O LITTLE TOWN

READINGS THIS WEEK CAN INCLUDE 2 SAM 7:1-16, PSALM 89, MAGNIFICAT, ROMANS 16:25-27, LUKE 1:26-38

Since I last reflected on the Christmas story
I have actually been to "the little town of Bethlehem"
This place which figures so much
in the Christmas story
can easily be romanticised.
We may not see the wood for the trees.
It was a bit like that for me.
So intent on seeing everything
I found myself at the manger shrine and wondered
"What now?"
I am a bit shocked that I did not have a profound revelation!
All we Christians have loved Bethlehem
since our childhood.
And, if not Bethlehem, then the idea of the stable
and the birthplace of Jesus.
The modern shrine has 
no stable
no inn

Indeed our learned Course Director, Kamal Farah,
invited us to critique
much of that which passes as 'truth' in the Christmas stories.
I am perhaps getting distracted. And am reminded that there is much about the Christmas story that needs to be unpacked



We experience a lot of Christmas input at this time 
One good question I heard asked about various school and church presentations was:  
Why all these stories and plays with a Christmas theme 
What's wrong with the story of the stable at Bethlehem.........? 
There are of course many representations of that story 
and it is rich in symbolism, myth (in the finest sense of that word) 
and cultural nuance 
When in doubt we should allow God's Word of Scripture 
to do its wonderful work in our hearts 
So take time this week to read the readings 
and just to allow them to speak to you. 
As you sit through the Carol Services take time too to be a little more open. Remember, as we see in this week's readings, 
hat Christmas is God showing himself to us in human form. 
It is about understanding who God is, 
and what God is about. So we find that Mary, when confronted by the angel has to begin on a journey of discovery because she does not understand what all this might mean 
^"29But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be"  
And Paul tells us at the end of Romans as we read today  
"the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages ²⁶but is now disclosed, and through the prophetic writings is made known to all the Gentiles, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith"  
The sort of message, that so puzzles Mary, 
is God revealing in Jesus what has been true for all time. 
This is the overarching message of the Christmas story. 
God is revealed to us in the person of Jesus Christ. 
He is, what controversialist bishop, John AT Robinson 
describes as The Human Face of God. 
This is a description I find really helpful. 
God cannot (or perhaps may not )be described...
he is indeed "the mystery that was kept secret" 
our philosophy, our history, even our theology 
does not come close to fully disclosing who God is 
if we want to know what God is like 
then the fullest revelation is Jesus.  


So what do we see 
We find at Christmas a deeply confronting story. 
God chooses a young girl about whom we know remarkably little. 
In the short passage of this morning's Gospel we know more about Joseph 
.... a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David  
than we do about Mary herself 

In fact we know more about Zechariah and Elizabeth than we do about their cousin: belonged to the priestly order of Abijah. His wife was a descendant of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. ⁶Both of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord. ⁷But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years.  

What might this say to us? 
At the very least we are reminded 
that God views people differently from the way we do. 
We make different choices about what is important 
so we look for wealth, success, power and prestige ..
God looks differently. 
There is an invitation here in the Christmas story 
to look with different eyes at the world in which we live. 
In the reading from the Hebrew bible too, 
we read of David's desire to build a Temple. 
This seems like a righteous desire, a good thing. 
But it is not what God wants. 
We do not always get it right, 
we are often fixated on the material when God is inviting us to look deeper. 
These are two modest insights 
that we get from addressing the stories of the Bible 
rather than sidetracking it.
Making room  
Part of the frustration for us at Christmas 
is finding Jesus amidst it all. 
Let us not so much complain 
about what Woolworths and Target do, 
let us rather see the challenge to point ourselves and others to Jesus. 


Ask tricky intelligent questions of your youngsters: 
Why did God come as a baby? 
What is he trying to tell us by being born in a stable? 
Why did the shepherds and the wise men come? 
and what do you think they said to Mary and Joseph? 
What, indeed, would we say to them?

Reality and la vida loca

What is your lifestyle choice? 
This is something of a modern question. 
Today's readings invite us to identify our lifestyle as Christian 
How do you live faithfully as a modern Christian day to day?
Once again we have a pattern for faithful living in each of the three readings.  
One thing that is striking is that "faithful living" is not lived out in a vacuum, but rather is the act of living vigorously and actively in this world in which we find ourselves. 
Though many religious words are used, 
the emphasis of the passages is not on the narrowly pietistic
it is on the dynamically active a life lived in full communion with God 
and totally engaged with human life. 
Fully in communion with God, 
totally engaged with human life. 
These themes flow through all the readings but in this reflection I will focus on the reading from 1Thessalonians

6Rejoice always, ¹⁷pray without ceasing, ¹⁸give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. ¹⁹Do not quench the Spirit. ²⁰Do not despise the words of prophets,but test everything; hold fast to what is good; ²²abstain from every form of evil. 23 May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²⁴

The call to worship 

I am struck always when I read this passage of its absolute nature..."always" ; "in all circumstances""without ceasing" 

Paul anticipates here 

that worship will not be an occasional, Sunday-only, 

type of activity 

It will be all of life. 

Two points can be made about this. 

One, we need to get down and do it!!! 

 We need to do it. 

So find the place and start. 

Pray daily, 

for your family, for yourself for your concerns. 

Decide that this is a life-habit 

that you are going to commit to and do it. 

Try, too, to seize the opportunity 

to turn your day to day activities 

into deliberate, unobtrusive prayer. 

Some years ago I was asked by a woman 

who was very upset about blasphemy 

"What do you do you when people punctuate there speech with "Jesus!", this and "Jesus" that!"

My response was 

that I try and use this as an opportunity 

to pray. 

It's not always easy. 

We can find our own little ways to be more attentive 

to the need to pray constantly. 

One of the great benefits of afternoon and evening walks 

is that we can use the opportunity to give thanks to God 

for our local environment and to pray for our neighbours. 

This may not work for you....

but find something that turns your heart to God 

is a GOOD thing and we will reap benefits. 

The great traditions of meditation call us to "mindfulness" 

not just allowing our day to day experiences 

to go to waste 

While we might take this to mean 

that we "should take time to smell the flowers" 

and we should!

it also means that we should treasure 

our daily emotional and spiritual experiences. 

How often do we have ups and downs...and simply not do anything about them other than fret!!!? 

Take time to debrief yourself and commit to God 

The American farmer-poet Wendell Berry 

reminds us that we are called to engage with life 

He says we are called to live the given life 

not the planned life. 

It is a reminder 

that what ever else we think 

we are to do 

we are in danger of avoiding living the life 

we are given 

in favour of the life we think we should have 

or that we so desperately long to live. 

We are called to live the given life

...not the planned 

being mindful of what we have. 

The kings missed the Christ child 

because their plan had him somewhere else!!! 

In this season of craziness....la vida loca 

we are called back to the given life 

and Christ really present with us

Trusting and hoping

Readings for Sunday 4 the December 2011 -  Advent 2 can include Isaiah 40:1-11; Psalm 85, 2 Peter 3:8-15; Mark 1:1-8

I trust that you are all making progress with your Christmas presents.
I once put to my children
an idea that comes out of such agencies as  the Christmas Bowl
Let's give each other presents of about $5-$10
and then each give $20 to another cause.
They looked aghast...well if not aghast then askance!
Another hair-brained, unrealistic idea of that priest
we are (un)fortunate enough to have as a father.
The youngest one got it...
...enraptured with caring for a girl in Tanzania
through a school project
it is easy to get her to understand
that $10 spent on her
what might otherwise be ---another Barby, a fluffy pen, cheeky knickers....or whatever
is here today and gone tomorrow!

But for the little Tanzanian girl
it can do so much more.
She was taken by the notion
that in Africa the wealthy send their children
to Europe as soon as they can
and so there is a "brain drain"
(I am impressed that a 12 year old
can get this quite difficult concept.)

Understanding that by supporting strong education
in Tanzania
then most people will stay if they can.
And thus halt the brain drain
This stuff is fairly self-evident
if and when you think about it!
Comfort and Trust
Today we are invited 
to reflect on the theme of Trust.
There is presented for us
an image of a God who we can trust
Amidst all our troubles and difficulties
and no one escapes this...
we trust that God will care for us and sustain us.
The readings tell us that God willBring us back...we can trust God to restore us
that God is ...patient with us
we often think God is slow
but God is  actually patient
That God will empower us with the Holy Spirit
Even John the Baptist says, " Don't be like me!"
rather open yourself to the one who comes after
and he will pour out his Holy Spirit on you..

These are promises in which we are invited to trust.

• God cares for us
• God is patient with us
• God empowers us

In our life
I hope that you might see here
that what is being offered is a chance to be real and genuine.
It is not unlike 
getting the Christmas present idea right.
There is nothing wrong with presents
there is an issue about proportion, 
and about what is important.
We can trust God to give us the right gifts,
but can we trust ourselves!
Can the world trust us to deliver
on God's behalf?
or have we been distracted by the trivial, the unimportant?

God cares for us and brings us home how do we care for others
and restore them
How do we act as agents of reconciliation
and bringers of peace?

God is patient with us have we given up on people,
have we stopped talking to someone who has hurt us
or have we settled for second-best in our relationships

God empowers us has our relationship with God
gone stale
do we allow ourselves to be open to the Holy Spirit
do we pray with vigour and with power
We can trust God
and we need to be trusted as God agents.

Looking forward

Readings for the First Sunday in Advent , November 27 2011. These can include:  Isaiah 64:1-9; Psalm 80:1-7; 1 Corinthians 1:3-9; Mark 13:24-37


Some Christians are fascinated by the so-called
Second Coming of Christ.
This doesn't surprise me
and in a way it is good to keep one's eye on the ball
.....or perhaps to realise that the ball is still in play....




God's work is not yet finished.
And though we see and understand
that everything that is necessary to be done,
in order to reconcile
humanity and God,
has been done
by Jesus on the Cross
and through his resurrection
And God continues to pour out the Spirit so that this work of salvation
may be taken up by us
and that we may live the new life,
yet there is also a sense that this is not all complete;

it has to be worked through and made real.

A weak analogy is that it is like a house that has been built
at great expense and with great care.
It is the house of the future.
Indeed one of my friends was telling me only the other day
about such a house that she is building in the next couple of years.
It will replace an old house
and will be designed to cope with all sorts of modern needs,
not the least of which is that she is older
and her lifestyle has changed.
It will no doubt be executed
and there will be a day when we will be able to say
...this house is complete....
and yet in a real sense it is only the beginning
....the ball is still in play...
the house has yet to be lived in
and that will open it up
to a whole new range of possibilities.
As yet undreamt of.
As yet unrealised. 


The coming of the kingdom
When Jesus talks about the coming of the kingdom
he talks about it in range of ways.
At times it is as if the kingdom is something that will be instituted
at the end of time
and yet he also says "the kingdom of God is amongst you"
He can also tell his disciples to pray
"your kingdom come on earth, as it is in heaven"
While the house has been built
it is yet to be experienced
and lived in
...the ball is still in play.....
we need to keep our eye on the ball.
Advent and Christmas don't so much point us to the second coming
but rather warn us that we should be alert, and awake
to the possibility of Christ's kingdom here on earth.

We have the heavenly image, the ideal if you like,
of what it might be like when the heavenly kingdom is realised
and Christ will come with shouts of acclamation.
But are we also alert to the signs of the kingdom
that are in our midst.
Are we sufficiently awake to see that there are opportunities
to proclaim the kingdom
right where we are today?

Small possibilities
I am reminded of a wonderful poem
that our life is worked out in the small stuff rather than the big stuff

Answers


I keep my answers small and keep them near;
Big questions bruised my mind but still I let
Small answers be a bulwark to my fear.


The huge abstractions I keep from the light;
Small things I handled and caressed and loved.
I let the stars assume the whole of night.


But the big answers clamoured to be moved
Into my life. Their great audacity
Shouted to be acknowledged and believed.


Even when all small answers build up to
Protection of my spirit, I still hear
Big answers striving for their overthrow


And all the great conclusions coming near.

Elizabeth Jennings

This kingdom that we are called to experience
is at least as much in the small answers
for us
as it is in the big stuff.
In a real sense, sometimes the "big stuff"
threatens the small things
and yet, for most of us, for most of the time
it is the small answers
that are the authentic ones.


The kingdom of God is close at hand.
It will be in our care for our children
and the care that we take in our relationships
the gentleness and the kindness
the generosity of spirit
and the day to day forgiveness
that God's kingdom will be known
on earth as it is in heaven.
We need at the very least to pay attention
and be awake for the coming of the kingdom.


Let us not be too distracted
looking for the stars
that begin to fall
(which Jesus tells us is not something that should essentially concern us)
but rather pay attention to our own little patch of earth.
And live in the house in which we find ourselves;
it is at least
in paying attention to the process of living that we
may discover the purpose and meaning
of this place where we dwell
and that God's kingdom
is in our midst.
This is our Advent Work!

The Reign of Christ---give us a break

 

We call this day Pentecost 23, but more importantly (being the last Sunday of the Church's year) it is the Feast of Christ the KingReadings for Sunday 20 November 2011 can be taken from Ezekiel 34, Psalms 95, & 100, Ephesians 1 & Matthew 25:31-46

As time goes on I become increasingly more republican!

So, the feast of Christ the King, (strangely promoted, perhaps even invented, in that most republican of countries, the USA.)
rather goes against the grain

But it has important themes for us to attend to
Even if we do have demythologise the language of monarchy!!

We get the idea...Christ is to us 
like the King is to his subjects
We need to not see this in a brutal way
but rather to embrace the idea
that we are the willing/contented subjects
of King Jesus.
The Lord of the Cross.
We probably only need
to consider the Gospel (here)
which is pretty direct.
"In so far as you cared for the needy
you are caring for me!"
and then the converse
(perhaps more chastening)
"Ignore the needy,
and you ignore me"
More specific
We are directed to the hungry
the thirsty
the stranger
the naked
the sick
the prisoner.
This list might seem almost arbitrary
but it bears some consideration.


THE HUNGRY...there are indeed people who just don't have food
How can we respond to them
Is it through Anglicare, or World Vision
or simply by bringing food to church each Sunday for St Mary Magdalene's and Beacon
THE THIRSTY...thirst is is often an allegory for those 
who have deep spiritual thirst
Are you attending to your own spiritual thirst?
Are you helping those who come to find an answer to their deep spiritual questions ( why is this happening to me?, Where is God? I feel purposeless!)  Do we take these questions seriously?
THE STRANGER
Do we miss the miss "the stranger" in our midst?
Those who are lonely, those who have no friends
those who need to be connected to other people?
THE NAKED
It would be easy to think of the naked ...sexually
But I suspect there is something more important here.
Those who have absolutely no protection
against the the pressures of the world
(just as the naked have no clothes).
Can you think of anyone who is so vulnerable?
THE SICK
Christians have deep concern for the sick
I want them to be well
and I want to pray really hard for them.
This is the work of the kingdom
Fervent prayer and care for the sick
THE PRISONER
It is perhaps the prisoner who interests me
We are, I think, talking about those who are
actually in jail
But also those who are in jails of their own making
or who have been trapped by circumstances
..the jails of addiction, poverty, or accident
We don't have to think terribly figuratively 
to realise that many of the world's people
live in jails that are not actually prisons


What then we hear is the simple message of Christ the King
Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty,
welcome the stranger,
clothe the naked,
release the prisoner.
Easy said
our faith commitment .....
...attend to this important stuff

Under the bed

Readings for Sunday November 13 (Proper 28-Pentecost 22): First reading and Psalm:Judges 4:1-7: Psalm 123: Second reading:1 Thessalonians 5:1-1: Gospel:Matthew 25:14-30


The Gospel reading today seems a little culturally curious
It has hard words which are perhaps a little too redolent of the harsh times in which we live :
"Those who have nothing will even have what they do have taken from them!"
How, might we ask, can we take from people who have nothing?
There are a couple of interesting points:
This is a parable about life in God's kingdom. 
The image/idea is that God has equipped us to live life
and we are to get on with it.
There is a sense in which we have been left to get on with it.
(This of course is only an image and we are not left alone)
But following the image
we see that some of us have 5 talents, some 2 talents
and some (probably most of us) have 1


The word talent here is a unit of money
rather than the way we often use it
to describe our personbal giftedness
As in Australia's Got Talent!
Why is this so? isn't it rather unjust?
No, I don't think so.
It's rather sort of how things are.
Some seem to have a lot of resources
some a modest amount
and some only a bit.
There is a point here: No one has no resources
We should remember this.
We sometimes think, that we are without any capabilities,
resources or gifts.
In terms of this parable
God has equipped every baptised person
(with the Holy Spirit)
to enable us to communicate/be Christ to the world.


THIS WEEK Consciously ask what am I to do?
What can I do? For Christ, to be Christ, to share Christ
(If we are tempted to think nothing then think again!)


Developing this a little further...
The condemnation that is reserved in this parable
for the person who has only one talent
and then takes it and hides it under the bed
is this
There is essentially only one failing
about what we do with our giftedness
and that is not that we are not as gifted as Mother Teresa,
It is not that we should have been a missionary, or a nurse,
a priest or a doctor.
It is not that we can look at someone else and see they are so much better than we are, musical, practical, influential
.....that is sort of how things are
Perhaps we will leave easier and better lives if we just accept that.
But the failing is, that in recognising that some are more gifted than we are,
we make the mistake of thinking either

• that we are not gifted at all or
• that we should leave it up to others

Each of us is called to use our talents
whether great or small


So, this week, the question is not:
Why am I not as holy as someone else? Or why am I not as gifted?
BUT what can I do with what I have been given?
Hiding our talents under the bed is not an option.

Did you hear the one about?

Readings for Sunday 6 November 2011, 21st Sunday after Pentecost --thoughts about Joshua 24, 1 Thess 4:13-18, Matt 25:1-13
We are now moving on
These last few weeks are called in the Church of England, our sister church,
Kingdom season
I think this is a very useful reminder
that what we are about
is God's work
is establishing the kingdom.
we are not just meandering around
God is working a purpose out as year succeeds to year.
And that purpose is the kingdom which proclaims
Good News
to the poor 
the imprisoned
those in need of healing
the blind 
the crippled.
As years go on I realise that these 'categories' 
are both figurative and actual
...there are many imprisoned who are not in gaol...
but that should not let us escape the reality
that there are people actually in gaols!


So any way the Gospel reading !!!!


It almost reads like a joke
Did you hear the one about the bridesmaids 
who got locked out of the reception?
You know they  spent the best part of the last two years 
preparing for this wedding
and then  they got locked out of the reception venue!!!!


The point?
Don't forget what's important
For the Christian...
You know the Anglican Covenant discussion
may be important
but there are people in jail!


For the Australian
The political fascination
of parties that hate each other
...there are people flooding to our shores 
whose lives have been devastated
by greed, rape, poverty
famine.
for God's sake!!!!
And I use that expression advisedly