4th Sunday of Easter B

Jeff Bagnall • 13 April 2024

Acts, chapter 4, verses 8-12 go straight into another speech of Peter that Luke inserts here. The context is the very early activities of Peter in Jerusalem. Together with John and others he had been gathering interested listeners in increasing numbers in the outer court of the Temple, and many of them were anxious to become believers and followers of Jesus. He had cured a lame man in the name of Jesus and was proclaiming the resurrection and accusing the Jews (it would be chiefly the leaders) of having Jesus brought to trial and put to death. The disciples had been arrested and kept over night, till in the morning they are brought before the high priest and other leaders and interrogated – “By what power or what name did you do this?” Peter replies to his accusers, laying the guilt for Jesus’ death upon them and referring to Psalm 118, that shows this pattern of behaviour. Peter affirmed Jesus as the one who can save people from this persistent pattern of behaviour, and can lift us out of our pattern of falling short of the Christian ideal. We have this Psalm after the reading, and the passage quoted as the response: Jesus is the key-stone to the building of the kingdom, and we are the rest of the building – we are a bit like the awkwardly shaped stones in a dry stane wall.

From the opening two verses of first letter of John, chapter 3, we read again of the very basic aspect of God and of our relationship to Him. We are children of God even now, when we are loved by Him despite our inadequacies. It is quite unimaginable what it will be like when we pass over into the life after death and live even closer to God.

In the Gospel of John, (10:11-18) we are told that Jesus is like a shepherd to us. Shepherding was different then and there, from how it is now here in Scotland where we sometimes have severe weather conditions and the shepherd can use a trained dog and maybe a quad-bike as well. Shepherding was beset with problems from marauding wild animals, occasionally from rogues and thieves but always from the straying of the sheep away from safe areas and from the food they need. In the Old Testament shepherding was often used as an image of God and His relationship with the chosen people. But here in the New Testament in this gospel the emphasis is on the love and care that God has for us, on the risks taken and on the ultimate aim of uniting all the people of the earth. We must recognise in the various hazards and straying nature of the sheep something of the way our own lives pan out; but also how like the shepherd with his sheep, God is with us; in Jesus, God Himself lives for us here and now, and dies to keep us safe and secure in following Him.

Jeff's Jottings on the Good Shepherd

Jeff Bagnall was a lecturer for many years at Craiglockhart College teaching RE to many future Catholic Primary teachers.

2nd Sunday of Lent - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 19 February 2026
The first reading is about the initial call of Abraham; it is used by the editors of the Book of Genesis as the launch of an extended saga of Abraham and his offspring. He is a semi-nomad who moves around with his large extended family from place to place; in this short account of his vocation, he is summoned by God to leave the past – his ancestors – behind and set off to a place that God will point out to him and will make his own. Responding to this, Abraham will not only be blest himself but will be a source of blessing to those who come across him – indeed to all people. But God is not understood quite the way we might envisage Him today, for he tells Abraham that He will curse those who curse him.

1st Sunday of Lent - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 14 February 2026
The first reading is chiefly the story of the temptation in the Garden of Eden often referred to as the Fall. It is a story that must have been told in various forms throughout the history of the descendants of Abraham. Other ancient cultures had similar stories, you may have heard of Pandora’s box , an ancient Greek story. These tales are about what it is to be human, about the pitfalls of human curiosity and about the cause of all the different evils in our world. They have all been told and retold time and again to different listeners and adapted appropriately, but all make much the same point. Our version in Genesis delightfully describes the human process of temptation; it starts, with what so often is the case, with a prohibition – “you mustn’t …” It proceeds with slightly changed interpretations of what is forbidden – “was it any of the trees in the garden?” and “You shall not eat nor even touch!” Then the victim of temptation just thinks the command is wrong and selfishly given – “the moment you eat it … you will be like gods!” We can all recognise this process and it should help us combat some of the temptations to selfishness that we have. Some Christians see this as an historical account and as the beginning of sin and death in our world which they call Original Sin. The story in Genesis goes on beyond what we hear today, with a glimmer of hope, saying:
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