Ramble for Kirwan Uniting Church Keeping in Touch pew sheet 24 August 2025.

Don’t laugh, I’m mentoring disadvantaged young drivers to get their 100 hours driving experience before they can apply for a test. So-called “friends” ask, “are you teaching them the proper way of winding down their window and shouting imprecations at other road users?” Cynics. Although that will be important after they’ve passed their test 😉 No, what I offer is encouragement. After an hour of reverse parking, reversing in a straight line, hill starts, they need to hear “Hey, you’re doing really well, I think you’ve cracked it, you should be proud of yourself”. If you knew the background of some of these kids, encouragement is a rare commodity.


A late acquaintance of mine exercised what he called a “Barnabas ministry”. Barnabas features in Acts 4, not taking as prominent a rôle as the better known apostles, but supporting them in encouragement and prayer and in practical giving. His name means, Son of Encouragement.

I have a very simple test when I plan and look back on church services. Will the faithful feel better when they go out than when they came in? Zealots will say, “Ah, we’re making disciples, take up your cross and all that, not offering light entertainment”. I don’t know about you, but it’s the times when I most feel the weight of a cross that I most need encouragement. St Paul in Philippians 2: “Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.”

Oh, and joy. Those same zealots will say that we are in church (or reading Keeping in Touch) to magnify Christ, not to be joyful. But God is magnified in our joys as well as in our sorrows. King David knew a thing or two about both, here’s what the psalmist says (Ps 16): “In your presence is fulness of joy, and at your right hand are pleasures for evermore”.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"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...
Read more

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 ...
Read more

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, p...
Read more