Sermon

What a month. I’m talking about the weather. It doesn’t seem so long since we had snow, yet this month we have had sunny, warm days. Today rain is bouncing off my office windows.

God often uses weather as a metaphor for how he interacts with his people. For example, one of Jesus’ names is the “sun of righteousness”. The idea is that in a world of cold, dark injustice and despair, Jesus shines like the sun bringing warmth and the light of fairness and hope and love and care.

The Bible tells us God takes our sins that are scarlet and turns them “as white as the driven snow”. Is there anything whiter and purer looking than freshly-fallen snow? God’s forgiveness of us is not half-hearted, its complete.

Another example is wind. The Hebrew and Greek words for spirit, breath and wind are the same word. God the Holy Spirit is dynamic, like wind. He blows into our stale and stubborn hearts and brings movement and momentum. He blows us towards God. Rev Matthew Henderson