Trinity 21 / Pentecost 22

Sunday, 25/10/2026

SENTENCE FROM SCRIPTURE:

Satisfy us by your loving kindness, so we shall rejoice and be glad. (Psalm 90)

HYMN

(Quite difficult to find a video of this one; you’ll have to do your own singing, but you’ll recognise the tune, and the lyrics are provided)

GREETING

Grace and peace to you from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen

COLLECT FOR PURITY

Almighty God,
to whom all hearts are open,
all desires known,
and from whom no secrets are hidden:
cleanse the thoughts of our hearts
by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit,
that we may perfectly love you,
and worthily magnify your holy name;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.

SUMMARY OF THE LAW

Our Lord Jesus Christ said: The first commandment is this:
Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is the only Lord. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength.”
The second is this: “Love your neighbour as yourself.” There is no other commandment greater than these. Amen. Lord, have mercy.

CONFESSION AND ABSOLUTION

God is love and we are God’s children. There is no room for fear in love. We love because God loved us first.
Let us confess our sins in penitence and faith.

SILENCE

God our Father,
we confess to you
and to our fellow members in the Body of Christ
that we have sinned in thought, word and deed,
and in what we have failed to do.
We are truly sorry.
Forgive us our sins,
and deliver us from the power of evil,
for the sake of your Son who died for us, Jesus Christ, our Lord.

ABSOLUTION

God, who is both power and love,
forgive you and free you from your sins,
heal and strengthen you by the Holy Spirit,
and raise you to new life in Christ our Lord. Amen.

GLORIA
sung by Sue StJoseph

COLLECT FOR TODAY:

O Lord, in your mercy: grant to your faithful people pardon and peace; that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve you with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. AMEN

PROCLAIMING & RECEIVING GOD’S WORD

FIRST READING
Deuteronomy 34.1–12
read by Gill Swales

¹ Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the LORD showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, ² all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, ³ the Negeb, and the Plain – that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees – as far as Zoar. ⁴ The LORD said to him, ‘This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, “I will give it to your descendants”; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.’ ⁵ Then Moses, the servant of the LORD, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command. ⁶ He was buried in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day.

⁷ Moses was one hundred and twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired and his vigour had not abated. ⁸ The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the period of mourning for Moses was ended. ^{✝ 9} Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, because Moses had laid his hands on him; and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the LORD had commanded Moses.

¹⁰ Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face. ¹¹ He was unequalled for all the signs and wonders that the LORD sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, ¹² and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel.

SECOND READING
1 Thessalonians 2.1–8
read by Grant Ferguson

¹ You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was not in vain, ² but though we had already suffered and been shamefully mistreated at Philippi, as you know, we had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition. ³ For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery,

⁴ but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so we speak, not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts. ⁵ As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed; ⁶ nor did we seek praise from mortals, whether from you or from others, ⁷ though we might have made demands as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children.

⁸ So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us.

GRADUAL HYMN

GOSPEL
Matthew 22.34–46
read by Kay Solaja

Hear the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew, Chapter 22, beginning at verse 34

Glory to Christ our Saviour

³⁴ When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, ³⁵ and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. ³⁶ ‘Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’

³⁷ He said to him, ‘“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” ³⁸ This is the greatest and first commandment. ³⁹ And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” ⁴⁰ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’ ⁴¹ Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question: ⁴² ‘What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?’ They said to him, ‘The son of David.’ ⁴³ He said to them, ‘How is it then that David by the Spirit calls him Lord, saying, ⁴⁴ “The Lord said to my Lord, ‘Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet’”? ⁴⁵ If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?’ ⁴⁶ No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

Give thanks to the Lord for his glorious Gospel

Praise to Christ our Lord.

SERMON

This morning I want to do something I rarely do, and that is to draw your attention to the Old Testament reading. Let me tell you why.

The readings at the Sunday Eucharist are on a three-yearly cycle – years A, B, and C, and the cycle starts at Advent . This year we have been on year A. So this is where I begin to explain.

It is three years since Hamas perpertrated the vile slaughter of Israelis, and the equally vile response the Israeli government perpertrated on the Palestinian inhabitants of Gaza. It would seem that the Hebrew maxim of ‘an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth’, meant to limit retribution and violence, somehow got lost in the red mist.

And so it is that today, in the three-yearly cycle of the Lectionary readings, we come to the very same readings that we had just three years ago. I recall that then, it was like scales falling from my eyes. I was in the congregation on that Sunday, and when this passage from the Old Testament was read, I muttered to my wife: ‘This is where it all started, and where it all went wrong’! For it was saying: ‘This land is for you and your descendants – for ever!’.

If you look at this reading from Deuteronomy which we just heard, to paraphrase, it goes something like this. Moses goes up a mountain, and God says ‘Take a look around. I’m going to give you all the land that you can see’. According to the writer of this account, God even indicates that there are, in fact, people living there.

Now that is both curious and confusing. For the narrative implies that the people living there are already some of the twelve tribes – Dan, Naphtali. Ephraim, Manasseh and Judah are identified. How did they get there before Moses and the rest of the Hebrew people? I won’t go into all that just now, but this is the point – the land was inhabited by people of whatever tribe or race. That meant that they were about to be dispossessed.

Well, it did happen over a period of some time. But for me, the sticking point is this. Whatever happened with Moses on Mt. Nebo in the millennial mists of time, there are people today with extremist views, who still hold to the notion that the land is theirs, and that nobody else has a right to live there. All because many centuries ago, the story was put about, for whatever reason, that this was a God-given land, and a God-given right to live there. Hence the violent situation which exists to this day, as we heard in graphic detail in the last few days in the Occupied West Bank.

Next Sunday’s OT reading is even more specific, and, indeed, horrific, but you’ll have to wait for that!

Apologies for a bit of a rant there. Let’s consider the gospel for today.

For some weeks now, we have been reading in Matthew’s gospel about the stand-offs Jesus kept having with the religious leaders of the time. The impression is given that he perhaps even enjoyed getting one over on the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the lawyers.

Today’s gospel is no different. Having just dealt with the Saducees and Herodians, he now faces the Pharisees. There can be no doubt that he was not popular with them. Indeed, as we shall see later, they were really gunning for him.

Every Sunday, in this church, at the beginning of the liturgy, the person leading recites these words that Jesus used to confound his critics. ’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ We actually use the version from Mark, which adds something about loving God ‘with all your strength’.

Now these words were not original to Jesus. He was quoting from the Old Testament, words which the Pharisees knew so well, for they were from something called the Shemah, words which every pious Jew recited twice daily, and, indeed, some still do, even today.

You might have noticed that when I utter these words, I lay some slight emphasis on the word ‘mind’. I worry about what I might call ‘mindless Christianity’, that is to say, a mindless acceptance of all that is demanded in life, in a world which is more and more complicated. Simple solutions of complex problems become more and more impossible. The need of brains and intelligence in religion is intensified. Somebody (not me!) once wrote that Muslims, on entering the mosque, remove their shoes and leave them outside. He went on to say that Christians, all too often, entering the church, remove their brains, and leave them outside. A bit harsh, perhaps?

That person went on to say that the offering of the full powers of the mind is the last full measure of devotion, and the hardest gift to give.

Applying one’s mind is essential to how we approach the holy scriptures. There are those to whom we might refer as being biblical literalists, who still believe that the universe was created in six calendar days, and I’ve no idea how they hold that together in the face of the evidence to the contrary.

What this phrase about loving God with all your mind is really saying is more than the joy of thinking things through. It also means having our minds changed into harmony with the way of the Kingdom, the way of God.. It almost certainly means repenting – changing our mind, changing the way we think, changing the way, then, that we behave. It might also mean giving up on our cherished prejudices.

Which brings me back to our Old Testament reading this morning. Not all Jewish people are prepared to take a literalist position on ownership of land in the Middle East. There are those who can see these words from an ancient document we call Deuteronomy as a story, meant to bolster the confidence of the Israelites as they probably felt extremely vulnerable after leaving Egypt, and wandering about looking for somewhere to settle. So they abhor the actions of fundamentalist Jews who seek to drive out Palestinians from their homes and land and liveliehood.

Can we really apply a literalist attitude, even one based on the Bible, to the world as we know it today? Does what we know and believe about a gracious and merciful God align with injustice and violence? I don’t believe that can ever be justified.

And it can never be justified in the words which end this command. ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’. A famous Jewish rabbi, Hillel, who lived about 100 years before Jesus, saw this as a summary of the law. He said: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the entire Law, and the rest is commentary. Now go and study.” That is not a million miles away from that which we in effect, are looking at this morning, and which we call ‘The Golden Rule’: “Do unto others what you would want them to do to you.”

If only. What if in today’s world that could be our goal. In our weakness, we can’t even live our own personal lives in that way, and if we can’t, how can we expect the Putins, the Netanyahus, the Trumps, the Hegseths, the Ayatollahs to do it?

We strive. We struggle. We fail. We fall. But here’s the thing. When we fall in God’s Way, who is there to pick us up and set us on the right path again? It is that merciful and gracious God – again and again. He forgives us, and by his spirit empowers us, to continue on the journey.

So then, love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and your neighbour as yourself. That is all we have to do. To which I would add, by way of commentary – just be kind!

THE CREED

We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
God from God,
Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one substance with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven;
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit,
the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father.
With the Father and the Son,
he is worshipped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

PRAYERS

Loving God,
as we gather today, we thank you for your constant love; for your presence in places where we cannot see you, in moments of shared joy, and in times of sadness.

For being near when we are unaware, and for standing beside us when we are most in need.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Loving God, creator of all things,

Help us to cherish your creation, protect our planet, and care for every living thing.

Guide us to live gently upon the earth and to restore what is broken.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Loving God,
We thank for Jim during this interregnum and for his continued support that enables us to worship in this place. We pray for all who lead worship, both lay and ordained.

As we look to the future, we pray for all preparing for the Reverend Diana’s installation here in St John’s and for her move to Dumfries.

We pray especially for the charge of St Margaret’s and mustard seed Edinburgh that she leaves to be with us here and from their time of interregnum that follows.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Merciful Father,
We remember those places of unrest where war is ever-present, where it is unsafe to live, where people are displaced, live in fear, and struggle to see hope.

We pray especially for Israel, Palestine, Ukraine, Sudan, Myanmar, and all other places we hold in our hearts.

We pray for those who misuse power, who weaponise religion, and who oppress others.

We ask for reconciliation, justice, and peace.

We pray for the safety of all who have been forced from their homes and for whom home is no longer a place of security.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Loving God,
We pray for all Christians across every denomination.

We pray for those for whom worship is dangerous, for those who seek to know you, and for those who do not yet know you.

We pray especially for Christians in the Horn of Africa and in China at this time.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Lord,
We pray for all who need your healing touch, for those suffering in body, mind, or spirit, and for those who care for them.

We pray especially for those nearing the end of life, when human help can do no more. Surround them and those who love them with your peace.

We also pray for those who are alone, that they may know your presence and the assurance that they are never truly alone.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Lord,
We pray for those who have died, for the faithful and the faithless, for those we have known and those we have not.

We hold before you the names known only to us.

In a moment of silence, we remember those in our lives, in our congregation, and throughout the world.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Gracious God,
walk with us each day. Bring your light into our lives. Help us to remember your name and the love you have for us.

Teach us to share that love with one another in all we do. Remind us that we are never alone.

Merciful Father accept these prayers for the sake of your Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those
who sin against us.
Do not bring us
to the time of trial
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power
and the glory are yours,
now and forever. Amen.

BLESSING

Christ the Son of God gladden your hearts with the good news of his kingdom; and the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. Amen.

HYMN –

DISMISSAL

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord
In the name of Christ. Amen