Weekly Bible Reflection
LENT: FOOD
ne of the interesting things that modern science has shown is that the universe fits into a single huge pattern. The same laws that control the fall of an apple, control the orbit of the moon. The same equation that describes the behaviour of an...
LENT: WELLBEING
ave you ever found that someone has misinterpreted something you have said? You say one thing and they hear you say something different. Often we are misunderstood because others haven’t listened carefully or because they have come to the...
LENT: TRUSTWORTHY
he New York author, Madeleine L'Engle, once commented: ‘I will have nothing to do with a God who cares only occasionally. I need a God who is with us always, everywhere, in the deepest depths as well as the highest heights. It is when things go...
LENT: WINE
he call by extremists within Islam for individual terrorist acts against the West gives us pause. ‘Is it safe to go anywhere these days – even shopping?’ we ask. Rightly, governments charged with the responsibility of ensuring the security of their...
LENT
oday is known in the church calendar as Ash Wednesday – the first day of Lent. Traditionally, it is an important time of preparation for Easter. In the northern hemisphere it is when the season changes from the darkness of winter to the delights of...
SACRAMENTS
ne of the significant disagreements within the Christian Church over the last five hundred years has been over the sacraments. The Catechism in the English (1662) Book of Common Prayer defines a sacrament as an outward and visible sign of an inward...
CHURCH
AUTHENTIC CHURCH esearch presented at the Anglican Connection Conference held at Beeson Divinity School last October revealed that average church attendance in the United States is less than twenty percent. This is less than half what research had...
GOD IS LOVE
e often hear the words, ‘God is love’, but what do they really mean? I ask this because too often our understanding of God’s love is shaped more by our culture rather than the Bible. In 1 John 4:10 we read, In this is love, not that we loved God...
JUSTIFICATION
letter turned up in The Australian newspaper last weekend, reiterating in just a few lines that ‘religion is the problem’ with the world. The myriad cynical voices around us today may tempt us to doubt the truth of God’s gospel. How important it...
MERCY
ne of the questions I am often asked at present is ‘Why doesn't God stop the terrorists?’ While there are no simple answers to this question, we need to remember that it is not God who has carried out these acts or even encouraged them. Indeed,...
SUPERNATURAL FAITH
mongst the Christmas gifts I received is a book by Michael Horton, Christless Christianity. In it Horton presents a hard-hitting analysis of churches in America, arguing that many present a faith that is ‘trivial, sentimental, affirming and...
RESURRECTION
n recent years ‘new atheists’ such as Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens have dismissed the miracles of the New Testament as fabrications. And when we think about it, to discredit the New Testament miracles is to discredit, for...
NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION
2014 WAS A TUMULTUOUS YEAR ll too frequently we have been reminded of the fragility of life – through the actions of political power play by Russia over Crimea and the shooting down of a passenger airliner in Ukraine; there have been the actions of...
CHRISTMAS: WHY WAS JESUS BORN?
CAROLS riting in the Weekend Australian Magazine eleven days ago, Nikki Gemmel noted that Christmas carols are slipping away from our culture. She commented that this is a loss, for ours is ‘the age of loneliness; of fear and flinch’....
VENGEANCE
nly ten days to Christmas and Sydneysiders were shocked and horrified by the hostage-taking in Downtown Sydney in Martin Place. Our hearts go out to the families of the two hostages who died. The evil that shook the world on 9/11 has now reached...
DELIVER US FROM EVIL
n the aftermath of September 11, 2001 there was much discussion on the subject of evil. While most people agreed that it exists, there was a strong opposing voice, especially from the world of academia. However, in the light of the recent killings...
LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION
hrist has died; Christ has risen; Christ will come again’ forms part of many a liturgy. But how many of us really believe that there will be an end time when Jesus Christ returns? And, if we do believe it, how many of us live as if it is a...
ANGLICAN THANKSGIVING COLLECT
he American ‘Thanksgiving’ is a holiday Judy and I have especially come to appreciate, for it resonates with the theme of thankfulness that we find in the Bible. Indeed, as our first Thanksgiving followed the events of 9/11, it was a particularly...