Sermon messages – Croydon Uniting Church

The following is a chronological compilation of sermon messages, in PDF form, available to download starting with the most recent. You can also watch videos of full services at Videos.

Welcome to the Messiah - 24 March 2024 – Palm Sunday

On first blush, this week’s Palm Sunday story is quite simple. Jesus and his ever growing band of disciples have been journeying from Galilee and have now reached Jerusalem in time for the Passover festival. Jesus procures a donkey and rides this into the city while his followers wave branches and shout enthusiastically ‘Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!’

On deeper reflection, it’s also an odd story. Jesus walks everywhere. It’s basically how people got around. Yet on this occasion he is at pains to ride an animal, and a donkey at that. Procurement of the donkey takes up more than half the episode, so was presumably unexpected and memorable. First time rider riding an animal that’s never been ridden before. What could possibly go wrong?!

It seems that it’s all quite deliberate. Jesus could have entered the city inconspicuously among the Passover crowds. This may have been the prudent and safe course of action. But Jesus seems intent on making a statement. That statement appears to be political, namely that he is coming as king, humble and riding on a donkey according to the prophecy of Zechariah 9:9. The crowd’s response is from Psalm 118, a song of people welcoming a victorious king into the city with shouts of Hosanna and blessing.

So Jesus chooses to enter the city provocatively as a king, as the long awaited and hoped for Messiah. Up until this point in Mark’s gospel, Jesus has been very careful to keep his identity under wraps, which is commonly referred to as the ‘messianic secret’ in Mark’s Gospel. But now he comes openly as the Messiah. Why the change in approach? Why stir up the crowd’s imagination when it’s clear that he is not the type of Messiah they were hoping for? But perhaps that’s the point. Jesus is in fact the Messiah and the events of the next week will show the type of Messiah that he is.

Click to download: 21 downloads
24-Mar-2024-Palm-Sunday-msg.pdf – 589.68 KB
The hour has come - 17 March 2024 – Lent 5

Most of our lives are regulated by clock time – minutes, hours, days and years. In Greek this is called chronos time from which we derive the English word chronometer or watch. Whether it’s our daily routine or gathering for a meeting or attending an event, our lives usually follow chronos time.

But there is another sort of time. It’s when a mother knows that it’s time for her baby to be born. Or when it’s time to move out of your long term family home. Or when it’s time to retire from a much loved activity or responsibility. These are examples of kairos time in Greek, which might be translated as the right time, or the favourable time or the God given time.

In this week’s Gospel reading from John, Jesus declares that the hour has come for him to be glorified. God’s kairos moment has arrived when he will be lifted up from the earth – on a cross. For John, this is not a moment of shame or chance, but rather part of God’s plan for Jesus. It is the moment when he will draw all people to himself, the moment when he will be glorified and exalted, and bring his mission to fulfilment. In John’s gospel, Jesus faces this kairos moment with calm acceptance.

I wonder if you are facing any kairos moments in your life? Are there decisions or actions needed that will transform or turn your life in a new direction? As we face such moments, may we have wise people around us and know God’s peace in our hearts that however difficult the decision, the time is right and God will be with us.

Click to download: 26 downloads
17-Mar-2024-Lent-5-msg.pdf – 632.06 KB
Come into God’s light - 10 March 2024 – Lent 4

I wonder what your night vision is like. As I get older I find that it’s getting harder to navigate at night in my sport of orienteering. It’s always been challenging to run at night while following a map and trying not trip over unseen objects in the darkness. But I’m finding it harder, especially on moonless nights when kerbs and imperfections in the footpath are hard to see.

The Gospel writer John likes using the metaphors of light and darkness. Jesus is the light that is shining in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome this light (John 1:5). Yet as we travel through the season of Lent, we are reminded that there were plenty of obstacles to trip Jesus up from temptation to do things his own way to the misguided expectations of others, from those plotting evil against him to his growing popularity.

In this week’s passage from John, Jesus speaks about how he must be lifted up (on the cross) to bring life to people. Out of great love for the world, God sent Jesus for this very purpose. But not everyone wants to come into the light because it will reveal their evil actions and evil intent. They are afraid of the light revealing who they really are. So while Jesus brings God’s light and God’s life, many choose to remain in darkness.

I wonder if part of us is also afraid of coming into the light. Perhaps it’s why we find repentance and confession difficult. We convince ourselves that we are doing okay and that admitting our weaknesses and failures (our sin) before God will make us feel guilty or ashamed. Perhaps then we have misunderstood God’s love. God wants to bring us to healing and wholeness and to help us live fully in the light. God is ready to embrace us like the father figure in the parable of the prodigal son. It takes courage to step into the light and admit our need. But it’s also the way to find life, true and abundant life. What are we waiting for?

Click to download: 31 downloads
10-Mar-2024-Lent-4-msg.pdf – 541.97 KB
Jesus transforms the temple - 3 March 2024 – Lent 3

What gets your goat? What makes you angry? Perhaps it happens when one of your electronic devices refuses to co-operate and do what you want. Perhaps it’s when you hear politicians argue with each other rather than address the needs of ordinary people. Or perhaps it’s when the world watches on with apathy as countries are torn apart by war.

Usually Jesus is pretty controlled and cool. Yes he gets frustrated with the disciples who are sometimes slow to catch on, with the religious authorities who put protocol and procedures above people and their needs, and with the crowds who seek signs rather than being prepared to commit to following his ways. But one day when visiting the temple in Jerusalem, Jesus really lost his cool. The temple was the focal point of Jewish worship. It was the place people travelled to in order to pray and to meet with God. What got Jesus mad was seeing how commerce had entered and taken hold within the temple itself – with money changers and stalls selling animals.

Greed and commerce and quite possibly injustice were intruding on the worship of God. And so Jesus confronted the money changers and drove out the animal sellers. But the priests who were in charge of the temple were not impressed. Some of the Gospel writers suggest this action by Jesus was the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. After this incident, they actively look for ways to kill Jesus.

Jesus was clearly passionate about worship. Nothing was to distract or prevent people seeking to approach God to worship – whether commerce, religious rules or sickness. And so here in the temple, Jesus took a stand. What he did was controversial and personally costly. I wonder if we ever ‘lose it’ for Jesus? What aspects or expressions of our faith are we so passionate about that we will take a strong stand and be willing to bear the consequences? How can we help each other to have both wisdom and courage to confront greed and injustice?

Click to download: 37 downloads
3-Mar-2024-Lent-3-msg.pdf – 489.09 KB
Oxymoron: Jesus the suffering Messiah - 25 Feb 2024 Lent 2

An oxymoron consists of two contradictory words placed together to create a new and sometimes profound expression. Examples include deafening silence, open secret, virtual reality, seriously funny. You get the idea.

In this week’s passage from the Gospel of Mark, Jesus wants to know who the crowds think that he is. The quick poll of the disciples suggests that most people think Jesus is some sort of prophet, based on his teaching and healing ministry. Jesus then asks the question of the disciples who have spent much more time observing Jesus both in public and in private spaces. Peter, the spokesman for the disciples, suggests that Jesus is the Messiah (or Christos in Greek, both of which are shorthand for King).

Now the title Messiah carried certain expectations, which pointed to a super version of King David of old. Different Jewish groups had slightly different expectations, but generally the Messiah was hoped to be a victorious, military leader who would crush Israel’s enemies and also sort out the Temple in Jerusalem and usher in a period of lasting peace and justice. Jesus turns these expectations on their head, predicting instead that he will be rejected, will suffer and will die before mysteriously rising again. A suffering Messiah? That’s an oxymoron for Peter who rebukes Jesus for even having such thoughts.

While we have had nearly 2000 years to get our heads around the concept of a suffering Messiah, it was a big leap for the first followers of Jesus. What was also problematic was Jesus’ assertion that his followers must be prepared to walk a similar path of suffering. It’s equally problematic for us. We are quite happy to follow in the footsteps of a compassionate and loving Messiah, but a suffering Messiah who calls us to take up our cross and follow, that’s rather more extreme. What might it look like for your community?

Click to download: 33 downloads
25-Feb-2024-Lent-2msg.pdf – 614.82 KB
Jesus tested - 18 February 2024 – Lent 1

In The Lord of the Rings story, the one ring of power is clearly evil. In the first movie, there are several scenes where various characters are tested to see their response to taking the ring of power for themselves. Gandalf the wizard, Aragorn the long lost king and Galadriel the elf queen all ‘pass’ the test by refusing to take the ring. But Boromir the warrior from Gondor fails the test as he tries to seize the ring by force, with severe consequences.

In this first week of Lent, the gospel reading is always the testing or temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. He is being tested in a positive way by God’s Spirit to see if he will remain true to God’s ways. At the same time he is being tempted in a negative sense by Satan to choose a different and easier path. The key word can be translated as either test or tempt.

The tests or temptations that we face may not carry the same weight or consequences, but are just as real. Every day we are bombarded with advertising messages both blatant and subtle to buy this product or take up that limited offer. These tests ask us a subtle question over and over again, namely where do you get your worth and value from? Buying our product or service is your route to happiness and fulfilment! God’s promise that we are valued and loved for our own sake is often drowned out. We fall into the trap of building the kingdom of self rather than building the kingdom of God.

This issue is serious, though, which is why Jesus included the line in his model prayer ‘Do not lead us into temptation’ (traditional form of the prayer) or ‘Save us from the time of trial’ (modern form). It’s a prayer asking God to give us the strength and wisdom to resist the tests and temptations that come our way every day. Will we choose to follow God’s ways of loving others and seeking justice and mercy or will we follow the world’s ways of looking out for ourselves first and foremost?

Click to download: 29 downloads
18-Feb-2024-Lent-1-msg.pdf – 543.87 KB
Jesus transformed - 11 February 2024

This is Mount Tabor, the traditional setting for this week’s Gospel reading about Jesus being transformed. The story is quite unusual as Jesus’ appearance is suddenly changed and he appears to talk with Jewish heroes Elijah and Moses. The story is full of symbolism and echoes that evokes other significant encounters on mountain tops – experienced by people such as Moses and Elijah. God’s imminent presence in the story is signified by the cloud that covers the mountain, a voice that speaks from the cloud and the dazzling appearance of Jesus.

Three of the disciples – Peter, James and John – have front row seats to the unusual drama. They are blown away by what they see, hear and feel. They are astonished, confused and very frightened all at the same time. Yet it’s clear that the amazing sound and light show is primarily for their benefit. They hear that Jesus is God’s beloved Son and that they must listen to him.

So as we approach the season of Lent, what might we learn from this evocative story? Perhaps we need reminding that there is rather more to Jesus than we often imagine, that Jesus has connections with the spiritual realm and with God that are mostly hidden from our normal senses. And perhaps we might learn that our perceptions and thoughts about Jesus need to be transformed just as much as Jesus was transformed. Perhaps when Jesus says hard things like take up your cross and follow me (which comes in the immediately prior passage and which we return to in the second week of Lent) we need to listen and ponder afresh what it means to follow Jesus.

Click to download: 33 downloads
2024-Feb-11-msg.pdf – 620.83 KB
Jesus the popular healer - 4 February 2024

Health matters are often in the news, whether it’s the latest push to get a Covid booster shot or statistics about bulk-billing rates or the threat of mosquito borne diseases after a wet and humid summer. Health issues also affect our friends and family, especially as we get older. For instance, there is rarely a week that goes by where my mother, who is now in her 90s, doesn’t have one or two medical appointments with frequent trips to the chemist. (A related question is whether modern medicine helps us to live better and more fulfilled lives or just longer lives?).

Health matters were also important during the time of Jesus. There were no GP clinics or hospitals or chemists dispensing drugs of course. But there were recognised places where one might go to seek healing and more than a few charlatans or magicians who claimed the ability to heal (usually for payment). Given this backdrop, it’s interesting that well over half the miracle stories recorded in the Gospel accounts are about healing, including in this week’s Gospel reading from Mark. They are usually reported in a simple matter-of-fact way with few details provided, yet their frequency in the Gospels suggest that Jesus was known to be a healer, that this greatly enhanced his popularity and that his direct hand-on approach was viewed as somewhat unique.

We may have all sorts of questions that arise in relation to such healing stories (e.g. Did Jesus really heal such large numbers of people? How? Was this ability unique to Jesus or is it available today?). The Gospel accounts don’t answer these questions directly, but rather are written to suggest that these instances of healing demonstrated Jesus’ authority over sickness, showed Jesus’ compassion for people and stirred up controversy, especially when healings took place on the Sabbath day.

With our modern health system, we may be tempted to gloss over the significance of Jesus’ healing ministry, but its prominence points us towards the character of God present in and through Jesus – compassion, care, and desire for wholeness and restoration. May these same characteristics shine through our service and witness in the community.

Click to download: 42 downloads
2024-Feb-4-msg.pdf – 610.46 KB
Did you hear what happened last Sunday? - 28 January 2024

I wonder how you fill in your typical Sunday?

Does it begin with a delicious cup of tea or coffee, or a walk or perhaps some quiet time with God? Clearly it involves coming to church to worship God and catch up with the community …

How about later in the day? Do you go home and enjoy a Sunday roast or perhaps catch up with family or spend time in the garden or just relax

In the first chapter of Mark’s Gospel we are led through a carefully choreographed ‘typical’ Sunday in the life of Jesus.

Click to download: 47 downloads
2024-Jan-28-msg.pdf – 618.85 KB
Hope in times of trial and disappointment - 21 January 2024

For those who seek and advocate for justice and peace, the last year has been quite challenging. We have seen the war of attrition in Ukraine grind on. We have seen atrocities committed by both sides in the Israel-Gaza war. We have seen the climate emergency worsen while delegates at the latest COP meeting fail to agree any meaningful measures to reduce fossil fuel emissions. And back home in Australia, the referendum to give Indigenous people a Voice to our Federal Parliament was soundly defeated.

Justice often seems to be in retreat and destruction and violence seem to be everywhere. These are not new observations unfortunately. This was the exact same complaint that the prophet Habakkuk wrote about, questioning why God allowed such injustice to prevail. Or perhaps it is like Paul describes in Romans that the whole of creation is groaning, waiting to be released.

How are we to continue seeking justice without giving up or falling into depression?

We need to remind ourselves that when all seems like doom and gloom, God calls us to hang onto hope, even when we can’t see it distinctly. It was this imaginative sort of hope that Isaiah gave to the exiles in Babylon that God had not forgotten them. It was this same hope that helped Mary envision a world turned upside down. It was this hope that was given startling new form in the resurrection of Jesus when all hope seemed to have died.

And we are called to pray. This can be hard when we see no change or things getting worse. But when we don’t know how or what to pray, Paul reminds us that God’s Spirit intercedes for us with groans too deep for words. So we pray for God to act.

We also pray that God would give us the courage and perseverance to continue the struggle for justice, just as God inspired people like William Wilberforce and Martin Luther King Jr to keep going in the face of seemingly intransigent opposition, for God’s justice will eventually prevail.

Click to download: 65 downloads
21-Jan-2024-Aboriginal-Sunday-msg.pdf – 747.14 KB
Had any epiphanies lately? - 14 January 2024

An epiphany is a sudden revelation or thought. There may well have been a gradual build-up beforehand, but suddenly you have a ‘Eureka!’ moment when a new thought becomes suddenly clear to you. It may be about your job, or about a problem that’s been baffling you or perhaps about your sexual orientation or gender identity.

Having had this epiphany, you now need to decide what you will do about it and who you will tell. There may be a significant cost in doing this and you may be misunderstood or rejected. But you may also be pleasantly surprised, find support from unexpected sources and have a deep sense of peace about taking a new direction in life.

In the church, Epiphany is both an event and a season in the calendar. As an event it refers to the wise men from the East (Magi) visiting Jesus and offering him exotic gifts. Their epiphany was linking a new sign in the sky (a comet?) with the birth of a new king, who turns out to be Jesus. It is also a revelation that foreigners should recognise and seek to worship a Jewish boy born to be king.

As a season in the church calendar, Epiphany follows the season of Christmas and is the period where Jesus appears to the world as both the Son of God (revealed at his baptism) and the hoped for Messiah (King) of Israel, as revealed at the start of John’s Gospel. How Jesus himself recognised and responded to these epiphanies is never really shared in the Scriptures, but we might imagine that they caused a range of emotions. These revelations also led many to misunderstand or reject Jesus.

So I wonder whether you’ve had any epiphanies lately, whether about your personal life or who this person Jesus may be as we’ve travelled through the Christmas season and beyond. What will you do differently now as a result? Who will you tell?

Click to download: 57 downloads
14-Jan-2024-msg.pdf – 652.67 KB
God’s promise to do a new thing (SOC4) - 24 September 2023

Just this week there is a major meeting of the UN to discuss progress in limiting carbon emissions and also to update progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). There is not much good news to report. Cuts to global emissions are happening too slowly to limit warming to the 1.5 degC target of the 2015 Paris Agreement. Already in July and August of this year this threshold was crossed, with 2023 destined to be the hottest year in recorded history. Fossil fuel usage needs to be phased out urgently but is beholden to powerful market forces.

How are we doing as a global community in providing justice to the poorest as set out in the 2015 SDGs? Again, not well. Of the 170 targets grouped under 17 key areas (e.g. poverty, hunger, access to education, affordable clean energy), only 15% are on track to be met by 2030. Partly this shortfall is caused by the Covid pandemic and more recently the ongoing war in Ukraine. Both of these crises indicate, however, that the wealthy nations of the world can work together and can find the money to fund major challenges if these pose a threat to their own people or way of life. Sadly, the needs of the poorest people don’t generate the same urgency or generosity of response.

The reading in Isaiah 43 was written at a similarly bleak time in history for the people of Israel. They were living in exile in Babylon with no real hope of any change to their situation. Wealthy and powerful nations were firmly in charge and had no mind to help the poor Israelites. Into this gloom the prophet speaks a word of hope, that God is not oblivious to their suffering and will soon do something new and unexpected. God will open a new path for the people to return home to Jerusalem and will make rivers flow in the desert.

Such a bold and subversive pronouncement is part of what OT scholar Walter Brueggemann calls the prophetic imagination – looking at the world in a new way with current constraints removed. How our world needs a similarly bold imagination! There are selfish vested interests, of course, that want the status quo maintained – so that they can continue to hold onto their power and wealth. But the way of God offers a surprising challenge to the status quo. New ways of thinking and new priorities are possible if people have the courage and will to make it happen.

Click to download: 117 downloads
24-Sept-2023-msg.pdf – 790.76 KB
God’s river of life (SOC3) - 17 September 2023

Rivers and creeks are a vital part of the landscape, bringing a source of fresh water to places downstream. They provide an environment for fish, reptiles, insects and plants to thrive and provide water for animals, birds and people to drink. They can also be places of great beauty and peace.

In the book of Ezekiel, the prophet has a vision of a river that starts under the altar of the Temple and flows east out of Jerusalem and down towards the Dead Sea. This river brings life wherever it flows, even to the Dead Sea. It swarms with fish and its banks are lined with fruit trees whose fruit is for eating and whose leaves are for healing. This river is closely associated with the presence of God, which brings life to both humans and the natural world.

When we think of the rivers and creeks near to where we live, I wonder if we pause to see the many forms of life they bring to the environment. And I wonder about God’s river, flowing where it will in the world, bringing life and healing in a different way.

Click to download: 111 downloads
17-Sept-2023-msg.pdf – 662.33 KB
A vision of peace (SOC2) - 10 September 2023

As we look at the world in 2023, we may find it hard to see signs of peace, that state of harmony and wholeness where people and the rest of creation are in right relationship with each other. Devastating wars continue in Ukraine and Sudan and Myanmar and in other places that we don’t hear about. Our climate is getting hotter all the time, with July being the hottest month since records began. We’ve seen intense wildfires in Europe and North America. Closer to home, many Australians are struggling to pay their mortgage or rent as well as feed their families, causing stress and anxiety. Peace seems far away.

Yet Psalm 85 assures us that despite our current problems, God is still faithful and trustworthy and will bring peace to the earth. How this will happen we are not told – just that God’s character of loving kindness, faithfulness and righteousness will result in peace. The psalm is a prayer of trust in God to act in line with God’s character. It’s similar to the line in the Lord’s Prayer that goes ‘May your will be done on earth as in heaven’. God’s will is to bring peace and righteousness. But for this vision of peace to become a reality, we need to do more than simply trust in God’s goodness and love. We need to walk in God’s ways of faithfulness and righteousness, which includes seeking justice for the poor and actively caring for the environment. As we do this more and more we may be surprised to find ourselves overtaken by peace.

Click to download: 110 downloads
10-Sept-2023-msg.pdf – 599.96 KB
A call to justice (SOC1) - 3 September 2023

It’s springtime in Australia and time to celebrate the Season of creation in the church!

The symbol or logo for this year’s celebration is a river flanked by two mountains with a bird flying overhead. The bird represents a dove of peace I presume, but the rest of the image tells a powerful if unintended story. It may of course simply be two images of a river, one reflecting the scene in the midday sun (the blue side) and the other reflecting the scene at sunset (the orange side).

But given the state of the planet this year, with 2023 so far being the hottest year ever on record, it’s hard not to see the right hand side as the world burning and being coloured by bushfire smoke giving that familiar orange haze. Indeed there have been horrendous wildfires this year in Canada, Europe and in Hawaii of all places. Meanwhile fossil fuel companies continue to make record profits.

In the book of Amos, the prophet rails against the wealthy trampling the heads of the poor into the dust. Amos warns them that God despises their empty worship when they fail to live justly and share the resources of the land equitably. A similar pattern of greed and corruption is easy to see in our world with the poor suffering the worst effects of climate change while rich Western companies and governments rake in huge profits and taxes from fossil fuel production, leaving the world to burn.

The rising cost of living is hurting many people in our society, but is crippling the poor in places from Africa to Asia to the Pacific. We need to change our ways and let justice and peace flow.

Click to download: 123 downloads
3-Sept-2023-msg.pdf – 610.56 KB
God’s Big Story – Part 5 - Psalms - 27 August 2023

Communicating with God through the good and bad.

Today we are thinking about the songs that we sing in church … including from the Psalms, which for Christians is perhaps the most popular book in the OT part of our Bibles.

The practice of singing whole psalms in church has largely disappeared, unless you are in a Presbyterian church. Yet the first 100 or so hymns in Together in Song are all psalms. And for the first 1700 years or so of the church, psalms were by far the most common songs sung.

So what’s happened? Why have we fallen out of favour with singing Psalms?
And what have we done to psalms like Psalm 22, which is often associated with the passion and suffering of Jesus on the cross, and yet which inspired the catchy upbeat song In the presence of your people …

Click to download: 152 downloads
27-Aug-2023-msg.pdf – 1.14 MB
God’s Big Story – Part 4 - Wisdom - 20 August 2023

Sometimes things go well for us and we are happy …
Sometimes things don’t go so well for us and we feel sad …

In today’s story from the Bible there’s a Mum who is feeling sad because her daughter is quite sick.

How do we communicate with God when we are happy or sad? Are they the same?

Click to download: 154 downloads
20-Aug-2023-msg.pdf – 975.41 KB
God’s Big Story – Part 3 – The prophets – 13 August 2023

Today we’re going to explore more of God’s big story focusing on the message of the prophets and how they transformed Israel’s understanding of God.

Click to download: 154 downloads
13-Aug-2023msg.pdf – 777.64 KB
God’s Big Story – Part 2 – Israel’s Kings - 13 August 2023

Click to download: 153 downloads
6-Aug-2023-msg.pdf – 937.43 KB
God’s Big Story – Part 1 – The Exodus - 30 July 2023

We have been taught from Sunday school onwards to read the Bible as a series of often unconnected stories about certain heroic individuals and their actions (e.g. Adam and Eve, Moses and the 10 plagues, David and Goliath, Paul on the road to Damascus). While this is helpful to a point, it may lead to a shallow understanding of the Bible and its message.

There are many ways to read and understand the Bible but I want to share with you a way that I have found to be very helpful over the years which is to read the Bible at three distinct levels …
(i) individual stories and characters
(ii) where these stories fit into the larger history of Israel and the church
(iii) what these stories and biblical books reveal about the character and purposes of God, and themes that emerge.

This approach is especially useful for getting a grasp of the OT, but is also useful for seeing the bigger picture of the NT.

Click to download: 148 downloads
30-July-2023-msg.pdf – 638.84 KB
Strength in vulnerability - 16 July 2023

For the past three weeks we have been exploring some of the mental health challenges that many of us and our loved ones face. We noted, for instance, that mental illness can affect anyone of any age. It is not a sign of failure or being a lesser person, nor is it a punishment from God.

Fortunately, there are a range of mental health professionals who can help and a variety of medications that can help alleviate the symptoms, although these often cause unwelcome side-effects.

But what of our spiritual tradition? Is there any wisdom or insight that might add to these other helps? We have drawn on several passages from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians. In this letter, Paul describes his many physical and mental challenges, including his daily anxiety for all the churches he has founded (2 Cor 11:28). He embraces weakness and afflictions for these allow the grace and strength of God to be more clearly seen in his life (2 Cor 12:9). He further suggests that it is these very frailties and vulnerabilities – the cracks in our lives – that allow the treasure of the gospel message to shine through (2 Cor 4:7).

There are many activities and approaches that can help us maintain our mental well-being. These include time spent in nature, listening to music, having a pet and joining in community. In their different ways, each of these activities points us back to the unconditional yet mysterious love of God and the call of God to love ourselves and to love our neighbour. Many mental health challenges cannot be ‘cured’ but the love and support of a godly community can life make life more bearable.

Click to download: 164 downloads
16-July-2023-Mental-health-3.pdf – 791.41 KB
Beauty in brokenness - 9 July 2023

What does it mean to be human? … perhaps it means that we have intelligence and can think logically … but then I look at how we treat the environment and I wonder how intelligent we really are.

One of the important insights from OT theology about humanity is that each person is a whole – that we cannot separate body, mind and spirit. This means that the health of each part of us affects the rest of us.

How does this affect how we think about mental health?

Click to download: 159 downloads
9-July-2023-Mental-health-2.pdf – 820.96 KB
We need to talk about mental health - 2 July 2023

We hear a lot these days about the mental health challenges faced by sporting stars, young people, older people, gender diverse people and indigenous people, especially with the conversations around the Voice to Parliament.

Some people – perhaps many people - may think that this is a delicate topic best left to the mental health professionals – psychiatrists, psychologists and trained counsellors.

So with these various helps available, why talk about mental health in church?

I think that there are three main reasons why we need to talk …

First, the statistics are hard to ignore.
Mental illness is very common and widespread.
2 out of every 5 Australians will face a mental health challenge in their lifetime. 1 in 5 will face a mental challenge in the next 12 months.

Second, talking about mental health breaks down some of the stigma surrounding it.

Third, I believe that our spiritual tradition offers insights and help that can complement other helps we receive from the medical profession and from counsellors … not to replace them but to add to them.

Click to download: 165 downloads
2-July-2023-Mental-health-1.pdf – 888.60 KB
Be a Voice for generations - 4 June 2023

27 May – 3 June is National Reconciliation Week in Australia. This is a week that calls for all Australians to learn about shared histories, cultures and achievements, and to explore how we can all contribute to achieving reconciliation in Australia.

The significance of the first date is that 27 May marks the anniversary of the 1967 referendum when indigenous Australians were first officially counted as citizens of this country. 3 June marks the anniversary of the High Court Mabo decision that ruled that indigenous people had indeed lived and productively used the land (well) before the European colonisers came, thus overturning the fallacy of this country being terra nullius (empty land).

The theme for National Reconciliation Week this year is Be a Voice for Generations. This has an obvious link to the referendum later this year to include a permanent indigenous Voice to Parliament in the Australian Constitution. If passed, this Voice will have an effect for generations to come. It is also a call to use our voices to have conversations about the referendum and its implications for reconciliation – whether to take a step forward together or reject the proposal and create further division.

In the closing words of the Uluru statement from the Heart that was the impetus for the Voice to Parliament … “In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.”

This is a gracious invitation to continue the long journey of reconciliation. Are you ready and willing to take this step? If not, what is really holding you back?

Click to download: 89 downloads
4-June-2023-Reconciliation-Week-msg.pdf – 570.70 KB
The Spirit at Pentecost – bringing peace or disturbing the peace? - 28 May 2023

The Christian festival of Pentecost is one of the three great festivals celebrated by the church each year, alongside Christmas and Easter. It tells the story of God’s Spirit being poured out on Jesus’ followers and how this experience and its aftermath was decisive in forming the new movement that we know today as the church.

God’s Spirit is imagined in different ways in the Bible. In the first reference – in the opening verses of the very first book of Genesis – the Spirit is the wind or breath of God moving over the waters. If we fast forward to the start of Jesus’ ministry, the Spirit descends on Jesus at his baptism in the form of a dove. In the Gospel of John, Jesus speaks of the coming Spirit as the Advocate or Helper, the presence of God drawing alongside God’s people to bring comfort. At Pentecost, the outpouring of God’s Spirit is marked by wind and fire and the immediate response of God’s people to praise God in various languages.

So it is hard to tie down the Spirit to a single image or role, which is not really very surprising, as the Spirit is the essence and presence of God alive and at work in the world, even before creation.

An interesting question to consider is whether the Spirit’s role is more to provide peace and comfort (as suggested in the Gospel of John) or whether to disturb the peace (as suggested in the story of Pentecost). Most of us would probably prefer the option of bringing peace, yet often in the Bible the Spirit seems to do the opposite, stirring up people to speak or act for God.

May God’s Spirit move among us afresh today, bringing peace where there is conflict and suffering but also disturbing the peace where we have grown too comfortable with the status quo. Come, Holy Spirit, to bring life and hope!

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Jesus, prayer and power - 21 May 2023

Prayer is often seen as a key part of our walk of faith. At its simplest, prayer is talking with and listening to God. Yet for many Christians, prayer remains a source of guilt and anxiety. We feel that we should pray more, or pray better, or pray more effectively. Some people view prayer as largely a waste of time that serves no practical purpose in the world. Despite these doubts, prayer remains a core element of Christian practice the world over and a source of blessing and encouragement.

Jesus completes his farewell teaching to the disciples by praying what is often called the High Priestly Prayer. In this prayer he prays for himself in the light of his impending death on the cross, for the disciples and for the later church (those who will come to believe based on the witness of the disciples). The prayer includes many of the key themes of John’s Gospel – glory, eternal life, faith, truth, Jesus’ origins and relationship with God. It also looks ahead to the time of the church as Jesus prays that his followers would be protected from evil, would be united in heart and purpose and would know the love and joy that comes from God as they witness to Jesus.

As humans, our life depends on breathing. We breathe in and we breathe out from the moment we are born until our dying breath. If our actions of compassion and service and witness in the world are how we breathe out spiritually, then prayer and worship are key parts of how we breathe in spiritually. It is through prayer that we are refreshed, encouraged, unburdened and remain connected with God.

There is no one right way to pray, or place to pray, or time to pray. Try to find a way, a time and a place that works for you and don’t be afraid to change it around occasionally. Listen out for God’s whisper in your heart that you are indeed a precious child of God and deeply loved by God. As you listen and talk, prepare to be surprised where prayer may take you.

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We remember mothers and their love - 14 May 2023

This Sunday is celebrated as Mother’s Day in Australia. It provides an opportunity for children to make their mother breakfast-in-bed, to give a bunch of flowers and a ready excuse for a family get together. There is of course also the commercial pressure to buy Mum this or that gift that she may or may not really want.

The odd thing about Mother’s Day is that we set aside just a single day to pause and remember all the amazing things that mothers do each and every day of the year … nurturing, caring, catering, managing, encouraging, helping, sharing common sense. And that’s not to mention that each of us only came to be born into this world through the painful labour of childbirth endured by our mothers.

It’s interesting that when Jesus is wanting to share the news about how his impending death will affect the disciples, he uses the illustration of childbirth. They will feel great pain – just as a mother feels great pain during labour. But just as the pain turns to joy for a mother when her child is born, so the disciples’ pain will turn to joy when they see Jesus alive again after the resurrection.

These pangs of childbirth are what it will take to bring Jesus’ vision for new life fully into being … a vision where every person is welcomed with respect and dignity, where loving and serving one another irrespective of our status or gender or background are the norm, where suspicion and animosity are replaced by kindness and acceptance. Wouldn’t it be great if this vision was lived out not just on a day like Mother’s Day but every day.

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Staying connected with Jesus - 7 May 2023

In our digital age, connections are all important, whether it’s the level of bars on our phone reception or the performance of our nbn connection. Problems arise when the connection is weak or broken. Just this week I was trying to set my Mum up with a new bank account and was trying to fill in all the details required at a computer at the bank. Despite trying several times, the internet connection kept dropping out so that I had to go back to the start of the form each time. We then tried a different computer with a better connection and it all worked okay.

Chapter 15 in John is all about connections, especially our connection with Jesus and through Jesus to God. John uses the metaphor of a grapevine, with Jesus claiming himself to be the vine, God as the gardener and followers of Jesus as the branches. The purpose of a grapevine is to grow and produce grapes of course with all these elements staying connected and working together. In a spiritual sense, we must stay connected with Jesus if we are to produce fruit in our lives.

How does this happen? Jesus teaches that his words and his ways must remain in us, especially the command to love one another. We are called to follow the example Jesus set of washing his disciples’ feet at the Last Supper and later his willingness to lay down his life on the cross for the sake of his friends.

This is hard teaching that may make us anxious about how we will in fact remain connected with Jesus through all the ups and downs and trials of life. The good news is that Jesus is wanting to hold on to us, through the gift of God’s Spirit, just as much as we want to hold onto Jesus. So we do not have to strive or be anxious, but rather live into the relationship that Jesus makes possible.

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Life after Jesus - 30 April 2023

We sometimes think that living as a Christian in a secular culture like Australia is quite difficult. The church has been pushed to the margins of our society, has a shrinking and often older cohort of members and is regarded with suspicion or hostility by many people due to past failures (e.g. abuse of children that was then covered up). All of this is true, yet it doesn’t paint the whole picture. Compared to other parts of the world, we live in a relatively tolerant culture that doesn’t actively persecute Christians nor stop us gathering for worship.

Most students of history would suggest that the emerging Christian church had a much tougher position than ourselves, awkwardly caught between a hostile Jewish community and a polytheistic pagan culture. They were also a relatively tiny group and now without their charismatic leader. If they were to survive and indeed to thrive, they would need a clear understanding of their mission and approach. The long teaching section in John’s Gospel in chapters 14-17 offers guidance for the time after Jesus.

Two early themes that stand out from these chapters are the call to continue Jesus’ ministry and the promise of God’s Spirit to help and guide them. These provided clarity of purpose and hope in the present and for the future. Whenever we become despondent about our future or weighed down by our secular culture, we would do well to reflect on the call to us to continue the ministry of Jesus and the promise of God’s Spirit to be with us and to encourage us.

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Starting over - 23 April 2023

The final chapter in John’s Gospel feels quite ordinary compared to its grand opening chapter that spoke of the Word of God becoming flesh and dwelling among us bringing light and life. In the final chapter we have a story about fishing and sharing a BBQ on the beach and a conversation between Jesus and Peter. It’s rather laid back and relaxed, though not for Peter.

The presence of Jesus sitting by a fire surely brings back for Peter bitter memories of the last time he sat round a fire and denied even knowing Jesus three times over. Peter is probably feeling embarrassed, ashamed and so disappointed in himself. Rather than rebuke him for his failures, Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves him, to which Peter replies 'you know that I love you'. Jesus then commissions Peter to carry on the mission of the Good Shepherd by feeding the flock, namely the emerging church community.

Failure and disappointment are met with grace, forgiveness and healing. Jesus gently restores Peter and helps him to start over. I wonder if there are relationships in your life or in your community that need a similar word of grace to help them start over.

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The cross of Jesus – shame or glory? Good Friday Service 2023

https://youtu.be/XBU8j8Y7yQQ

For Jesus, his ministry was always likely to end up this way. He angered and divided some people just as much as he amazed and thrilled others. He was seen as a threat to the status quo by those in power, and people who hold power often respond with violence and retaliation when they feel threatened. And so the temple authorities, the Pharisees and the Romans formed an unlikely alliance to arrest and silence the trouble-maker from Galilee.

From one perspective, the death of Jesus is a story of rejection and betrayal, of human brutality and shame as he dies an agonising death on a cross. From John’s perspective, however, being lifted up on the cross is the moment when Jesus is glorified and draws all people to himself. It is the means by which God’s love and glory are fully revealed to the world and also how God’s life is made available to all.

So how do you see the Good Friday story? Is it a story about the darkness and evil that dwells in the human heart? Or is it a story about the light and love and life that God wants to bring into the world? Or is it a strange combination of both these stories?

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Looking backwards and looking forwards - Palm Sunday – 2 April, 2023

https://youtu.be/ZWywvSL4Cws

On Palm Sunday each year, we remember the story of Jesus entering Jerusalem, riding on a donkey. The people throw their cloaks on the ground and wave palm branches as they sing a song that welcomes the king into the city (taken from Psalm 118). Jesus adds to the spectacle by deliberately choosing to ride the donkey, acting out a prophecy from the Scriptures (in the prophetic book of Zechariah) about the king coming in humility and peace and riding on a donkey.

Not everyone is pleased to see Jesus being feted in this way. His regular opponents throughout the Gospel story, the Pharisees, grumble about how the whole world seems to be going after Jesus. John’s Gospel then includes an odd little incident to show that this statement is quite true. Some Greeks – non Jewish people – are visiting Jerusalem for Passover and have heard about Jesus and want to see him and request an audience through two of his disciples.

For Jesus this is the sign that his message is indeed reaching into the world. It recalls the well-known verse from earlier in this Gospel that the reason Jesus came into the world was because God loved the world so much. For Jesus, the decisive hour is now within view – the climax of his ministry.

From one perspective, the death of Jesus is a story of rejection and betrayal, of brutality and shame as he dies an agonising death on a cross. From John’s perspective, however, being lifted up on the cross is the moment when Jesus is glorified and draws all people to himself. It is the means by which God’s love is fully revealed to the world and also how God’s life is made available to all.

So how do you see the Easter story? Is it a story about the darkness and evil that dwells in the human heart? Or is it a story about the light and love and life that God wants to bring into the world? Or is it a strange combination of both these stories?

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The beginning of the end for Jesus - 26 March 2023

I wonder if you have had the privilege of sitting with a dying person or sharing time with family members immediately following the death of a loved one. Usually few words are spoken, but it is often a special and even sacred moment. Death has a way of stripping away our masks and trivial concerns. A precious person’s life journey has ended, and those remaining must begin a new chapter without the ongoing presence of the one who’s died.

When Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, died, Jesus wasn’t there. So his missed out on the rawness of the death and the grief that followed. But when Jesus does turn up, recriminations flow freely from Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus. If you had been here, our brother would not have died … Moved with compassion, Jesus visits the tomb where the body has been laid, prays and then calls to Lazarus to come out. Lazarus emerges, alive again!

Based on this incident, Jesus claims to be the resurrection and the life, the one who promises to give life to us even though we die. It is also the seventh and final ‘sign’ in John’s Gospel that points to Jesus as the one who has come to bring life – eternal life – to the world. This sign stirs the imagination of the people and also hardens the opposition against Jesus. It is the event that precipitates the beginning of the end for Jesus as we move rapidly towards the events of Easter.

This story adds to the mystery surrounding death. Will we live again, even though we die? What will that new life look like? And do we need to fear death? May God give us hope and wisdom as we ponder these questions.

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Jesus the good shepherd - 19 March 2023

I’m not sure how much you know about sheep and shepherds. If you’re like me, I suspect the answer is not too much. We may think of sheep as cute and cuddly, which is true if we think of newborn lambs. A fully grown sheep, however, weighs in at some 100 kg and is a strong and sometimes stubborn animal. Shepherds leading small flocks of 50 to 80 sheep are a Middle Eastern tradition whereas in Australia flocks tend to be much larger and are rounded up with sheep dogs or quad bikes.

So how do we relate to Jesus calling himself the good shepherd in John chapter 10, with ourselves as the sheep?

Sheep have certain needs – for grass and water – that a shepherd takes care of. So if Jesus is the good shepherd, he provides for our basic needs. This is similar to the line in the Lord’s Prayer asking God to give us our daily bread.

Sheep are vulnerable to certain marauding predators like wolves or foxes. In the Middle East, the shepherd keeps them safe by building a sheepfold (enclosure) and by sleeping across the entrance. As the good shepherd, Jesus promises to stay close to us and never abandon us.

In Jesus’ thinking, the sheep are so valuable that as the good shepherd he is prepared to lay down his life for the sake of the sheep. This points ahead to the cross where Jesus’ death will – in a paradoxical way – bring life to those who trust in him.

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Insight and blindness - 12 March 2023

he natural world is beautiful. So are many of the people who inhabit our world – their love and creativity and care for others is often amazing.

We soak in the beauty of the world through our senses, especially through our sight. Unfortunately, our physical sight can be impacted by various conditions and also by the ageing process. One of the most common – and curable – of these conditions is cataracts that slowly but surely dim our sight. In affluent countries like Australia we can undergo simple surgery to remove cataracts and have our sight restored.

But there are other forms of blindness that are not so easily cured. There is a saying that there are none so blind as those who will not see. This condition is called prejudice and most of us suffer from it in one form or another. We learn it from our parents or peer group.

In this week’s Scripture reading from John 9 we see a very old prejudice at work. Jesus sees a blind man and his disciples want to know whose sin caused him to be blind, his own or his parents. This prejudice of equating suffering with sin features in several religions and cultures – whether seen as karma or an understanding of God where bad deeds are punished.

Jesus will not buy in to the prejudice and instead heals the man, on the Sabbath day. What ensues is fairly predictable as both Jesus and the man are harangued for breaking the ‘no work on the Sabbath’ laws. While the blind man slowly grows in faith and insight regarding Jesus, his opponents reveal more and more of their prejudice and blindness regarding Jesus.

It’s easy for us to criticise Jesus’ opponents for their prejudice. But if we’re honest with ourselves, we too carry prejudices. It might be our attitude towards indigenous people, or asylum seekers, or gay people, or the unemployed or those who don’t take climate change seriously. Jesus calls himself the light of the world and, if we are willing, will open our eyes so that we can see things from God’s perspective. To benefit from the insight Jesus offers, however, we first have to be willing to admit that we have a problem.

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Jesus in dispute - 5 March 2023

I’m not sure what your image of Jesus is – whether you see him as a gentle and compassionate healer or as a spiritual person who is often at prayer, whether you see him as meek and mild or as a firebrand preacher. He was all of these things and more.

In this week’s readings from John’s Gospel we are presented with an image of Jesus that we may find less appealing. He is in dispute with a group of Pharisees and the chief priests about many things – including his origins, the source of his authority to teach and who is acting and speaking more faithfully.

The way that John presents it, such disputes were a regular feature of Jesus’ ministry and occurred in open public spaces rather than behind closed doors. And Jesus more than held his own in the passionate and often vitriolic exchanges. Note that various Jewish writings from this era show that similar heated exchanges were indeed the norm.

What sets Jesus’ remarks apart from those of his opponents, however, is his insistence that he has come to bring life and light to people, and to satisfy their inner thirst for relationship with God. This provides a useful criterion to judge our words and actions against. Do they bring life? Do they enlighten people and point then towards God? Do they reveal God’s character of love and grace?

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Daily bread - 26 Feb 2023

Each culture in the world has its staple food. For Pacific islanders it might be taro. For many Asians it’s rice, while for many Africans it’s maize or corn porridge. For those in the Middle East and through much of Europe the staple food is some form of bread, usually made from wheat.

So when Jesus is faced with a hungry crowd of people, the food on hand is five small loaves of bread and two salted fish. He gives thanks to God for the food, and then distributes it to the crowd. Everyone has enough to eat and there are basketfuls of left-overs. One lesson that we might take from this incident is that hungry people need practical help – they need food to eat. We might also learn to trust in what we have available and that God is able to provide what we need in abundance.

Next day the people come back for more free food, but Jesus engages them in a rather different way. He offers the people bread from heaven, the bread of life that God gives. If people eat this sort of bread they will never be hungry again. This bread is Jesus himself, which leads on to an interesting conversation about how they might ‘eat’ Jesus. We may well hear overtones or echoes of Communion in Jesus’ words. The people are both intrigued and repulsed.

The gist of what Jesus is saying is that if we want true and satisfying life, we need to take Jesus’ words deep inside ourselves and trust that God will nourish our soul or spirit with them. We might do this through some sort of contemplative prayer or meditation on Scripture, both good daily disciplines of faith.

There is a well-known line in the Lord’s Prayer that goes ‘Give us today our daily bread’. I wonder if this refers to God providing what we need to sustain us each day (food, drink, shelter, purpose) or whether it refers to the bread of life that Jesus talked about (a daily connection with God through prayer and Scripture). Perhaps Jesus had in mind both types of ‘bread’ – as both are important.

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Jesus on trial - 19 February 2023

Crime shows and whodunit mysteries are among the most popular shows on TV. I’m not sure why. Perhaps we like the challenge of trying to piece together the clues and solve the mystery. Perhaps we are curious about how evil people think and how they hatch their plots. Perhaps we like the thrill of the chase and feeling afraid – but all observed from a safe distance.

Crime and subsequent court cases happen all the time in real life. These are often petty crimes but occasionally a high profile case stirs the public imagination, such as the recent Brittany Higgins rape trial or the impending case of a man accused of killing two campers in the Victorian Alps. In a court of law, witnesses are called to give evidence, the truth of statements made is weighed and the judge or jury must decide a verdict.

We may be surprised to find several public ‘trials’ of Jesus In the Gospel of John, starting with the one in chapter 5. Jesus’ crime is healing someone on the Sabbath day, a day designated to be free of work, including healing it seems. When confronted with his crime, Jesus defends himself by saying that he is just doing what he sees the Father (i.e. God) doing. This statement is interpreted by his opponents as a second crime, claiming equal authority with God. Jesus then calls on various witnesses – John the Baptist, the powerful signs he is performing (like the healing) and Scripture – to support his own claims.

Where is truth to be found? What verdict will we – the jury – come to in this case? Why does any of this matter two thousand years after the events in question? It matters if we want to get to the truth of who Jesus is and by implication, who God is. We each have to come to our own conclusion.

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A chance encounter with Jesus - 12 Feb 2023

It’s fascinating that the woman with the most number of speaking lines in the whole of the New Testament is an unnamed Samaritan woman whom Jesus meets one day at a well. She is far removed from Jesus in terms of gender, ethnicity, religion and sexual background … and yet the two strike up a deep and meaningful conversation following a chance encounter.

Unlike other biblical encounters at a well that lead to marriage (think of Rebekah, Jacob, Moses), this conversation steers towards discussing water and thirst, most appropriate for the context. Jesus is physically thirsty and asks the woman for a drink of water. The woman, it turns out, is spiritually thirsty and engages with Jesus concerning how to quench her thirst, about worship and who the Messiah might be.

The hook is when Jesus talks about the gift of living water that he can provide. Intrigued, the woman wants to know where to get this living water that will fully satisfy her thirst. Jesus doesn’t say much more here but in later chapters will speak about the food that leads to eternal life (chapter 6) and the living water (chapter 7) that likewise leads to eternal life.

Where do we turn to satisfy our spiritual hunger and thirst? Where is our ‘well’ where we find sustenance and refreshment for our spiritual journey? What practices do we follow each day? May we be as open as the woman in this story to seek and to receive all that Jesus has to offer us.

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Jesus and his puzzling answers - 5 February 2023

(Youtube video available)

There seems little doubt from the stories we have of Jesus that his presence aroused curiosity, amazement and hostility, probably in equal measure. He became known as a healer and prophetic teacher but also became a controversial figure due to the company he kept. You see, Jesus seemed to be as comfortable mixing with suspicious tax collectors and prostitutes as he was hobnobbing with the upper classes of his society.

Early on in John’s Gospel an influential member of Jewish ruling council, Nicodemus, comes to Jesus at night in order to try and understand him better. He seems curious. He is polite rather than confrontational. But he is also puzzled by Jesus’ remarks that a person must be born from above if they are to see where God is at work in the world. Nicodemus hears that one must be born ‘again’ (the preposition in Greek can mean either ‘from above’ or ‘again’) and interprets this literally (how can anyone re-enter their mother’s womb and be born again, clearly a ridiculous proposition).

But Jesus is meaning something more subtle and spiritual … a person needs to be transformed by God’s presence in their life to open their eyes to God’s ways and this is like a new or second birth. Nicodemus doesn’t seem able to grasp the concept and leaves somewhat confused. He maintains his curiosity in Jesus, however, and appears twice more later in the story, including at the cross.

I am encouraged by two aspects of the story. First, it’s quite okay to have questions and doubts about our faith and about the person and message of Jesus. We may not always get a straight-forward answer to our questions, but it seems that Jesus is prepared to engage with anyone, right where they are at. Second, Jesus said some really puzzling things that don’t always make much sense to us. But the implicit invitation made to Nicodemus – and ourselves – is to keep grappling with what Jesus said and eventually we may gain greater insight and understanding … which may lead to further questions … and that’s okay too.

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Jesus at a wedding - 29 January 2023

(Youtube video available)

Weddings are intended to be a happy social occasion where two people pledge their love for each other, with family and friends present to both witness the vows made and to bless the couple. What follows is usually some sort of party with music and dancing, sometimes tasty food and often too much alcohol. Weddings have been celebrated in this fashion for thousands of years.

Then someone thought it would make a fun reality TV show to bring couples together to be married – who’ve never seen each other before and who don’t come from a culture of arranged marriages – and do all this in front of TV cameras and a national TV audience. And so we get the horror show Married at First Sight – what could possibly go wrong?!

As in this TV show, weddings don’t always go to plan. When Jesus and his friends attend a wedding in Cana, the host runs out of wine. We think that’s no big deal, but in a culture where wedding celebrations might last a week it was a serious faux pas and could damage the social standing of the family. No problem thinks Mary, the mother of Jesus – just ask my son to fix things and do what he says. And so we have the story of Jesus turning water into wine.

At one level it’s a simple story of Jesus showing kindness and compassion and meeting people where they’re at. According to the Gospel writer John, however, there’s more going on here. He calls it a sign – that points to Jesus’ connection with God and a demonstration of God’s power and authority working through Jesus. The provision of wine is associated in Jewish thought with blessing and is a symbol of the life to come (see Isaiah 25:6-8 and also the wedding imagery in the book of Revelation). So for those with eyes to see, Jesus’ actions point to something deeper – the inbreaking of God’s life into the here and now.

May our eyes be open this week to where we see God at work in our lives.

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What are we really celebrating at Christmas? - Christmas Day - 25 December 2022

(Youtube video available)

Christmas is a wonderful time of year when we gather with friends to sing carols about the birth of Jesus and often indulge in too much food and drink. We get to enjoy our version of Christmas because we are relatively wealthy and live in a country that is peaceful most of the time.

Unfortunately for many millions of people, our sort of Christmas celebration is a fantasy … whether for those struggling through a cold winter in Ukraine without electricity or water, or hungry and famished in East Africa or asylum seekers still living in limbo in Australia and wondering if and when they might be deported or offered a visa.

The Christmas stories that we are given in three of the four Gospels are far more gritty and challenging than we usually imagine. The best known in Luke’s Gospel suggests that Jesus was born on the road to an unwed mother far from home and in the shadow of the oppressive threat of the Roman army. There was no roast dinner or a warm bed to snuggle into.

Matthew illustrates a different danger, this time from King Herod and his violent soldiers on the warpath to remove any perceived threat to Herod’s hold on power. Joseph and Mary and Jesus had to be ready to flee at short notice. Then there is John’s expansive view of events from a heavenly perspective where the Word of God risks taking on human flesh in Jesus and faces rejection from most people, which was also the lived reality for John’s community.

So there is a real cost that underlies the Christmas story – hardship, threat and persecution. The good news is that God considered these challenges worth taking the risk for. And so Jesus was born into a divided and dangerous world, born to an obscure rural couple and whose birth was celebrated only by those at the fringes of society, the shepherds.

Yet these stories also point to God being content to bring hope and favour in the most unpromising situations and to work through unlikely people. The warning to the comfortable and rich like us in these stories is that it is easy for us to miss or reject what God may be doing in our midst. May the Spirit open our eyes to see what is really worth celebrating at Christmas and what the cost might be if we are to fully embrace the story of the one born at Bethlehem.

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What love looks like - 18 December 2022

Love takes many forms. It might be the love of a parent for a child, or the love shared between lifelong friends or it might be love of music or nature. In English, these various forms of love are all described by the single word ‘love’. Unfortunately in our culture – and especially in movies – love is often confused with lust and sex. Perhaps that’s because it’s easier to capture this sort of love on film or in the words of a song. Such erotic love is certainly one type of love, but not the only or most important form of love.

In the New Testament the most commonly used word for love is agape, which is a good translation of the Hebrew hesed, or loving kindness. This type of love is part of God’s character and seen in how God cares for and interacts with humans and the world. Agape love is not selfish but rather cares for the other. It is faithful, committed and prepared to be sacrificial for the sake of another. Such love is described in the famous passage in 1 Corinthians 13 and seen in Christ’s giving up of his life on the cross.

In the Advent story this week from Matthew’s Gospel, love is seen in the attitudes and actions of Joseph towards Mary. When Joseph finds out that Mary, his fiancée, is pregnant but not through his actions, Joseph seeks a practical solution – a quiet divorce – that will hopefully protect Mary from shame or stoning. Later, when Joseph finds out in a dream that Mary is pregnant through God’s Holy Spirit, he decides to go through with the marriage and to adopt the child as his own. This is agape love in action. It may be costly for Joseph but he wants the best outcome for Mary and the child and for himself.

There is a carol entitled Love came down at Christmas. May it point us to the love of God revealed in the birth, life, ministry and death of Jesus, and may we be inspired by Jesus’ example to love others we meet and interact with this week.

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Surprised by joy - 11 December 2022

In our culture, many people seek happiness. Advertisers con us into believing that the secret to happiness is to buy this product or holiday at that destination. Then our life will be happy, our family members will all get on marvellously with each other and life will be full of laughter. We know that advertising works, so many people buy into this shallow understanding of happiness.

The reality, though, learned through experience, is that true and lasting happiness can’t be bought so easily. Even if we do buy the advertised product, our family members won’t necessarily get on and there will still be stresses and anxieties aplenty, especially at this time of year. Happiness is fickle. It depends on how we are feeling on any day, how well we slept last night, what particular circumstances we are facing today and even our brain chemistry.

But joy is different to happiness. Joy is an emotion that comes from a different place to happiness. We can feel joy even if our circumstances are bleak. It’s an emotion that says we’re in the right place and doing the right thing. It often comes from God’s Spirit, which was the case for Mary, the mother of Jesus. Outwardly, her circumstances are not good … she is expecting a child but her husband-to-be, Joseph, is not the father. This will most likely cause her to become a social outcast and the subject of gossip.

Yet God’s promises to her about who this child will become and how God will transform the world through him fill her heart with joy as she sings the song we know as the Magnificat. God is acting to bring change and life and hope and Mary has a significant part to play. So she is filled with joy and sings her subversive song.

May we too find ourselves surprised by joy at what God is doing in our lives and in the world.

Click to download: 199 downloads
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Praying for peace - 4 December 2022 – Advent 2

One of the Advent candles that we light each year represents peace, usually lit on the second Sunday of Advent. The radical vision outlined in Isaiah chapter 2 looks forward to a day when people and nations will learn God’s way of peace and will take their weapons of war (swords and spears) and make them into implements for farming (ploughs and pruning shears). All people are encouraged to walk in the light of God’s ways. During Advent, we are also reminded that Jesus came as the Prince of Peace (one of the titles used to describe the Messiah in Isaiah 9:6) and that at his birth, the angels announced glory to God in heaven and peace on earth among those whom God favours (Luke 2:14).

But when we look at the world at the end of 2022, there are many places and many situations that lack peace. One of the most disturbing of these situations is the ongoing war in Ukraine that has displaced millions of people, killed thousands and made life miserable and dangerous for many. Yet equally disturbing is the famine in east Africa where millions of people face starvation and extreme hunger as winter rains fail again, made worse by the effects of climate change.

Closer to home, we are shocked by the latest Closing the Gap reports that highlight the desperation experience by many indigenous communities as children are (still!) being removed from families in large numbers and young people are locked up in prison. The hope of having an indigenous voice to Parliament enshrined in the Constitution is also under attack as a major political party (the Nationals) this week decided to oppose the proposed referendum.

In these and other situations it’s hard to see how peace can come, who will make it happen and how it can be sustained. It has always been thus through human history. Yet Advent also teaches us that nothing is impossible with God. Our role is to bring peace wherever we can but also to keep praying for peace and seeking God’s mercy and grace.

Click to download: 211 downloads
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What do we hope for? - 27 November 2022 – Advent 1

What do we hope for?

What does hope look like? Desire for a certain this to happen? Expectation that it will happen?
Does hope require action on our part or do we sit back and watch it happen?

One symbol of hope is a rainbow …
God’s promise to never flood the whole world in a great flood … sign of hope after rain …
light splits into various colours …
can represent a nation (South Africa) or gender (LGTBIQ) …
can cause controversy at a World Cup soccer tournament …

For us a rainbow will be the various shades or colours of hope that we can explore through Advent, starting today with hope in the OT …

Click to download: 201 downloads
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Two visions of the world - 13 November 2022

Good news or bad news? … we almost always prefer the good news option

There will be peace … or there will be wars

Long and prosperous life … or persecution

Being reassuring … or being radical

It’s all up to God … it’s mostly up to us

Interestingly, it is the reading from the prophet Isaiah which leans towards the good news of peace and prosperity and the Gospel of Jesus that leans towards bad news, wars and persecution.

Perhaps it’s a case of comfort the afflicted for Isaiah’s audience and afflict the comfortable for Luke.

So two starkly contrasting readings, both set down in the Lectionary today.
I wonder which one we are more drawn to and why …

Click to download: 213 downloads
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Who needs to change? - 30 October 2022

Whether we like to admit it or not, most of us find change quite difficult, especially as we get older. We feel comfortable in what is familiar and form lifetime habits and ways of thinking. This thinking includes our views of other people. This week’s Gospel story about a tax collector named Zacchaeus, however, shows that change is possible.

The usual interpretation of the story is that Zac is a despised individual who has grown very wealthy at the expense of the poor. The crowds label him a ‘sinner’ and grumble when Jesus goes to share a meal with him. The good news is that Zac has a change of heart after meeting Jesus and commits himself to give away half his money to the poor in the future. A lost person has been found and their life transformed by an encounter with Jesus. Zac changes for the better.

There is an alternative reading of the story, however, that turns on a point of grammar. The verbs that describe Zac giving money to the poor and repaying anyone he has defrauded are both present tense, which suggests actions and attitudes that Zac is already doing. So who needs to change? In this reading of the story, it is Zac’s neighbours who need to change their thinking towards him. Rather than seeing Zac as a despicable tax collector working for the Romans, Jesus encourages them to see Zac as he really is – a son of Abraham who is acceptable to God.

I wonder what prejudices we hold of certain types of people that might need to change – whether towards indigenous people, the LGBTQI community, other drivers on the road or even towards other Christians. The story of Zacchaeus shows us that we all have prejudices and blind spots but that we can change our thinking and our attitudes towards people.

Click to download: 217 downloads
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What we (really) think about ourselves and others - 23 October 2022

One characteristic of we humans is that we have lots of feelings – about ourselves and about other people. Some of us are more in touch with these feelings than others, and some of us are better – or worse – at expressing these feelings in appropriate ways.

Ways to explore these feelings might include sharing your thoughts with a trusted friend (or counsellor), writing them down in a journal or talking to God about them in prayer. This last option may seem odd, but God is both a very good and patient listener and a person who can point us towards a better understanding of ourselves and others.

In this week’s Gospel reading, two quite different people share their personal thoughts with God through prayer. The first person, a Pharisee, would have been considered a respectable and upright citizen who took their religious faith quite seriously. Their prayer is rather self-focused – reminding God of their virtuous habits and comparing themselves – favourably – to other more dubious people like tax collectors and robbers. In this prayer, the Pharisee appears to do most of the talking – a bit like us often when we pray. As in the image, this person also puts themselves above other people.

The second person is one of the afore-mentioned tax collectors, who were despised by most people as traitors to Israel (since they collected taxes on behalf of the occupying Romans) and as greedy bastards (as they tended to overcharge people and pocket the difference). This person’s prayer is short and simple – they recognise how their life falls short of God’s ways – a harsh but probably true assessment of their practices – and they seek God’s mercy. The sting in the tail of this parable is that it is the second person, the tax collector, who goes home in right relationship with God, rather than the Pharisee. The moral of the story is that God wants us to come to a realistic and honest perspective of ourselves first and foremost and to be humble enough to seek God’s forgiveness. Only then can we hope to come to a realistic view of another person that avoids stereotypes and arrogance. Too often we are quick to judge another without knowing their full story

Click to download: 213 downloads
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Responses to Creation - 25 September 2022 – SoC 4

We all have varying responses to the creation that is around us every day. Some of these responses include wonder, awe, respect, thankfulness, guilt, anxiety, fear and anger. Sometimes we move between these various responses depending on what we have seen, experienced or been subject to. While each of these is a valid human response towards creation, the Scriptures suggest that three responses are most appropriate.

The first and most common response in the Scriptures is wonder and awe towards creation that is seen as vast, untameable and yet intricate and inter-connected. The witness of creation is to point us towards its Creator, God. This first response may well lead us to thankfulness and even worship.

Another response in the Scriptures is that of repentance. Quite often creation is described as suffering or broken or groaning, which is actually a reflection of human rebellion and sin against God. The spiritual and the physical are mysteriously linked together.

A third response that flows on from repentance (= changing one’s mind) is to change one’s actions and return to following God’s ways of justice and peace and care for all of creation, which is the vocation of humanity according to Genesis 2:15. As we do this, healing and joy and freedom come to creation.

As you contemplate your own response to creation, which of these three are you most drawn to and why?

Click to download: 233 downloads
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Listening to indigenous wisdom - 18 September 2022 – SoC 3

There is certainly a wow factor to creation … whether watching the colours of sunrise or sunset, or the power of the ocean waves, or the delicate plants that survive in the most challenging conditions or weird looking insects. There is so much beauty and diversity – and strangeness – in creation that all of us from time to time wonder what lies behind it all.

The Hebrew answer is that the Creator God is responsible for all that we see in creation. This belief was so foundational that the opening chapters of the opening book of the Bible are given to stories about the origins of the world and of humanity’s place in the world. The best known of these stories comes in Genesis chapter 1 which starts with the words ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth’. Written as a poem or song, the chapter outlines six ‘days’ of creation, culminating with the creation of humanity. At the end of the series, God declares all of creation to be very good.

We have often been taught to read this Genesis account with humans – made in the image of God – standing at the pinnacle of creation and given the vocation of ruling over it. Creation is thus seen as under human control and ready to be exploited for our purposes – whether for farming or mining or building cities. Creation is our servant.

Indigenous people – and ecologists – have a vastly different understanding. They see creation as inter-dependent with each element depending on all the other elements. From one perspective, humanity is the most dependent species of all – we cannot survive apart from the rest of creation. So indigenous wisdom – built up over centuries and millennia – is that we must care for creation just as creation cares for us. Part of this wisdom is knowing about which animals or plants can be taken at which time and in which place and in which way – so that the overall balance and fruitfulness of creation is sustained. There is so much that we can learn from this indigenous wisdom, one of the voices of creation that is often ignored.

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Creation speaks - 11 September 2022 – SoC 2

We often marvel at the beauty and order of creation. God declares it to be ‘very good’ as the creation hymn in Genesis chapter 1 expresses it. Although it does not speak in the words of human language, creation nevertheless ‘speaks’ to us all the time. As Psalm 19 puts it, creation is speaking every day and its voice goes out through the whole earth, its words to the end of the world.

Although we may struggle to discern it sometimes, Scripture suggests that there is a connection between the physical and spiritual realms. So in Psalm 19, for instance, creation tells of the glory of God and the commandments of God are righteous and bring life. There is a balance and connection between the two realms.

Hence when the nation of Israel faces God’s judgment for neglecting God’s ways, the land of Israel mourns and becomes empty and formless (Jeremiah 4:23-28). It is as though creation is unravelling and reverting to chaos just as the nation is collapsing and being sent into exile. Conversely, when Israel is forgiven and urged to return to the land, creation rejoices and blossoms, and water flows in the desert (Isaiah 35:1-2). So the health and mood of creation seems to mirror what is happening spiritually within Israel.

If creation continues to speak to us today and if there is a connection between the physical and the spiritual, what is the voice of creation saying? The burning forests, melting glaciers and polluted rivers seem to suggest that humanity’s greed and selfishness is making the planet sick. But if we will repent of our evil ways and look after the poor and care for the earth wisely – rather than seek profit and ever growing consumption – then perhaps creation can again thrive and give glory to God – as intended

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The creation as holy ground - 4 September 2022 – SoC 1

Spring has arrived – and with it the sense that nature is waking up from its winter slumber … wattles and blossoms are in bloom, bees are buzzing, birds are mating and some trees have starting sprouting fresh new leaves. It’s also the time to celebrate the Season of Creation (SOC), which runs through the whole of September each year.

The symbol for SOC this year is the burning bush, which is taken from the story in Exodus 3 where Moses is intrigued by the sight of a bush that is in flame but not burning up. As he approaches for a closer look, God speaks from the heart of the bush and asks Moses to remove his sandals because he is standing on holy ground.

The burning bush as used in this symbol is engulfing the world in flame. It speaks of creation as under stress due to climate change, leading to higher temperatures and more wild weather events. These include fires in western Europe and western America along with new records for temperature in the UK (above 40 deg C) and devastating floods in Pakistan where a third of the country in under water. Nature and ecosystems are suffering.

The theme of SOC this year is listening to the voice of creation, which includes listening to the voices of those who speak on behalf of creation – scientists, ecologists, indigenous peoples, subsistence farmers and fishermen. And of course we can also go to the source and listen to sounds and voices of nature itself by spending some time along a creek or parkland – quietly listening to the various bird calls, frogs and insects.

What message are these voices telling us? Perhaps they are saying that it’s time to take off the sandals of our unsustainable lifestyles that are slowly killing the planet and reconnect with the holy ground of God’s earth.

Click to download: 224 downloads
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God’s kind of hospitality - 28 August 2022

Offering hospitality is part of being human – it happens across all cultures and all religions. We are social creatures by nature. It’s one reason why the covid lockdowns were so difficult for so many people – we were cut off from gathering and meeting with family, friends and work colleagues – and despite the technical marvel of programs like Zoom, it just doesn’t provide the same experience as being in the same physical space with others.

Middle Eastern culture places a particularly high importance on hospitality, which is one reason why Jesus seems to spend so much time sharing meals with others. He was even maligned as being a glutton and a drunkard (Luke 7:34). As followers of Jesus, Christians are called to practise hospitality, for who knows – we may be entertaining angels unawares, as Abraham did (see Genesis 18). But Jesus suggests a few tweaks on normal social etiquette – such as inviting the poor, lame and crippled and not just your friends and family – and not expecting an invitation in return.

As a country we have much to learn about hospitality. Our treatment of refugees and asylum seekers over the last 20 years, for instance, is nothing short of shameful. Yet even when we locked up these people as prisoners for years, despite the fact that they have committed no crime, their desire to offer hospitality to visitors was amazing. They offered the one thing possible – making us endless cups of green tea in the visitor’s centre.

The great blessing - as well as the great danger – of offering hospitality is the possibility that we will be changed, that our understanding of life will be broadened, that our compassion and empathy for others will be deepened as we listen to the stories of our guests. May we learn afresh the joys of offering hospitality, despite the ongoing need to be careful to do so in a covid safe way.

Click to download: 253 downloads
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Journeys of faith - 21 August 2022

Every one of us is on a journey called life. It had a beginning point, has many twists and turns along the way and will one day reach an end. Older people in particular, may be well aware that their journey of life is drawing to a close and may look back over their life with a mix of gratitude, fulfilment and regret.

Our journey of faith also traces out a path, although we may not be conscious of when it really started – whether in the womb (as suggested by Psalm 139), or gradually as we discovered more about the world or at a definite point in time. Along the way our journey of faith may involve cul-de-sacs, brick walls, exhilarating mountain top experiences, routine and habit. Hopefully for all of us there is a growing edge to our faith, whatever stage of life we are up to.

In this week’s challenging reading from Hebrews two journeys of faith are contrasted. The first is the journey of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt to Mt Sinai where Moses receives the Ten Commandments and many other laws. The description of the scene at Mt Sinai is intended to convey awe and wonder – as Yahweh descends on the mountain in storm and fire. The earth shakes and the people are terrified. It’s as if the writer is telling later generations how awesome and powerful the presence of God is and therefore how they must obey God’s every command as though their very life depends on it.

This journey of faith is contrasted with a Christian’s journey of faith that will culminate in God’s glorious presence in heaven, surrounded by angels and all the saints who have gone before. Amidst all the struggles and challenges of life on earth, only two things are truly dependable and solid, namely God and the kingdom Jesus is building. So the message in this case seems to be to endure whatever hardships life may throw at you because your journey will end in the glorious presence of God.

Two journeys of faith towards two apparently quite different destinations. Yet the journey is towards the same God in each case. So it is with each of us. Our journey of faith is unique to us yet it has a common end point – the presence of God. So the author seems to be saying that however difficult or routine or amazing our journey of faith is – and it may be all this and more over our lifetime – keep your eyes fixed on the final destination of the journey and the hope of enduring life in God’s presence.

Click to download: 240 downloads
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Faithfulness and focus - 14 August 2022

Faith is a many splendoured experience that comes in various forms. Sometimes faith is knowing something deep inside that you just know to be true. Sometimes faith is more like a hunch or an intuition. Sometimes faith is borne from past experience, such as knowing that the light will come on if I turn the switch. Sometimes (often in fact) faith is a form of trust, such as following a course of medication or having a vaccine because we trust the medical science.

Spiritual faith is trusting in the goodness and loving kindness of God even when our situation or circumstances may suggest that we are all alone in the world, forgotten by God. In the ‘Hall of faith’ chapter in Hebrews 11, there is a list of famous people of faith from the Scriptures placed alongside another list of unnamed people of faith who suffer misery and persecution. All are commended for their faith, which suggests that having faith is no guarantee that life will be easy and, conversely, that suffering is not caused by a lack of faith.

The passage then encourages us to persevere in our own ‘race’ of faith in the light of this multitude of both ‘successful’ and ‘suffering’ forms of faith. In this race we are encouraged to persevere through the hard times that will inevitably come our way at some stage or other, focusing especially on the example of Jesus who is the beginning and end of our life of faith, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith (Heb 12:2). As we know, Jesus endured great shame and agony on the cross, but then experienced joy. We can expect to experience similar challenges – and joys – as we follow in the footsteps of Jesus, who is the source and inspiration of our faith.

Click to download: 207 downloads
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Faith and faithfulness - 7 August 2022

When I was a young adult I admired people of faith. I wondered how they could be so certain about the big questions of life when to me everything seemed quite uncertain. I think I made the common mistake of contrasting faith with doubt, assuming that a person with faith must have no doubts.

These days I would call myself a person of faith – but that doesn’t mean that I have everything figured out. Rather, it seems to me that faith is having the courage to trust what you can’t fully grasp, despite the uncertainty, as suggested by the above quote from Brene Brown. The book of Hebrews states it this way: faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see (Heb 11:1).

So when I look at the world I see plenty of reasons for doom and gloom and many situations that seem impossible to resolve, such as the ongoing war in Ukraine or the climate emergency that we seem no closer to solving. But faith is trusting in God and God’s promises in spite of the difficulties and struggles that surround us every day. It is having the courage to trust that following the way of Jesus will make a positive contribution to the world and the people around us.

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Teach us how to pray - 24 July 2022

Prayer is a deeply spiritual practice that crosses many religions. People pray for all sorts of reasons – for protection and security from evil, for the healing of a loved one, for rain or for it to stop raining, to connect with one’s god. Even non-religious people pray in times of extreme anguish. People like the slave trader John Newton, who – afraid that he was about to drown during a fierce Atlantic storm – cried out to God to save him – promising to turn his whole life around. Newton survived the storm, gave up slave trading and became a Minister and hymn writer, whose best known hymn is the classic Amazing grace.

In this week’s gospel reading from Luke, the disciples observe Jesus at prayer and ask him to teach them how to pray. As faithful Jews they would have prayed at least three times every day, so the request is more about how to pray like Jesus. The prayer Jesus teaches them – known to us as the Lord’s Prayer – is short and memorable, less than 60 words, which one can recite from memory in under a minute.

Why then do we so often find prayer difficult? Perhaps it’s because we have a transactional view of God – that if we do this (e.g. pray) then God will do that (e.g. grant our requests). This seems to miss the point of prayer which is about building relationship and trust. We don’t pray to try and twist God’s arm to give us what we want, but rather so that we will be changed through the practice of prayer and will come to understand more of God’s character and God’s perspective on the world. We also tend to fill our prayer times with our words and find it much harder to be still and to listen to what God may be saying to us.

A disciple is a learner – and when it comes to prayer we are all learners. There is no one right way to pray or right place to pray – just read through the book of Psalms, which is the Bible’s prayer book. If you struggle with prayer this is a good place to start. If we listen to Jesus we will learn that prayer can be very simple, but whose daily practice helps connect us with God.

Click to download: 124 downloads
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Getting the balance right - 17 July 2022

We often hear these days about the need for people to get their work/life balance right. This dilemma has been highlighted by the trend of working from home that was encouraged during covid lockdowns. The home became the place of paid work as well as the place of learning for many students. The home is of course also the place one lives one’s personal life. So where does work (or study) begin and end and how does this impact the rest of life?

A similar issue lies behind this week’s Gospel reading about two sisters, Martha and Mary. It appears that Martha is in charge of running the house and expects her sister Mary to help out as required when Jesus and his band of travelling disciples arrive for a meal. Providing hospitality to guests was both an honour and an expectation in Eastern culture. And the role of women was to organize the hospitality. This was considered to be women’s rightful ‘work’.

The problem is that Mary decides that she will sit and listen to Jesus’ teaching – alongside the other male disciples – while Martha prepares the meal. Martha is unimpressed and interrupts Jesus to demand that he persuade Mary to get back into the kitchen to help out. Instead, Jesus commends Mary and suggests that she has chosen what is the ‘better part’.

What’s at stake is more than a feminist rebellion against imposed gender roles. The situation asks us to consider how to balance the demands of discipleship (learning to follow Jesus) with other demands in life (e.g. work, home schooling, running a house). Jesus often invites people to follow his example which cultivates the inner life of relating to God (e.g. through prayer, worship, stillness) but is also fully involved in life in the world (e.g. work, community building, helping others). The challenge – as with the question of contemporary work/life balance – is how to balance these distinct yet overlapping spheres of our lives.

Watch on Youtube here.

Click to download: 123 downloads
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Get up! Stand up! Show up! 10 July 2022

This week is NAIDOC Week that provides us all with the opportunity to remember and celebrate the culture, history and many achievements of indigenous people in this country now called Australia. The week-long celebration grew from the Aboriginal Sunday promoted by William Cooper back in 1938 to mark the Sunday before Australia Day each year as a day of mourning for indigenous people. Under the promotion of the National Aborigines and Islander Day Observance Committee, NAIDOC has been extended from a day to a whole week and has moved from January to July.

The theme this year is Get up! Stand up! Show up! It’s a reminder of how indigenous people have indeed got up, stood up and shown up in defence of their lands and culture against the invading colonisers and in the long fight for recognition, rights and treaty that continues today.

It’s also an invitation for the Second Peoples of this country to get up, stand up and show up as allies and advocates for the First Peoples. This is more than offering an acknowledgement of country at the start of a meeting or event. It’s an attitude and aspiration of being willing to do more in this space and to walk with the First Peoples in their struggle for justice.

The OT prophet Amos rails against the complacency of the people of his day towards injustice and urges them to instead make justice roll down like a river and righteousness like a never failing stream (Amos 5:24). In our day, justice for indigenous people includes closing the gap on so many basic issues such as housing, health and rates of imprisonment. It also means having the courage and active will to implement the Uluru Statement from the heart to give indigenous people a voice to Parliament, to establish a makarrata truth-telling commission and to work towards a treaty.

While these are grand visions on a national scale, we can also work at a local level. The Assembly of the Uniting Church encourages each local congregation to reach out and connect with their local indigenous mob … not to solve problems but to develop a relationship. And then to listen, to listen deeply and then listen some more to the stories and history and lived experience of our local indigenous brothers and sisters.

A video of this message is available on Youtube via this link.

https://youtu.be/aAWEoRWYOe4

Click to download: 115 downloads
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Called to freedom - 26 June 2022

Freedom is a gift and a right that we don’t often think about in this country Australia. We are used to doing what we want, when we want and with whom we want. But those of us who live in Melbourne have had a taste of what life is like when certain freedoms are removed. During covid lockdowns in the last two years we were not allowed to gather together, not allowed to travel and not allowed to leave our homes at all except for a very limited number of reasons. When the restrictions were eased, we delighted at once again being able to meet with other people and being allowed to participate in communal activities.

Paul places freedom at the heart of the gospel, along with grace and faith. In his letter to the Galatian churches, this freedom is focused on being liberated from the Jewish Law with its many restrictions and regulations. We can enjoy right relationship with God based purely on our faith in Jesus Christ and what he has done for us.

Because of this insistence that we don’t need to follow the detailed demands of Jewish Law, Paul is seen as a bit of a trouble-maker and rebel … like Jesus before him! But Paul turns this on its head by suggesting that we are to use our freedom to love and serve others, effectively becoming a slave … the very opposite of a free person.

So while freedom is a fundamental right, it’s possible to abuse our freedom for selfish or indulgent ends. Instead, sometimes we have to curtail our freedom to best serve others. This was seen during the covid lockdowns when the vast majority of Melburnians complied with the restrictions and curtailed their freedom for the sake of loving and serving others by keeping them safe. Sadly this attitude has largely disappeared and selfish indulgence is back in charge.

May God give us wisdom to discern how to use and enjoy our freedom – in ways that serve the interests of others.

Click to download: 233 downloads
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Children of God through faith - 19 June 2022

Today we’re going to hear a story from the Bible about a man called Abraham, who is sometimes called the father of faith. God asked Abraham to do some amazing things … and he believed God … and even more he trusted God and did what God asked of him.

Watch on Youtube here

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Paul’s story, our story and God’s story - 12 June 2022

Humans are born storytellers, whether it be stories shared with family members or friends, or whether it’s meeting with guests who come to our food bank or to Tuesday lunch or to our playgroups. Telling stories is part our human DNA and each person has a story to tell if we take the time to listen. Some of these stories involve hardship and resilience, some speak of care and compassion and some are the stuff of laughter and legend, especially in families.

The apostle Paul also has an interesting story to tell. While we may usually think of Paul in terms of dense theological arguments about Christ (e.g. Romans) or sorting our church problems (e.g. Corinthians), his life story is quite fascinating. He was brought up as a strict Pharisee, the sort of person who often opposed Jesus, and later he tried to actively suppress the church. After a memorable but mysterious encounter with the spirit of the risen Jesus, Paul’s life is completely transformed and he becomes an outspoken and passionate witness for Christ. But not immediately. After the encounter with Jesus it is nearly another 20 years before he begins his ministry. Perhaps it took him that long to reconcile his faith in Jesus with his earlier faith as a Pharisee.

As Christians, what gives our stories meaning and what gave Paul’s story meaning is how they interact with God’s bigger story that goes all the way back to creation. This bigger story involves the people of Israel, the insights of the prophets and wisdom writers, the coming and ministry of Jesus, the giving of the gift of God’s Spirit and the ongoing life of the church and of the wider creation.

On this Trinity Sunday it’s helpful to reflect on how we are invited to share in God’s story and to participate in the life of God. We each grasp different aspects of God’s story – creation, justice, worship, love, compassion, grace, forgiveness, inclusion – which is why it’s important that we listen to each other’s stories as well as to the all-encompassing story of God.

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Surprising Spirit - 5 June 2022

Pentecost Sunday is one of the few days in the church year when we highlight the person and work of the Holy Spirit. So it seems a shame when we focus too much on some of the symbols associated with this day – wind and fire – both inanimate forces, which point to a powerful and perhaps threatening force at work (think storms and bushfires).

In the Acts 2 account that we usually read at Pentecost, the effect of the Spirit is certainly powerful, leading the disciples to praise God loudly and in multiple languages, which soon gathers a crowd of bewildered onlookers. The Spirit then emboldens Peter (and perhaps other disciples) to speak about Jesus and about the recent events of Easter. The Spirit challenges the hearers to respond and then gives vibrancy to the new community that forms. So the Spirit is indeed a powerful agent, pointing people towards God and towards Jesus and prompting life-giving responses.

This week we will instead be reading from the second Pentecost story that occurs in Acts 10, in which Peter is led through a series of Spirit initiated occurrences to speak to the household of a Roman soldier named Cornelius. The result is similar to the first Pentecost story with those present led to praise God and respond positively to the message about Jesus. The key difference is that this time around, those listening are Gentiles, non-Jewish people, Romans no less who were often despised by Jews.

This second Pentecost story illustrates that God’s Spirit often leads us to go beyond where we might feel comfortable, with surprising and life-changing results. It turns out that God accepts every person whose heart is open – everyone is acceptable to God, even those we might consider beyond the pale. So the person of the Spirit works powerfully and surprisingly. Where might the Spirit be leading each of us this Pentecost?

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Towards peace and reconciliation - 29 May 2022

The apostle Paul uses the imagery of reconciliation and peace between estranged parties as one of the ways of understanding the death of Jesus. He argues that humanity was estranged from God – and from one another – but now God has acted decisively through the death of Jesus to bring both reconciliation and peace. This has not happened through human initiative or power, but rather through the gracious actions of God.

The headline slogan ‘Be brave. Make change’ is not a plea to the new Labor government from the Greens or Teal independents, although it would be an appropriate message to send. Rather it is the chosen theme for this year’s National Reconciliation Week that starts on 27 May and runs through to 3 June. This annual event provides an opportunity to learn about the histories, cultures and achievements of indigenous people, and the chance to explore how each of us can contribute to achieving reconciliation in Australia.

When we think of the often fractured relationships between indigenous people (the First Peoples of the land we call Australia) and later colonisers/settlers/immigrants (the Second Peoples), it is clear we have a lot of ground to catch up if there is to be true reconciliation and peace. A good start would be to listen deeply to each other. Indigenous people yearn for their voice to be heard, as expressed in the 2017 Uluru statement from the heart.

They want a voice to Parliament enshrined in the Constitution, a Makarrata (truth-telling) Commission and a treaty. Each of these requests will be challenging to implement and potentially costly for Second Peoples, but with a change in government, now is the time to act – to be brave and to make change. May God give our political leaders both the wisdom and the will to act, and all Australians the compassion and courage to respond positively.

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Success and struggle go together - 22 May 2022

We all like winners.

We’re told that winners are grinners.

We’re told that winning isn’t the main thing … it’s the only thing.

But for every winner, there is always a loser and often many, many losers.

So if we shift our thinking a little, what does success look like away from the sporting field?

What would a successful outcome in Ukraine look like?

What would a successful church look like?

And with all the focus on winning at all costs, where is the right balance between success and struggle? These are some of the questions we’ll be thinking about today

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The gospel message spreads - 15 May 2022

People make plans all the time … whether it’s plans to go away on holidays (which for many of us have been on hold for the last two years), plans for how to celebrate an upcoming birthday or how we will spend Election day on 21 May, or plans for getting fit or losing weight. Such plans help add meaning to our life and give us a future to look forward to.

There’s a well-known verse in the book of Jeremiah that suggests that God has plans too, good plans … plans to prosper us, plans to give us hope and a future. This promise is spoken in the midst of a dismal medium-term outlook for Israel that includes loss of their land, loss of the temple and exile to Babylon. God seems to be saying that there is a bigger perspective here, if we have eyes to see it and trust to grasp it.

Jesus too had a plan for his followers that is summarised in Acts 1:8, namely that they would be his witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. In its historical context, this plan gives an outline of how the message of good news spread from its starting point in Jerusalem all the way to Rome, the centre of the then known world.

How might this plan apply to us today? It suggests that we begin where we are and live out our witness – through both our words and our actions – among our friends and our neighbours. As the opportunity arises, we can carry the message about God’s love and justice wherever we go. One benediction puts it this way … Go into the world in peace; carry God’s wisdom, speak forth God’s word and embody God’s love, wherever you are and whoever you meet.

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Called to be witnesses – living like Jesus - 8 May 2022

While it is usually the men who feature in our Bible readings, this week’s description of the early Christian community in Acts 2 suggests that roles and responsibilities were evenly shared. The (male) apostles may have been the teachers, but it was almost certainly the women who provided the hospitality and the homes for people to meet in, as was the case during the ministry of Jesus. It takes the gifts of each person to build a community, so let us remember and be thankful for the wonderful gifts that so many women contribute.

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Called to be witnesses through what we say - 1 May 2022

The story of Easter normally finishes with Jesus – risen from the dead – appearing to his disciples and commissioning them to go out into the world and spread his message of good news. Of the four Gospel stories we have, three of them – Matthew, Mark and John – finish in this way. The fourth Gospel – Luke – continues the Jesus story for another thirty years, thus giving us a valuable insight into what happened after the first Easter.

What did the disciples do? Luke tells us that they waited in Jerusalem and gathered together in prayer in the days leading up the Pentecost, when God’s Spirit was poured out upon them. This gift of the Spirit seemed to give the disciples a new boldness and confidence and they started telling people about Jesus and even healing people in a way similar to Jesus. This got them into trouble with the authorities, just like Jesus. Eventually the disciples were scattered and wherever they went, they continued to share the story of Jesus. And small communities began, formed of followers of Jesus.

Christian communities today are the spiritual fruit of the efforts of these early followers of Jesus who shared their message through both their words and their actions. The challenge for us today is to continue the never complete mission of Jesus to bring good news to the world. Many of us are comfortable doing this through actions of love and compassion. But we need to also tell the story of Jesus – in words. May God’s Spirit give us the boldness and confidence to do so and also the wisdom to know the right words to speak at the right time.

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We all carry certain hopes and dreams within us - Easter – 17 April, 2022

The story of Easter is brutal, confronting and enduringly evocative. Jesus, the one who was known as a compassionate healer and bold preacher, comes to Jerusalem at Passover time. After annoying the temple authorities he is arrested by the Jewish leaders, tried and then sentenced to death by the Romans. It all takes place very quickly and brutally and within a 24 hour period Jesus is dead and buried. Might and power have won over compassion and love. Hope has died.

His followers are in shock as to how this could have happened and are now afraid for their own safety. This should be the end of the story as the leader of the movement is eliminated. But then something unexpected and extraordinary happens. The tomb where Jesus’ body was laid is found to be empty and some of his followers see visions of angels saying Jesus is risen from the dead. Their grief turns to confusion and then to joy. Something changed them and energised them to take the message of Jesus out into the world. The most plausible explanation is that they encountered the risen Jesus.

When we look around at all the turmoil in the world, it’s obvious that might and power usually win (e.g. the Russian invasion of Ukraine). Compassion and love are for the so-called bleeding hearts of the political left who fail to see that strength and toughness are needed to overcome evil and injustice. And yet … and yet … the person of Jesus – his life, message, death and resurrection – has had a deeper and more lasting influence on humanity than any brutal despot or government. The story of Easter affirms that goodness is indeed greater than evil, that love is greater than hate and that life is greater than death (Desmond Tutu).

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Welcome or hostility? - 10 April 2022

This Sunday is known as Palm Sunday and recalls Jesus’ entry into the city of Jerusalem. We are used to seeing signs when we enter a town or city. If they were a thing back in Jesus’ day (which they weren’t) such a sign might have read ‘Welcome to Jerusalem – capital city of Judaism’. For Luke, Jerusalem is a most significant place. It’s where the priest Zechariah had his vision in the temple, the place where Jesus was dedicated, the goal of Jesus’ long journey and of course the place of his passion, death, resurrection and ascension.

In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus set off for Jerusalem way back in chapter 9, so it’s taken a long time to reach the city. Luke has carefully built the tension in his narrative with regular reminders that Jesus is headed for Jerusalem and what will likely take place there. Now that he’s finally arrived, what sort of welcome will he receive?

His followers are excited, joyful and singing songs that speak of a righteous and victorious king entering the city in the name of God. They clearly regard Jesus as a king, the Messiah, based on his ministry and mighty deeds. They are looking forward to those in authority welcoming Jesus as the king who brings peace and hope and new life.

The Pharisees meanwhile, Jesus’ chief sparring partners through the whole story, try to dampen the buoyant mood and ask Jesus to tell his followers to be quiet. We’re also told that those responsible for the running of the temple, the heart of Jewish worship, are seeking to kill Jesus, especially after his action of disrupting the ‘business’ side of the temple’s operation.

All seems set for a high stakes showdown, where welcome will quickly turn to hostility and violence.

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Living with clarity or confusion - 3 April 2022

This week the Federal Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, handed down the Budget. Clearly it was prepared with the imminent election in mind, with cash handouts to many and a temporary reduction in the fuel excise which will make petrol and diesel purchases some 20 cents per litre cheaper for motorists.

What is rather more confusing (or perhaps it’s clear …?) is the vision for Australia’s medium term future as outlined in the Budget. It would suggest that we need to spend rather less on addressing climate change than previously and spend nothing more on aged care (despite obvious issues in staffing numbers and pay) yet we can afford to spend billions of dollars on seemingly unimportant infrastructure projects in marginal electorates.

This week’s Gospel story illustrates the gulf between Jesus’ vision and that of the disciples. While Jesus is quite clear and open about the reception he will likely receive in Jerusalem (mocking, insults, flogging, death), the disciples remain confused and lacking understanding (thinking that Jesus will receive a hero’s welcome from the authorities in Jerusalem). The story of the blind man Bartimaeus receiving his sight illustrates that he sees clearly who Jesus is and what his needs are, even while the disciples remain in a fog of confusion.

As we continue to walk with Jesus on the road that leads to the events of Easter, I wonder whether we are clear or confused regarding what we are called to do as followers of Jesus. Where are we seeking to follow Jesus even though the road seems hard, and where are we following our own agenda even though it may be well wide of Jesus’ call? Where do we see clearly and where do we remain blind?

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The heart of the gospel – walking with grace - 27 March 2022

Most religions claim to offer a source of comfort and guidance. They provide a basis for moral beliefs and ethical behaviours, often provide a sense of community and a connection to tradition. Religions differ significantly, however, when it comes to questions of God, multiple gods or no god at all. The three monotheistic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – all claim that there is one God who is the Creator and who has provided guidelines for how to live a just and holy life. When it comes to Christian faith, the teaching and person of Jesus Christ provide unique insights into the nature of God.

This week’s parable points us towards how we are to picture God. It’s the well-known parable of the Prodigal Son, in which a disrespectful younger son demands his share of the family inheritance and promptly spends all the money on wild living. When he is broke, hungry and without friends, he returns home, hoping to be taken on as a hired labourer. His father sees him returning from afar, rushes to welcome and embrace him and throws a big party to celebrate the son who was effectively dead now being alive again.

The second, older son hears the music from the party and becomes angry on learning that his father has thrown a party to mark the occasion of his younger brother’s return. This older son is presented as the dutiful, responsible one who always does the right thing, but who resents the father for not honouring him with a party for his many years of faithful service. The father invites the older son to join the celebration, but the parable is left open-ended as to what will happen next.

Jesus’ repeated message – that we know as the gospel – is that God is indeed like the father in the parable – gracious, compassionate, extravagant in love and patient with our shortcomings. We do not have to merit or earn our salvation from God, but rather can receive God’s blessing as a free gift. We call this free gift grace. This is the heart of the gospel message. The challenge for us as Christians is how prepared we are both to receive God’s grace into our own lives and to extend such grace to others.

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Distractions – finding good excuses not to follow - 13 March 2022

I wonder what sorts of things are distractions for you? It could be Facebook, or talkback radio, or shopping. A distraction is neither good nor bad in itself. It is simply something – or a person or a situation – that prevents us from concentrating on something else. Often we enjoy such distractions since they may keep us from attending to more important but difficult issues. Other times distractions are just plain annoying – like a constantly dripping tap.

In this week’s reading from the Gospel, Jesus makes a deliberate choice to set off for Jerusalem despite knowing that rejection, suffering and probably death await him there. The text states that he set his face to go to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51). No distractions for Jesus. Just a narrow and single-minded focus on following the path that God seems to have laid before him.

Several would-be disciples encounter Jesus and offer various excuses as to why they can’t follow him right now. One must organise a funeral for their father, one needs to go and say goodbye to their family and one is apparently unsure about basic requirements such as where they will sleep each night if they follow this itinerant preacher. Each of these excuses seems entirely reasonable. Yet the clear implication is that they are distractions from following Jesus and embracing his mission of bringing God’s kingdom into reality.

This is hard teaching that we may try to ignore or wish had never been spoken. That’s because distractions – while neither good nor bad in themselves – take us way from other priorities. And as Jesus makes clear, those who wish to follow him must be prepared to walk the same path as he takes, which includes making God’s kingdom our number one priority. Lent is a good opportunity to review our priorities and how we are spending our time, and to check whether distractions are diverting us from following Jesus.

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Temptation – finding an easier path - 6 March 2022

This week is the first Sunday in the season of Lent, the 40 day period leading up to Easter. Why 40 days of Lent? This number is based on this week’s reading – the so-called temptation of Jesus – in which Jesus is in the wilderness for 40 days being tempted by the devil. It’s also why the traditional discipline for Lent is fasting (and prayer) as Jesus apparently fasted throughout the 40 days.

The temptations that Jesus faces all seem reasonable – feed yourself (and potentially others) to ease your hunger, rule over the nations of the world (responsibly and justly of course), and show others that God can indeed save by leaping off the temple. Jesus resists these temptations by choosing to follow God’s way instead – the way of deep trust in God, the way of service and the way of humility and suffering. These will be the hallmarks of Jesus’ ministry.

We face different temptations to Jesus but they are often equally subtle and enticing. At heart, most temptation is about making ourselves the centre of everything – satisfying our own desires and building our own little kingdom of self. If we follow the way and example of Jesus, we will resist such temptation by deliberately choosing to turn to God and following the ways of God’s kingdom instead.

May Lent be a rich season for you as you take time to reflect on your personal walk of faith.

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An upside down adventure - 2021 Dec 19

Many Protestant Christians have a rather ambivalent view of Mary. Yes she is the mother of Jesus and features prominently in the Christmas story, but she then rapidly disappears from our view, only to reappear at the foot of the cross (in John’s Gospel at least). But Protestants are wary of the high view of Mary in the Catholic Church and her exalted role in redemption and prayer. Because of this ambivalence, and the influence of Christian art that usually depicts Mary as meek and demure with her eyes cast downwards, we lose sight of Mary’s contribution to our faith.

Mary’s song in Luke 1:46-55 that we know as the Magnificat is actually quite subversive and radical. Mary considers herself blessed and favoured by God, who has done great things for her. God’s choosing of Mary to be the mother of Jesus is indeed an honour, but it comes at considerable personal cost to her reputation and later life. The stigma surrounding the origins of Jesus will never leave her and she will most likely live much of her life on the margins of polite society. So a rather upside down blessing.

The balance of the song is equally subversive as Mary sings of the proud, powerful and rich being brought low while the poor and hungry are lifted up. In many ways this is a foretaste of the message and ministry of Jesus who comes to bring good news to the poor through word and action. Mary’s prophetic words are filled with faith, courage and vision and set out the first declaration of God’s upside down kingdom adventure in Luke’s Gospel. So yes, Mary fulfils an important role in being the mother – and educator – of Jesus but is also an inspiring example of an early female disciple who has an important voice for us to hear.

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An adventure centuries in the making - 2021 Dec 12

At Christmas time there often seems to be an emphasis that everything has to be new – new gifts and new toys for the children or grandchildren, new table settings, new clothes. It’s all an advertiser’s dream as people flock to our shopping centres to buy ‘stuff’ for Christmas. No wonder that many retailers make more profit in the three weeks before Christmas than for the rest of the year combined. Of course we also retain older traditions – perhaps cooking a favourite recipe handed down over a couple of generations, watching Carols by Candlelight, decorating a tree with our treasured ornaments. So Christmas is a mix of old and new.

The Christmas story itself as we read in Luke’s Gospel is now considered old, but at the time God was doing a new thing among the people. The birth of John (later called the Baptist) was part of this new adventure. When Zechariah rejoices at the birth of his son, John, his words look both backwards and forwards. They recall God’s promises of old – promises made to Abraham to bless his descendants – and promises fulfilled at the Exodus as God acts with might to save the people from their enemies. Zechariah’s words also look forward to the ministry of John who will encourage people to repent and turn back to God afresh.

As we prepare to celebrate Christmas once again, I wonder where your attention is drawn. Do you look back with amazement at God’s plans and promises that came to pass in that first Christmas with the births of John and then Jesus and all that flowed from them? Or do you rejoice in what God is doing in our midst today, or look forwards with anticipation to where God’s Spirit is leading us in the future? Wherever your gaze is drawn, may you reflect with joy at how God is weaving your story into God’s bigger story.

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An adventure beyond the ordinary - 2021 Dec 5

This week, as we move a step closer towards Christmas, we hear the story of Mary receiving some most unexpected news. She is to have a son who will be named Jesus, who will rule on the throne of David and be called the Son of the Most High God. Mary asks how this will be since she isn’t even married. The somewhat mysterious response is that the power of God’s Spirit will come upon her.

We are probably too familiar with this story that we miss how scandalous it is at so many levels. Mary is young and as yet unmarried, so to become pregnant is a social scandal that will lead to innuendo, disgrace and possibly worse. What will she say to her parents and to her fiancé Joseph? Mary is also a nobody in the wider scheme of things. She comes from an ordinary family and from a very ordinary small village. She has no status, no connections.

But therein lies the beauty and mystery of this story – that God chooses to work through ordinary people like Mary living ordinary lives. God may well have seen qualities in Mary to suit her for this rather extraordinary role – a deep faith perhaps, courage and a sense of calm. Perhaps God sees these or other qualities in our lives. The most important characteristic though is that Mary says ‘yes’ to God’s invitation. She doesn’t know where this will lead or about the joys and challenges and griefs it will bring her but she says yes anyway. May we be inspired by Mary’s adventure beyond the ordinary.

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An adventure beyond religion - 28 November 2021

Advent is here, which marks the beginning on a new year in the church Lectionary cycle as we move to the year of Luke. Although there is often good wisdom and discipline in following the Lectionary readings week by week, the selection of Advent readings has always left me a bit puzzled. Even more so in the year of Luke which has its own insightful portrayal of the origin story of Jesus as Luke intertwines the prediction, arrival and celebration of two special babies – John (later to be known as the Baptist) and Jesus (later to be given any number of names and titles).

The story begins with Zechariah, an elderly and faithful priest descended from the line of Aaron. Zechariah serves at the temple in Jerusalem, the heart of Jewish worship. Both he and his wife Elizabeth are described as righteous and blameless – people who are careful to follow the laws and guiding ways of the Jewish torah. But they are both old and in one significant way, their lives remain unfulfilled as they have no children.

But God has a plan to bless Zechariah, which is conveyed to him in an angelic message. Zechariah struggles to comprehend that his wife in her old age should now have a son. This child, to be named John, will also be a blessing to the wider nation of Israel as he will become a powerful prophet a little like Elijah. All this will take Zechariah, Elizabeth and John well beyond their comfort zone, well beyond the safe sanctuary of the temple and its organised religion. It will be an adventure – that will bring blessing and pain, joy and sorrow. As we emerge from two long years of Covid disruption, I wonder whether we are ready to embark on a fresh adventure with God?

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Living with integrity - 2021 Nov 21

Integrity and trust are essential for any relationship whether friendship, marriage or in public life. Both seem to be under a cloud at the moment among our political leaders, whether Prime Minister Scott Morrison or Premiers Daniel Andrews and Gladys Berejiklian. The word integrity comes from the Latin integer meaning whole or undivided. So in mathematics, an integer is a whole number without any fraction. If a person lives with integrity there is a wholeness – their words and actions match – they do what they say. We might call them authentic or honest. The Bible uses words like straight and upright to describe such people. I wonder if you know people who live like this? Or were influenced by people who lived like this?

In the story of Ruth, Boaz is a person of integrity. When challenged by Ruth to act as next-of-kin for herself and Naomi, Boaz promises that he will act to ‘redeem’ them and will do so that very day. He is as good as his word and gathers the necessary witnesses to fulfil his promise. He buys the land belonging to Elimelech, Naomi’s now dead husband, and takes responsibility of providing for Naomi and Ruth. Boaz also marries Ruth and they have a son Obed, who has a son Jesse, whose youngest son, David, later becomes the most famous king of Israel. Integrity leads to unexpected blessing.

In a culture where so much seems to depend on appearance and spin, the biblical emphasis on integrity is helpful reminder that a person’s character matters just as much if not more than their words or their social media presence. Sometimes we may make promises we later regret or that are costly to fulfil. A person of integrity will either make good on their promise, despite the cost, or will explain openly why they can no longer do so (e.g. how the circumstances have changed). If politicians would act in this way then perhaps they would regain the trust they have lost.

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Living with courage and vulnerability - 2021 Nov 14

Living with vulnerability is a fact of life for many people in our world. This may be due to illness, disability, age or gender. It may be due to our social situation as a single parent, or a widow, or a refugee or an indigenous person. For people involved in creative pursuits, vulnerability comes with the territory. But for some people, especially males, vulnerability is often seen as weakness. Hence we may be reticent to share what we are really feeling. By following the cultural expectation that we need to appear strong and in control, we avoid making ourselves vulnerable and may as a result end up lonely and disconnected from others.

As widows, Ruth and Naomi are very vulnerable. They are limited in what work they can do and their hence finances are precarious. The Hebrew word for widow literally means one who is silenced or bound. So in many ways they are unseen and unheard. To survive in such a male dominated world they must be both shrewd and courageous. So in the middle chapters of the story we see Ruth doing what she can to scratch a living by gleaning (picking up grain that has been left behind or dropped by the harvesters). Later she and Naomi hatch a plan to persuade Boaz, a close male relative of Naomi, to act on their behalf. This plan is daring and requires great courage to pull off. You can read the details in Ruth chapter 3.

The thing about choosing to make ourselves vulnerable is that it always involves risk. We may be rejected or mocked. We may be misunderstood. We may be regarded as weak. We may suffer pain or violence. But the surprising part is that being vulnerable with each other is essential if we want real or deep connection with one another. It’s also the gateway to creativity and innovation, since any artistic or creative venture requires vulnerability. The question for us is whether we are prepared to take the risk of being vulnerable in order to build connections or to be creative.

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Slowing down with Ruth - 2021 Nov 7

Often we get caught up in the headline news of the day, which can affect our whole outlook and mood. For months we’ve waited grimly for the daily announcement of Covid infection numbers or the roadmap out of lockdown. This week we may have tuned in the various messages coming from the world’s leaders and activists at the CoP26 climate conference in Glasgow that will affect the planet in important ways. But perhaps the biggest and brightest headline this week was the finding of missing 4 year old Cleo in Western Australia that brought a smile to many faces and hearts.

I’m sure that God is somehow involved in all these headline grabbing stories. But it’s important to remember that God is also involved in our ordinary everyday lives, if we have the eyes of faith to see it. Perhaps in the joy of children playing together, in the quiet catch-ups with friends or even in the routine of working in the garden or going for our daily stroll.

Amidst the headline grabbing OT books that speak of the exploits of towering figures like Moses, Samuel and David, there is the short story about Ruth and her mother-in-law Naomi. It’s unusual in the patriarchal biblical culture to have such a focus on the relationship between two women and their struggles and joys. But it’s refreshing that such a story was deemed important enough to include in our Bibles. It shows that God is concerned and involved with our everyday life and simple tasks like putting food on the table. God has no speaking lines in this story yet is present in nearly every scene. May this story encourage us to slow down and look out for where God is at work in our lives.

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Giving thanks for those who have inspired and helped us - 2021 Oct 31

Isaac Newton, the famous mathematician and scientist, once wrote that ‘If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants’. It is customary on All Saints Day (1^st November) for us to pause, acknowledge and give thanks for those who have walked before us and inspired us in the faith, whether these people are renowned church leaders or little known people who played an important part in our personal faith journey. They are the giants on whose shoulders we stand today.

As Melbourne emerges from our sixth and hopefully final Covid lockdown, it also seems appropriate to pause, acknowledge and give thanks for the thousands of people who have helped us through this pandemic, whether medical researchers, healthcare workers, teachers, delivery truck drivers, supermarket workers or cleaners. The pandemic has highlighted who really are ‘essential’ workers and how the burden of the pandemic has often fallen on their shoulders, often at significant personal cost.

The Bible readings set down for All Saints Day all highlight that new life often comes out of the worst of circumstances. Lazarus succumbed to an unnamed illness and died. Many people, including Jesus, are caught up in the circle of grief and loss. But then surprising and unexpected new life emerges as Jesus calls Lazarus back to life. We have been living through nearly two years of grief and loss caused by Covid. As we emerge from this experience, where have you found unexpected new life? For what are you especially thankful?

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Learning from Job - 24 Oct 2021

This year has sometimes felt as though we are living through a second pandemic. We thought at this time last year that we were nearly done with Covid, that summer and the arrival of vaccines in the new year would return everything to normal. Then along came Delta and we were thrust once more back into the anxiety and isolation of extended lockdowns that we are only just emerging from. The future still feels uncertain. This second year of the pandemic has been much harder to live through for many as the virus and the lockdowns have taken a significant toll on our physical, mental and spiritual health. Where has God been through this time of suffering and loss?

his question lies at the heart of the book of Job. Where is God in the midst of suffering? Although this book is often bleak, the last few chapters suggest that God is with us in our darkest despair and in our pain – even though, like Job, we may not always be aware of God’s presence. God does eventually break the silence and speak to Job, restores him to health and blesses him.

Our lives may not always come to such a happy ending as the book of Job, but along with Job we can be comforted when we recognise God’s power, justice and love at work in the world and in our lives. God never explains the cause of Job’s suffering, however, which remains a mystery. So too we may never know the cause of suffering in our lives but we can take solace from Job’s experience that God does hear our cries, does care and does want to have relationship with us.

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2021-Oct-24-Acting-Wisely-Job-2.pdf – 1.07 MB
Sitting with Job - 3 Oct 2021

The book of Job is not an easy or feel-good read. The subject matter is fairly heavy – about loss, grieving, suffering and God’s justice. But it’s also about the value of community, about faith and about wisdom. It may actually be a good book for our current times as we struggle with some of these same issues in the midst of our extended and worsening Covid lockdown.

While me may at times ponder the themes of suffering and loss and the presence/absence of God in a general or abstract way, we experience suffering and loss in specific and personal ways – the loss of a loved one, the loss of a job or a dream, the mental suffering caused by lockdowns or the physical suffering caused by sickness. Each person’s experience of suffering is unique. Just as it is for Job.

As Job suffers loss after loss, he maintains his faith in God, who is seen to bring blessing but who may also allow trouble to afflict us. As Job struggles on with a painful disease, three friends come to see him. They too are affected and distressed by Job’s suffering and sit with him, silently, for several days. We might learn from this initial approach taken by the three friends that our presence at such a time is probably more important than any words we may speak. Our presence, our empathy and perhaps gentle touch are appropriate responses – rather than our judgments or solutions to the person’s problems. May we carry this wisdom with us when we encounter people who are suffering.

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2021-Oct-3-message-Job-1.pdf – 813.05 KB
Acting wisely? - 26-Sep-2021

In a few weeks’ time, the nations of the world will gather in Glasgow in Scotland for the CoP26 UN sponsored climate change conference. (CoP is Conference of the Parties, when the 197 nations of the UN gather to discuss climate change. This year’s meeting is the 26^th such meeting since 1995). This conference is considered the most significant since Paris in 2015 and will set the direction and framework for climate action for the next ten years or so. Climate scientists have indicated in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report that this period is crucial if we have any chance of limiting global warming to under 2^OC.

Australia is considered a laggard on climate change, along with Saudi Arabia, Iran and Brazil. This is because we have no commitment to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050 and steadfastly boast that we are doing our fair share by a 26-28% reduction in emissions by 2030 compared to 2005. Note that most of this reduction – if achieved – will come from changes in land clearing (i.e. cutting down less forest than planned). Our reduction in actual CO₂ emissions is forecast to be less than 5% by 2030. By contrast, most other developed countries propose to reduce their actual carbon emissions by 40-70% by 2030.

Is this a wise course of action for Australia to take? We are already the driest continent on earth (other than Antarctica), already suffer from major bushfires and flood damage from cyclones, and already experience extended and crippling droughts – all of which are expected to worsen considerably as the global climate continues to warm. So we are committing ourselves – as well as the rest of the world – to a dangerously warm future. The excuses trotted out by our Federal government are that they will not commit Australia to an open-ended program that could cost billions and cost jobs in coal mining. A detailed roadmap is needed to allow for accurate forecasts of likely costs. Yet this same government has just signed us up to a completely open-ended program to build nuclear powered submarines with no costing (except that it will be well north of $100 billion) and no timeframe and only a vague promise on jobs.

The book of James contrasts two types of wisdom – earthly and godly. Earthly wisdom is characterised by selfish ambition, boasting and lies, while godly wisdom is characterised by gentleness, peace and mercy. Here peace refers to the Hebrew concept of shalom, where every person and every part of creation knows their place and enjoys the blessing of living a healthy and fruitful life. It seems that Australia is choosing the way of earthly wisdom – recklessly ignoring the warnings of climate scientists and foolishly locking in a destructive future for our planet. Pray for a late change of heart and the setting of a realistic but ambitious target to reduce our emissions.

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Wisdom from planet earth - 19-Sep-2021

The Season of Creation focus this week is on ecology (oikologia, literally study of the house). As a scientific discipline, ecology explores the relationships and connections between living organisms – including humans – and their physical environment. Humanity of course has significantly altered the environment of many creatures through agriculture, forestry, commercial scale fishing and creeping urbanisation. Many species are under threat as their habitat shrinks or is destroyed. Other species are struggling to adapt to climate change (e.g. the coral reefs of the world as the ocean warms).

English poet and Dean of St Pauls cathedral, John Donne, famously wrote that ‘no man is an island, entire of itself’. He was speaking of the deep connections between all of humanity, so that the suffering or death of even a single person affects the whole. Likewise there are deep and sometimes mysterious connections and inter-dependence between all living creatures. As part of the created order, and especially given our call to care for creation, humanity is integrally connected with the health and well-being of all creation.

If we are to turn around the widespread threats facing the planet, we need wisdom as well as the will to act. The book of Proverbs suggests that God is ultimately the source of true wisdom, but there is much to be gained from close observation of how various creatures live and co-operate. There is also much wisdom to be gained from listening to indigenous people who have cared for creation for millennia. They would tell us to listen to creation itself and to respect our plant and animal neighbours with whom we share the earth. Covid has given us the time and space to slow down and explore the environment close to where we live. What are we seeing? What are we hearing? What wisdom are we discerning?

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What’s unusual about God’s ‘economy’? - 12-Sep-2021

The economy is what most politicians and business leaders seem to focus their attention on, even and especially during these Covid times. While daily press conferences may focus on case numbers and hospitalisation rates, the push to get people vaccinated and ‘the economy’ opened up again form the back story. It’s clear from the Prime Minister’s language that he wants the States to stop lockdowns as soon as possible … because he wants the economy to be buzzing along when he calls the Federal election early next year.

It may surprise you to know that the New Testament speaks several times about God’s economy (oikonomia) and about being good managers (oikonomos) or economists of God’s resources. These Greek terms refer to managing various aspects of a household, including its finances. But when these terms are linked to God’s provision and God’s values, it becomes clear that God’s economy operates quite differently to the commercial economy that we are used to.

God’s economy is built on grace and generosity, where all have enough and all are treated equally whether or not they ‘work’ equal hours (as in the parable of the vineyard workers). God’s economy encourages us to build up treasure in heaven – rather than in our bank accounts – by loving our neighbour. In this Season of Creation it is helpful to think about our neighbours broadly – and to include our plant neighbours, animal neighbours and bird neighbours (as indigenous Christian leaders encourage us to do). God’s economy is also heavily focused on the poor and encourages positive discrimination for the poor, confirming that the economy of God’s kingdom is remarkably counter cultural. There are not winners and losers in God’s economy, nor rich and poor, and caring for creation is not an afterthought. Instead, there is a just home for all of God’s creatures, both human and non-human.

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12-Sep-2021-A-just-home-for-all.pdf – 1.28 MB
Welcome to the Season of Creation - 5-Sep-2021

This is the time of year when Christians are invited to celebrate the season of creation. It seems appropriate to be doing this at the start of spring when flowers are blooming and all of creation seems somehow more alive. For the Wurundjeri people of Melbourne this was season is called Poorneet, the tadpole season, the season of plentiful food from lilies, orchids and yam daisies.

It also seems appropriate to be remembering the groanings of creation in the lead-up to the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow which starts at the end of October. While much media attention remains focused on the Covid pandemic, the threat of climate change poses a larger threat to the whole of creation as habitats warm and become inhospitable to many species. While fossil fuel companies direct our attention to the small changes we can make to our own individual lives (which collectively are helpful), we will not reach sustainable levels of emissions without major changes at a government level.

The creation stories recorded in the book of Genesis set the scene for the unfolding story of God, creation and humanity. In these stories, humanity is given a vocation to care for and tend creation as God’s representative. If we take our cue from God’s gracious providence, as described in Psalm 104, the call is not to dominate over or to destroy creation but rather to care for it in such a way that each part of creation can thrive. There is much we can learn from our indigenous brothers and sisters in this respect. But we must also recognise that use of fossil fuels (e.g. coal, oil, gas) must drastically reduce – and soon – to give creation a fighting chance. As some of the posters at the School Strike for Climate rallies point out, there is no Planet B.

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Australia’s hardening attitude towards refugees - 29 August 2021

This week we have seen Australia scrambling to evacuate our citizens from Kabul in Afghanistan along with interpreters and security staff who helped Australians during the last 20 years. It’s clearly been a difficult and dangerous task to undertake in the current circumstances but our government’s tardiness and flip-flops on visas haven’t helped. Our offer to take in 3,000 refugees from Afghanistan sounds reasonable at first blush, but not when compared to historical precedents.

After World War 2, Australia accepted some 100,000 refugees/migrants from Europe every year for 15 years. After the Vietnam War ended, we took 8,000 refugees per year for 10 or more years. We accepted 40,000 refugees from Kosovo and 12,000 from Syria. There is a trend here. Australia has steadily become less compassionate and less generous. Our language reflects our hardening actions. Asylum seekers are now ‘illegals’ and our Immigration Department has become Australian Border Force. We claim to be the land of the fair go but we have closed our hearts to the needs of the vulnerable seeking hope and a new life in our midst. I have witnessed first-hand the effects of our cruel policy of indefinite detention of asylum seekers. Yet Scripture is unambiguous. We are called to love the foreigner in our midst, because God’s people have known what it’s like to be foreigners and to be oppressed. Jesus calls us to feed the hungry and to welcome the stranger. Sadly, these Scriptures are ignored by our Christian Prime Minister who himself oversaw the ring of steel placed around Australia in 2014, supposedly to protect our borders (who remembers Operation Sovereign Borders?). Please pray that our political leaders would become more compassionate and that the Australians who vote for them might also be more empathetic and kind to the plight of refugees.

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29-Aug-Refugee-Sunday.pdf – 1,004.45 KB
Enduring the battle with evil - 2021 August 22

This last week has been pretty grim on the news front. The spread of Covid seems to be getting away from us in Australia, especially in NSW but also in Victoria and ACT. Lockdowns are being extended and made more restrictive. The collapse of the Afghan government and the mad scramble to evacuate people from that country are deeply troubling on many levels. Good news seems to be rather thin on the ground at the moment.

The closing remarks of Paul’s letter to the Ephesian church are a reminder that we live in an often dark world and we are engaged in a battle against evil whether we like it or not (which is not to say that Covid in itself is evil, although some of the actions of the Taliban in Afghanistan appear to be evil). Paul is not trying to alarm the church, but rather is being fairly practical. He writes that there are evil forces at work that will try to tempt, deceive or manipulate us in ways that will undermine or threaten our faith. So we must resist these forces and stand firm. This call is consistent with the line in the Lord’s Prayer ‘Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil’.

The way to stand firm is to arm ourselves – inwardly – with the character of God – with truth, righteousness, peace, faith and the hope of salvation. We’re also to immerse ourselves in God’s word – the Scriptures – and to pray as we are led by God’s Spirit. If we follow these suggestions it does not mean that evil will cease to buffet our lives … but we will have our focus where it needs to be – on God and what God is able to do in us and through us. Then we can be strong and able to withstand what comes in our direction.

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Living wisely - 2021 August 15

As we endure our sixth Covid lockdown in 18 months, many of us are feeling somewhat fatigued and frustrated. Why does it keep happening? When will life ever return to ‘normal’? In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians he calls on followers of Jesus to make the most of every opportunity and to live wisely. But what does this look like in practice?

We’ve had a couple of glaring examples this week of the opposite – how to live unwisely. The first came from Liberal MP George Christensen who gave an impassioned plea for Covid lockdowns and other health measures to be abandoned, labelling them as ‘madness’. While it’s true that lockdowns are costly and curtail our freedoms, the evidence from Australia and elsewhere in the world is that the alternative – just letting the virus rip – is far, far worse both in terms of lives lost and the economic impact. Luckily for our country, State Government leaders have wisely avoided the path suggested by Christensen.

The second example has been the Government’s quick response to the newly released IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report. This report paints a fairly gloomy outlook for the global climate with temperatures predicted to rise by at least 2 degC over pre-industrial temperatures, locking the world into more intense bushfire events, cyclones, flooding and the like. The time to act to prevent the worst effects is right now with reductions in carbon emissions of around 50% needed by 2030. Our government’s predictable response is to maintain its hope that future technology can solve the problem while refusing to do anything substantial to reduce emissions in the short or medium term. While governments have generally been praised for following the advice of scientists in how to handle the Covid pandemic, they casually ignore the advice of climate scientists. This seems a very unwise path to follow. How about Paul’s advice on how to live wisely? At first glance it seems simplistic and to those outside the church probably ridiculous. The advice – focus on worshipping God and living holy lives, whether in the church, in the home or in the workplace. Paul puts his finger on some important truths. If we want to live wisely we need to tune into God’s wisdom and God’s ways. These include putting people first, rather than profits, as Christensen would suggest. It also suggests that listening to scientists who have spent a lifetime observing the physical world – whether in the area of human health or the area of climate – would also be wise.

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Put on the character of God - 2021 August 8

The focus of the Olympic Games has shifted from the pool to athletics this week. There have also been finals in team sports and new events like BMX and skateboarding. There have been many highlights … medals for competitors as young as 13 (in the skateboarding) and as old as 62 (Andrew Hoy in equestrian) … Australian track athletes making it to their respective final … teams playing ever so well yet not quite winning.

One particular highlight came in the final of the men’s high jump competition where the two leading competitors, Mutaz Barshim from Qatar and Gianmarco Tamberi from Italy, both cleared 2.37 metres (or 7 ft 9 inches in imperial measurements). Both failed to clear the next height of 2.39 metres. They were offered a jump-off to determine the winner. Instead they asked if they could share the gold medal. Barshim said “I know for a fact that for the performance I did, I deserve that gold medal. He did the same thing, so I know he deserved that gold.” Tamberi said “Sharing this moment with a friend is even more beautiful ... It was just magical.” Two competitors, two friends, sharing the joy and sharing the spoils.

In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he encourages the community to speak the truth and to speak only words that are full of grace and useful for building up. The example of the two high jumpers and their words of grace for one another show how this can work in practice. Imagine how much more could be achieved in the political sphere if our politicians actually spoke the truth and stopped trying to score points off each other, and worked to build up rather than tear down. Paul’s advice is really so simple yet could make such a difference in our families, our churches and in the wider community.

Due to lockdown, worship this week will once again be on Zoom. Please contact the church office for the link.

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2021-August-8-Ephesians-4.pdf – 441.82 KB
The mystery of the gospel - 25 July 2021

I wonder if you’re into mysteries. Certainly crime and murder mysteries are among the most watched genre on TV and streaming platforms. We watch out for clues – and often some red herrings as well – and then use both our reasoning and our intuition to try and solve the mystery. There are other mysteries that we ponder as well, such as when our lives might return to ‘normal’ after Covid or whether what we are experiencing is the new normal. In both these situations we rely on our human wisdom to try and solve the mystery.

In the letter to the Ephesians, Paul writes about an entirely different type of mystery, one that has been revealed only by God. This mystery concerns the gospel and some of its key messages. One of these that confounded the Greco-Roman world of Paul’s time was how a movement could embrace both separatist Jews and non-Jewish people, both free people and slaves. This was simply unheard of, and astonishing for a devout Jew like Paul to embrace and endorse.

In our culture, we more readily accept the notion that people from vastly different ethnicities and backgrounds can worship together and welcome one another as followers of Jesus. Yet one doesn’t have to look too hard at the church to see that different streams struggle to live out this remarkable part of the gospel, drawing often unspoken boundaries based on gender or race or age or background. We like our communities to be fairly uniform.

Yet in the magnificent vision of the church in heaven given to us in the book of Revelation there will be a multitude of people from every nation, tribe, people and language. So one of the enduring challenges of our faith is how we make this vision a reality. One sign of hope this week was from the national gathering of the Uniting Church Assembly who chose a young, second gen Tongan woman (Rev Charissa Suli) to be the next President of the Uniting Church. God continues to work in mysterious and marvelous ways.

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Blessing and grace – 11 July 2021

I wonder if there’s anyone in your family who was adopted? My grandmother Vera was adopted and her birth and early life were always a mystery, as records were not always kept or made available. Despite the uncertainty about her origins, Vera was always loved and was always part of the family.

In the letter to the Ephesians, Paul is writing to a community of Christians who are mostly Gentile, that is, non-Jews. He begins the letter with a grand prayer or poem that outlines the many blessings we have received from God through Jesus Christ. One of these blessings is to be adopted into God’s forever family and to be known as God’s children. For Paul, this is one of the great mysteries of the gospel message, that the privileges once bestowed on the Jewish people are now freely available to all. And one of the most significant of these privileges is to be considered God’s children. This honour is ours through grace, one of the key themes of this letter. We did not earn this privilege – rather it is a gift – along with forgiveness and acceptance. Grace is the unique aspect of Christian faith that no other religion offers. We don’t have to strive or become anxious about pleasing God – we are accepted as we are. But we are re-created in Christ to be people who want to follow God’s ways and embody God’s character of love and justice. We’re part of God’s family and so are called to reflect this in how we think about ourselves and in how we live.

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Leading in the easy and the tough times - 2021 July 4

When it comes to leadership, is it more difficult to lead during times of crisis or when things are going well? Certainly the public scrutiny of leaders is high when times are tough … think of the focus on State and Federal government leaders during the Covid pandemic with their daily press conferences and rapidly changing health guidelines. Every comment and every decision is reported and analysed and awkward questions are asked. Tough decisions need to be made under real time pressure that won’t please lots of people.

Tough times don’t last forever, thankfully, and eventually easier times will return where there is less attention on leaders. These easier times allow focus on the important rather than the urgent, for leaders to be proactive rather than reactive. But I wonder if it’s actually harder to lead well when people aren’t watching so closely … since complacency can set in and decisions can be made by routine or habit.

King David was a strong and effective leader for tough times. He was a courageous and shrewd soldier. Yet his most glaring failures happened when he was taking some R&R time. While the army is off fighting Israel’s enemies, David is relaxing in Jerusalem. He spots a beautiful lady bathing and in quick succession, he desires her, enquires after her and brings her to the palace where he has sex with her. Was in consensual? We’re not told. More likely, it was a powerful and entitled man taking what he wanted. It gets worse. When the woman, Bathsheba, becomes pregnant, David conspires to have her husband killed in battle and he then takes Bathsheba as his wife.

So David dismally failed the challenge of leading in the easy times. He became distracted by seeking after selfish pleasure and lost his moral compass. His integrity failed when no one was watching. There is a lesson for all of us here. We all have weak spots where we can be tempted. It’s why there is a line in the Lord’s Prayer that says ‘save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil’. May God give us strength to act righteously even when no one is looking – and grace when we do stumble and fall.

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Leading – mandate and vision - 2021 June 27

One of the most challenging tasks of leaders is to articulate a vision for the future, communicate how we will get there and then to persuade people to follow. Our current crop of Federal Government leaders are fairly dismal at this task, whether providing a clear vision and goals for Covid vaccinations, or about tackling a longer term issue such as climate change. The latest mantra that Australia should reach zero carbon emissions as soon as possible and preferably by 2050 illustrates the point. It is not a vision that motivates anything, it has no plan for how to achieve the goal and it persuades no-one.

Compare this to King David and his vision to build up the city of Jerusalem including a temple, or house, for God. This was a fairly grand vision that sought to provide a central place for worship as well as uniting the tribes of Israel. (We’ll set aside David’s theology that believed God could be contained to a single place and a single building …). God in turn takes this vision and makes it grander still. God will instead build a house for David, an everlasting kingdom or dynasty to arise from his offspring. This vision sustained Israel for over 400 years until Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians and the last king carted off into exile.

The vision lived on, however, for a new David, a Messiah, to raise up the tribes of Israel once more. Many people wondered if Jesus might be the hoped for Messiah. And Jesus did speak a lot about the kingdom, the kingdom of God, which was his central vision. This was not an earthly kingdom, however, with a king ruling on a throne in Jerusalem, but rather a kingdom that reigned in people’s hearts where they followed God’s ways of justice, compassion, forgiveness and mercy. This vision was simple and memorable and has inspired millions of Jesus’ followers down through the centuries.

Articulating a vision remains an important role for good leaders, but as Christians we already have a compelling and clear vision, given to us by Jesus, which is to build God’s kingdom through our witness, worship and service. It’s a vision that excites, motivates and guides what we do.

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Leading when the going gets tough - 2021 June 20

I wonder if you’ve had to fight any giants recently? Or nearly drowned in a storm at sea? Probably not, yet these two well-known stories from Scripture – David and Goliath and Jesus calming a storm – have much they could teach us. In particular, as part of our series on leadership, these stories have some challenging insights.

Saul was king over Israel yet he – along with the rest of Israel’s army – is terrified by the physical size and presence of Goliath. He doesn’t know what to do. When David offers to fight Goliath, Saul cautions David but allows him to face Goliath anyway, alone. One might conclude that Saul demonstrates canny leadership, letting others fight his battles for him. Or one might conclude that Saul fails dismally in his role as leader and in his duty of care for David.

In the second story, the disciples are crossing Lake Galilee in a small boat at night along with Jesus. When a storm suddenly erupts they panic, and like Saul, do not know what to do. What is their leader, Jesus, doing meanwhile? He is fast asleep at the back of the boat. Is Jesus also being derelict in his leadership responsibilities? When the disciples wake Jesus, he takes charge of the situation, speaks to the waves and the wind, and everything becomes calm.

What might we learn about leadership from these two stories? Leaders will almost certainly face tough situations that they may well not know how to deal with. Both David and Jesus demonstrate an important lesson for Christian leaders. Rather than being paralysed by fear or relying on just our own resources, leaders seek out and trust in God’s provision and wisdom and then show courage by acting. When the going gets tough may we learn to do the same.

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2021-June-20-Leadership-3.pdf – 1.02 MB
Choosing leaders - what really matters - 2021 June 13

It’s sometimes said that we get the government we deserve, meaning that if we elect a certain type of person then we shouldn’t be surprised when they act in certain predictable ways. Hence the actions of Donald Trump conform to the type of person that he is: similarly with Scott Morrison given his background in marketing and spin, where appearance matters more than substance.

Both these leaders would claim to be Christian, which makes the actions of our Federal Government in dealing with a Tamil family from Biloela all the harder to fathom. Nades and Priya and their two girls Kopika and Tharunicaa were arrested in the middle of the night and placed in immigration detention in Melbourne over three years ago and were moved to Christmas Island detention nearly two years ago. What does the government’s treatment of the family over this period, including in the last several days, reveal about the heart of our Federal leaders?

As Samuel reflects on the challenges of choosing a new leader to be king over Israel, he notes that people tend to see only the outward attributes of a leader, whereas God looks at the heart – the place of both emotions and knowledge, wisdom and integrity in ancient thought. Samuel went against cultural practice in choosing David to be king, the youngest of eight brothers, confirming that God saw qualities in David beyond his youthful appearance and inexperience.

So how do we choose leaders? The image above suggests that we often have unspoken biases – regarding gender or age or outward abilities. We may not take the time in prayer to discern other attributes of a person, which may be even more important in the long run, such as the depth of their spirituality and inner life and wisdom to see things through God’s eyes. So perhaps we do get the leaders that we deserve if we don’t look beyond the surface to see what is in the heart of a person.

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Why it’s hard to be a leader - 2021 June 6

Who would want to be a political leader at the moment? Whether it’s Deputy Premier James Merlino and Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton making decisions about Victoria’s fourth Covid lockdown, or Prime Minister Scott Morrison or Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck trying to answer questions about the slow vaccine rollout in aged care settings. Leadership can be a hard and challenging role, especially when making decisions that will anger or upset people.

Being a leader has always been difficult. Just ask the prophet Samuel … or Moses before him. Samuel had the role of a Judge in Israel, settling disputes between people and acting as a messenger between God and the people. Towards the end of his life, the people rejected this model of leadership and demand that a king be appointed instead. It’s personal and it’s painful for Samuel. He knows how the thirst for power and greed can corrupt any leader and warns the people about the potential dangers a king will bring. But the people eventually get their way and Saul is chosen to be king.

A thousand years later, kingship is a failed institution in Israel, yet the people again long for a king, a Messiah to lead the people and throw off the oppressive yoke of the Romans. They wonder if Jesus just might be the hoped for Messiah, but he resists the temptation to go down that road. When two of his disciples jostle for positions of power under Jesus, he offers a startling critique of leadership by suggesting that those who want to lead must instead serve others.

It’s easy to criticise leaders. We think we could do a way better job. But could we? If we pause for a moment we may recognise that if we follow Jesus’ model for leadership, it will require us to let go of our own ambitions and desires and instead to serve the needs of others. This self-emptying and taking on the mantle of a servant is hard work, and our best efforts will still disappoint some people. So spare a thought for our leaders – whether in politics, or in the church or in the workplace – and remember that it’s a difficult role.

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Jesus prays for the church - 2021 May 16

This week the church celebrated Ascension Day, the day when we remember the ascension of Jesus to be with God. For the disciples it marked their final physical separation from Jesus and one imagines it was a day of mixed emotions. Before leaving, Jesus had prepared the disciples for his departure as best he could with the promise that the Holy Spirit would come and dwell among and within them and also praying for them and for future disciples like us.

This prayer of Jesus, as recorded in John’s Gospel, gives us a rare insight into how and what Jesus prayed. It is an intimate prayer to the Father but also quite bold. Jesus asks three things of God for disciples – that they be protected from the evil one, that they experience the same close relationship with God enjoyed by Jesus and that they be kept safe by the truth (especially about God’s love for us and about God sending Jesus to us). I wonder what comfort you draw knowing that Jesus still lives in God’s presence and that he prays for you. Given that Jesus experienced some of the best and the worst that humanity could throw at him during his life, he knows what it is to live a human life. He knows the joys and challenges of our life. And he promises to be with us. So when life gets tough, it’s good to remember these truths and these promises.

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Life after Jesus - 2021 May 2

In the midst of all that is going on in the world, bot good and bad, we wonder where God might be at work and whether the world is our friend or our foe …

These are questions that also occupied the mind of the Gospel writer John who wrote many years after the remarkable life and ministry of Jesus, when the Christian community was struggling to find its place in the world.
John was trying to paint a vision for life after Jesus.

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Stay connected - 2021 April 25

This Sunday we commemorate ANZAC Day, the day that our Prime Minister Scott Morrison calls ‘the most sacred day of the year’. The government is so keen to promote this day that it has sent a coloured flyer to every household in the country using the above image. In the flyer we are told to remember the courage and sacrifice of those who have served in the Australian Defence Force and how we can commemorate the day at home.

While it is helpful to remember this part of our history – including the large personal cost to individuals, families and communities – the approach taken by the government appears quite hypocritical, parochial and sexist. The photo used, for instance, is supposed to prompt our thinking about the soldiers who have fought and died but features only white males. The flag shown is the Union Jack and is a reminder that the wars Australia has fought in have been instigated by empires on the other side of the world – whether British, American, German or Japanese – and have had little to do with our country (e.g. recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). We seem to enter these conflicts at the behest of others and without clear goals of what we are actually trying to achieve.

We are told in the ANZAC Day flyer that these wars have been fought to protect our freedom and democracy. Yet when people flee from conflicts and wars overseas and seek freedom and safety within our democracy, we lock them up like criminals for years and years and deny them the very freedom that we say we value so highly. Likewise we choose to ignore the wars fought on our own soil by indigenous people who died trying to protect their country and way of life from the invading British, our ancestors. So why are some soldiers held up as heroes to be worshipped and others completely overlooked? Perhaps it’s because history is very messy and doesn’t fit easily into the simplistic ANZAC myth.

As Christians our values are shaped by a very different story. While the heart of the gospel story includes the service, suffering and death of Jesus – to which the ANZAC myth is often linked – the wider gospel story condemns violence (as Jesus notes in Matthew 26:52 ‘all who take up the sword will die by the sword’) and calls us instead to be peacemakers (Matt 5:9). The prophetic scriptures of Israel such as Micah 4:1-4 look forward to the nations learning the ways of God – the ways of peace and justice – and turning their spears into pruning hooks and swords into ploughs.

So on ANZAC Day, let us indeed remember the service and courage of those who have fought in the Australian Defence Force, but let us also remember the subversive call of Jesus to be peacemakers rather than to engage in conflict and war. Let us be careful to distinguish between a government supported propagation of a national myth and the reality that our history is far more ambiguous and dark.

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The continuing story of Jesus - 2021 April 18

Now that Easter has passed and school holidays are coming to an end, many of us are thinking about getting back to life as usual with all its daily challenges. It was similar for the first followers of Jesus – but with one major difference. They were dealing with disappointment and despair, as all their hopes of a new movement centred around Jesus had been dashed.

This is the situation facing two dejected disciples as they head back home after the devastating events of Good Friday. Jesus joins them on the road and they get into conversation but somehow don’t recognise Jesus. They talk about what has happened, explore the Scriptures and later share a meal with their new friend. Suddenly their eyes are opened and they recognise that they have spent the day with Jesus. Their hearts are stirred and they want to share their insight with others.

I wonder if we ever experience something similar? We are going about our business and a stranger joins us and asks how we are doing. We pour out our heart to this person and they then leave and we don’t see them again. Yet in the encounter we have received a precious gift and perhaps encountered the presence of the risen Jesus with us. The heart of this story is that Jesus meets us where we are – on the road, in our homes, in our struggles and in our joys. Jesus meets us in all the messiness of our lives, but also as we open the Scriptures and share a meal with others, especially Communion. Easter is not an event that has occurred once in history but rather it’s an adventure with the risen Jesus that has begun. It’s a path on which we walk, teeming with the promise of surprising new life.

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The empty tomb - 2021 April 4

In our Australian culture, Easter is often celebrated by going away for the weekend and by over indulgence in chocolate Easter eggs. For those among us who remember the day by going to church, we expect there to be plenty of Hallelujahs and plenty of joy as we recall that Jesus rose from the grave to new and everlasting life.

But the very first Easter Sunday, at least according to Mark’s quite short account, was a different sort of day altogether. The male disciples are huddled inside and struggling with a range of emotions including shock, grief and probably shame. Their dreams for the future have all come shattering down. The women appear more stoical and three of them set off for the tomb where Jesus’ body was laid, in order to anoint his body with spices.

At the tomb the large stone blocking the entrance has been rolled away and a figure dressed in white (an angel?) tells them that Jesus has been raised and is going ahead of them to Galilee where they will see him. The women’s emotions are intense and mostly negative ranging from great alarm and fear to utter astonishment and confusion. They flee from the tomb and talk to no-one. And that is the end of Mark’s Gospel. No hallelujahs. No joy. No sign of the risen Jesus. No celebration.

The account suggests that Jesus’ resurrection was completely unexpected, despite his having told them several times that he would rise again. The resurrection was mind boggling and amazing and terrifying all at the same time. The disciples would take a little time to adjust to the news, but this unexpected day turned their world upside down. Life had triumphed over death, light over darkness and love over hate.

We tend to be a little blasé about the message of Easter, perhaps because we knew all along how the story would end. So our challenge is to sit with the story and try to recapture some of its raw emotion and power to change our view of life and our place in the world. It’s a whole new day, if we just have eyes of faith to see it.

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The passion and death of Jesus - 2 April 2021

Good Friday is often considered to be the most holy day in the Christian calendar as we gather to hear once more the story of Jesus’ rejection, betrayal, suffering and death. At a human level it is a most distressing story of corruption and callous cruelty. At a spiritual level it is also a disturbing story as Jesus cries out from the cross ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’.

Three brief thoughts as we contemplate the events of Good Friday:

First is its inevitability. Jesus has been purposefully heading to Jerusalem for this final showdown with the Jewish authorities. During his final week in Jerusalem, Jesus directly confronts the temple authorities for their corruption and unfaithful leadership. Simmering animosity reaches boiling point and their actions are predictable. Jesus has known for a long time what his likely end will be.

Second is Jesus’ innocence. Neither the Jewish Council nor Pilate can find just cause to condemn Jesus. The priests feel threatened and Pilate wants to maintain civil order, but Jesus is clearly portrayed as innocent of any charge deserving death. This line of argument will be important for the emerging Christian community to show that Jesus was far from criminal in his actions.

Third is Jesus’ isolation. He has no friends among the priests and scribes and as soon as the heat comes on, the disciples all flee, leaving Jesus alone. In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus’ anguished prayer that he might be spared from this hour of suffering receives no response from God. In his humanity and in his relationship with God, Jesus feels completely cut off and alone, hence his cry of abandonment from the cross.

Like the women watching on from a distance, we can only watch the unfolding events and wonder why Jesus’ life and ministry must end this way. Yes it seems inevitable, but couldn’t God intervene? Yes, Jesus is innocent so why does justice not prevail? Yes, Jesus is isolated but must those with power always prevail? There is profound mystery here, as our questions remain unanswered. As Jesus experiences the worst that humanity can inflict, where is God?

The answer to that deep question must wait until Easter Sunday to be answered.

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Jesus in Jerusalem - 2021 March 28

Palm Sunday is here, the day we remember and celebrate Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem and the entry point into Holy Week that culminates on Easter Sunday. Mark tells us that many people spread their cloaks and branches on the ground and welcomed Jesus with great enthusiasm. What Mark doesn’t tell us is the response of the religious authorities, the other opponents of Jesus or the general population of Jerusalem.

The following episodes tell us plenty, though, as Jesus confronts the temple authorities through both word and action, while various groups try to trap him by asking controversial questions. Through it all, Jesus appears to be firmly in control and well aware of what is happening around him.

I wonder what this day means for you. Is it a day to mark what is often labelled Jesus’ triumphant entry to Jerusalem? Is it a day to attend a justice rally, inspired by Jesus’ confrontation of unjust practices at the temple? Or is it a day to ponder who Jesus is and what he might be calling you to do?

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The cost of discipleship - 2021 March 21

I wonder what topics of conversation fill up your time when you go on a road trip with your spouse or with friends. Do you pass the time talking about the latest news on Facebook or delve into deeper topics? In our Gospel reading this week from Mark, Jesus and the disciples are on an eventful road trip that will end up in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.

We know that Jesus was thinking about the betrayal and rejection and death that awaited him there, because he keeps reminding the disciples of this probable turn of events, although they don’t seem capable of hearing this message. Meanwhile, what are they talking about on the road? Who will be remembered as the greatest among them and who will get the positions of power alongside King Jesus in the coming kingdom of God.

Jesus offers them some hard truths. To be truly great, a person needs to learn about serving others. Jesus then shares that his life and his role as Messiah are all about serving, and even giving his life as a ransom payment to free others. While the world encourages us towards selfishness and looking after ourselves first, Jesus asks us to go in the opposite direction and serve others first. Are you ready to adopt this upside down approach to greatness? Or if you already live in this way, what gentle wisdom do you have to share with others?

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Following a suffering messiah - 2021 March 14

The first half of Mark’s Gospel is built around answering the question of ‘Who is Jesus?’. So we are introduced to Jesus the teacher, Jesus the healer, Jesus the one who has power over unclean spirits and even storms, Jesus who feeds large crowds. These various portraits come to a head when Jesus asks the disciples straight out who they think he is. While popular opinion views Jesus as a prophet, Peter correctly identifies Jesus as the Messiah or King (or Christ in Greek).

The words have barely left Peter’s lips when Jesus begins to speak about the suffering, rejection and death that awaits him. None of this was expected for Israel’s Messiah who was usually seen as a powerful conquering hero. Jesus then makes a bad situation worse by stating that anyone who wishes to follow him must be prepared to walk a similar path of suffering. This call to costly discipleship doesn’t sit well with our generation. The advertising industry makes its money by persuading us that what we really need is greater comfort and more fun, which will be ours if we just buy a particular product or service. So it remains as radical – and uncomfortable – today as it was in Jesus’ day to own the fact that we follow a suffering messiah who calls us to a costly following.

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Jesus in Gentile territory - 2021 March 7

In the Jewish world of Jesus’ day, one of the hot topics was who is and who is not acceptable to God. Various Jewish groups such as the Pharisees and the Essenes (the community that lived near the Dead Sea and who was responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls) had strong views on this. Each group drew tight boundaries around who is acceptable and what conditions must be met to make one acceptable. We see this thinking at work when the Pharisees accuse Jesus’ disciples of not observing the ‘correct’ method of washing hands before meals.

But it seems that even Jesus had his prejudices. When a Gentile (i.e. non-Jewish) woman approaches him for help, his first impulse is to ignore her request and push her away. Her wit and perseverance win out and change his mind, as Jesus learns an important lesson on who is acceptable to God.

As Christians we hold that every person is acceptable to God, whatever their race, religion, gender or status. But as I look around at many church congregations, including our own, I wonder how well we live out this open welcome in reality. Whether intended or not, we easily erect barriers that make some people feel unwelcome. What might need to change for us to be a community that reflects the amazing and life-giving reality that everyone is acceptable to God?

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Jesus ministry expands - 2021 February 28

There are many ways that we can train people to take on new tasks or fill a responsibility. We might take the approach of a parent, a classroom teacher, an online educator or a coach. The way that Jesus trained his disciples seems closest to what we might term a traditional apprenticeship model. The disciples first spent a lot of time with Jesus observing both his teaching and his actions, and then Jesus sent them out in pairs to extend his ministry in new places (Mark 6:7-13). They are tasked with proclaiming a message of repentance, healing the sick and casting out unclean spirits – the same ministries that have occupied Jesus.

The key instructions they are given are to go out together in pairs, to travel light and to rely on the hospitality of others. The team ministry approach makes sense to us as we can share the gifts we have and benefit from the encouragement and support of at least one other person. Jesus’ instruction to travel light – no money, no spare clothing, no food – sits less easily with us. Rather than being independent, it means reliance on others and also reliant on God. The third aspect is going out to people where they are and relying on them for hospitality. This is often the opposite to our approach of inviting people to share our space with our rules.

It seems that the disciples were quite successful in extending and replicating Jesus’ ministry. They had learned well from Jesus. How would we fare in following Jesus’ instructions for mission and ministry? Are we prepared to travel light, go to where the needs are and then rely on the hospitality of others? If not, what might have to change or what might we need to let go of?

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Jesus and the kingdom of God - 2021 February 21

Jesus was known as a teacher and healer. Surprisingly, his favourite teaching topic (based on the evidence of the Gospel accounts we have) was not love and was certainly not the value or purpose of his death. Rather Jesus’ favoured topic was the kingdom of God. This was the ‘good news’ message that Jesus both announced and demonstrated in his actions.

But what did Jesus mean by the ‘kingdom of God’ and why don’t we spend more of our time thinking about what was central for Jesus? The kingdom of God was based on the idea that God is ultimately in charge and God reigns (or carries out the role of a ruler) wherever people acknowledge God’s goodness, power, inclusiveness and love and seek to live by God’s ways. For Jesus this meant freeing people from sickness or other oppressions, restoring them to community and bringing people life in all its fullness.

In our day, as in the time of Jesus, we have a daily choice in how we will live and how we will relate to others, whether to bring life and hope and wholeness or whether to live in a way where fear or selfishness rules our lives. When we focus too narrowly on the needs and activities of our own church community, we run the risk of missing Jesus’ bigger call to build the kingdom of God.

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A day in the life of Jesus - 2021 January 31

I wonder what fills your typical day. Work? Volunteering? Catching up with friends or family? Minding grandchildren? Housework and preparing meals? I wonder also where God fits into your day. A prayer at the start and end of the day or before meals? An intentional time of reading the Scriptures and meditating on them?

In the first chapter of Mark’s Gospel we are given a glimpse of a typical day for Jesus. It’s fairly breathless activity from morning until evening as Jesus teaches, heals, confronts unclean spirits, heals some more and plans his next move. Somewhere in the busy schedule there must be time for eating and there is definitely a time for prayer and solitude. In other words there is both action and reflection, doing and connecting with God … which is a good model for our lives.

As followers of Jesus, are we called to emulate Jesus’ busy schedule of speaking and healing (and what might this look like in our context)? In this passage from Mark, we are offered both positive and negative examples of what it means to be a disciple. Negatively, we are offered the example of the male disciples who seem to want to organize and bend Jesus to their own program of ministry, which Jesus resists. Positively, we are shown the example of Peter’s mother-in-law who serves and offers hospitality. Our first response may be to dismiss this as first century gender stereotyping. But the same word for serving (diakoneo) is later used by Jesus to summarise his own mission (Mark 10:45). So let us learn to follow Jesus using the gifts and passions we’ve been given, but to do so from a position of loving and serving others.

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Day of Mourning - 2021 January 24

For many people in Australia, 26^th January is a final public holiday to be enjoyed before schools start back and life resumes its hectic activity. But for indigenous Australians it is a day to mourn – for loss of ancestors who died during the invasion by Europeans, for land stolen and culture destroyed.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus states that the truth will set us free. The truth that Jesus has in mind is the truth about the nature of God and how to live the abundant life that is possible through God. The truth about Australia Day is of a different order but still vitally important for our country. The truth that can set us free is to know what happened during and following the settlement/invasion of British colonisers – to recognize the great harm and suffering inflicted on the indigenous inhabitants and also to recognize that our current prosperity is built on the theft of land from indigenous peoples. These injustices from the past continue in the present and must be addressed if we are to truly become one people.

In the words of a Benedictine prayer, may God bless us with a restless discomfort about easy answers, half-truths and superficial relationships, so that we may seek truth boldly and love deep within our hearts. And may God bless us with holy anger at injustice, oppression and exploitation of people, so that we may tirelessly work for justice, freedom, and peace among all people.

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Good News - 2021 January 17

One sometimes hears the comment from a person who professes to be a Christian and follower of Jesus that they want nothing to do with the church. This may be because they think the church is corrupt and only interested in propping up the institution, or that the church is pretty much irrelevant in our day, or that they’ve had a bad experience with someone in the church previously. Whatever the reason, it seems unlikely to me that Jesus would ever encourage a person to be a solo Christian in the world.

Why do I say this? Based on the reading from Mark’s Gospel this week that the first act in Jesus’ public ministry is to call four people to follow him. These four are ordinary folk, fishermen, and have no particular qualifications or experience to make them stand out from others. As we soon discover they are also quite fallible and make mistakes and get confused. So they are quite like us! Jesus will be their mentor and teacher, but pretty soon they will be extending the ministry of Jesus based on what they have seen and heard from him. These four are soon joined by others – both women and men – so that there is a growing community of people who follow Jesus.

So it has always been, right from the beginning. This was clearly Jesus’ intention rather than being a Plan B if things did not go well. Jesus deliberately formed a new community who followed his ways and taught others to do the same. Certainly the church over the years has shown itself to be fallible, to make mistakes and to get confused – just like the people who make it up – but the shape of Jesus’ ministry is clear – follow me and be part of the movement that I am establishing.

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Jesus is baptised - 2021 Jan 10

We’ve barely finished singing Christmas carols and eating Christmas leftovers and hot cross buns are already on sale in our supermarkets. Consumerism, it seems, waits for no one. It’s a little the same with Mark’s Gospel. Within the opening few verses he’s introduced John the Baptist and his message about repentance. Then Jesus arrives on the scene, unannounced and incognito. He’s one among many people being baptised by John in the muddy waters of the Jordan River.

What marks Jesus out is what happens after he’s baptised … as God’s Spirit descends on him like a dove and a voice from heaven proclaims him to be ‘My Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased’. Jesus is named and affirmed and empowered, ready to begin his ministry (after a period of testing in the wilderness). What is true for Jesus is also true for Jesus’ followers, including ourselves. We too are named and affirmed and empowered for ministry by God’s Spirit. What a blessing and what a challenge! How ready are you to follow in Jesus’ footsteps as we begin the new year?

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Jesus the light of the world

How do we see the world? Through our eyes! … but sometimes we don’t see things even though they’re right in front of us … it’s like we’re blind to them - whether it’s certain people or beauty - we just don’t see … like the shy quiet neighbour who just goes about their business.

On the other hand we can become invisible to others and our amazing life experience and wisdom is ignored … because we’re old …. Jesus was very good at noticing people, especially the ones other people walked by without seeing. In today’s Bible story, Jesus sees a man who has been blind since birth – never able to see anything. He probably had to beg for food. Jesus rubbed some mud on his eyes and prayed that God would restore his sight. After the man washed his eyes, he could see!

But as we’ll hear shortly, this got Jesus into BIG trouble because he did it on a Sunday when you weren’t supposed to do any work.

Liturgy for 22 March 2020 (PDF) worship service.

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Are you listening? Are you following?

This week we bring our series on the Sermon on the Mount to a close as we explore Matthew chapter 7. The most memorable verse in this section is verse 12 – the so-called ‘golden rule’ - that reads ‘Do to others as you would have them do to you’. This simple and positive statement provides a summary of the sermon as a whole and links back to Jesus’

earlier calls to live out what he says.

This ‘rule’ is not actually a rule at all, but rather is about priorities and heart attitudes that lead onto actions. If our heart is concerned with status or wealth-seeking, or having power over others, or anger when our demands and wants are not met, then we will struggle to live in the way Jesus intends. However if we focus on generosity, compassion, justice and mercy then our lives will reflect the way of Jesus.

Lest we despair of ever reaching this high calling, it’s worth remembering that to have any hope of walking this road, we are reliant on God’s grace, God’s love and God’s empowering along the way. And the support and encouragement of fellow travellers. May this call both inspire us to action and also compel us to seek the help of God’s Spirit and one another.

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Cryptic words

In our Bible readings today there are several puzzling words and phrases that show up … that even with 2000 years of Christian history we still debate their meaning… terms like kingdom of God, born anew, born of the Spirit, eternal life, blessing, grace, faith, justification. These words form part of two cryptic and ambiguous conversations. But what do the words really mean?

One definition of what we treasure is what we could not bear to lose. So I wonder how we might cope with losing everything we own (as many families experienced during the bushfires over summer). Ultimately it’s a matter of trust – do we really trust that God will somehow provide what we need (our ‘daily bread’)? If the answer is yes, then we can hold lightly to our possessions. If the answer is no, then perhaps we do treasure what we own more than our relationship with God.

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Jesus’ upside down message

This week we are exploring two very famous passages – the beatitudes that begin the Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew chapters 5 and the companion text from Micah chapter 6, namely the call to do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God.

How do we ‘hear’ these passages afresh? The instructions in Micah 6, for instance, are easy to mentally l agree with, but very challenging to live out. They require no less than to reflect the character of God in how we live. And if justice lies at the heart of God, then how are we, personally, actively pursuing justice for our indigenous peoples, or asylum seekers, or those living on Newstart allowance? If we are not making a personal response to do justice then have we really heard the call?

The beatitudes are equally challenging. Our tendency is still to think that the ones God blesses are the rich, the powerful, the healthy, etc. Instead Jesus says that God’s blessing is available to all of humanity, even for the types of people we regard as hopeless, those – we think – who are beyond God’s interest or care. If we allow them to, these beatitudes will change how we see other people and direct us to the sorts of people Jesus naturally gravitated towards.

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Jesus calls us to discipleship and community

This week’s reading has Jesus walking by the Sea of Galilee and calling two sets of fishermen brothers. According to the presentation in Matthew, they immediately leave their nets, their homes and their livelihoods behind and go with Jesus. The first community of followers of Jesus is thus formed.

One question that quickly springs to mind is how and why these practical folk just dropped everything to follow Jesus. We suspect there is more back story (as hinted at in Luke’s and John’s accounts) but here we’re not told. A second question may be what did Jesus see in these four fishermen (as well as what they saw in Jesus). I think Jesus saw potential, courage and resilience. I wonder what qualities Jesus sees in you (perhaps these and other talents)?

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Learning from our indigenous brothers and sisters

We had a Day of Mourning service as endorsed by the Assembly of the Uniting Church and as requested by our brothers and sisters in the Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress. Growing up in this country we were taught very little about its violent past and about the pain and hurt caused to indigenous people by the white settlers and colonisers. Massacres and murders of aboriginal people were common, driving people away from their traditional lands and taking their children were considered necessary practical steps in the development of the country … for white people … for our ancestors … who simply moved in and took over the land.

This is our shared history … and it’s not good and it’s not just. So today we have a day to reflect and a day to listen and learn from our indigenous brothers and sisters.

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2020-01-19-message.pdf – 663.36 KB
The heart of baptism

This week we jump from stories of Christmas and the birth of Jesus to the account of his baptism by John. This account is quite brief and doesn’t address the questions we may have about baptism (e.g. why was it necessary for Jesus to be baptised? what is the ongoing significance of our baptism?). When this reading is placed alongside the reading from Isaiah 42:1-9, however, we begin to see some common threads.

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The Christmas road less travelled

This week is Epiphany when we hear the ‘other’ Christmas story from Matthew’s Gospel. It’s much darker, grittier and more dangerous than the family friendly Christmas story from Luke’s Gospel. How are we to hear this story?

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2020-01-05-message.pdf – 575.97 KB
What is the significance of the Christmas story for you?

Christmas Day is here! … the day when we remember Jesus’ birth … an event that went largely unnoticed at the time. Exactly how it all happened and who was present is less important to the Gospel writers than the fact that it did happen. Luke, Matthew and John each imbue the story with themes that are important for them in the telling of the Christmas story …

Each of these Gospel writers present the story as theologically significant.

God plans the birth.

God orchestrates the birth.

God celebrates the birth.

For Matthew, Jesus is Emmanuel – God with us. (See other recent Messages)

For John, Jesus is the Word of God taking on human flesh and dwelling amongst us.

While for Luke, Jesus is the Saviour for humanity who is both Messiah and Lord.

So in thinking about the significance of Jesus’ birth for us in Australia in 2019, what do we take from these three accounts and how much of our thinking about this day is culturally conditioned? In our celebrations of Christmas, where is Jesus to be found? Front and centre, or off to the side somewhere or mostly forgotten? How have we domesticated Jesus to meet our comfortable cultural expectations?

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A Christmas Meditation

Here we all are on Christmas Eve, singing some of our favourite carols and remembering the traditional story about the birth of Jesus. It’s the same story that is depicted on some Christmas cards – where everything is bathed in a soft golden light, where Mary Joseph and Jesus all wear haloes and the lines of the shadows have all been blurred.

In some carols, baby Jesus doesn’t even cry.

It’s all very serene and tranquil and romantic – but so unreal it’s more like a fairy tale. What is the more realistic story? Imagine with me what the scene was probably more like …

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Unpacking the image of Immanuel

The main human players in the Christmas story are Mary, Joseph and Jesus. Yet Joseph is often a secondary character, off to the side as it were, as if we are uncertain what to do with him. After the birth stories, Joseph disappears entirely from the narrative, while Mary has several more appearances.

In Matthew’s version of the Christmas story, though, Joseph has a more major role than Mary. He is the one who has to respond to Mary’s unexpected news about her pregnancy, he is the one who organises their escape to Egypt and he is the one who brings the family back to Nazareth. He is also the one who names the child Jesus. How much of this is historically accurate we don’t know, but Joseph is presented as someone who is upright in character, who stays calm and who is practical.

Joseph is a good example of a support person, the quiet behind the scenes person who gets things done and who serves in a no fuss way. So often in history, it is women who fulfil such a role, but here it is Joseph. What might we learn from his example, his trust in God and his practical action?

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2019-12-22-message.pdf – 429.46 KB
An alternative vision

This third Sunday in Advent is often called Joy Sunday, when we remember the song that is sung by Mary (called the Magnificat). Despite her challenging personal circumstances, Mary sings of God’s blessing and God’s alternative vision for the world that will come through her child, Jesus.

One of the interesting aspects of Mary’s song is that it is expressed in the past tense, as though God has already accomplished the overthrow of the rich and powerful and has already raised up the poor and fed the hungry. When we look at the world we realise that this alternative vision has not yet arrived. This may cause us to doubt and question like John the Baptist does in our second reading this week. Or we may rejoice with Mary and commit ourselves to help make this vision a reality.

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Daring to say yes to God

Clearly there were rumours circulating regarding the legitimacy of Jesus that both Matthew and Luke address in their own way. The story of Mary’s encounter with the angel Gabriel in Luke 1:26-38 takes on new reverberations in light of the #metoo movement, as women report on unwanted sexual advances made against them. Did God take unfair advantage of Mary by overpowering her (Luke 1:35)? What would have happened if Mary had said ‘no’?

The result of Mary’s co-operation with God’s demand is that she holds the exalted title of Theotokos (God-bearer) and may be regarded as both a prophet (e.g. Luke 1:47-55) and model disciple (e.g. Acts 1:14). Although God may not ask of us something as dramatic as God called Mary to, the question remains whether we dare to follow Mary’s example and say ‘yes’ to God.

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2019-12-08-message.pdf – 324.16 KB
The hope and challenge of Advent

Welcome to the season of Advent, a time of waiting and preparing for the coming of Jesus. This first Sunday is often called Hope Sunday or sometimes Prophets’ Sunday. It is a day to remember the ancient words of the prophets pointing to the hope of transformation and justice, a hope born out of trust in God’s faithfulness to make things right.

Advent begins by acknowledging that there is much in our world that needs transformation, whether we think of violence and wars, poverty and inequality, the gathering climate emergency, or the growing number of displaced people looking for a safe home. Jesus told us not to be alarmed by such situations but rather to stay awake and to keep sharing the good news through our words and actions.

The challenge for us and every generation is that Jesus left no timelines or detailed plans for us to follow. So we have to read our context and respond as we are able. How does the season of Advent fill us with fresh enthusiasm and hope as we contemplate being agents of change in the world?

Click to download: 469 downloads
2019-12-01-message.pdf – 252.94 KB
The king in God’s upside down kingdom
This Sunday is called Christ the King Sunday. The image of Christ as a king, seated on a throne, always seems slightly jarring. Yet the later writings of the NT often portray Christ as ruling at God’s right hand and, in the book of Revelation, as a figure of unimaginable power and glory.

This week we will explore 3 questions:
- How did a crucified pretender king come to be known and worshipped as a king, and as a rival to Caesar?
- Second, what sort of king is Jesus and what sort of kingdom does he reign in?
- How will we approach this king – both in worship and in our everyday life?
Click to download: 460 downloads
2019-11-24-message.pdf – 257.27 KB
Welcome to the world of Matthew

An overview of the book of Matthew at the start of the lectionary year focused on this gospel.

Click to download: 740 downloads
Introducing-the-Gospel-of-Matthew.pdf – 72.09 KB
Living in community

Building strong relationships is hard work. Of the many aspects involved, we might choose the following as important requirements: availability, mutual respect, communication, shared interests and time.

Leaders in the early church had a challenging role to bring communities together and help them come to a common sense of identity and purpose, given the diverse religious and social background of the members. The writer to the Colossians lists some key ingredients that they saw as necessary. One was obviously a shared faith in Jesus as Lord and recognition of the God of Israel as the one true God. Beyond these core faith commitments are listed compassion, kindness, humility, willingness to forgive, love and thankfulness.

This week as we come together with our friends from Croydon Parish Players to celebrate their 63 years of performing theatre together and to bless them for the next chapter in their journey, it is worth noting that what makes this group tick – beyond a shared passion for theatre and performance – is their emphasis on building Christian community. It is this aspect that attracts and grows their members. The question for all of us is how are we making the investments needed to build strong, deep and resilient communities?

Click to download: 446 downloads
2019-11-17-message.pdf – 52.68 KB
Mysterious hope

There hasn’t been a whole lot of happy news around recently but where is God in the midst of troubles and problems? The message of Haggai is that God is still with his people – amidst the rubble and broken dreams - and still has a future for them and us if we will listen.

Click to download: 361 downloads
2019-11-10-message.pdf – 440.17 KB
What do justice and peace look like?

The cry of the prophet Habakkuk still resonates strongly today. Why must we look at the world and see violence, destruction and injustice? Why does God not act? Why does justice often not seem to prevail? The Gospel story about Zacchaeus starts from a similar position … 'why can tax collectors continue to rip off ordinary people and get away with it', questions the crowd?

But when Jesus spots Zacchaeus looking down at him from a tree, Jesus sees something more than a disreputable tax collector. He sees an opportunity for transformation, for justice and for reconciliation. In the face of hospitality and grace, lives are changed. Jesus names this change as salvation, but he could also have said that peace and wholeness has come to the situation, both for Zacchaeus and for his neighbours.

The world often appears to be in a mess with justice and peace far off. The insight of Jesus is that even the most contentious issues and people can be transformed with a change of heart that leads to changed action. The message from the prophet is not to give up or give in to injustice but to be patient and work towards justice.

Click to download: 381 downloads
2019-11-3-message.pdf – 535.94 KB
Relationship not rules

Many, if not most, Christians pray. In extremis, many non-religious people also pray. But why do we pray? We may pray out of a sense of desperation, or from a sense of Christian duty, or because we want to change the outcome of a situation. It seems that the desire or need to pray is fairly primal.

In this week’s Gospel reading from Luke, Jesus tells a parable about the contrasting prayers of two people. One of the people is deeply religious and appears to live a good life. His lengthy prayer reminds God of his devotion to following God’s ways. The second person prays a short prayer from the heart, acknowledging his brokenness and need for God’s help to turn his life around.

One prayer is focused on following rules while the other is wanting to restore relationship with God. One prayer comes from a place of self-confidence while the other is a cry for help and mercy. Which of these approaches does Jesus commend? Which approach is more typical of your prayer life?

Click to download: 429 downloads
2019-10-27-message.pdf – 44.89 KB
Some essential lessons about faith

I wonder what you regard as being essential to your faith. Is it your personal relationship with God, strengthened through practices such as prayer and reflection on Scripture? Is it being part of a worshipping community who gather each week for encouragement? Is it the call to make a difference in the world through loving others and seeking justice?

This week’s readings offer some insights into what Jesus and Paul regarded as some essentials of our faith. The first is that our faith can often feel small and fragile. Jesus compares it to a mustard seed, while Paul notes that we can feel intimidated by those around us if we speak up about our faith. While our faith might be small, we have faith in a powerful God, who delights to work in and through our life through the Spirit.

The second insight is that our faith – thankfully – is built on God’s grace. There is nothing that we can or must do to earn God’s favour. This is a huge blessing and a truly distinctive part of Christian faith. It also means that we can make no demands on God. As Jesus reminds us, we are to regard ourselves as servants, following in his servant footsteps.

How are these insights informing your everyday faith?

Click to download: 387 downloads
2019-10-06-message.pdf – 43.86 KB
Making kingdom use of money

This week’s Gospel reading from Luke features a topic that many of us feel uncomfortable talking about in church – namely money. But Jesus clearly thought it was an important topic to talk about as around two thirds of all his parables feature money and our attitudes towards money.

Here Jesus shares a puzzling parable about a rich man (God?) and his less-than-honest manager (Israel?) who is looking after his affairs. The manager is called to account for his stewardship – how he has mistreated the wealth of his master. The manger quickly devises a crafty plan to make new friends for himself – reduce the amount of what the master is owed so that the poor debtors will be grateful and make him welcome.

The intended lesson? Use the resources at your disposal – including money – to make friends with the poor and outcast – because it is the generous and those who welcome the poor who will inherit the blessing of God’s kingdom. The parable asks we rich folk a challenging question – how are we using the resources at our disposal to welcome such people and to share God’s good news with them?

Click to download: 393 downloads
2019-09-22-message-1.pdf – 56.63 KB
The cost of following Jesus
Reworking Jesus’ words in light of his other teaching he seems to be asking people …
- will we love the outsider and stranger and the least as much as our own family?
- Will we willingly share what we have with the poor and hold loosely to material possessions?
- Will we identify with Jesus as Lord and King – rather than Caesar – and so risk losing our life – as Jesus will – to follow God’s agenda – or will we play it safe and go with the flow?
Click to download: 550 downloads
2019-09-8-message-1.pdf – 517.68 KB
Practicing Hospitality

Jesus suggests that when we have a luncheon or dinner, we have the opportunity to invite people beyond our circle of friends and family – the poor, crippled and blind – who cannot repay us. In this way we reflect the hospitality and welcome of God, which is offered freely to everybody. How open and inclusive is our hospitality – as individuals, as a community and as a nation? How might we enhance this vital ministry?

Click to download: 459 downloads
2019-09-1-message-1.pdf – 477.08 KB
Getting the Sabbath balance right

How do we view and utilise the gift of a Sabbath day? Do we take a day of rest to refresh our bodies, minds and spirits and remind ourselves that the world will keep going without our input? Do we take a day to immerse ourselves in creation or spend the day with those we love? And do we also do what is needed on this day to bring healing, wholeness and justice in our world?

Click to download: 443 downloads
2019-08-25-message-1.pdf – 241.10 KB
Following Jesus, the beginning and end of our faith

The life of faith is often compared to a journey or walk through life. In this week’s reading from the book of Hebrews, it is compared instead to a race that has been set before us.

Click to download: 590 downloads
18-August-2019-message.pdf – 931.23 KB