This sermon was preached on the 31st of October 2025, keeping All Souls, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: Job 14.1-14 John 5.19-29 I’m going to talk about fear tonight. Fear is a tricky emotion. It has its place, it has its purpose. Predicting the future is part of the human experience: it’s part of who we are, as a species. All of us are constantly looking into the future, a few seconds, a few minutes, a few hours, a few days. ...
This sermon was preached on the 7th of September 2025, The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: The Letter of Saint Paul to Philemon I was tempted today, perhaps a little earnestly, to change the introduction to the reading from Saint Paul. We didn’t just hear from his letter to Philemon – we heard the whole letter, all four hundred and fifty or so words of it. ...
There’s a Lilly Pilly tree in the rectory yard. This year it fruited twice, and from the second smaller crop I decided to make sorbet. Warren on TikTok came up with a great way to take the seeds out of the fruit, and I’ve adapted that for this sorbet recipe. Ingredients Lilly Pilly fruit (this recipe will scale to however much you have; I had around 500g) sugar juice of half a lemon Give the fruit a rinse and remove stems. Drop it into a pot with about a cup of water, and simmer for a couple of minutes, stirring, until the fruit is blanched - it will lose most of its red colour. Remove from the heat and leave to cool until the mixture can be safely handled. Gently squeeze the fruit to remove seeds and discard them. Keep the pulp in the saucepan along with the liquid. Then sieve the deseeded pulp and liquid into a saucepan. Reserve the pulp. Measure the volume of the liquid and add an equal volume of sugar. Bring to a simmer and stir until the sugar dissolves forming a syrup. Add pulp, lilly pilly syrup, and lemon juice to a blender and run until smooth. Pour the mixture into a metal container and freeze. Every 30 minutes, stir with a fork to break up any ice crystals. After a couple of hours, it should be ready to serve. I must say it is absolutely delicious. It has a rich, deep flavour, almost like a more complex cherry sorbet. The colour really surprised me, a visceral pink!
This sermon was preached on the 15th of June 2025, Trinity Sunday, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: John 16.12-15 Why do we speak the creed together, each and every Sunday? Why do we lend our voices to it, lend our bodies to it, give it our voice? The language of the creed is dense. It’s technical, theological. It speaks in response to debates among Christians that raged many centuries ago. And so some people argue that it is no longer relevant. ...
This sermon was preached on the 4th of May 2025, The Third Sunday of Easter, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: John 21:1-19 Hearing today’s Gospel, I think of Peter, and I find myself reflecting on just how difficult the path to reconciliation and forgiveness can be. When you’ve done something wrong, and you know it, it’s can be hard to accept forgiveness. And when you’ve done something very, very wrong, it can be hard to believe that even the possibility of forgiveness exists. ...
This sermon was preached on the 27th of April 2025, The Second Sunday of Easter, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: John 20:19-31 The risen Jesus bore wounds. Wounds in his hands; wounds in his feet; a wound in his side; and for a very long time, that surprised me. If the Bible didn’t tell us what we just heard, then I would have pictured the risen Jesus as healed entirely – pristine and perfect. His hands healed, his feet healed, the wound in his side healed. The marks of minor childhood injuries, scars on knees and feet, all healed. Even the callouses upon his hands from working his trade, healed. ...
This sermon was preached on the 20th of April 2025, Easter Sunday, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie. Texts: John 20:1-18 Hearing the Resurrection Gospel, proclaiming it, it’s hard not to weep with joy and awe. It’s hard not to let one’s voice crack and break. Love permeates every verse of Saint John’s telling of the Resurrection. Consider the love and care of Mary Magdalene for Jesus. Jesus was her rabbi, her master, her friend. And he died. He died, most horrifically. ...
This sermon was preached on the 19th of April 2025, Holy Saturday, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie, preceding the Flowering of the Cross Texts: Mark 14-15 Today, Jesus descends into the underworld, into the ground, to be with the dead. Today, Jesus harrows hell. Today, Jesus liberates the captives, offering to them his outstretched hand. And all who take grasp of it, he lifts up to freedom and eternal life. ...
This sermon was preached on the 18th of April 2025, Good Friday, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie Texts: John 18.1–19.42 “It’s nothing personal.” If you watch one of the Passion movies, you can almost hear those words going through the heads of the Roman centurions, as they brusquely drive nails through each of the limbs of Jesus. Crash goes the hammer, driving a nail, crude and blunt, through tender flesh and into wood. ...
This sermon was preached on the 17th of April 2025, Maundy Thursday, in the Anglican Parish of Kalamunda-Lesmurdie Texts: John 13.1-17; 13.31b-35 Would you have let Jesus wash your feet that night? Imagine yourself in the room we have just heard of. You and the other disciples are sat around the dinner table. There’s a sense of foreboding, of tension… there’s a tingle of fear in the air… a silence, strange and thick, falls upon the room. ...