Happy Epiphany!

07 Jan Happy Epiphany!

6^th January 2025

Happy Epiphany everyone!

Christmas ends on the day of Epiphany…the 12^th day of Christmas…with the arrival of the magi…the wise travellers, or astrologers from Persia. I always marvel that a handful of mystic stargazers find Jesus an object of worship and devotion, and obey the command to not tell Herod where Jesus is living thus giving Joseph & Mary time to flee to Egypt for safety. Anyway…that’s today. Why do we mash that into the Christmas narrative when Matthew gives us hints that they arrive quite some time after Jesus is born? I’m not sure exactly, but it’s good to remind ourselves that our world lives at a fairly rapid & compressed pace…not always a good thing for faith. I’ll say more about that at the end of all this…but right now let’s get ourselves in tune for the week ahead.

1. Sunday, 12^th January we continue our worship & teaching series, “Winds of Change: Stand in the Son.” (Ephesians 1:3-14) This is another one of those weeks where you should be grabbing someone who isn’t part of the life of the church on a consistent basis& encourage them to join you. Paul captures the heart of God sending Jesus for us & choosing us as his own in love. Go on…invite them. Even if there isn’t morning tea.
2. Zoom Bible Study Catch-up (we resume our studies based on the previous Sunday’s worship texts)
   Friday 17^th January 2025  @ 1:00 p.m.
   Join Zoom Meeting  —  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81166125179  —  Meeting ID: 811 6612 5179
3. You’re going to get sick of me plugging this one but I want you to grab a friend or family member who isn’t yet an active member of the Church and bring them!UnEarthed: Uncovering stories of Faith in Australia – Thursday 27^th February 2025 – This citywide multi-church evangelism event will be a FREE event for you, your families, and friends held at the Range Function Centre. Please note that date! It’s going to include Karl Faase, Colin Buchanan (and his adult country repertoire) and special guests from the Faith Runs Deep documentary interview series. All-Australian stories of faith in Christ from the length & breadth of this sunburnt country…the Great Southland of the Holy Spirit.
4. Speaking of the Bible & Stories of Faith…Leonie has been extremely diligent in finding & creating some very do-able and some very stretching Bible Reading Plans for us. There are at least 4 you can choose from available at the Hall. There are dozens of other options available on-line that can be accessed directly from your phone…we can help. If there’s one “new” thing I would hope you embrace this year, it’s a plan to read a growing section of the Scriptures every day…really stretch yourself in experiencing God’s word for you. Let me encourage you to pick up something different this year than what you may have done last year. Last Sunday a few more were picked up…if you don’t see the one you want, talk to us & we’ll print it & I’ll deliver it to your door.

Now back to where I was a bit ago…Every now & then you hear me read something from the Bible, or you read something from the Bible, & your heart says, “Sounds like what I just saw on the news.” The Bible speaks very clearly to us in the 21^st century just as it did in every preceding century. The Bible is true because it is God speaking into the persistent sinful broken circumstances of the world he made in love for his delight…and every now and then it describes what you & I watch happening all around us. That hit me again this week…

I was chatting with a pastor-friend the other day, he rejoiced at the fuller house on Christmas Eve & lamented the quick slump back to & below normal worship levels immediately following. He said he understood family holidays and all that, but still…I simply quoted Jesus, Mark 4, the parable of the farmer sowing seed.

You know this one…guy goes out to sow & scatters seed in a way that sounds like a drunken sailor…seed falls all over the place: the path, among rocks, amidst thorns, and finally on good soil. But it was the thorns that I highlighted as what seems really true today…and over the church’s life: The seed that fell among the thorns represents others who hear God’s word, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things, so no fruit is produced. – Mark 4:18-19

I told him I figured that was true all the time; sin bends our hearts toward “the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things” so we become unfruitful for the kingdom & nothing eternal emerges from our lives. I think it’s a sad reality…but it’s the one that “got us” at the beginning: When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. – Genesis 3:6  (Compare the underlined sections.) Those “weeds” in Jesus’ parable sound pretty much like the temptation of the fruit in the Garden…and one more: “Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is passing away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever. – 1 John 2:15-17

From the first book in the Bible to some of the last letters written to the church, the thorns are always present, and always capture human hearts to make us unfruitful for the kingdom so nothing eternal emerges from our lives. You see it in the generational slide in faithfulness in many of our own families…one generation’s devotion does not always make its way into subsequent generations. We see it in the coarsening of our western culture…what would not have been permitted is now encouraged…we could go on.

But rather than be depressed & throw up our hands, every confrontation with weeds, temptation, or a rejection of a living faith is meant to be met with another application of the gospel lived before the world. The last line from John, But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever. Or from Jesus “the seed that fell on good soil represents those who hear and accept God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!”

When we faithfully persist in being the people Jesus saved us to be…sent as he was sent to announce God’s saving rule by his death & resurrection and to live lives reflecting his grace & love at all times…fruit is produced by the word living within us. This isn’t about you & me working hard to become “super good soil,” but about allowing Jesus to shape our lives into his so that we live forever & the product of our lives (the fruit of our faith in those around us) does too.

I’ll see you Sunday…amidst thorns and all other sorts of stuff…let’s persist together!

Peace

John