Meetings at the Chapel

Posted on Dec 22, 2024 by M Emlyn Humphries
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Welcome

Posted on Apr 10, 2017 by M Emlyn Humphries

Please join us to find a place of prayer and rest in a busy week. From intimacy in prayer God is able to do many things.

Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives
May you never give up praying.
When you pray, may you keep alert and be thankful.
Pray that together we may make the message of the mystery of Christ as clear as possible.
Amen
(Based on Colossians 3 and 4)

Readings for Sunday: Vanderbilt Divinity Library

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O that today you would listen to his voice

Posted on Mar 8, 2026 by M Emlyn Humphries

Exodus 17:1- 7 Psalm 95 Romans 5:1-11  John 4:5-42

Audio Version

Jesus asks us to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, minds and strength, to love others as ourselves and to love our enemies. He asks us to not be anxious and to take up our crosses daily, losing ourselves in our calling to follow him. He asks us to take the lower place, to bare the other cheek to the slap of authority and to carry the burden of our oppressors; to give our cloak to the one who demands it, to lend to our enemies and those who would do us harm.

He speaks these words to the elders, chief priests and scribes, and, in the light of the resurrection, to the principalities and powers.

Without him all is the futility of our minds, alienation and darkness. We become ignorant, bitter and hard hearted, losing sensitivity, abandoning our true selves in God to licentiousness, greed and impure practices. This is not the way we have learned Christ Paul writes in Ephesians 4:20.

Jesus embodies truth, without which we become deluded by our lusts: we experience wrath.

And is that what we see in ourselves, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation- our own lusts are our times of trial; the sin from which we need deliverance; the mercy grace speaks to.

O that today you would listen to his voice, beloved bearers of God’s image. Surely God is angry at the evil and wickedness in the world. Could we believe in any other God; but where are we to draw the line; from the least to the greatest trespass, we need to know the God of forgiveness.

In the wilderness, the place of formation, the place of realisation of our need, the place Paul tells us that we learn endurance, character and hope, God’s love is poured into us.

O that today you would listen to his voice. The voice of the Spirit.

Moses hears many voices; quarrelling, complaining. In our lives we hear many voices,

What shall I do?

God’s promise to Moses was that he would go before him and stand on the rock at Horeb. God would stand before him on the rock and provide water for a parched and complaining people.

Moses strikes the stone with his staff, the staff that he had struck the Nile and it flowed like blood bringing death. This water would bring life, at Horeb, the mountain where YHWH revealed his name in the burning bush, LORD, YHWH, I AM, where God gave his word of Command and now Water.

Is the LORD among us or not!

Listen to his voice.

Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise! 
For the LORD is a great God and a great King above all gods…
O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!

Jesus you are LORD; YHWH; I  AM; our Lord, Lord of all who would be lords, King of all who would be kings, who would be gods.; we kneel to no other, we bow down to no earthly power, no government, no authority in church or state; honouring our leaders and doing good to all. For the Lord Jesus, our Lord has mercy on us; for Jesus is mercy; the oil poured out for our healing; our God, faithful to forgive and through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God, as Paul tells us.

Christ has freed us from sin,

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. …while we still were sinners Christ died for us. Much more surely, therefore, since we have now been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God.

Reconciled to God, Paul gives us hope; we will be saved by the life of Jesus the Christ.

And what is the wrath from which we are saved? Psalm 7:14-16 tells us of those who turn from God,

See how they conceive evil,  and are pregnant with mischief, and bring forth lies.
They make a pit, digging it out, and fall into the hole that they have made.
Their mischief returns upon their own heads, and on their own heads their violence descends.

Romans 1 tells us that God’s wrath is seen in the giving over by God to sin so that each receives in themselves the due penalty for their error, a choice made in the full knowledge of God’s righteous decree in the things he has made. Creation is held in a loose moral weave, it has been said, not Hindu karma, but a kingdom of mercy, grace and forgiveness that holds us all, which when withdrawn brings calamity and collateral damage.

Let us kneel before the LORD our Maker!

O that today you would listen to his voice

Jesus says,

believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; …But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth…”

God is Spirit and God the Father seeks those who worship him in spirit and truth.

Listen to his voice. Receive him gladly, do not let it be said, “They are a people whose hearts go astray, and they do not regard my ways.”  Rest in the gift of Jesus; listen to the call.

Where the water is poured out at Horeb, Elijah heard the still small voice of God. As wrath and the consequences of wrath rage around us, as chance and time ravage us, be still and hear, seek solitude with your God, the privilege of the Samaritan woman, so that others might hear and say, this is truly the Saviour of the world.

He gives the water of life; Jesus says

“Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”

Ever-flowing life! Beloved image bearers, everyone, Grace and Peace.

Photo by Michael Surazhsky on Unsplash

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How can these things be?

Posted on Mar 1, 2026 by M Emlyn Humphries
Audio Version

Genesis 12:1-4a      Psalm 121 Romans 4:1-5, 13-17  John 3:1-17   

Bible readings

How can these things be?

Nicodemus reacts to Jesus’ call to be born from above.

Paul knows God as the one who gives life to the dead and calls into being the things that do not exist.

Jesus says that as his followers we enter into the company of those who are like the wind; you do not know where it comes from and where it goes. Our certainty is that being born of water and the spirit, we discern flesh as flesh and spirit as Spirit.

Do not be astonished Jesus says!

Nicodemus knows Jesus to be a Rabbi, a teacher, because he has seen the signs Jesus has done, signs he can only believe could be done by one sent by God.

How can these things be?

Very truly I tell you, says Jesus;

we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen, yet you do not believe our testimony.

You? We? Our? Jesus moves from the I of his purpose to the we of his person.

Moses demands the testimony of two or three witnesses. Jesus’ testimony is ratified of the Spirit; both speak; Jesus is the Son of Man, who ascends and descends from heaven; who is lifted up so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life; not by birth in the flesh but by water and Spirit; the waters of birth and the Spirit. This was the testimony of John the baptiser on seeing Jesus; behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world… he who baptises with the Holy Spirit…This is the Son of God.

How can these things be?

Jesus suffers, dies and rises from death, death on a cross; God the Father gives God the Son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. We are all saved from slavery through Christ; freed; redeemed, to live a life in all its fullness; to receive of the abundance of God together with all the families of the Earth.

To believe is to love- not to adhere to a law; it is to love. Jesus is the beloved of the Father, in whom we believe; in Jesus, the Father is revealed to us by the Spirit.

Nicodemus believed the signs and he is to believe in the one who saves, the one who is ascended into heaven and seated at the Right Hand of the Father, in whom we are blessed; in whom we do not perish; in whom we receive overflowing life.

Everyone! Everyone, not only the heirs; we are brought into the blessing through our love; belief. We are grafted into the vine of blessing by Christ; not by our works but by his work on the cross; by the word to our hearts that we are Justified.

Paul says of us,

Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due. But to one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness.

The promise depends on faith.

How can these things be?

Faith: trust. And love: belief.

And who is this God in whom we are to trust and love?

Nicodemus calls Jesus Rabbi or Master; the psalm calls him LORD. But the one we read as LORD has a personal name YHWH: I am: a verb not a metaphor.

LORD, Master, Creator; each a metaphor bringing emotional triggers; LORD speaks of worldly power and rulers; Master of slavery and Creator of a recent controversies that deaden the mind. Translators have an agenda and a context.

There is power in the name.

The psalm praises the name of God; YHWH. YHWH is maker of heaven and earth, one who does not slumber but keeps us; is shade from the harsh sun, who keeps us from evil and keeps us in life. Jesus is LORD.

Jesus will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forever more; the one who gives life to the dead and calls into being the things that do not exist.

Grace and peace.

Photo by Apex 360 on Unsplash

Devotional

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If you are the Son of God…

Posted on Feb 22, 2026 by M Emlyn Humphries

Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7 Psalm 32 Romans 5:12-19 Matthew 4:1-11    

Audio Podcast

Devotional Resource

If you are the Son of God…

If you are the Son of God… The principalities and powers heard the Voice, This is my Son, and they heard the testimonies of John. The Son of God famished? How could it be that God would be weak; isn’t this just a man.

Did God say…

The first temptation in Genesis. Did God say?

Then the promise, you will be like God… and the fruit was good for food; and the first trespass.

And sin came into the world, as Paul tells us by one man. The sin? An offence against God’s command not to eat.

Jesus knows and affirms and counters from the law , “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” Truly we are sustained by the Father in community and in the breaking of bread and, in affliction, it is the voice of God that keeps us nourished.

 “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” Not just one loaf but many! One loaf would be enough. Give us today our daily bread we are taught to pray..

“If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down.”

Jesus answers from Psalm 91, stopping short at the verse, … the serpent you will trample under foot; the prophecy in Genesis, believed by Christians to promise salvation from the sin of the world. The true sign of God’s sonship is the life, the Cross and resurrection of Jesus the Christ not a pointless dare. Did the snake hear Genesis in the answer?’ I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.’

“All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” This is the slavery to the world offered from which we are redeemed in the Cross. …death spread to all because all have sinned, Paul tells us. We are held in captivity to sin, to the rule of death and violence; of subjecting and subjugation. This is what is on offer; slavery.

Jesus has the authority of the rule of God, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.

And this is where we must rest too. Sin tempts us to fall short, to not be content with the word of the Father in our hearts that speaks so that we might know him sustaining us. The sin in the world seeks to make us miss the mark in tempting us to a  longing for more than we need, vain glory and power.

Church listen: God’s rule is not of this world. In our sinning our guilt is in falling short, of beholding the tree of life and believing a lie. The rule of God is always there for us.

In Christ we are saved from the sin of the world, from slavery to the system that enslaves us with lies. God always sets before us the good. We know this and aim for the target and sometimes miss. But the free gift is not like the trespass.

Paul writes

For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the gift following many trespasses brings justification. If, because of the one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

Paul continues, one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all.

Think hard about this.

The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.

God’s purposes will not fail; Eden is in our hearts; we are temples of the Holy Spirit; there is life for all.

The psalmist writes:

  • Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 
  • Happy are those to whom the LORD imputes no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit. 

This is our inheritance in Christ and was ever so. And sin is in the world so we need to be aware and keep a short account of sin.

  • Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,” and you forgave the guilt of my sin.

In this we are reassured and stand on truth, the steadfastness of God.

  • Therefore let all who are faithful offer prayer to you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach them.
  • You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with glad cries of deliverance.

God’s promise in all circumstances is to be with us and for us.

  • I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you. 
  • Do not be like a horse or a mule, without understanding, whose temper must be curbed with bit and bridle, else it will not stay near you. 
  • Many are the torments of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds those who trust in the LORD. 
  • Be glad in the LORD and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart.  

Grace and peace

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Christ is Revealed

Posted on Feb 15, 2026 by M Emlyn Humphries
Readings

Devotional Resources

Podcast Episode

How are we to approach this well worn story of Jesus’ transfiguration. We are familiar with its glory, the audacity of Peter and the voice from the bright cloud.

Peter says of himself in the letter,  we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known the power and coming of the Lord.

Lord, keep us from this temptation as we approach this passage of scripture.

It is a revelation of Jesus as the crucified Son of God and of God as the Father. It is a revelation of the Christ who was to be killed and after three days rise from the dead.

Peter says, no prophecy is a matter of one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. Let’s receive this story as such.

To Peter he recalls the word spoken out of the cloud as he was inviting himself into the conversation, This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased. So important is this revelation in the letter he says it is a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in our hearts. Mattthew adds, Listen to him! To what God spoke.

And how Peter’s heart must have burned as he declared his faith in Jesus as the Christ, Son of the Living God, a heart soon to be cast down as he rebuked Jesus when he said that he was to suffer, be killed and rise again after three days. This is Peter who Jesus first calls a Rock on which faith is to be founded and then Satan. This is Peter the one who would deny Christ three times. This is the Peter who here learns to listen.

On the mountain he saw and recognized Moses and Elijah talking with Jesus and boldly joined the conversation without being called, Lord it is good for us to be here… let us build…, only to be engulfed in a cloud.

And the voice of God speaks from a bright cloud like a devouring fire we hear in Exodus. Moses had to wait and listen for the call for six days in the cloud we learn. Six days after the rebuke, get behind me Satan, Jesus had called Peter and James and John up to the holy mountain.

On that mountain, in a vision, Moses, Elijah and Peter, James and John hear God speak, This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!

Listen to him! This is the command of God from the mountain. Listen to him!

Holy is he! The psalm teaches us; he is to be extoled and worshipped: the Lord our God is holy.

When Christ is truly revealed to us in his holiness; when words fail us, we fall to the ground overcome with fear.

Jesus touches us and says, Get up do not be afraid.

Get up, do not be afraid.

This is the morning star rising in our hearts. And as we look, there is no one except Jesus himself alone.

The vision has ended and life on the mountain is resumed, the disciples and Jesus go down the mountain and Peter, who six days earlier was rebuked carries the word, This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him!

We have the Law. We have the Prophets. We have Peter and the traditions. Elijah had to learn to hear the sound of sheer silence in his time of darkness. Moses taught of the forgiving God, whose word is to be found near us, in our mouths and in our hearts. The Psalm teaches, the LORD to be a righter of their wrongs; avenger of their wrongdoings.

This is the grace of the cross where God is perfectly revealed. Listen!

This is the throne of Christ, the earth shook; in his death and resurrection Jesus is transfigured, exalted over all peoples.

Mighty King, lover of justice, you have established equity; you have executed justice and righteousness in Jacob, on Calvary, on the cross.

And at the table, a feast of good things is laid before all principalities and powers as we share in the cup and the bread is broken; truly the flesh and blood of Christ; real food transfigured.

We may be few, appear foolish, but Christ is revealed in  and through us, in what we say and in what we do, and as Christ is revealed in us we are transfigured and the world is transformed. Go deep little children: God deep and listen to him!

Grace and peace.

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Foolishness Revealed

Posted on Feb 8, 2026 by M Emlyn Humphries

Isaiah 58:1-9a (9b-12)  Psalm 112:1-9 (10)  1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16)  Matthew 5:13-20

Devotional Resource

Audio Version

And we are salt and we are light- salt of the earth and light of the world.

Salt speaks of purity and wisdom, light of our Lord Jesus Christ.

When purity and wisdom have lost their taste, they are of no worth, wisdom and purity are rejected, cast out and trampled underfoot- worthless!

It is easy to appear wise. It is easy to be religious and follow rules; to seem pure; to enculture righteousness. But does this season the earth?

When Christ shines in us, people see good works- the salt of the law, the salt of the letter, the prophets; this salt is good works and the letter of scripture and the prophets  does not change anything- only Christ’s Light working through us can fulfil and accomplish the word’s meaning and intent- deepen our understanding so that we act righteous.

It’s a mystery; the mystery of the cross that brings us into the kingdom. Even the one who breaks the command becomes the least- even the one who teaches poorly is in the kingdom, such is the power of the cross- the good news of Christ crucified.

Lord fill us with your light and inspire us to be those called to be great in the kingdom; who do and teach the word, knowing, in its fullness, the forgiveness of the Father  so that we might exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees who indeed were wise and pure in word and action.

And what is this light that is to shine in us and bring us to the knowledge of the Father, the knowledge of the Holy, that God our Father is glorified?

God is our Father, so we are light, bearing the light of God the Son. Through the Son, others are lead to see the Father. Jesus reveals God to be our Father.

Isaiah warns us, to want God to be on our side, to set others as the least, is our downfall. To fast, to humble ourselves even, does not open our eyes. It is what we do that reveals faith.

Do you participate in oppression, do you quarrel and fight and strike with a wicked fist? Is that what your religion leads you to do? Is violence how you strive to catch God’s ear- make your voice heard on high. White washed  words of death?

Lose the bonds of injustice!

Undo the straps of the worker’s yoke! Let the oppressed go free!

Share your bread with the hungry and the poor and hear oh Church, with your many buildings and investments, bring the homeless poor into your house, clothe the naked and feed the hungry. Those who would teach, look after your family.

Then the light will break forth, the light that shouldn’t be hidden under a bushel basket.

Here I am! is the cry of our hearts.

Fed and strengthened in the Lord- a foundation for many generations, repairers of breaches, rifts, and restorers of communities torn apart by hate is our identity.

And this is the wealth the Psalmist tells us is, light for the upright, as we shine-out grace, mercy and at-one-ness with the rule of God. All fear is faced down, secure in the Lord. Our hearts are steady.

That the poor have received food is the root of our power. God himself, the Father is glorified. The desire of the wicked comes to nothing; those who would have victory through violence are nothing.

We, with Paul stand, not with persuasive words of wisdom but with demonstrations of the power of the Spirit, so that our faith might not rest on human wisdom, our latest hero preacher high and lifted up, but on the power of the Cross, the throne of God.

This is God’s wisdom- set out in the scripture that cannot be changed but not understood by principalities and powers set to nothing by the cross. The religious took these words and used them to crucify Jesus, the Lord of glory.

This cuts  to the quick; the Law and the Prophets, the cannon of scripture killed Jesus. We must know the Law and the Prophets as words wrought in heaven- foolishness and incredible to the wise.

We have the mind of Christ!

So let your light shine before others; let our light shine before others, so that they may see our good works and give glory to our Father in heaven.

Grace and peace.

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