The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity – Reflection by Canon Leslie

The Gospel reading for this Sunday is from Matthew’s fourth block of Jesus’ teaching. This is the chapter on the relationships among Christians, or life in the church, and is sometimes described as a community rule. While some of the teaching in Matthew’s community rule may seem quite harsh, the dominant message concerns forgiveness.
 
The parable that Matthew places at this point in the community rule is a very powerful one underpinning just why Christian people should be forgiving people. Christians are people who recognise that they have been forgiven so much by God, and consequently they should go on showing forgiveness to others.
 
Matthew makes the point in the parable of the slave who was forgiven a large debt by his master, but then refused himself to forgive a small debt owed to him by one of his fellows. Those who refuse to forgive tend to box themselves into a tight corner.
 
To prepare for this Sunday’s service I invited those of you who want to do some thinking beforehand to focus on the image of the mender. In today’s picture from his book Explorer, Teddy Horsley discovers who has mended the broken shelves in the kitchen.
 
Next week is Harvest Festival in the Cathedral. So next week the image to help us prepare for participation in the Sunday service, whether offline in the Cathedral or online at home, is simply Harvest. You can find out more about that theme here: https://www.prayerforliverpool.org/prayer-resources.html. We would really appreciate you letting us know how you are using these materials. Please send us your ideas and photos of the things you may create; email them to [email protected].
 
If you’d like to learn more about Teddy Horsley and his writings, visit his website: https://teddyhorsley.org/, or his page on the website of St. Mary’s Centre: http://www.st-marys-centre.org.uk/resources/TeddyHorsley.html.
 
We warmly invite you to join us in worship online here:
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Teddy Horsley sends his Sunday greetings to all.
 
Canon Leslie