Lossiemouth Church of Scotland

This is the text of Rev. Graham Crawford’s sermon for Sunday 06 September 2015:

Today, quite rightly is a day of celebration here at St. James.

We are celebrating with two people who have stepped forward to profess and confess their faith. We are celebrating with yet another who has agreed to work as a leader (Elder) in this congregation. It is a great day for our church.

Yet in the heart of our celebration there is a hint of sadness, a hint of confusion, a hint even of disillusionment.

After all, most of us grew up with the great hymns of conquest on our lips: “Jesus shall reign where’er the sun”; “Soldiers of Christ arise”: “Ye armies of the living God”. The Billy Graham mid-century campaign had a tremendous effect on our churches, even through the Sixties, and there was a genuine belief that nothing could stop Christianity conquering the world by the year 2000.

Now, of course nothing could be further from the truth. [Read more…]

The sermon on Sunday 23 August 2015 from Rev. Graham Crawford: 

Over the last few weeks, in our Old Testament scriptures, we have been building and building to the climax of Solomon’s temple, somewhere permanent for the Ark of the Covenant, and as a result, God, will dwell.

From the joyful procession of David bringing the Ark home up until this point, it has all been building up to this when the temple is completed and finally dedicated to God.

This is one of the most important passages in all of the Jewish writings, for the Temple – and their beliefs concerning the temple – in many ways defines the Jewish people from this point on. The fact that an Islamic mosque now sits on that site is also one of the causes of all the unrest in the Middle east. So it is important to understand this Temple and the worship therein for us to understand much modern conflict while asking ourselves questions about our own place of worship as well as the place of worship in our lives. [Read more…]

This is the text of Rev. Graham Crawford’s Family Service on 28 June 2015:

Jesus took a little child whom he placed among them. Taking the child in his arms, he said to them, 37 ‘Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.

Let us welcome the children into the church and, in so doing, welcome God into our midst, that together we can worship God.

We sing together CH4 185, Come Children join and sing.

For our family service this morning we are using as our theme Matthew 19 Verse 14.

However, we are using the King James Version: “Suffer little children, and forbid them not to come unto me: for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.”

Unfortunately, so many of us grew up on the King James Version – and we seemed to stop half way through the verse. And so worship became “suffer little children”. We were brought to church, made to suffer through a service few of us really understood and, as a result, few of us came to Jesus. Look around and you will see that to be true:

• How many teenagers have we in church?
• How many in their twenties, even thirties and forties?

One reason, I believe, is that we do not really explain to young people the meaning of worship, the importance of worship, or the joy of worship.

So, today’s family service is going to be like a traditional service, except every stage will be carefully explained so that we all know the meaning of worship. Then, in my two talking sections, I will try to explain the importance and joy of worship, so that no-one will have to suffer any more sitting there being bored wondering: “Why on earth is Graham doing that?!” [Read more…]

This is Rev. Graham Crawford’s sermon for Sunday, 21 June 2015:

If you want a frozen pizza to have in your freezer for emergencies, in the USA, one of the options is Tombstone Pizza.

Originally it was the product of a small bar or pub in Wisconsin, but it grew and grew until it attracted the attention of one of the big multinationals and it is now part of the Nestle empire. Part of its success has to be its marketing. After all, who would forget the phrase, “What do you want on your tombstone?” The inference being, of course, that you can choose all sorts of toppings.

However, it is also something which we all think about from time to time. Some people get very creative with their tombstones or gravestones, as we more usually call them here. I have a book in my library, “A small book of grave humour,” which contains many fabulous epitaphs, although one of my favourites came after the book was published, which is on Spike Milligan’s Gravestone. “I told you I was ill!”

However, the inscription had to be written in Gaelic in order for it to be approved by the Chichester Diocese. I plan to be cremated, so I will not have a gravestone or even a tombstone, but if I did I know what I would want on it: [Read more…]