Burnside City Uniting Church (BCUC)

Last week 5 members of Burnside City Uniting Church attended the 2 day Global Leadership Summit in Adelaide. This event happens every year in many cities around the world. We heard from a variety of speakers and had lively discussions with people from other churches about their ministries. One point from a Pastor from Nairobi, Kenya stands out for me. ‘Jesus said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few”. Rather than madly rushing around trying to gather in the harvest alone, each leader needs to focus on having more harvesters’. I am grateful to the many people here at BCUC who are “harvesters – labouring in the fields” for Jesus and I am especially grateful for those who came with me to this leadership training this year. We are all called to share the Good News of Jesus with our neighbours.

“If only I had more faith….” Jesus told His disciples even a little bit of faith is enough to do great things. “If only” is a common excuse for doing nothing. We have all the faith we need. Our faith comes from God who out of nothing created everything. God has the power to do wonderful things with our little bit of faith. God will work through us when we are willing to step up to the challenge.

This week, Jesus tells two stories illustrating the lengths God will go to in order to find the lost. This week is also National Suicide Prevention Awareness week. Sometimes it is easy to find the lost, they are obvious in shelters, in prisons. Sometimes though the lost are hard to find. They might be your neighbour, your friend, your child or parent. If they are struggling with difficulties they may well hide them behind a fake smile, a glib “I’m fine”. Take the time to ask someone how they are feeling with genuine concern for their welfare. Go for lunch or a coffee or a walk together and listen to the person. If we don’t look hard enough we’ll never find the lost amongst us.

Whether it is the achievements of our children or ourselves, hearing the national anthem or Steve Waugh’s final innings at the SCG, life throws us plenty of opportunities to feel proud. Pride, we are told is the most serious sin, it accounted for Lucifer after all. So what are we to do? The problem for me lies in our use of the word, the Greeks have a better one, Hubris, meaning arrogance, a complete lack of humility. This is the sin we are to watch for. The idea that we are more important, higher than even God and as such deserve things. How much easier our lives would be if we were humble like Jesus. Imagine the King of the Universe washing feet! Let’s feel pride at good things but not at the expense of remembering we are subjects of God. We are the created and all we have is a gift of grace from a loving God. As C.S.Lewis wrote, the proud man is always looking down, he will therefore never see what is above him.

Over the next two weeks I’m going to be looking at the Isaiah readings in the lectionary. They complement each other as this week we are looking at integrity in worship. Essentially the point Isaiah is raising this week is “How can you expect God to listen to your worship if it does not reflect how you live?” This is a hard message, difficult to hear. I know in my own life the way I live Mon-Sat doesn’t always match up to God’s standards. Thankfully Jesus bridges this gap for us. But even so, we must keep trying to worship God in our lives every day. Wesley famously said, “Preach the gospel, and use words if necessary”.