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Of Wrath and Love

  Like all of us, I guess, I get earworms. Sometimes they’re songs or tunes which I’ve always thought were dreadful, and the instant they worm (intended pun) their annoying way into my head, I shudder and try to think or sing over them. Other times, I love the music and words, or at least they’re OK, but perhaps they’ve worn out their welcome after playing on loop. An aural invertebrate like that wriggled in yesterday. It wasn’t the music, but the words of one of the song’s verses which made me happy because they displaced troubling lyrics from a song from Friday. First, that Friday song. I was at an event organised to enthuse a Christian denomination’s ministers, active and retired, in the “Regions”, ie not the big smoke. We are thought to be more depressed and in need of self-care than our metropolitan sistren and brethren. It’s my experience in my particular region, that we’re a jolly sight happier and more cohesive than the poor folk in the smoke, but maybe that’s just me. We kick
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"From Grief to Gold", a sermon delivered at Townsville Central City Mission, 13 October 2024

Job 23:1-10 Job is undergoing awful suffering. He has lost his family and his wealth. Three remaining so-called friends are telling him that it’s his own fault. He answers one of them. Like us in terrible situations, he is looking for answers from God, but can’t find Him or hear His voice. Still, despite all evidence to the contrary, Job is convinced that God is there somewhere and does know what Job is going through. We are reminded of the old chorus, “Standing somewhere in the shadows, you’ll find Jesus”. Then Job replied: “Even today my complaint is bitter; his hand is heavy in spite of my groaning. If only I knew where to find him; if only I could go to his dwelling! I would state my case before him and fill my mouth with arguments. I would find out what he would answer me, and consider what he would say to me. Would he vigorously oppose me? No, he would not press charges against me. There the upright can establish their innocence before him, and there I would be de
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Ramble for Townsville City Central Mission newsletter 13 October 2024

 It’s TCCM’s Church Camp this weekend. I don’t know if that means a posh retreat centre, or members’ own tents or caravans, or kipping under the stars in a swag, or a mix. My tent camping has been of three sorts. Fun Boys’ Brigade camps, not-so-fun field camps during Army basic training, and fun again in our own tent in assorted lovely locations, in Australia and Europe. Those Army camps, often on Dartmoor: Imagine a treeless Qld/NSW border wilderness in winter. Barracks, not usually associated with happy thoughts, were yearned for. Luxury, as Monty Python’s Yorkshiremen would have put it, compared to a flimsy two-man tent in a cutting gale. So its easy to understand how a nomadic shepherd would have longed (Ps 23) to “dwell in the House of the Lord for ever”. And what comfort has been derived over the millennia from the assurance that there’s room for everyone in that House, (John 14). “there are many rooms”. We look at houses through two lenses. One sees other people’s houses, parti
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Who do people say that you are? A meditative ramble on the Lectionary Gospel for 15 Sep 2024.

Mark 8:27-30 Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.” Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him. NT 101 for theol students. In just over a century, Wrede’s “Messianic Secret in Mark” has gone through classic understanding of how things are/were, to debunking, rehabilitation, more debunking, and back to a sort-of rehabilitation. I looked for my copy, couldn’t find it, assumed that like half of my library it’s gone to a good home. But this being a Ramble, not a learnèd paper for submission to The Journal of New Testament Studies, I can play a mind game. What happens if we reverse questioner and responder? So, Peter asks Jesus, “Who do people say that I am?” Good question, a brave one too in light of Psalm
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Consider the birds of the air. A meditation on "Being present".

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  “Consider the birds of the air”, says Jesus in Matthew 6. And in Matthew 10:29 “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care.” This morning we found that one of our cockatiels, Holly, the hen bird, died during the night. We buried her respectfully and reverently, in sure and certain hope of the resurrection of the dead and raising to life eternal. Psalm 36: You, Lord, save both people and animals. Her mate, Glimfeather, is bereft. He’s singing to her, looking for her. This is the second mate he’s lost in his sixteen years. Last time, depression brought on physical illness, before introducing Holly restored him to health. So I’ve moved a small table into the verandah next to the aviary, and I’m typing from there so that we can see each other, and I can talk to him. And he can sing to me.  Which illustrates a motif well known to chaplains, that of “being present”. Wouldn’t it be lovely if Glimmy spoke English (he sort
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Change and Challenge. An unpreached sermon for Pentecost 5B, 23 June 2024

Mark 4:35-41 That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” +In the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We love spiritualising bible accounts like this. Look, I’m as guilty as anyone. I was searching for a title, and came up with “We’re all in the same boat”. And yes, there’s real comfort to be found in the
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  A hot mustard harvest An unpreached sermon for Sunday 16 June 2024 Pentecost 4B Mark 4:26-34 He also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.” He also said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.” With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in pr
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