Rambling for Kirwan Uniting Church Keeping in Touch Newsletter 24 October 2021

The first thing I do in the morning (apart from the usual), after Leisa has brought my tea 🥰 is read email, then BBC (for world), ABC (for Australia) and the Townsville Bulletin (for local) news. Then Facebook and Twitter. All on my iPad. Did you know that iPads are mentioned several times in the Bible? Well, the generic term, tablet, which is what copycats like Android and Microsoft call their devices, ripped off from the original. The Ten Commandments on tablets of stone are most familiar, but the closest to how I use my tablet in those first moments of the morning pops up in Habakkuk 2:2: “Then the LORD replied: "Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it.”

I mean that when I encounter an interesting snippet of news, or a Facebook update from a friend, or a funny tweet, I run out into the kitchen or bathroom or wherever Leisa is, holding my iPad and reading to Leisa from it. While what God via Habakkuk means is “Here, I have a message for Israel, inscribe it on a tablet so that whoever is bearing the message can read it out to the folk on his route as he runs”. (Sorry about the gendered language, a late 7thC BCE herald would have been he).


Of course, I could keep exciting tidbits to myself and not bore Leisa with ephemera from the Twitterverse, but that wouldn’t be very sociable, would it. Similarly, we could keep the messages in God’s Word Written which He intends us to share, to ourselves. But how much lovelier it is to be so excited about God’s love revealed in Christ that we can’t stand still, but have to “hit the deck running” as we gossip the Good News.

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