Sermons Preached in Lincoln's Inn Chapel

Contents

The one-line summaries are guides drafted with the help of AI, not Maurice’s words.

1. God’s Patience the Ground of Our Patience Advent Sunday

   The waiting husbandman of James’s letter is first of all God, whose longsuffering with persons, nations and Churches is the ground of our patience and of a hope wider than private escape.

2. The Sleep of the Church Second Sunday in Advent

   Christians fall asleep not through persecution or false doctrine but through lazy indifference to their neighbours; Paul wakes the Church with the nearness of a salvation from lovelessness, which Christ Himself kindles.

3. The Misery of Limiting Our Hope in Christ Third Sunday in Advent

   Paul’s warning that hope in Christ for this life only makes us most miserable does not belittle present joy; it rebukes a selfish contentment confining Christ’s redemption to this life and a few.

4. Sorrow and Joy Necessary to Each Other Fourth Sunday in Advent

   Paul’s paradox of sorrowing yet always rejoicing is real: sorrow, accepted as a gift, joins us to Christ’s sorrow for the world, and beneath it lies joy in the Father’s will, which Christmas commands.

5. The Witnesses for the Glorified Son of Man St. Stephen’s Day

   A martyr is a witness rather than a mere sufferer, and those who suffer for conscience testify against falsehood; Stephen’s vision of the Son of Man at God’s right hand is the Church’s witness.

6. The Blessing and Curse of the Law First Sunday in the Year

   Circumcision, God’s covenant to rescue a people from the flesh, reconciles David’s delight in the Law with Paul’s dread of it; free obedience comes only from trusting the Lawgiver as Father in Christ.

7. Christ Among the Doctors First Sunday after Epiphany

   The boy Christ, hearing and questioning the doctors in the Temple, reaches beneath their commentaries to the plain sense of their own sacred words, and shows them a power mightier than the letter they served.

8. St. Paul at Athens Second Sunday after Epiphany

   Paul’s sermon on Mars’ Hill affirms, against the safer method of denouncing pagan error, that the Athenians are already God’s offspring, near to a Father they have only dimly sought.

9. The Miracles of Christ Generally Third Sunday after Epiphany

   Christ’s miracles, from the water turned to wine to the healing of the leper, are not proofs demanding blind assent but disclosures of the Father’s grace, to be tested by whether they bear his likeness.

10. Christ Casting Out the Evil Spirit Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

    No law or chain can tame the Gadarene demoniac; only Christ’s direct claim upon his spirit heals him, a deliverance repeated in Paul’s conversion and in every reformation since.

11. The Parables of Christ Fifth Sunday after Epiphany

    Christ’s parables do not conceal divine mysteries behind homely images but unveil them, so that ordinary things such as seed, shepherd, and father become visible witnesses to anyone whose inner eye and ear are open.

12. Practice and Speculation Sixth Sunday after Epiphany

    Hoping for Christ’s coming manifestation is no idle speculation but the very ground of practical holiness, since knowing God as a calling Father, not a rulebook, is what makes obedience possible.

13. Christ the Purifier of Priests and Laymen Septuagesima Sunday

    Malachi’s refiner sits to purge priests and people alike, so the old Candlemas festival teaches that no saint shields sin and that humanity is purified in the Son of God.

14. The Old and New Paradise Sexagesima Sunday

    Not allegory but history links Eden’s tree and rivers to the New Jerusalem’s water of life, and the Spirit and the Bride invite everyone who hears, thirsts, or wills to drink freely.

15. The Foundation and the Building Quinquagesima Sunday

    The foundation of human society is already laid, Christ, a Person, not an opinion, so Lenten conversion turns us from prizing our opinions about Him and our superiority to others toward charity.

16. The Vine and the Branches First Sunday in Lent

    Our Lenten barrenness comes from disbelieving that the Father has already grafted us into Christ, the Vine, whose bond joins us to one another; abiding in Him, not self-effort, bears fruit.

17. The Body and the Members Second Sunday in Lent

    Human society is literally one body whose members suffer and rejoice together, and only a Person, Christ, the Head of every man, can bind it, so Lent means confessing our denials of that order.

18. Theology and Morality Third Sunday in Lent

    Micah’s call to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly cannot be met by moral maxims alone; only the Bible’s theology, the unveiling of the righteous God in Christ, gives it ground and power.

19. The Sin of Man and the Justification of Man Fourth Sunday in Lent

    All are condemned in Adam and all justified in Christ, Paul writes, so we should confess our own depravity, not a universal one, and never assume selfishness as society’s ground.

20. Hatred Necessary to Love Fifth Sunday in Lent

    David’s hatred targets whatever rises against the righteous God, beginning within; our boasted gentleness is often indifference, and true charity grows from hating falsehood, including the frauds of an election.

21. The Lord of Hosts and the Lord of Peace Sunday before Easter

    The God of armies and the Lord of Peace are one, and He Himself gives peace in every place, not as quiet repose but as the power of sacrifice issuing from the Cross.