Election Special for Kirwan Uniting Church's Keep in Touch

If you took the same sort of cocktail party etiquette tips which I did, you'd have been taught not to discuss politics, sex or religion.  Well religion is sort-of unavoidable in my line of work, so how about the other two? Most of you won’t know this, at least I hope most of you don’t, but the Council and I managed to hold off demands from some outside quarters to discuss a matter concerning sexuality. As you do know at Kirwan, all too well, that sort of discussion promotes division and hurt. So our cocktail party is still on the rails, the weather and the Cowboys are OK topics.

But wait … isn’t there an Election coming up?  There is indeed, and Leisa and I posted off our ballot papers some days ago.  I’ll be at Synod on Election Day.  The results start to come in during a guest lecture.  The guest lecturer will comment afterwards, and I think there’ll be a large screen set up for Synod members to gawp at Antony Green  -  although if past experience is a guide, much gawping will be done over the road at the Surf Life-saving Club 😊 

So what do I say to fellow cocktail partyers (partiers, use whichever form you want, leave controversy for politics) who ask, “How should a Christian vote?”  God be praised, we don’t live in a theocratic Catholic or Eastern Orthodox country where clerics tell us for whom we should cast our ballot, nor in the American bible belt where voters are urged bizarrely to vote for the most unbliblical ne’er-do-wells imaginable. You’re an educated subset of the electorate, you can make up your own minds. But HWJV? How would Jesus vote? Romans 11 and 1 Corinthians 2 ask, “Who has known the mind of the Lord?”, so it would be presumptuous to say HWJV. But He and the OT writers have left some tips.  Matthew 10 “Heal the sick”. Is my favoured candidate from a party with a good track record in this regard?  Matthew 25: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” Does this sound like my candidate’s party?  Leviticus 19: “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” Does my candidate’s party remember that we were all strangers in Australia as recently as a couple of hundred years ago?  Is my candidate’s party likely to search for the Peace on Earth which the angels declared at Christ’s birth?  Does my candidate’s party agree with the psalmist (Ps 24) that “The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.”.  Are God’s earth, seas and rivers in safe hands?

And whoever is our next PM, pray for him or her!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ramble for Kirwan Uniting Church Keeping in Touch pew sheet 25 June 2023.

  (I wonder if they've missed me? 😊) Well, we’ve lived in our little cottage for six months now. We love it, it’s comfortable and homely, and very “us” - you know what I mean by that. Maudie the German Shepherd loves it, she can cavort around the yard all day long, fetching balls which Leisa throws morning and evening, and making me chase her for those same balls during the day while Leisa is at work to pay the mortgage. I think that the cockatiels love it. It’s difficult to tell. Holly, the hen bird, would never let on, and Glimfeather, the cock bird, would chirp happily in a Force 4 cyclone. I’m sitting on the front deck as I tap this, looking up at Castle Hill right behind us. It’s not perfect, of course. The irrigation points leak, and the system is counter-intuitive in the extreme to programme. The bathroom slopes alarmingly to one end. It’s on one of the busiest roads in Townsville. That’s not such a problem for me until I put my hearing aids in. Maudie loves it most of all
Read more

Ramble for Kirwan Uniting Church Keeping in Touch pew sheet 1 January 2023

  Our new pad has an electrically operated gate for our cars to come in and out (to our electrically operated garage, which is being used for storing assorted unopened and part-opened boxes for the time being.) The pedestrian gate opener is obstructed (on purpose, for security reasons) by a padlock. So how do parcel deliverers, meter readers and bearers of mulled wine (thankyou Robin   😊 ) gain ingress? Well, they press the groovy wi-fi connected camera doorbell which rings my and Leisa’s iPhone, wherever we might be in the world, displays their pic and allows one or both of us to tell them that we’ll be right down (if the dog is safely in) or ignore them if we’re in Woop Woop so that they can leave goodies at North Ward or JCU PO. Except it’s not connected yet. Give me a day or two to understand the accompanying installation instructions. Two well-known instances in scripture of Jesus, as it were, pressing the doorbell, are in Revelation 3: “Behold I stand at the door and knock.” And
Read more

Ramble for Kirwan Uniting Church Keeping in Touch pew sheet 12 February 2023

  While there’s still time to dash out and buy a card, let me remind you that it’s Valentine’s Day on Tuesday. It’s also Gail Mumme’s and Shirley Nuss’ birthdays, so you can buy them a card for each occasion. Just remember that it’s traditional that a Valentine card should be from an anonymous admirer. On the first Valentine after we started going out, I composed a poem and faxed it to Leisa, or rather I faxed it to the firm of structural engineers for whom she worked. It was entitled, “The Poet’s Plea to a Civil Engineer”, and dealt with the pain of separation. I lived in West Sussex, while Leisa lived and worked Mon – Fri in London. The poignant last two lines are: If things don’t get better, I’ll jump in the sea, Sir, So build me a tunnel from Sussex to Leisa.   A few weeks later, she flew to Egypt on holiday, and I composed another poem on the inauspicious topic of a Romanian Airways Tupolev. Since then, the Muse has largely left me.   Poetry makes up a large part of the Bible. In
Read more