The church duties roster is now available for the second quarter of 2010. You can find it here…

• Second Quarter Duties Roster

You can click on the link above to view it online or you can right mouse click on it and chose “save target as” to save it to your computer.

God Bless,

Dave Q

Last Sunday’s sermon on unity and having a new attitude (based on Philippians 2:1-11) has been posted.

The Mighty Men Conference last weekend (and for me, the meetings which preceded it) were a great inspiration. The messages were simple – We need to have a recent personal testimony of God’s action in our lives; We need to know the freedom which we have in Christ which unshackles us from the laws, demands and fabric of the world; We need to have personal time with God every single day; and men need to take their place as prophet, priest and king in their homes and families.

Most amazing was that men came from right across Australia, from every denomination, age and maturity in Christ. And we were one. Our group from Merredin got split up (may have been intentional on the part of the organizers) and so I shared a tent with two men from Adelaide and shared in worship with two men from Kangaroo Island. Who we were was irrelevant – we shared faith stories and encouraged each other in our Christian journey. It was good.

Our focus this morning follows something of this sense of unity. Using that wonderful text from Philippians 2, I want to show that our unity is derived from our attitude (the way we look and respond to things). It is ambition, conceit and self-centredness which creates disunity. Paul calls us to “have the same attitude as Christ Jesus” who made Himself less, took the role of a servant and laid down His life.” It is this Christlike attitude which brings unity, joy and peace into our situation. Strained relationships drain out all our joy and the answer is quite simple – make the relationship right, even if it means that you have to “lose the point”. And have a good heart about it.

Tonight at SNAC I want us to look at why we come to church, and why God comes to church. When we come for the same reason then we are truly blessed – not just for the moment, but in our hearts and lives. We need to come to church and God wants to come to church and when we meet together we are filled with the Spirit.

Finally, we are starting a Men’s Group on Wednesday evening at the church. We will start at 7pm with something to eat and time to relax with each other. We have some ideas about where we want to go with the group and it would be good to talk through expectations that you might have too.

Rev David de Kock

The updated readings are now on the “Bible Readings” page. They focus on the lead up to Easter and the period just after. If you read one line per day (which might be one or two readings) they will take most of March.

You can find the readings here http://www.merredinunitingchurch.org/weekly-readings/.

God Bless,

Dave Q

Because a lot of our men are at the Mighty Men Conference in Perth this weekend, the services today at Merredin and Mukinbudin are given over to the ladies. And welcome to the Church of Christ congregation who are joining the service in  Mukinbudin.

I recently received some literature from the Frontier Services and was deeply moved by the amazing work that they do in the Outback and in the “not so out” Outback. Four things struck me in particular – the work in Aboriginal Communities, work amongst migrants, the crisis of mental illness in rural Australia and the Work Parties who gather to repair and restore church buildings in small communities. Frontier Services asked us to have a special service sometime to focus on their work which is often not very high on the agenda of the church. With this in mind, it is appropriate that Sal Marais leads our service today. I was asking people about their dreams recently and it came to light that Sal would really like to teach  Aboriginal children on a station. She wants to go to the   frontier, so who better to lead the service today!

But going back to the things that struck me. There is a wonderful article in Frontier News titled “One is the loneliest number”. It details the problem of  depression when one lives in an isolated community. And I can understand that. When you live inside your head and your only conversation is with yourself, it is easy to sink into depression. The article details the valuable  contribution of the Patrol Minister who brings companionship into the isolation. We as a Christian community can also play a vital role in this regard. I read of the Men’s Shed movement and I see its value in helping men who find themselves “alone in the midst of the crowd”. It’s a brilliant concept. Connected to this is our plan to start a Men’s Group in Merredin on March 10^th. Getting  together for an hour of fun and barbeque (with a beer or two perhaps) and then some input on God, life and relationships. More about that later.

Another helpful article was about the Work Party movement. Men and women who give up two weeks or more in some outback town to refurbish the churches. They take their caravan (if they have one) and enjoy the travel to some place 500 or more km’s away. They make good friends and bring a bit of new life into the community. A wonderful idea.

Enjoy the service and may the Lord be with you.

Rev David de Kock

Last week, we saw that we should have –

• A heart of confidence in God (believing that He can fulfil His promises)

• A heart of compassion for people (believing that God loves them as much as He loves us), and

• A heart of concern for the growth of the Kingdom of God (believing that God’s intention is that none should perish but that all should come to faith in Him).

Today we are going to look at the great Possibilities which the Gospel gives us when we commit to its Priority and see it as the Purpose and Pattern for our life.

In Philippians 1:12, Paul tells us that “what has happened to him has really served to advance the gospel”.

Oh Yes? Listen to what happened to him … (2 Corinthians 12:23-27)

He was imprisoned, flogged, exposed to death.
Five times he received forty lashes minus one.
Three times he was beaten with rods,
Three times shipwrecked, a day and a night on the open sea.
Constantly on the move,
In danger from rivers, bandits and his own countrymen.
In danger from the Gentiles,
in danger in the city,
in danger at sea, and in danger from false brothers.
He laboured and toiled, went without sleep, went hungry and thirsty, and was cold and naked.

And he says, “I want you to know that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel….

And indeed, the advancement of the gospel is our purpose too … it is God’s commission to us – Follow me and make disciples.

The Gospel offers us the great Possibility to do this in any and every circumstance. Follow me and make disciples…

In verse 14, Paul say, “Because of my chains” – because of, not despite: There is a huge difference.

“Despite my chains” implies that I am not constrained by them. I am bound up but despite that I pushed ahead. It is by sheer human effort that I can achieve in my circumstances.

“Because of my chains” tells us that the chains are the very reason why Paul and his colleagues “have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and fearlessly.” Paul used his circumstances to share the gospel – he made the most of every opportunity!

I believe that this means that we can find great possibilities for the Gospel just where we are. Paul was in chains and in prison but he saw that as opportunity to speak the word even more courageously. He did not think that he had to get out of the situation before he could do that! There was no “if only” or “when I” in his planning. He did what he could, right where he was.

We must speak and live the Gospel right where we are, in our situation.

“Where you are” is not a hindrance, but an opportunity.

Your unchurched friends are not a liability but an opportunity. Your family who have drifted away from Jesus are not to be mourned over, but to be prayed over. Your difficult circumstances are a challenge to live in faith.

The power of the gospel flows out of our confidence in God and our love for His people – as we heard last week.

We hesitate because we often fear ridicule, unpopularity, and social isolation if we are too vocal or demonstrative about our trust in God. But if we really trust God then the place we are is the place where God wants us to be and we must use the possibilities in that place to share faith and the good news. God has put us there for that very reason.

One of our goals this year, indeed, our primary goal is to serve 42 (10) people outside the congregation this year for the sake of the gospel. I believe that each of us can use our situation to do that quite easily. A friend, a neighbour, a colleague – we are connected to them in our life and we are, in a sense, therefore also obligated to share our faith with them – just as Paul was able to use his far more complicated situation of being chained to the guards in the dungeon.

How do we do this?

Well, we need first of all to recognize the Priority of the Gospel message. Paul says, “The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached.”

The priority is that Christ is preached. In Paul’s case he sometimes saw the gospel preached out of envy and rivalry, even selfish ambition; he said that the motive did not matter.

In our case we might feel inadequate to share our faith, we might be hesitant because we fear stumbling over the sharing of our faith despite its roots deep within us, but all that matters is that Christ is preached.

It is better to do the right thing even if it is done badly. It is better to do the right thing than to do nothing at all. It is better to do the right thing even if the motives are mixed or wrong. And the right thing is that Christ is preached.

Our priority is to be so convinced of our salvation in Christ that we are no longer hesitant to share our own hope with others, especially the ones we love.

When we preach Christ we are not simply preaching values, or another good way to live, we are preaching the very essence of life …

– God made us to live in relationship with Him, Adam sinned and we became separated from Him by default, our life lost its purpose and meaning – then Christ came, and through His atoning death, He gave us our life back, in all its fullness, with all its promise and potential.

And so Paul says in verse 21, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” He did not fear death and neither should we – death is not a threat but the culmination of life, and it bring us into the presence of the One who desires that we can see Him and know Him and walk with Him in glory.

But Paul did see Purpose in life, specifically, in his case, that his readers’ joy in Christ Jesus would overflow on account of him.

And I do not think that our purpose is much different. Because of our faith and hope in Christ Jesus, joy should be our benchmark. Our spirits must be lifted up. Our hope is sure, our destiny is secure.

As Paul tells us in Romans 8 – “I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We are safe in God’s love for us, nothing can ever threaten that, nothing at all! And that is cause for joy.

The purpose of our life is to live in this joy, and to be absolutely content, fearing no threat nor disaster.

The Westminister Cathechism has, as its first statement of our faith, “The chief end of man is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever.” This is our chief purpose, to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.

And that must affect the Pattern of our life.

Not just to speak the gospel, or even just to believe it, but to live it.

If we believe it, it must shape our lives.

And to be quite blunt, if you believe the extraordinary claims of the gospel then you have no option but to live according to its extraordinary promise – that the God who spoke the universe into being is madly in love with you, and has shaped a destiny for you which involves a personal relationship with Him within the community of His people.

So, says Paul, “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ … stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel without being frightened in any way.”

The great Possibility of the Gospel is realized when we, BECAUSE of our situation and circumstances are able to preach Christ as a Priority, to make the joy of Christ the Purpose of our life and to Pattern our lives so that we conduct ourselves in a manner worthy of the Gospel.

And the outcome will be that not only will our own lives be content, but others will know that contentedness themselves.

May the joy of the Lord be your strength.

Rev David de Kock

This is going to be a busy week – starting today! Four services today and then gathering steam to the Mighty Men’s Conference in Perth beginning on Friday. I will be going down on Thursday to attend a Ministry Supervision Meeting in the afternoon and the Ministers Pneuma Breakfast on   Friday morning. The Supervision Meeting is an experiment in the        Presbytery where six ministers have been selected to share insights in ministry together – the joyful days and the hard times. This will be our  second meeting and I am already gaining great benefit from the balance of new thinking, experience and academics in the group.

We are continuing today with our series in the Letter to the Philippians. Last week our focus was that we should have Confidence in God;      Compassion for people and Concern for Christian growth. This week we move on to Philippians 1:12-30. The points follow on from last week’s  concern for Christian growth. And this fits neatly with our own goal to reach out to others this year (42 in Merredin; 15 in Muka, 10 in Bruce Rock and 5 in Southern Cross).

If we want to reach out we need to know the great Possibilities that come with the Gospel. We need to understand the Gospel’s Priority and its   Purpose and the message of the Gospel needs to become a Pattern for our life.

The Kingdom of God does not grow simply because the church opens the doors on Sunday. No, the Kingdom grows because Christ Followers are everywhere and everyday living the Gospel in a way that attracts others to Jesus. By the example of our lives lived in an attractive way, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel, other people are drawn to its Good News. As someone once said, “Preach the Gospel at all times, and, if  necessary, use words.”

Tonight we will be showing the video of the Mighty Men’s Conference held in South Africa – it’s a documentary presentation by Angus Buchan of his vision. You will see the setting up of the biggest tent in the world and how it proved to be too small for the conference. I really encourage you to come along (and to bring something for shared tea). If you need a lift please call me and I will fetch you and deliver you home afterwards.

Rev David de Kock

Our focus today is on the new heart that Christ brings into our life.

• A Heart of confidence
• A heart of compassion, and
• A Heart of concern for Christian growth

Let me tell you the story of Alma and Steve. They were a couple from England who had settled in South Africa, in Benoni, in fact. They were not married to each other. Steve had never married and Alma was widowed with 3 boys in their late twenties. Steve and Alma had a daughter of their own – she was 4 years old.

They owned a pet shop specializing in aquarium fish. Alma also grew medicinal herbs on their small holding and operated as a kind of medicine woman in the area.

One day Alma walked into the school hall where we were having a church service. She had a kind of glum look on her face, and smelled of tobacco smoke and human sweat. Her hair was untidy and her clothes needed a good wash.

She didn’t have a clue about church. She didn’t know when to sit and when to stand. She was uncomfortable singing – and we sang a lot, and with gusto. But she listened with deep intent to the sermon. After the service she shot out before anyone could talk to her.

The next week she was back and again she left in a hurry. This carried on for a couple of weeks, then she brought Steve with her and the little girl went to Sunday school. They stayed afterwards and she pounced on me. “Tell me more about this God stuff” she said. We went to her house and after scooting the 7 huge Alsatians off the lounge furniture and gingerly taking my seat amidst the mounds of dog hair and an overpowering doggy smell, we began to talk.

To cut a long story short, their life, like their personal hygiene, garden and house, was in a mess. Everything that could go wrong had gone wrong. They were in huge financial difficulties. Although the house and car was paid off and they had thousands of valuable tropical fish – they had barely enough money from their shop takings to buy dog food, cigarettes and bread – in that order.

I spoke to them about Jesus and the Christian life. They hung onto every word – they had never heard it before.

In the end they gave their lives to Jesus, were baptized in their swimming pool (once it had been cleaned) and were rid of the demons that had come into their life through their involvement in an occultic organisation.

It was the most amazing transformation that I had ever seen. They cleaned themselves up, tidied their garden and house and seemed to have permanent smiles on their faces. And, oh yes, they also got married and little Emma was baptized.

It was an extraordinary display of God’s power. We can have A Heart of confidence in the power of God to change lives.

In Paul’s letter to the Philippians he greets the church in the customary way and tells them of his thankfulness to God for their life as Christians. He says: “I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now.”

The founding of the Church in Philippi is a great story of God’s power at work. Paul and Silas, with Timothy and Luke tagging along, came to Philippi after Paul had seen a vision of a man of Macedonia begging them to come and help them. Philippi was a Roman colony, perched in the mountain pass that linked Asia and Europe, so it was quite a strategic city. But because it was primarily a Roman colony there was no synagogue there. So on the Sabbath they went outside the city to the river where they thought there might have been a place of prayer. There they found a group of women gathered, one of them being Lydia, a wealthy merchant woman from Thyatira, who was a worshipper of God. We’re told in Acts 16 that the Lord opened her heart to the message of the gospel and she became a Christian. She then invited them to her house, and effectively began the first Church there in Philippi. So here was a wealthy Greek woman who became one of the first Church planters. But then as they started moving around the city, a slave girl began to follow them. She had an evil spirit by which she predicted the future. She wasn’t your modern day fortune teller. She really could tell the future. And she started following Paul and the rest around shouting out “These men are servants of the Most High God, who are telling you how to be saved.” Well, eventually Paul got so sick of this that he turned around and commanded the evil spirit to come out of her. And she was healed. So there was now a rich merchant woman and a slave girl who had been touched by the gospel.
But then the owners of the slave girl, who’d been charging people to have their fortunes told started a riot and had Paul and Silas arrested for throwing the city into an uproar and for advocating customs unlawful for Romans to accept or practice. So Paul and Silas were thrown into prison.

Well, in prison with their feet in stocks, they began praying and singing hymns to God. They’d seen God’s power change the direction of Lydia’s life, they’d seen the slave girl freed from her bondage to an evil spirit and, like Steve and Alma, nothing was going to stop them praising God, not even being chained up in a dungeon. But there was more of God’s power at work for them to experience. As they were singing an earthquake began to shake the very foundations of their prison. The doors flew open and everyone’s chains came loose. The jailer was about to commit suicide rather than risk being thrown into jail in the place of his escaped charges, but Paul chose to stay and help him, rather than escape and take his freedom. The response of the jailer was immediate: “What must I do to be saved?” Paul told him “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, along with your whole household.” And so he and his whole family were baptized. So the Church in Philippi had begun, with a rich merchant woman, a poor slave and a middle class prison officer who all experienced the power of God in different but equally effective ways.
So as Paul writes to the Philippians he can say with great assurance: “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” He remembers the way God’s work in them began, in the changed lives, the changed hearts of those first few believers, and he continues to have confidence that God will bring the work he began in them to a conclusion on the day when Christ returns.

Before Steve and Alma became Christians they had no concept of the love of God. They hadn’t known anything of the work of Jesus Christ. But God touched their heart in a real and decisive way. They came to discover that God has the power to change lives. It was a real privilege for me to see it happen. It was exciting to see them coming to know Christ in a real and personal way. And it was all due to the work of God in their life changing them and making them new.
That’s the sort of experience that Paul is looking back on as he writes of his confidence that God will bring his work in them to its completion.

This new life also creates in us A heart of compassion

The experience Paul had in sharing the gospel with the church in Philippi left him with a deep affection for them, and vice versa. He says “I long for you with the affection of Christ Jesus.” Paul was no softie. He was as tough as anything when it came to facing opposition to the gospel. In fact in Philippi, when the authorities released him, he didn’t just walk away as you or I might have. No, he pointed out to them that he and Silas were both Roman citizens who had been publicly beaten without trial, quite illegally, and demanded what amounted to a public apology from the magistrates. So he could be tough when the occasion warranted it. But he also had a softer side – he showed affection for this church.  
Jesus also was hard when it came to those who refused to listen to God speaking through him. Some of the harshest words in the New Testament in fact appear on the lips of Jesus. But he also loved those he came to save with a life-giving love. Paul exhorts us to have the mind of Christ in the way we relate to others, but he shows us here right at the start that he has that mindset himself.
He longs for them with the compassion, or affection, of Christ Jesus. And what is it he longs for? That their love “may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.” He wants their love to overflow the way his love for them is overflowing.

This isn’t some gushy, sentimental sort of love. The love he’s talking about overflows with knowledge and insight.

A knowledge of God perhaps. A knowledge born out of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. A knowledge that, ultimately, comes from God’s Holy Spirit. A knowledge of what pleases God.

And how do we find on that knowledge? By being students of God’s word so we grow in our grasp of the truth, in our grasp of the gospel. But it is also a knowledge of humanity. Of the weaknesses and foibles of our fellow Christians.

A knowledge that helps us to empathise with one another, to make allowances for the failings of our fellow mortals. A knowledge of what might be helpful to another person in a given situation.

That seems to be the idea behind the word insight. Insight is that faculty which allows our love to be directed in a way that’s right for a particular situation, or for a particular person. Insight allows us to see through the obvious or the superficial to the deeper significance of what’s below the surface, to get to the root of the matter, so we can know how to act in the most loving way. Again this is something the Holy Spirit gives us as we ask him for it.

Finally then, this new life gives us a Heart of concern for Christian growth

Paul’s prayer is that their love would overflow in knowledge and insight in both the personal and global sphere.
It’s personal because his aim is that they might each be found to be pure and blameless in the day of Christ. That their overflowing love for God will result in lives that are kept pure and without sin. But it’s also global, because the result of such purity of life will be that they’ll reap a great harvest of righteousness.

It seems to me that when Paul talks about a harvest of righteousness, he’s looking beyond our personal righteousness, to the righteousness that will spring up in the hearts of others who see us and are drawn to the gospel like a moth to a flame. It’s as though the love we show becomes a seed that’s planted in the hearts of those around us.
It’s like a contagious disease. The sort of life he’s talking about, you see … a life characterised by love overflowing in knowledge and insight and purity and righteousness, is a very attractive thing. People love being near people whose character exhibits that sort of love. Just think how effective we’d be in spreading the gospel if our whole life was characterised by that sort of love!

Do you ever pray that sort of prayer for the people of Merredin? Do you ever pray that sort of prayer for me, or the other leaders of the congregation? Let me suggest that it would be a great thing to pray every day for those named on the front cover of the Newsletter. And for those named on the Joys and Concerns page and for those celebrating birthdays and wedding anniversaries and for the two families that we pray for anyway each week.

Pray that their love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help them determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ they may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.
Paul prays with confidence and joy because he knows that in the end, it’s God who determines our future, not our outward circumstances or the various schemes of human beings. He knows that our place in God’s family has come about by God’s grace alone and that God’s grace is sufficient to keep us there, that God can be trusted to see us through. He prays out of the love he has for them, that the same love, the love of Christ would flow out of their hearts and fill them to overflowing. And he prays in confidence because he knows that the harvest of righteousness that he’s asking for itself comes through Jesus Christ by the grace of God. 
We too are recipients of God’s saving grace. Each one of us is here because God has worked a miracle in our lives. None of us would have chosen Christ if God hadn’t first chosen us.
So let Paul’s prayer be ours as well: that our love would overflow in knowledge and full insight so we’d be able to determine what’s best, so we might be found pure and blameless in the day of Christ and so our lives might bear a harvest of righteousness, not only in our own lives but in the lives of those we influence by our love, for the glory and praise of God.

This is very different to the romantic love that has become attached to    Valentine’s Day since Miss Esther Howland of Colorado in the USA sent the first Valentines Day card to her lover in the 1800’s. In a sense this   became an americanisation of the Roman pagan festival of Lupercalia. In early Rome boys and girls were kept strictly apart but on the Festival of Juno – the Roman Queen of goddesses, all the girls put their names in a jar and the boys drew them out and the couple so drawn were partners for the duration of the festival of Lupercalia. The idea was one of a short term romantic liaison – very different to Valentine’s concern for the sanctity of marriage.

So today, use the moment to celebrate your spouse. It is so easy for us to feel as if the love has grown cold, and the relationship has become boring, but from that’s not true. We have just drifted into taking each other for granted. Do something different today to show that your love is still as real as ever!

Please note that there will be NO SNAC meeting tonight. We decided last week to meet on the 1^st & 3^rd Sundays when I don’t go to Southern Cross. Next Sunday we will show the Mighty Men Video.

Be reminded that the Men’s Breakfast is on Saturday and the Parish Council meet will also meet on Saturday at the church.

From this week I will be in the church office on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings from 8.30am to 1pm. Once a month I will be in Bruce Rock on a Tuesday but I will give notice of that. Please feel free to make an appointment. My contact number at any time is 9041 1117.

God bless
Rev David de Kock

Wayne at the Church of Christ has let us know about some upcoming training sessions they are holding. Ron and Justine Simms will be holding the following training sessions in the next few days.

7.00pm Thurs 11th Feb “Intimacy with God and Worship”
7.00pm Friday 12 Feb “Life in the spirit and Kingdom Living”

Saturday 13th Feb
Morning session – “Baptism of the Spirit and Gifts of the Spirit”
Afternoon session – Teaching and Workshop – “The Prophetic”
Evening session @ 7.00pm “Carrying the Presence of God – Part 1”

9.30am Sunday Worship service “Carrying the presence of God Part 2″
7.00pm Sunday “Bringing revival to Australia”

The Church of Christ is located on the corner of Throssell & Hunter Streets Merredin. For further Details/Times Etc you can contact Wayne on 0427 099 002.

God Bless,

Dave Q

1. They are rooted in a relationship with God

2. They outline human response to the grace of God

3. They move faith from the abstract to the actual by specifying behaviour

TEN IMPORTANT QUESTIONS

1. Do you honor anything or anyone above the one true God?
2. Has God been replaced by something physical or material in your life?
3. Have you dishonored God’s name by using it in a frivolous manner?
4. Is your work more important than your relationship with God?
5. Do you honor your father and mother?
6. Do you value human life?
7. Have you kept your marriage vows?
8. Do you respect other’s rights of ownership?
9. Do you tell the truth?
10. 10. Are you content with what you have or do you covet the possessions, relationships and successes of others?”

4. They require personal responsibility for the well being of the community

5. They illustrate the connection between our vertical relationship with God and our horizontal relationships with each other

In the introduction to her book, The Ten Commandments, Dr. Laura Schlessinger writes; “Each day we make many, seemingly minute decisions about things that don’t really seem earth shattering. So what if we broke a promise? So what if we find passion in another bed while we or they are still married? So what if we are too focused on work, TV, or clubs to spend time with our family? So what if religion is not a big deal in our lives? When one adds up all the so-what’s,” one ends up with a life without direction, meaning, purpose, value, integrity, or long-range joy.”

I doubt that you can find another passage in the Bible that so concisely, clearly and compassionately outlines the grace of God and the response to that grace human beings are called to make than the Ten Commandments.

So lets turn to Exodus 20 and read verses 1-17.
And God spoke all these words:

^?2? “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. ^?3? “You shall have no other gods before me.

^?4? “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. ^?5? You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, ^?6? but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

^?7? “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

^?8? “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. ^?9? Six days you shall labor and do all your work, ^?10? but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. ^?11? For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

^?12? “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you. ^?13? “You shall not murder. ^?14? “You shall not commit adultery. ^?15? “You shall not steal. ^?16? “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

^?17? “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

I want to about why the Ten Commandments are so important. Any document that has lasted as long and has exerted as much influence on humanity as this one must have something going for it.
1. They are rooted in a relationship.
Look at Exodus 19:4 – 6.
^?4? ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. ^?5? Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, ^?6? you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.”

These are not arbitrary laws that require blind obedience to an invisible authoritarian. Vs.5 says, “If you keep my covenant.” A covenant is a sacred promise between two parties. You can have a contract without having a relationship. But you can’t have a covenant without one. The Ten Commandments are like a wedding vow in many ways.
God pledges his power and love and promises and presence to Israel. In turn, God expects Israel’s loyalty to himself and compassion toward others. God didn’t jot down the Ten Commandments then answer Israel’s question, “Why should we do this?” by saying, “Because I told you so.” Often, God does tell his people to obey because, “I am the Lord.” But even then his commands are predicated on this relationship. The Ten Commandments are built on responsibility. God is as bound by them as we are.

That’s why, in part, the Ten Commandments don’t work with people who don’t have a relationship with God. Why should a person avoid stealing if he or she doesn’t acknowledge the God who said, “Thou shalt not steal.”? Why should a person honor their marriage commitments if they haven’t already made a commitment to the God who said, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”?

The power of the Ten Commandments lies not in the fact that they are laws, but in that they are descriptions of how people live in relationship with God. It is true that they are law. But more than that, they are words that describe a relationship.

2. The Ten Commandments outline human response to the grace of God.
Exodus 19:1- 2 uses the word ” After” twice. In the third month after the Israelites left Egypt—on the very day—they came to the Desert of Sinai. ^?2? After they set out from Rephidim, they entered the Desert of Sinai, and Israel camped there in the desert in front of the mountain.

After what? Vs. 4 answers that question. “After I carried you on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself.”

And Exodus 20:2 says “I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”

Before God ever commands them to do anything or to refrain from doing anything, he saves them. Moses did not show up in Egypt with two stone tablets and say, “If you guys will agree to obey all these commands, God will deliver you from Egyptian slavery.” He showed up and said, “God has heard your cry and has sent me to deliver you.” Then, and only then, did God outline the response Israel was to make.

Exodus 19:4- 5 outline this order perfectly. Vs. 4 says, “You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself.”
Vs. 5 says, “Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession.” Deliverance first. Commandment second.

And you remember what happened just 40 days after they first received the commands? They decided to violate at least the first two of them by building the golden calf and having a pagan party. And what did God do? He forgave them and reissued the commands. That’s grace.

One objection we sometimes make about studying the Ten Commandments is that the law was nailed to the cross. We are saved by grace, not law, so why are we having a sermon on the ultimate example of law?
Well, even Paul in Romans, said that the law is good. But the law doesn’t save us, it does however describe how saved people respond to the grace that saved them.

3. The Ten Commandments move faith from the abstract to the actual by specifying behavior.
If you were to do a nationwide survey and ask people, “Do you believe in God?” I’ll bet the numbers would surprise you. A huge percentage would say, “Yes, absolutely, I believe in God.” But then if you examined their lives you’d find that what they profess to believe and how they live show very little correlation. I can say to Margie, “I love you.” But if I never act out that love in specific, concrete behavior, my words are empty.
Faith, like love, is too easily kept in the realm of theory. The Ten Commandments don’t allow us to claim belief in God without demonstrating that belief in concrete actions and behaviors. They require us to affirm our faith in the daily grind of living.

So instead of, “Do you believe in God?” the Ten Commandments ask us ten questions,

1. Do you honor anything or anyone above the one true God?

2. Has God been replaced by something physical or material in your life?

3. Have you dishonored God’s name by using it in a frivolous manner?

4. Is your work more important than your relationship with God?

5. Do you honor your father and mother?

6. Do you value human life?

7. Have you kept your marriage vows?

8. Do you respect other’s rights of ownership?

9. Do you tell the truth?

10. Are you content with what you have or do you covet the possessions, relationships and successes of others?”

To God, our answers to those specific questions about behavior and morality demonstrate our belief.

4. They require personal responsibility for the well being of the community.

The “you” in all these commands is singular. One of the reasons, maybe one of the top three reasons, our world is in such a moral mess right now, can be summed up in these words; “It’s not my problem.” Really, it doesn’t make a big impact on my life if someone in Perth covets his neighbor’s way of life. If someone in Kalgoorlie lies about a business investment, big deal. If someone murders an Indian in Melbourne, that’s just too bad. Those sins don’t affect me; it’s not my problem. The problem is, though, that almost everybody feels that way. And sooner or later you are going to be lied to, or robbed.
When God came down to the mountain, hundreds of thousands of people were gathered around its base. He didn’t address the crowd, though. He addressed each and every individual. “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt. You shall have no other gods before me. You, standing there by that rock, and you over by that cedar tree, and you too, the one in the red turban who is thinking in his heart how glad he is all these other people are hearing all these commands. I’m talking to you!” There is a connection between personal responsibility and the well fare of the community. The Ten Commandments shout at the top of God’s voice, “It is your problem!”

Every lie you tell or tolerate, every covetous thought you allow to live longer than a flash, every secret lust, every act of dishonesty, all of them matter. And the only way we will see our world healed is if we take the personal responsibility to make it holier and healthier beginning with ourselves.

5. They illustrate the connection between our vertical relationship with God and our horizontal relationships with each other.

The first four commands describe our relationship with God. The last 6 describe our relationships with each other.

In Mark 12 Jesus answered a question about which was the greatest command. He said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this; Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.” What Jesus did was summarize the Ten Commandments. Love God. Love your neighbor.

These days in our culture we’ve edited Jesus’ summation of the Ten Commandments from two down to one. As long as people love each other we’re happy. You can keep God, thanks. All you need is love. The problem is we can’t get everyone to love each other. You see God is love. You get rid of God, you lose love.

What sounds like a thoroughly New Testament teaching had its origin in the Ten Commandments. You can’t have a healthy, holy relationship with humans without having a healthy, holy relationship with God.

Texts: Leviticus 8:1-9, 1 Peter 2:4-12 & Mark 1:1-8

‘The Franklin Expedition to the North Pole in 1845, with 138 officers and men, carried a “1200 volume library, a hand organ playing fifty tunes, china place settings for officers and men, cutglass wine goblets, sterling silver flatware, and no special clothing for the Arctic, only the uniforms of Her Majesty’s Navy.” It was a noble enterprise, and they were nobly dressed for it. They all died. Their corpses were found with pieces of backgammon board and a great deal of table silver engraved with officer’s initials and family crests. Dignity was all.’ So writes Annie Dillard in her masterpiece of reflection on human expeditions and encounters with God, called “Teaching a Stone to Talk.”

Her experiences in the church’s worship are interweaved with commentary on polar explorations. She finds the amateurism distressing: “A high school stage play is more polished than this service we have been rehearsing since the year one. “In two thousand years”, she says, “we have not yet worked out the kinks.”

The attempts to be relevant are laughable: I have overcome a fiercely anti-Catholic upbringing”, she says, “in order to attend Mass, simply and solely to escape Protestant guitars.”

And though she says that “people in churches are like cheerful, brainless tourists on a tour of the Absolute” she cannot keep herself away, for this is the only bus heading that way. So she discards her dignity and throws in her lot with random people, joining the motley sublime, ludicrous people who show up in polar expeditions and church congregations.

But listen to this comment … “On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside of the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke?

The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. The ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares as we come in the door; they should lash us to the pews. For one day the sleeping God may awake and take offense, or the waking God may draw us out to where we can never return.”

“Week after week we witness the same miracle: that God, for reasons unfathomable, refrains from blowing our dancing bear act to smithereens. Week after week, Christ washes our dirty feet, handles our stinky toes, and repeats, ‘It is all right, believe it or not, to be people.’”

In the great mystery of our faith, God calls us into relationship with Him – into covenant. He knows exactly what it is that we are supposed to be and to do; we, for the most part, stumble along in the dark. We pore over the Bible to find the answers. Like a proud daughter after her first ballet lesson we do our worship pirouettes before our doting Father – its clumsy and graceless, but He smiles lovingly at us, as if we had rendered a world class performance of Swan Lake. We trip over our feet and our tongues, and despite it all, we are okay.

When God calls us, we have absolutely no idea of what it means and where it is going to lead us. We think we do, but for the most part, we are like a man lost, who refuses to ask directions. We go round and round, seeing the same landmarks and then at some point, we turn right, instead of left, and behold, there is our destination. Its never been far away at all.

The beginning of the Gospel is about John baptizing in the desert. All the people went out to him, for he was preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. They came because here was a man who seemed to know where he was going, and they were lost. Thousands were baptized by him but he always said that there would be one who would come after who would baptize with the Holy Spirit. While wholly within the mission of God, John was still playing with a chemistry set on the church floor – but he was warning the people to don their hard hats: the dynamite was about to explode.

And it exploded when Jesus preached his first sermon in Nazareth – “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor; he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

This was turnaround time, the stone was laid in Zion – the chosen and precious cornerstone. He called us out of darkness into His glorious light – He issued us with crash helmets and life preserving jackets, He lashed us to the pews.

And He called us … listen carefully to what He called us, “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God.” We are set apart from our fate, we are rescued from our destiny, we are set on a new course – indeed we are given new life.

Peter, in describing God’s turnaround of our destiny through the ministry of Jesus borrows the words from Hosea the prophet and turns them around. Hosea was instructed to take for himself an unfaithful wife. She bore two children and Hosea was instructed to name them Lo-Ammi (meaning “not my people”) and Lo-Ruhamah (meaning “not loved”, or “not having mercy”). They were symbolic of the destiny of God’s divided people: The Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah – people who were respectively “rejected” and “shown no mercy”.

Peter now says to us, once you were not a people (Lo-Ammi) now you are the people of God (Ammi-El); once you were not shown mercy (Lo-Ruhamah) now you have received mercy.

In Christ, Jesus has turned the tables on our destiny. In His death, He has given us life. By His stripes, we are healed.

We plod along on our journey, often not seeing its purpose and embarrassed about our worn clothes. But that’s not right. We are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. It might not seem like it to us, but our garments are of splendour – sparkling white, washed in the blood of the Lamb. We are robed in glory, we are headed, with the heavenly throng, to take our place before the Throne – to cry out Holiness and Glory to our magnificent God.

And it begins with our baptism. The first record of a ceremonial washing in the Bible comes with the preparation of Aaron and his sons to be ordained as priests of the Most High God.

The Lord said to Moses, “Bring Aaron and his sons.” Moses washed them and then dressed them in magnificent robes. They were a chosen people, a royal priesthood for a holy nation.

When we are baptized, we too become a chosen nation, a royal priesthood and a holy nation. It might not seem like that to us, but nothing in God’s economy is as it seems. We pray poorly worded prayers, we sing songs out of tunes, we miss God’s cues in the events of life – but it changes nothing.

In faith, we have come; in grace we are blessed.

We play games with God but He takes us seriously, because that is His promise, His covenant. He does not doubt us, He will not forsake us.

We are adorned in royal robes, we stand at the foot of the Throne, God bends forward to hear our whispered prayers – and we are playing with dynamite. Not because it is dangerous to do what we do, but because God takes us seriously. He has made a promise which He will not break, not even bend.

Paul says to Timothy …

If we died with Him, we will also live with Him,

If we endure, we will also reign with Him.

If we disown Him, He will disown us;

If we are faithless, He will remain faithful, for He cannot disown Himself.

God’s promise is certain and true, He will cleanse us, He will determine a new destiny for us.

If we reject His promise, He will allow Himself to be rejected, but He will remain faithful to His promise to us, because He has made Himself one with us in Christ.

This “baptizing” action has been part of the life of God’s people since the time of Moses. The ‘washing’ of Aaron’s body with water was the initial step in his ordination as the first priest of Israel, and Moses made it clear: “This is what the Lord has commanded to be done.” From that time on ceremonial washing was an essential part of Israel’s religious life. Baptism (and circumcision for males) was required for any non-Jew to convert to Judaism. When John the Baptist burst on the scene, he made the dramatic statement that even Jews needed to be baptized with a baptism of repentance because they had slipped from the life of faith and trust in God. And Jesus Himself was baptized in order to “fulfill all righteousness.” And He commanded us to be baptized as a sign of our covenant relationship with the Triune God.

So what does this covenant actually mean? Well, I’m going to leave the answer to that for the sermon. May your ears be open and your heart ready…

I will also partly address that question when we begin to look at the Ten Commandments at the SNAC (Sunday Night At Church) service this evening.  I want to address the fact that the power of the Ten Commandments (“Ten Words”, if we want to be literal) is not that they are laws but rather that they are descriptions of how we are to live in relationship with God. They turn the theory of our faith into a specific behaviour pattern. If I believe in God, then this is how my life is to be lived. Of course, I fail often. But the goal is not rendered impure just because I am not pure, this is why grace and forgiveness is so much a part of being a Christ follower. At the heart of my faith is my relationship with God, and because of His grace, our relationship holds intact, even when I fail. Hope to see you this evening.

Rev David de Kock

Texts: Ecclesiastes 5:8-20 & Isaiah 40:28-31

Learn Something New

Well here we are one month down, or a twelth of a year gone already. why is it that the older one gets the quicker the years flash past at several times the speed of light? ( well it seems like it does)

I wonder, is it Gods sense of Humour? or is it us getting wiser and realising finally that our sojourn here is a brief one indeed?

Some of you might have read the my say colum in the Mercury the week before last, where I spoke about New Years resolutions and why do we make them? why do we set our selves up for failure? why do we make a resolution that we can’t or maybe won’t keep?

And why can’t or won’t we keep them?

As I said in the paper it’s Possibly because we ( when I say we I’m talking rehtorically) tend to make these resolutions when we are at our most vulnerable.  just after midnight when one may be anebriated or the next day when the same one may be suffering a hangover. I can remember back to my youth hearing people say that they will never drink again after a heavy night on New Years Eve.( funny that?)

New Year’s Eve has always been a time for looking back to the past, and more importantly, forward to the coming year. It’s a time to reflect on the changes we want (or need) to make and resolve to follow through on those changes. Did your New Year resolutions make the top ten list.

This list and comentary’s was taken from the NYE website Australia.  I ‘m slightly gobsmacked that there was a website dedicated to NYE and frivolous resolutions which I’m sure the vast majority have no intention of keeping.

If you have a look at the Celebrity Resolutions it is enough to make your mind like mine, boggle at the inane and down right stupid things people make resolutions about. ( why I ask after reading this drivell are celebrities put up on pedastals?)

Anyway I digress here is the list of The Top Ten New Years Resolutions  for 2010 made by every day Australians like you and I.

1. Spend More Time with Family & Friends

Recent polls conducted by General Nutrition Centers, Quicken, and others show that more than 50% of Australians vow to appreciate loved ones and spend more time with family and friends this year.

2. Fit in Fitness

The evidence is in for fitness. Regular exercise has been associated with more health benefits than anything else known to man. Studies show that it reduces the risk of some cancers, increases longevity, helps achieve and maintain weight loss, enhances mood, lowers blood pressure, and even improves arthritis. In short, exercise keeps you healthy and makes you look and feel better.

3. Tame the Bulge

Fifty-five percent of adults in Australia are overweight, so it is not surprising to find that weight loss is one of the most popular New Year’s resolutions. Setting reasonable goals and staying focused are the two most important factors in sticking with a weight loss program, and the key to success for those millions of Australians who made a New Year’s commitment to shed extra pounds.

4. Quit Smoking

If you have resolved to make this the year that you stamp out your smoking habit, over-the-counter availability of nicotine replacement therapy now provides easier access to proven quit-smoking aids. Even if you’ve tried to quit before and failed, don’t let it get you down. On average, smokers try about four times before they quit for good. Start enjoying the rest of your smoke-free life!

5. Enjoy Life More

Given the hectic, stressful lifestyles of millions of Australians, it is no wonder that “enjoying life more” has become a popular resolution in recent years.

6. Quit Drinking

While many people use the New Year as an incentive to finally stop drinking, most are not equipped to make such a drastic lifestyle change all at once. Many heavy drinkers fail to quit cold turkey but do much better when they taper gradually, or even learn to moderate their drinking. If you have decided that you want to stop drinking, there is a world of help and support available.

7. Get Out of Debt

Was money a big source of stress in your life last year? Join the millions of Australians who have resolved to spend this year getting a handle on their finances. It’s a promise that will repay itself many times over in the year ahead.

8. Learn Something New

Have you vowed to make this year the year to learn something new? Perhaps you are considering a career change, want to learn a new language, or just how to fix your computer? Whether you take a course or read a book, you’ll find education to be one of the easiest, most motivating New Year’s resolutions to keep. Challenge your mind in the coming year, and your horizons will expand.

9. Help Others

A popular, non-selfish New Year’s resolution, volunteerism can take many forms. Whether you choose to spend time helping out at your local library, mentoring a child, or building a house, these nonprofit volunteer organizations could really use your help.

10. Get Organized

On just about every New Year resolution top ten list, organization can be a very reasonable goal. Whether you want your home organized enough that you can invite someone over on a whim, or your office organized enough that you can find the stapler when you need it, these tips and links should get you started on the way to a more organized life.

All these are well worthwhile resolutions, has anyone one here made one of these resolutions? And have you so far kept them?

A New Year resolution is a commitment that an individual makes to a project or a habit, often a lifestyle change that is generally interpreted as advantageous. The name comes from the fact that these commitments normally go into effect on New Year’s Day and remain until the set goal has been achieved, although many resolutions go unachieved & are often broken fairly shortly after they are set.

All this got me to thinking that as Chritians we well know, or should know, that trying to do things in our own strength is usually a recipe for disaster.

For instance how does one forgive ones nieghbour? When we’d much rather hold a grudge, thereby feeling superior in our self-righteousness. How do we  love our enemies? etc. the answer,we know, is that alone  we can’t. but if we ask God and trust in him then all things are possible. in   Matthew 19:26 also Mark 10:27 Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible. ( the camel through the eye of a needle quote)

So? Should we make New Years Resolutions? I believe so. If we have things in our lives that are not glorifying to God then it probably is a good idea to change that which is holding us back.

Although I generally don’t make resolutions, New Years or otherwise I think there are probably quite a few times when a New Resolution may be just the thing I need to keep me on track with God. How about you?

I found this Quote on a website called Clarity in God which sums up what I’m trying to say…

ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE

It is not God that you must convince…. It I is you that you must convince. God knows He loves you. You must know and believe He loves you. God knows health and healing is already paid for and settled. You must know that as well. God has done His part in all areas. And we must do our part.

So if you happen to be someone who makes New Years resolutions or even if you don’t. It really is important to Know that all things ARE possible in Christ Jesus Our Lord and Saviour. AMEN

My heart has been stirred at the Wednesday Prayer Meeting as we have sought to understand the meaning and purpose of “Revival”. This past week we saw that when you are convinced about the truth of something, that conviction takes a hold of your life. (I touched on this last Sunday morning too, so God must be saying something!) My own conviction is that I (and probably other Christians too) are satisfied with far less than the fullness of God’s promise, and we are easily strangled by the world and its expectations. Let me illustrate, outside my study window is a lemon tree. It had been invaded by a creeper and if I had left it, the creeper would have strangled the tree. However I cut off the invading tendrils and as I look at the tree now I see the dead remnant of the creeper still twined through the branches – they have no more stranglehold but they are still a burden and they make the tree look ugly. Our lives are often like that – we come to Jesus, we cut the ties with sin but we still feel their burden, fearful that they will somehow regain power. The strangling vine of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil invaded the Tree of Life – we might have cut the life from the vine but we must also drag the dead branches from the tree if we want to know life in its fullest. A new book about the Pope John Paul II tells that he used flagellation to bring himself closer to Jesus. The idea is similar but perhaps a bit extreme. I believe that we simply need to be more certain of our faith and trust in the power of God to remove our sins from us “as far as the East is from the West.” The promise of Jesus is NEW LIFE – and it is so radically different to the old life that Jesus explained it to Nicodemus as being ‘born again’. Let’s step out in faith, believing that we ARE ‘born again’, we DO have a new life. The old has gone and the new has come – and the new life is brimming with promise. It is the abundant life!

Our new Junior Youth Group starts Friday at 5pm. It’s open for all children from Year 3 to Year 7 (Hope I got that right!) It’s going to be fun!!! (Volunteers contact me)

On Sunday evening we have our first SNAC service, starting at 6pm. Bring some food to share. After tea we will look at why the Ten Commandments are still relevant today. I will be in Southern Cross the following week so we will then have a movie on the Mighty Men’s Conference.

God bless
Rev David de Kock

Roy Robertson, a former sailor, founder of “The Navigators” and staff member of the Billy Graham organisation gives this testimony:

“My ship, the West Virginia, docked at Pearl Harbor on the evening of December 6, 1941. A couple of the fellows and I left the ship that night and attended a Bible study. About fifteen sailors sat in a circle on the floor. The leader asked us to each recite our favorite scripture verse. In turn each sailor shared a verse and briefly commented on it. I sat there in terror. I couldn’t recall a single verse. I grew up in a Christian home, went to church three times a week, but I sat there terrified. I couldn’t recall a single verse. Finally, I remembered one verse – John 3.16. I silently rehearsed it in my mind. The spotlight of attention grew closer as each sailor took his turn. It was up to the fellow next to me. He recited John 3.16. He took my verse! As he commented on it I sat there in stunned humiliation. In a few moments everyone would know that I could not recall from memory even a single verse. Later that night I went to bed thinking, ’Robertson, you’re a fake.’ At 7:55 the next morning I was awakened by the ship alarm ordering us to battle stations. 360 planes of the Japanese Imperial Fleet were attacking our ship and the other military installations. My crew and I raced to our machine gun emplacement, but all we had was practice ammunition. So for the first fifteen minutes of the two hour battle, we only fired blanks, hoping to scare the Japanese airplanes. As I stood there firing fake ammunition I thought, ’Robertson, this is how your whole life has been — firing blanks for Christ.’ I made up my mind as Japanese bullets slammed into our ship, ’If I escape with my life, I will get serious about following Jesus.’”

When it comes to finding real joy in our life, pretty much all of us are simply firing blanks. We live in an age consumed by entertainment. All around us advertisements tell us that there is absolutely nothing money can’t buy to make our lives happier. Many Christian people talk about joy; some actually show joy — at least when they’re near other believers. But all too often our experience lacks the real joy of the abundant life which the Bible promises.

Paul in the four short chapters of Philippians, uses the word “joy” six times as his frame of reference. He cared a lot about this church. He had been instrumental in founding it on his second “missionary journey”. We read in Acts 16, how Paul had wanted to go north with the gospel (through what we used to call the “Eastern-bloc” countries), but a strong vision of a Macedonian man calling-out for his help he was compelled to cross the Aegean Sea towards Greece, and the European continent.

The first town Paul encountered was Philippi. His first convert was Lydia, and she opened her home for the first (and only) church Paul ever allowed to financially support his work. This church evidently had a number of members gifted by God with a giving spirit. They not only supported Paul, but, even though they were themselves poor, got involved in seeing to the needs of the poor at Jerusalem. This is a secret we see in Philippians — You are in a better position to receive when your hand is open to give.

This letter is all about the search for genuine joy. It is a call back to the roots of our Christian faith and the joy that is to be found in the life lived in Christ.

In contrast, we live in a society that has gone materialistically mad!

We have become isolated

We have lost the sense of community. We live largely in isolation from one another and the world. We are isolated in our homes, transfixed by our TV gods; protected from interruption by our answering machines and we have insulated ourselves from human touch.

Second, we have become selfish

Frank Sinatra established the anthem of the era in his song, “I did it my way”.

Third, there is a growing air of ambivalence

We used to be passionate, with fire in our bellies. We used to have a sense of right and wrong; of good and evil. Today feelings are as dependent upon the direction of the prevailing winds, as on any code of morals or values.

One of the reasons our society is where it is.. why it has no interest in life, is that we see no firmness of commitment to an ethic, or to ideals, or to each other.

Fourth, our focus is on human rights

We have become so obsessed with gender, human sexuality and empowerment issues that we have lost all clear and balanced Biblical thinking.

Our contemporary culture has made us isolated, selfish, ambivalent, individualistic and ultra gender sensitive. It seems to me that we are leaving no joy-filled legacy for the next generation.

Paul writes in Philippians about genuine joy. The one truly satisfying (joyful) condition is a surrender to the saving grace and Lordship of Jesus Christ. Only salvation, coupled with a lifetime of discipleship provides the genuine joy of which Paul speaks. Everything else is diversion!

And the most joyful people are the believers who practice their faith, faithfully everyday – pursuing this “long obedience in the same direction”. And as they do that they discover the things which Paul addresses in his letter to the Philippians:

1. JOY OF PURPOSE Philippians 1:1

Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons:

Paul called himself and Timothy “servants”. The word literally means slave.” That doesn’t sound particularly joyful but to go from servant, with some choices and freedom, to slave, totally bound to the will or whim of a master, has to have some strong motivation.

For Paul it was the realization that being “In Christ” was greater than anything else life offered.

Paul had a wide range of experience and education. He was self-motivated, self-actualized, self-justified and totally self-righteous. Then he met Jesus on the road to Damascus, and he discovered all that self stuff was empty and meaningless! Paul had been involved, accomplishing, and climbing social, political and personal ladders. But, compared to the loveliness of Christ, all that personal fulfillment stuff paled, lost its attractiveness and faded into oblivion.

From that moment Paul could see no further than the cross, and it drew him to offer himself as servant, then as slave of the Lord Jesus. Paul used the phrase “In Christ,” or “In the Lord” some 150 times in his letters. Much like a fish lives “in water”, Paul could feel the close, comforting, compelling presence of Jesus in every waking moment. Paul had given himself over to the cause of Christ – it had become his purpose.

There is something unique and joyful about people who are driven from within, in a noble cause that is from above.

For each of us there is a person out there whom you must face someday. It is the person you are becoming. The purpose you give yourself to now is the person you will become. Paul gave himself to Christ as Lord and Master — slave for life! The spiritual principle is that the slave will do the Master’s will, and in the doing, become like the Master. In Christ, Paul’s life was purpose-filled, purposeful, and he was focused on the “joy set before him.”

2. JOY OF PEACE Philippians 1:2

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God every time I remember you.

In his letters, Paul did a most remarkable thing which we often overlook – He brought together the words “grace” and “peace”. Grace is the Greek word, the Hebrew is peace. The order is theological; grace comes first (from God), and then peace follows.

Many people are looking for peace (both public and private), but are looking in all the wrong places. Politicians negotiate treaties, supposing that peace is the result. Policemen are sometimes called “peace officers”, supposing that legal order passes for inner peace (joy). The popularity of alcohol and drugs manifests the craving for peace, as people attempt to gain escape from the war (within and without) by getting “high” for a few hours.

The “high” that is really needed is grace. You cannot experience peace until you’ve known grace. There can never be a friendship with God — the “peace that passes understanding” – until there is a settlement of the wages of sin that comes by the grace of God. The joy of peace comes after the gift of grace through the cross. The order is important for the peace which brings the joy must be built on the solid foundation of God’s grace.

A foreman was once called to inspect a concrete basin at a sewerage plant. He asked a worker if the bottom of the basin was solid. The man replied, “Solid as a rock”. The boss, being a man of action, promptly waded in. To his great surprise he slowly sank up to his waist in the gooey mess, and as he was going down he yelled at the worker, “I thought you said this bottom was solid?” The worker replied, “It IS, boss, you just ain’t come to it yet!”

If you’ve looked for your peace in a better job or bigger car, a prettier wife, more leisure time, or anything else, you may be a person of action, but you haven’t come to THE SOLID ROCK! Peace comes after the grace which is found in the relationship with Jesus.

3. JOY OF PRAYER Philippians 1.4, 5 (NIV)

In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now,

The Philippian church had been faithful. Their gifts, prayers and encouragement had followed and undergirded Paul throughout his ministry.

Many times during the ministry I have felt low, struggling with issues and people. When both my brother and my Dad died in the same year I experienced a particularly depressive time. But it was the prayers and messages of comfort that came from my congregation which undergirded me. It was the fact that my family dropped everything to stand by me that pulled me up. It was the elders who granted me two month’s Sabbatical leave who showed me that I could refind that joy.

It was those who are in partnership with me in the gospel who through prayer and support gave me back my joy. Real joy is undergirded with prayer.

4. JOY OF PERSUASION Philippians 1.6

“being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”

The world is constantly bombarding us with new thoughts and plans but without confidence in what you yourself know to be right, you cannot function like God intended. You need to be sure of what you believe.

A minister was doing his usual “children’s sermon” during the morning service. They were gathered on the floor around him. “Tell me, kids, what is furry, gray and lives in a tree?” No reply. “Okay, let me give you a better hint. What’s furry, gray, lives in a tree and eats nuts?” Nothing! “One of you must have the answer.” Dead quiet. “All right, see if you can get it on this; what’s furry, gray, has a long bushy tail, eats nuts, and lives in a tree?” Little Johnny only half-raised his hand. “Ahh, John, you know?” “Sir,” said the hesitant Johnny, “I know the answer must be Jesus, but it sure sounds like a squirrel to me.”

What are you absolutely certain about? What really important things (i.e.: that which will still matter a hundred years from now) are you certain about? Paul was convinced about the salvation which comes by the love of God.

“For I am CONVINCED that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Rom 8.38, 39

Are you confident in God’s love and His plans for you? In that confidence you will know joy.

5. JOY OF PARTICIPATION Philippians 1.7 (NIV)

“It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me.

There’s a certain joy about participating together in kingdom work. Oh yes, there is a camaraderie that develops when people work together in other fields but there is nothing quite like being involved in Kingdom work in the fullness of the grace of God.

Gary Inrig, in his book, “Hearts of Iron, Feet of Clay” tells the story of an evangelist whom God had used in a significant way in England, and how he drifted into a life of sin. Most of his sin was private, but the burden was so great that he left the ministry. Finally, when the man realized what a fool he’d been, he came back to the Lord like the prodigal from the pigpen. He found exactly what the prodigal son had found, a loving Father who received him back, blessed and re-strengthened him.

After a long period of waiting, he felt called back to ministry. However, he constantly feared that his sin would come back to haunt him and cripple his ministry. After a time, he was finally able to rejoice in the forgiveness of God. One night in Aberdeen, he was given a sealed note just before the service. It described the shameful events of his sin years ago. His stomach churned as he read, “If you have the gall to preach tonight, I’ll stand and expose you”.

The evangelist took the letter and went on his knees. When he stood to address the crowd. He began by reading the note … every word. Then he said, “I want to make it clear that this letter is true. I’m ashamed of what I’ve done. I come tonight not as one who is perfect, but as one who is forgiven”.

He knew the grace of God and he knew that he was in partnership with God in His work – despite his past.

What have you done?

What letter – if the truth be known – would you have to read? “Sinner” describes all of us, and it is all “first degree,” premeditated! So where’s the joy in that you may ask. That’s just the point – joy isn’t in sin! It’s in Jesus!

This letter to the Philippians is a call back to the community of faith (away from our isolation); it is a call back to self-denying serving (away from our selfish ways); it is a call back to standing for Christ-likeness and Godly living (in spite of today’s pluralistic trends); and it is a call to respect and cooperation between men and women of God – a partnership in the gospel. It is a call to servanthood – that which Jesus was, and what He wants us to be. It is a call out of the place of “no joy”, and into the kingdom of God. And there we would find our purpose, our peace, our prayers in partnership, our persuasion, our participation in the gospel, and our joy …real joy!

• The morning KYB Bible study starts Monday 1 February at 10.00am
• The evening KYB Bible study starts Wednesday 3 February at 7.30pm
• Junior Youth Group starts Friday 5 February from 5 – 6.30pm
• SNAC (Sunday Night At Church) begins Sunday 7 February at 6.00pm
• The Great Eastern Gathering – Saturday 6 February in Quairading
• Mighty Men’s Conference 26-28 February. Please give your completed registration form and money to Dave Quinn or you can register online at www.mightymensconference.org.au.
• KUCA Camp is on 5-7 of March. Please see Lisa Arthur for more details.

In this connection I have been meditating recently on Ps 126 whose theme is about the turnaround which God brings into our lives. The people had been captive in Babylon for 70 years and the Lord has suddenly set them free .. they feel like men who had dreamed; their mouths were filled with laughter; they are stunned by the turnaround in their fortunes. One of the delights of the Lord is that things will not always be as they have been, there IS a promise of a new day and so as we live now, between the burden of yesterday and the restoration of tomorrow, let us always keep our joy. And we do that by simple trust in the Lord who always makes good His promise.

While the year is really only just getting started, we have some good plans in hand to meet our objectives of reaching out to the community in 2010. A lot of these are related to finding our own motivation and the encouraging of one another. I intend for this year that the morning sermons will help us to walk worthily with Jesus in the new life He has given us. We will also start a SNAC (Sunday Night at Church) service in the evening from February 7^th.  We will start with a shared tea and then have a service. I intend that the service will appeal to all the young at heart, will be different, interesting and upbuilding. I’ll tell you more about it next week. Specifically I hope to reach the worldview of the young adults but I am sure that it will be very encouraging even for older folk (and beside, they have to bring the food!).

Aiming at the younger children we have Toddler Jam started up soon and also another group on Friday evenings for older children and young teenagers. We start on February 5^th. And children, don’t forget to register for KUCA Camp Out which takes place over the weekend March 6 to 7.  Sunday School starts next Sunday.

On Wednesday evenings our prayers continue to be focused on revival in our town. We are being encouraged by Ken Terhoven’s book, Breath of Heaven – a selection of inspirational messages from Revivals of past centuries. Please feel free to come along for the hour.

I am still sorting out times when I will definitely be at the church office during the day but if you need to get hold of me at any time, call 90411117. Even if I am not home, the call will transfer to my mobile, at no additional cost to you.

May our Lord bless us with abundance in the year ahead.

Rev David de Kock

Life is an interesting journey, it is filled with all kinds of apparent anomalies and yet it is perfectly balanced … if we could only see beyond the immediately apparent situation into the greater vistas of God. 

Much of life, particularly when we are caught up in its pain and struggle, is filled with us calling out to God for His help  and yet, in a kind of paradox of the faith, His help only comes when we respond to the call that He has already placed on us.

I remember when I first understood God’s call to me to enter the ministry – I was 27 years old and a brand new Christian. I was struggling with a lot of things in my life – I suppose it was that time when you finally have to shrug off the vestiges of bachelordom and accept the fact that with two children in the house you have to settle down, be more careful of your money and look beyond the immediate satisfaction of your desires. I looked at my life thus far and found it wanting … but I didn’t know what it needed.

I called out to God in the nights, when everyone was asleep …. “what is my life? what must I do? where must I go?”

I had not yet accepted Jesus as Saviour and Lord of my life and yet I knew that there was God. I had been to a church boarding school and knew all the jargon and ceremony .. But I did not yet know Jesus ..

And in my calling out to this unknown God, I discovered that He had been calling out to me for a long time already.

He spoke to me one night …. Clear as anything, I heard His words, “Many times I have longed to come to you but I have been prevented from doing so until now ….” I later discovered that these are the words of Romans 1:13 and these words were clear and powerful enough to wrench me out of my own struggle to understand life, and to put meaning to it …

It would be another 16 years before I would be ordained into fulltime ministry but it set a revelation in my heart that when we call out to God we will discover that He has already called us.

This is no anomaly of life, this is reality in the spiritual dimension – God is focussed on us,

He is intent on restoring us back into relationship with Him. I don’t know why that is, but that’s what the Bible is all about – God’s pursuit of intimacy with that part of His creation made in His own image.

We are presently in the season of Epiphany – that period in the church calendar which comes after Christmas and in which we begin to explore the incredible purpose of the incarnation of Christ. Why did God become Immanuel? God with us!

Epiphany is a hard word to explain – it is a state of sudden and unexpected realisation of an eternal truth. Paul Cannon defined it in our first combined service two weeks ago as an “a-ha moment”.

It’s a flash of the revelation of glory – in this instance, the realisation that Jesus came amongst us as part of the eternal plan of God to restore the lost relationship between God and that part of His creation made in His image.

And the dawning realisation that this is not just about us who think that we have already found the way, but perhaps especially for those who are lost on the way: the strugglers and stragglers and ragamuffins who grab at hope in so many wrong places.

Our text from Isaiah sums up this spiritual reality in a most profound way …

God calls out to creation ….             “Listen to me, you islands ;             Hear this, you distant nations …”

And then we have a prophetic pre-incarnate word from Jesus, of how the Father called Him to His task in incarnation …             “Before I was born, the LORD called me … He said to me, ‘You are my servant and in You will I display my splendour’ …

He formed me in the womb … TO BE HIS SERVANT .. ….TO BRING JACOB BACK TO HIM AND GATHER ISRAEL TO HIMSELF.”

Before Jesus was born … when He was in unity with the Father in the heavenlies, He was called to bring Jacob back to God ….and Israel to Himself …

NOW LETS JUST PAUSE HERE A MOMENT … Follow this with me….

Jacob and Israel are the same person … the son of Isaac.

The name is also used interchangeably to speak of God’s people – the sons of Abraham.

In the physical realm we see this nation as representing Judaism, but in the spiritual realm Israel and Jacob represent all of God’s people – EVERYONE : believers and surprisingly, also those who are not yet believers.

“Jacob” was the name given by Isaac to his son. It means deceiver or grabber. It is used frequently to refer to those who still doubt, those who have not yet fully come to faith in Christ Jesus.

“Israel” was the name that God gave to Jacob after wrestling with him through the night at Peniel on the Jabbok river.

That night Jacob became a believer and God changed his name from “Jacob the deceiver” to “Israel, the one who struggles with God.”

Interestingly though, God most often continues to identify Himself as the God of Jacob … He longs for the deceivers and grabbers to come home to Him.

Most of us are on a journey to God but we have not yet arrived ..

Its true that we all want to be there, even those who are still very far from God – deeply lost in sin and transgression – but its also true that we are confronted by many obstacles. Just living in this world is one of them.

The point though is that God is focussed on restoring us all back to Him … the believers (Israel) and the world (Jacob).

The church is an important part of this as the prophecy from Isaiah continues to tell us.

“I will make you a light for the Gentiles that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth ….”

We are called also to follow in the way of Christ, as servants to also “restore the tribes of Jacob and to bring back those of Israel that I have kept.”

We have the same task as Jesus and yet the church has often been slothful in its fulfilment of the task. Perhaps its pride … that’s what God seems to imply.

He remarks in the text from Isaiah that while Jesus was formed in the womb to be a servant to bring back Jacob, we might consider it too small a thing to be God’s servant in this task

And that is true. Often the church is so full of pomp and ceremony that one wonders if she really has a servant heart at all.

And the servant heart is not so much about talking about social awareness as being hands on in the task of bringing backslidden Israel and reluctant Jacob back to God ..

This is the task of Jesus and it is the task of the church.

The Son of God was revealed (born of the flesh, son of the Virgin Mary, Immanuel – God with us) to take away the sin of the world. He is revealed by the Holy Spirit to Israel – to those who believe – that we might be strengthened and encouraged to fulfil the task to which we are called.

And so, lets go back to where we started …

God has called us into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord … long before we had called out to Him .. Paul says that he was called … that the church of God is called -  to be holy … and that all those everywhere who call on the name of Jesus … are given grace in Him .. are enriched in Him, in speaking and in knowledge .. and that they do not lack any spiritual gifts ..

Why? For what reason are we given grace and knowledge and spiritual gifts?

Because this is our task and we have been equipped for it.

He who is faithful and true has called the church to fulfil the task of restoring the lost back to God … We call out to God.. often with selfish intentions but He has already called us to a task – to minister His grace to Israel and to Jacob – to the church and to the world.

• December 27 – Final service of the year at 9.00am. All welcome.
• January 3 – Combined service at the Anglican Church – 9.00am
• January 10 – Combined service at the Church of Christ – 9.30am
• January 17 – Combined service at the Uniting Church – 9.00am
• January 17 – Moorditj Mia Nursing Home – 2.30pm
• January 24 – All church services return to normal – 9.00am

I watched a video clip on YouTube this week. The lady was saying that church music was developed to “put bums on seats and to entertain the audience”. She said that in the olden days, coming to church was the only time that poor country people could get to hear any live music.

Personally I think she was talking rubbish. Church music, even from the earliest times of the Bible, with such great hymn writers as King David, was always about helping people to celebrate God. The greatest hymns are always good theology, about the words of our faith and about what we believe about God.

Certainly it helps illiterate people to have rhyming sentences put to music. It especially helps with the memorization of faith concepts.

And it helps today where people are often not readers of the Bible or regular attenders at church – they still know the hymns from their childhood and these are often the support of their faith walk in a too busy world. And this is no more apparent than in the great hymns of Christmas.

O come all ye faithful – God of God, light of light, Word of the Father, now in flesh appearing

Even, Away in a Manger – Fit us for heaven to live with You there.

Silent night – Far and near, the angel song; Christ the Redeemer is here

The first nowell – Sing praises to our heavenly Lord, that hath made heaven and earth of nought, and with His blood, mankind hath bought… They just go on & on.

These are the hymns that speak to us of the greatest event that this creation has ever known – mostly they are really good theology. They tell the story of the Christ Child, the shepherds and the angels, of the virgin mother and most amazing of all – CHRIST WITH US! Emmanuel.

Christmas is absolutely the best time in all the world. And it’s been the top of the pops for over 2000 years.

Forget about the commercial frenzy – that’s not really Christmas, even though we get ourselves very much involved in the whole scene anyway.

CHRISTMAS IS AMAZING!!

In fact its utterly beyond comprehension, which is probably why we do all the crazy things we do at this time of the year.

We eat too much, we put up lights everywhere, we bring trees into our houses, we buy things for people we see everyday, and wrap them in beautiful paper which we will just throw away anyway – whole forests disappear in December which is a real headache for the concerned conservationists.

All of this is just our feeble attempt to somehow celebrate something which is incredibly amazing, so big, so vast, so utterly unbelievable that we even sometimes do some stupid things to mark the occasion. Kind of like, “pinch me, I think I’m dreaming!”

How do you get to grips with “Emmanuel” – God with us?

Can you actually get your mind around it?

God coming to us – the Creator within His creation.

Its really hard to get the picture, isn’t it?

I was reading about the Rev Robert Evans this week in Bill Bryson’s “A short history of nearly everything.” Rev Evans is a retired minister in the Uniting Church in New South Wales, a writer on modern evangelical revivals and a part time astronomer. His claim to fame is that he has discovered more Super Novas that anybody else, even more than the great scientists in their huge observatories.

Now listen to this …

A Supernova is an exploding star whose light can outshine an entire galaxy for about a month. How it explodes is an interesting phenomenon. Over time, millions of years, its inner gravitational pull becomes so strong that initially it implodes, drawing everything into itself. Its gravitational pull is so strong that it sucks in everything, including light – it becomes a black hole in the universe.

And its core becomes incredibly heavy. Imagine a million cannonballs squeezed into the size of a marble. As Rev Evans says, just a teaspoon full of this imploded star could weigh 90 billion kgs – that’s the equivalent of the total grain harvest of Western Australia for 7 years: in a teaspoon! …And then suddenly it explodes outwards sending all kinds of matter into space. It’s a nuclear explosion of such gigantic proportions that it makes Hiroshima look like a Christmas cracker. It would be the equivalent of a trillion hydrogen bombs all going off at once.

But you don’t need to worry about it. The nearest likely candidate to be a Supernova is a star called Betelguese which is a mere 50 thousand light years away. To put that in perspective, to get there you would have to travel at the speed of light for 50 thousand years. In contrast, travelling at the speed of light, it would take you a mere 1.3 seconds to get to the moon, or 8.3 minutes to get to the sun.

Its hard to fathom God’s creation – its mind boggling.

We see pictures in books of our own solar system but they can never be to scale. If the earth were the size of a pea, Jupiter would be 3 lengths of a footy field away, and Pluto, the furthest planet from earth would be 21/2 kilometers away – that’s from here to the  Narembeen turnoff, or, going the other way, to the Merredin Grain bin. The nearest star outside our solar system is Proxima Centauri,  would, on this scale be 16000 kms away – that’s from Merredin to London, England and back!. There is absolutely no prospect whatsoever that any human being will ever travel to the edge of our solar system and our solar system is just a dot in the universe.

Amazing isn’t it…

And the God who made all this came right inside His creation. RIGHT INSIDE!

He who flung stars into space by speaking them into being, who spoke the separation of sky and earth, who announced light, and life..

This God came as a baby born of a virgin mother…

Man, I can’t get it. I just can’t understand it.

The Lord of all creation, the master of the universe – God, made himself utterly dependent on man. Formed in the womb of a virgin girl, He came to us.

Its absolutely crazy but it’s the reason why we are here today, because we believe this.

This amazingly, fantastically big God became a child, a baby in a virgin’s womb – following His own rule for a nine month gestation period, and the years needed to be lived in order to grow to be a man – so that He could lay down the life He took up in order to change our destiny. To turn around everything that we had messed up in our life and history and to give us a new beginning.

Oh, man, this is incredible! Its no wonder that we do crazy things like coming to church in the middle of the week, and eating a roast lunch just a few days after the summer solstice.

Listen to this text from Isaiah 35 – see what God has done…Isaiah wrote this 500 years before the birth of Jesus – so in the text he is still expecting it to happen. For us it has already happened – 2000 years ago!

The desert and the parched land will be glad; the wilderness will rejoice and blossom. Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom; it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy. The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, the splendor of Carmel and Sharon; they will see the glory of the LORD, the splendor of our God. Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; say to those with fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you.” Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then will the lame leap like a deer, and the mute tongue shout for joy. Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. The burning sand will become a pool, the thirsty ground bubbling springs. In the haunts where jackals once lay, grass and reeds and papyrus will grow. And a highway will be there; it will be called the Way of Holiness. The unclean will not journey on it; it will be for those who walk in that Way; wicked fools will not go about on it. No lion will be there, nor will any ferocious beast get up on it; they will not be found there. But only the redeemed will walk there, and the ransomed of the LORD will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.

I grew up on the edge of the Kalahari Desert. I haven’t yet seen the deserts of Australia but let me tell you, the Kalahari Desert not a glad place. Its dry and parched. In places its just moving sand, in other places, its hot sheets of stone, in still other places, the pebbles are the size of golf balls, black as the night and always shiny and hot and hard. Nothing lives during the day and only the snakes, lizards and scorpions come out at night. It does not rejoice. It drains the energy from you like a supernova. Despite everything it never quite has life – what life there is hides away, survives on little and blooms very seldom.

BUT, in God, the desert will be glad! The wilderness will rejoice! It will burst into bloom and shout for joy! It’s a metamorphosis! And its coming, says the prophet…so strengthen your hands, steady your knees, be strong, do not fear…

GOD IS COMING TO SAVE YOU!

Get up! Get Ready! Get going! The eyes of the blind will be opened. The ears of the deaf unstopped. The lame will leap like a deer. The mute tongue will shout for joy. It’s a transformation! Deserts are blooming, invalid people are being restored.

… Have you thought about that… invalid people, in-valid people. Same word, different pronunciation, same meaning. People without worth, or value. The nothings of creation are becoming the somethings.

In Peter’s first letter, he says this, “you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. ?10? Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.”

Once you were not a people – you were in-valid, but now you are a chosen people, a people belonging to God. We easily miss the reference to the names of the unfaithful children of Hosea. God spoke through that prophet of starting all over again. The unloved became the loved and those without mercy received mercy – it’s the Message of Christmas!

God has transformed His creation. He has taken a people made in His image, who through sin had made themselves in-valid, and He has, in His Son, born of a virgin, dead on a Cross, risen into glory, given us back the value we first had in Him. He started again. Once you had not received mercy, now you have received mercy.

Christmas is the season of Emmanuel. It is God with us and there can never, ever, be a better cause for celebration.

When John the Baptizer was becoming uncertain of his own future, he sent his disciples to Jesus to ask the question, “Are you the One, or should we wait for another?”

Christ’s answer was simple – He quoted from Isaiah 35, this same text – “Tell him what you see, the eyes of the blind are opened, the ears of the deaf are unstopped, the lame leap like a deer and the mute tongue shouts for joy.”

In more words than were necessary He was saying, I AM THE ONE!

Observe the fulfillment of prophecy! Look at broken, in-valid people being restored!

My friends, water is gushing forth in the wilderness, There are streams in the desert. The burning sand has become a delightful pool. The land which at first sucked in the moisture is now a bubbling spring.

Its turnaround time. …. Its Christmas! Before us is the Highway of Holiness. It is for those whom Christ came to redeem. He has paid the ransom. He has set us free.

I love the last words of this prophecy – Gladness and joy will overtake the travelers on this Highway of Holiness – we will never be able to outrun the gladness and joy which is the blessing from the One who says,”I am the One!” Sorrow and sighing, on the other hand will flee away.

This celebration today says, “I believe this!” You are here because this promise is for you. This is the celebration of the greatest event which has ever, ever taken place. The Almighty entered into His creation to take sadness and sighing away from us and to overwhelm us with His gladness and joy.

Listen to the voices of those who discovered this in the beginning, when Christ was born amongst us:

Mary, the virgin mother. God chose to enter the world through her womb…

“My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant.

Zechariah, the father of John…?“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. ?

The angels…Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom His favour rests.

Simeon, the old priest in the Temple…?“Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”

And you … how will you add your voice to the great chorus of praise? How will your journey be on this great Highway of Holiness?  How will you savour the great love which God has for you? Rejoice in Him, celebrate the new dawn.

Because Christ has come, everything is different now!

God is with us!!! Hallelujah….

It was star which began the    process of understanding that which we call Christmas – a star which shone bright in the heavens and which seemed to move as if guiding those who would follow it. The Creator was shifting the  heavens for a momentous event. Wise men chose to follow the star and they found a new born baby in a cave just off the Shepherd’s Fields outside Bethlehem. Some shepherds in those fields were themselves startled by the bright light and they heard angels  singing.

Wise men and simple shepherds came together to bear witness to the spectacular – a baby born, new life begun. But this was even more extraordinary because this was no ordinary baby. This was God – the Lord of all creation, the Master of the Universe, making himself utterly  dependent on man.

God became a man, a baby in a virgin’s womb – following his own rule for a nine month gestation period, and the years needed to be lived in   order to grow to be a man – so that he could lay down the life he took up in order to change our destiny.

This is what Christmas is all about – the Creator God who entered his creation in order to change its course.

Happy Christmas! Whether you like it or not, your destiny has been changed because of what we  celebrate today. Two thousand years ago it suddenly got better, and it IS better! You cannot imagine what life would have been like without Christmas. And life can be still  better when it is truly lived in the light and life of the Saviour. Hallelujah! Amen.

Rev. David de Kock

All the members of Merredin Uniting Church would like to wish the people of Merredin and the surrounding towns a very blessed Christmas. We hope and pray this Christmas is a wonderful, happy and safe time for you and your family.

If you would like to join us for our Christmas Day Service it will be at 9.00am at our church building on Fifth Street. Come and hear “What’s so amazing about Christmas”. All are welcome.

God’s Richest Blessings

Dear David,

It was a delight and privilege to meet you when we visited Merredin recently. I know that for some tour members it was a highlight of the tour and I am sure the Merredin people enjoyed it as much as we did.

Thank you David for your leadership of the service and also giving us an insight into your own faith journey – your personal touch was very inspiring to the Sing Australia members.

Merredin is very fortunate to have you as their Minister – you are an inspirational leader and a wonderful asset to Merredin and the surrounding district.

I am sure the event opened new doors for you in Merredin and this will be invaluable in your work in that community.

The remainder of the tour was a great success with many memorable nights of singing, dining and friendship with existing groups. We started a new group in Kalgoorlie. Our visits to schools in Wyalkatchem, Morowa and Mullewa touched the hearts of everyone in the group and these times were highlights of the tour.

Again, many thanks for the wonderful hospitality shown to us, it will long be remembered by all tour members.

Have a very Happy and Blessed Christmas,

Yours sincerely,

Colin Slater  OAM
National Director