Ramble for Kirwan Uniting Church Keep in Touch newsletter 15 November 2020

I shouldn’t be sitting here at my Mac, promised the surgeon that I’d take it easy for a couple of weeks. But here I am, resplendent in a turban bandage covering Tuesday’s op wound, and unresplendent without a shirt so that my coronary artery bypass “zipper” is displayed for all to see. Except there’s only Leisa and the dog to see it. No pics, this is a family pew sheet.

Ah, the dog. Yannie is our German Shepherd and she had a tumour cut out on Tuesday, the same day as my cochlear implant surgery. Poor Leisa had to toggle between the Mater, JCU Vet and working from home. Yannie is at my feet sporting a “cone of shame” to prevent her from licking her wound, and a couple of Leisa’s socks to prevent her from scratching it. We make a fine pair.
I know why I look like a knife sharpening block, but Yannie doesn’t know why bits of her do. She just knows that her supposed carers took her to a disinfectant-smelling place where she gets jabbed every few months, but this time they went to town on her. If another dog, Farside Cartoon style, were to ask where her wounds came from, she might answer like the false prophets in Zechariah 13, “I got them in the house of my (supposed) friends”. You might have heard that misapplied to Jesus. But no, the chapter makes it clear that Israel was awash with false prophets who ritually self-harmed themselves, a pagan custom. And when God had had enough and threatened drastic punishment, the false prophets said that they were simple shepherds and they had an accident at their mate’s house, that’s how they got injured.
Zechariah 13 is a sobering chapter of the consequences of falsely claiming to be speaking for God. The US Election has featured some particularly egregious examples of this sin; one or two of our own pollies are not purer than the driven snow when it comes to the same hypocrisy. If the chapter ended halfway through verse 9, there wouldn’t be much hope for either of our countries. But it doesn’t. The second half of the last verse picks up a promise from verse 1, that a fountain has been opened for uncleanness, and that God will say that we are His people and we will say that He is our God. Which brings us back to wounds. That ending promise rests on Isaiah 53:5

But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

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