave a place in which one felt invincible?

Like Robinson, scholars have long thought that as important as the Transfiguration is, the message that one should return to real life is of equal value. One cannot stay in the rarefied atmosphere of the clouds (isolated and insulated) but must descend to the messiness that is daily living. As followers of Jesus we are obligated to immerse ourselves in the lives of those around us, to be part of the world, not separate from it, to shine our experience of Christ’s light in the darkness that can be human existence. 

It is certainly true that we are called to come down from the mountain and to share in the lives and experiences of our fellow human beings but, as I reflect on the Transfiguration one more time I wonder if that is what the author of Matthew is trying to tell us here. 

Is Matthew talking about the disciples or is he talking about Jesus? It is Jesus who leaves the exalted atmosphere of the mountain top. It is Jesus who as he is descending reminds his disciples that he is about to suffer and die. Jesus leaves the relatively safety of the mountain to face the agony of the cross. He chooses not to take advantage of his privileged status – not to be protected by God from the torment and pain that lies ahead. Jesus boldly leaves the mountain to bury himself once more in the stark realities of human existence. Despite being declared the Son of God, he makes the decision to face whatever it is that lies ahead of him as a human being.

 The Transfiguration and what precedes and follows it, is part of the pattern and tension of Jesus’ life. A life in which times of exaltation are followed by times of dejection, times of being accepted are followed by times of being rejected, times of being understood are followed by times of being misunderstood, times of revelation are followed by times of concealment, times of clarity are followed by times of paradox, and times of certainty are followed by times of confusion. 

At his birth Jesus is celebrated by the magis but then he is forced to for his life. At his baptism Jesus hears God’s voice declaring him to be God’s Son, but immediately he is thrust into the silence of the desert and the temptation to avoid the discomforts that that entails. On his entry to Jerusalem Jesus is cheered by the crowds only to be jeered by them when he stands before Pilate. Jesus’ disciples follow him when all seems to be going well but abandon him when he needs them most. 

Jesus’ life is anything but monochrome. All three evangelists point us away from the mountain to the cross. They want to be absolutely certain – not that we leave the mountain – but that we don’t leave Jesus on the mountain, that we see the tensions and paradoxes that exist in life of one who is fully human as well as fully divine. If we forget Jesus’ humanity, his frailty and his vulnerability, if we leave him on the mountain, we miss the whole point. Jesus, fully human, suffers as we suffer and knows joy as we know joy. There is no armour of godliness that protects him from the realities of human life. 

Jesus’ divinity might show us what God is like, but Jesus’ full humanity tells us that God knows what it is like to be us. To leave Jesus on the mountain is to focus on his glory to the detriment of his humanity, to allow him to come down is to embrace the complexity of who he really is. 

I will still love singing: “Tis good Lord to be here,” but from now on, I will ask myself whether it is Jesus who comes with us to the plain, or whether it is we who follow him into the breadth and depth of what if means to be fully human. 

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“Being more righteous”?

February 10, 2026

 

 Fifth Sunday after Epiphany – 2026

Matthew 5:13-20

Marian Free

In the name of God, Earth-maker, Pain-Bearer, Life-Giver. Amen.

Context is everything. If someone says to you that: “it was really dark”, they could mean a number of things. They could be saying that it was a moonless night, that they had read a book or seen a film with a depressing theme, or that it was an especially dark chocolate that they had eaten. The only way to know for certain what they mean is to know the context of the sentence – either by paying attention to what was said previously (were they talking about a time or place or were they referring to something they had read or seen) or by noticing their physical surroundings (is there evidence that they have just eaten a piece of chocolate?)

There is no reason why we should imagine that the gospels would be any different. On Sundays we hear only small segments of the gospels, but to fully understand what we hear, we have to read the text surrounding our mornings’ set piece and we have to have some understanding of the social, historical, geographical and political context of the writer and/or the community whom the writer is addressing.

I find this particularly important when it comes to the gospel of Matthew. Read in isolation, Matthew’s gospel can appear to be harsh and legalistic. In fact, in the first year of my ordained ministry I struggled to preach on Matthew. It seemed so oppressive and so lacking in the grace that I found elsewhere in the gospels, setting standards that few but the most holy among us could achieve that it was difficult for me to find something inspirational and encouraging to say.

Take for example the last saying from this morning’s gospel. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all I accomplished. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 5:17-18, 20).

At first glance the emphasis on the law, in particular on keeping the letter of the law, contradicts what we know about Jesus’ general antagonism towards the law, and his general disregard for laws that had become burdensome rather than liberating. (His insistence on working on the Sabbath being just one example.)

So what is going on the background of this gospel, that the author of Matthew should be so insistent that Jesus had demanded that the law in its entirety should be kept if one is to enter the kingdom of heaven?

As I often tell my students, the only way we can build up a picture of the situation in which and into which Matthew is writing, is through the clues that we find in the gospel. While the social/historical situation at the time of writing can provide us with some background, there is no external evidence for the life of Jesus or the life of the Jesus’ communities.

It is generally agreed that all the gospels were written after the fall of Jerusalem in 70CE. Jerusalem had been destroyed by the Romans and with it the Temple. Any who survived the slaughter were forced to leave the city and to begin life again. Without a Temple, there was no central focal point for the Jewish faith and no place in which to practice the sacrifices and rituals that were the established means of expressing and maintaining a relationship with God. As a consequence, there developed a reliance on the law as a replacement for the Temple – a practice which had already begun with the Pharisees (who rejected the Temple) and which, after the destruction of Jerusalem developed into what we know as Rabbinic Judaism. The development of Rabbinic Judaism explains a post-Temple emphasis on the law, but not why this emphasis impacts on the Matthean community, for this we have to turn to the gospel itself.

From the way in which the gospel is written, and from certain sayings and inclusions, it is possible to discern that the author of Matthew was writing for followers of Jesus whose origin was Jewish. For instance, unique to Matthew is an emphasis on the ways in which Jesus fulfills Jewish scriptures, Jesus’ genealogy which goes back to Abraham, the father of Judaism, (not Adam as in Luke), Matthew’s use of the title ‘Son of David’ for Jesus and the comparison of Jesus (new law-giver) with Moses (the giver of the law), not to mention the command “to go only to the lost sheep of Israel”.

Historically, there is some evidence that post 70CE a number of Pharisaic Jews found a home in a place called Jamnia. Here they were able to pursue their focus on the law unimpeded. Scholars believe that a community who believed in Jesus likewise found a refuge in Jamnia and that these two “Jewish” groups both claimed to be the true continuation of the historical Israel and in some small way competed with each other for that title.

It is this that helps us to make sense of Matthew 5:17-20.  “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees” could well be an incentive for the Matthean community to prove themselves as the true Israel by being more righteous than the Pharisees whom they viewed as their competition.

When it comes to reading the scriptures we should not be naïve or simply take the words at face value. We should do all that we can to understand what is really being said and why. The alternative to this spirit of inquiry is at best to risk misinterpretation, but at worst is to impose burdens on ourselves and others that were never intended by Jesus.

Faith is not a competition, but a relationship, a relationship based on God’s unconditional love as revealed by Jesus, a gift to be received not earned. Any other reading of scripture risks being coercive and even abusive.

We owe it to God, to ourselves and others to delve beyond the surface into the truer meaning.

 

 

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Blessings (and responsibility)

February 7, 2026

Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

Matthew 5:1-12 (some thoughts)

Marian Free

 

In the name of God whose thoughts are not our thoughts and ways are not our ways. Amen.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Right there we have a clear indication that Matthew’s voice is very different from that of Luke who doesn’t qualify or try to expand the meaning “of poor”.  Luke simply says: “Blessed are the poor,” making it quite clear that those who are not poor are not included. He makes this even more explicit in his second major departure from Matthew’s wording: “Woe to you who are rich.” Unlike Matthew, Luke’s beatitudes are followed by a list of woes – to the rich, the full and the laughing. (This is consistent with Luke’s agenda which is to make explicit God’s preference for the poor and marginalised – think of the Magnificat which is mirrored here.)

 

It is often assumed that Matthew has spiritualised the Beatitudes, taken the sting out of them – we don’t have to actually be poor to belong to the kingdom of heaven, we can simply be humble, aware of our spiritual poverty. That said, being “poor in spirit” doesn’t seem to be a commendable state of being, certainly not one that would seem to warrant the status of blessedness! So we are left with something of a mystery.

 

Beatitudes simply means blessings. They are not unique to the gospels but are found throughout scripture. There are seven individual beatitudes in the Book of Revelation. What we know as The Beatitudes is a group of blessings which are found only in the gospels of Matthew and Luke.

 

Scholars believe that the authors of both Matthew and Luke used Mark’s gospel as their starting point and that they had another common source (for convenience called Q or ‘source’) from which they drew material. Each them also appears to have had access to teaching that was unique to them. (For example, only Luke records our favourite parables – the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son.) Both authors follow Mark’s ordering of events, but because they were writing independently, they have used their common material quite differently. Matthew for example begins his first block of Jesus’ teaching with what we call “The Sermon on the Mount”. Luke includes much of the same material, but splits it into two parts – a sermon and a travel discourse. Another difference between the two gospels is that while Matthew places Jesus on a mountain for this important block of teaching, Luke places Jesus on the plain. It is possible that Matthew, addressing a largely Jewish audience, uses the mountain to draw out the similarities between Moses the giver of the law and Jesus the new law-giver. For the writer of Luke who was writing for a largely Gentile audience, the allusion to Moses would have been missed.

 

In Matthew, this block of teaching or “Sermon on the Mount” takes up all of chapters 5 through 7 and, while links between the different sayings can be discerned, it is basically a collection of individual sayings which have been collected by Jesus’ followers and recorded together. It is very unlikely that Jesus would have simply have stood on a mountains and reeled off a list of proverb-like sayings. It is much more feasible that Jesus said many, if not all these things, but said them in conversation, over meals, or while journeying with his disciples as the occasion arose. Then after his death his followers would have repeated them when they met together and finally someone would have gathered them into a collection something like that which we have today.

 

Returning to Matthew’s record of the Beatitudes, perhaps they are not as starkly different from those of Luke as I have made out. Warren Carter suggests that, in much the same way as Luke, the first four beatitudes that are recorded by Matthew, refer to the oppressive situation in which believers find themselves and the Sermon as a whole addresses the ways in which the Kingdom of God is breaking in to address those situations. He argues that the first beatitude has less to do with being humble and patient as I suggested above, but refers to those who are “materially poor and whose spirits are crushed by economic injustice, deprivation of resources and few options.”

Blessing of the meek (the third beatitude) is proclaimed in Psalm 137. The first four beatitudes emphasize God’s actions “promising divine reversals in both the present and the future.” Carter suggests that the next five beatitudes turn our attention to human behaviours which contribute to the building of the kingdom – doing mercy, making peace and, when necessary accepting persecution in the cause of justice and peace.

Jesus begins his ministry saying: “Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is near.” In this collection of sayings, beginning with the Beatitudes, Jesus begins to set out what the kingdom might look like – what God will do, and how we are called to respond.

Whatever Jesus’ original meaning, we who are relatively well-off and who are not under the thumb of an oppressive and exploitive colonial power are blessed. We are blessed because we already have glimpses of the kingdom. We are blessed because we know what it is to be in relationship with the living God. We are blessed because Jesus has shared our existence and demonstrated that it is possible to grow into our divinity. And we are blessed with the power of the Holy Spirit.

With those blessings comes responsibility – the responsibility to play our part in making the kingdom a reality on earth, to work for justice and peace, to hunger and thirst for righteousness to challenge unjust structures and to confront oppression of any kind.

Like most of Jesus’ sayings, the Beatitudes come with a sting – the blessings are ours, but so too are the responsibilities. We who are blessed should become a blessing for others.

 

 

 

 

 

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