What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Sermon for Dedication Sunday 2014

    26 October 2014 – Dedication Sunday from Kelvin Holdsworth on Vimeo.

    You have come to something that cannot be touched – in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

    I suppose I should give the full verse of the text that I want to preach on this morning. The verse I’ve chosen comes from the letter to the Hebrews and the portion that Wolfgang read to us a few moments ago.

    You have not come to something* that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them.

    I suppose it takes a certain kind of preacher to dare to preach on the verse that refers to a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them.

    But I guess I’m that kind of preacher anyway.

    But I really want to leap off from that first phrase – You have come to something that cannot be touched.

    For today we are celebrating our Dedication Sunday – a day when we step outside the usual cycle of Sunday readings and set aside some time to give thanks for what we have around us.

    And I’m being deliberately ambiguous about that – for I give thanks not simply for the building around us but for the building that is the saints of God in this place who are all around us as we worship together each week.

    St Mary’s the building can certainly be touched. Indeed if you touch it in some places a bit of it will flake off which you can take home for a souvenir. But today I think we are doing a bit more than giving thanks for lumps of sandstone.

    For you have come to something that cannot be touched. You have come instead to Mount Zion – the city of God itself.

    By the time the Epistle to the Hebrews was written people were gathering together in groups to worship Jesus Christ. The idea of the weekly gathering to worship was already established amongst the Jewish people and adopted by those who found God through their experience of Jesus. But it was important to remind them even at the beginning that they had come to something that could not be touched.

    I remember asking one of you a while ago what it was that he thought bound everyone at St Mary’s together. He thought for a moment and said, (more…)

16 responses to “St Andrew's Day 2008”

  1. Christina Avatar
    Christina

    On a related theme, was there not a year recently when we had to move the assumption because it fell on Ash Wednesday? I don’t remember Christmas being delayed, but of course, can’t comment on the delay of the second coming.

    Reply
  2. Christina Avatar
    Christina

    And I know I meant “annunciation” before you point it out to me.

    Reply
  3. Rob Murray Brown Avatar
    Rob Murray Brown

    Is there a reason that the two celebrations cant be held on the same day? Do you really think that Christ would object to sharing a day with one of his disciples. I think not!

    Reply
  4. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    I think that it is more about giving the church the full opportunity to concentrate on both.

    The themes that we remember at Christ the King (ie how Jesus undermines all our expectations of monarchy and power) don’t fit terribly well with theme we think about on St Andrew’s Day (thinking about missions and spreading faith in the world and also praying for Scotland). Advent 1 is something else altogether and also does not make a good fit.

    I quite like the way the calendar works as it is a good reminder to us that being God’s people is something that happens daily, not weekly.

    Reply
  5. Rob Murray Brown Avatar
    Rob Murray Brown

    Im feel sure that your congregation would manage to digest more than one message on any particular day. The fact is that St Andrews Day is on the 30 November each year – every 7 or so years this will fall on a Sunday. I cant remember it ever being moved before and see no reason to start in 2009.

    Reply
  6. Kelvin Avatar
    Kelvin

    St Andrews Day is on 1 December this year in the Scottish Episcopal Calendar as it is every year when 30 November falls on a Sunday.

    It is the way the Ecclesiastical calendar works.

    To quote fully from the published Calendar:

    Each Holy and Saint’s Day listed in the Calendar has been assigned a number which indicates its category.
    It is intended that feasts in categories 1 – 4 (below) should be kept by the whole Church. Days in categories 5 and
    6 may be kept according to diocesan or local discretion. Commemorations not included in this Calendar may be
    observed with the approval of the Bishop.
    When two celebrations fall on the same day, the following table indicates which takes precedence.
    1 Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday;
    Easter Day (and the weekdays following);
    Pentecost;
    Ash Wednesday; Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday in Holy Week; Ascension Day;
    Christmas Day ; Epiphany;
    Sundays of Advent, Lent and Easter.
    2 Feasts of The Lord (Naming, Presentation, Annunciation, Transfiguration);
    Trinity Sunday; All Saints’ Day;
    Dedication and Patronal Festivals;
    Eves of Christmas and Pentecost;
    First Sunday after Christmas;
    First Sunday after Epiphany (the Baptism of the Lord).
    3 Sundays after Christmas (except Christmas 1);
    Sundays after Epiphany (except Epiphany 1);
    Sundays after Pentecost (except Pentecost 1);
    Weekdays in Lent.
    4 Feasts of the Apostles and Evangelists;
    Saint Mary the Virgin, the Visit to Elizabeth;
    Joseph, John the Baptist (Birth, Beheading);
    Mary Magdalene; Michael and All Angels;
    Stephen, the Holy Innocents;
    Kentigern, Patrick, Columba, Ninian, Margaret of Scotland.
    5 All Souls’ Day; Holy Cross Day;
    Conception and Birth of Mary, Mother of the Lord;
    Thanksgiving for the Institution of the Holy Communion (Corpus Christi);
    Thanksgiving for Harvest.
    6 Other commemorations.
    Notes:
    (i) Epiphany may be kept on the Sunday following 1 January, and the Ascension on the Seventh Sunday of
    Easter.
    (ii) Feasts in Category 2, falling on a weekday, may be kept on the nearest Sunday, except Sundays in
    Categories 1 and 2.
    (iii) Feasts in Category 4, falling on a day of higher category (other than a weekday in Lent), should be
    transferred (in chronological order) to the next available weekday.
    (iv) Where feasts in Category 4 fall on a Sunday (other than a Sunday in Categories 1 and 2), they may, if local
    circumstances require, be kept on that day.
    (v) The weekdays of Advent and Easter may be given special weighting.
    (vi) When days in Category 6 coincide with a day of higher category, they should be omitted that year.
    (vii) Thanksgiving for the Institution of Holy Communion is particularly associated with the Thursday after
    Trinity Sunday.
    (viii) Thanksgiving for the Harvest may take place on any appropriate Sunday.

    The full thing can be found within this zip file:
    http://www.scotland.anglican.org/media/liturgy/liturgy/calendar_and_lectionary_pdf.zip

    Reply

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