Dealing with Anger — All of us from time to time will feel angry and we certainly see signs of anger around us in such things as road rage. But of all the human emotions anger is perhaps one of the most difficult to deal with. Responses to anger range from trying to bury it within ourselves to free venting of our anger in a rage.  There is an opinion in some church circles that it is wrong to be angry and texts like Colossians 3:8are brought out to support that point of view: “But now you must get rid of all such things…” and the first thing mentioned is anger. But when we read the Gospels we find that Jesus was on occasion angry. I think, for example, of when he turfed the money changers out of the Temple. Or in Marks Gospel (3;5) when he responded to the way people were using a man with a withered hand for their own ends. And Ephesians tells us (4:26): “Be angry but do not sin.” How can we be angry without sinning? Well, it’s not by trying to repress our anger, that is, try and bury it within ourselves and hope it won’t escape. It isn’t by releasing it, giving free expression to the anger within us.  There is another way, and this is to redeem it. That is, turn the energy of our anger into a good purpose. People like Wilberforce were angry at the slave trade and they allowed the energy of that anger to overturn the trafficking of human beings. An early desert monk by the name of Evagrius said we should not waste a good anger on being angry with a person. Rather, he said, we should be angry at a wrong and allow that to motivate you to right the wrong. Often when we feel angry it is a knee jerk reaction to something that we perceive to have threatened us in some way. Something happens and we react. Action leads to reaction. To redeem our anger we need to place a step in between the action and reaction and that step is to question. Something happens and we feel angry. We then ask, Why am I feeling like this and what can I do about it? That is, I think, how we can be angry and not sin. … Continue reading →

There are a number of ‘Specified Ministries’ within the Uniting Church including the ministry of Lay Preacher. Today across the Synod we celebrate and give thanks to God for those who have been called by God to exercise this ministry. Without their commitment to proclaim the Word of God, it has been estimated that half the services of worship conducted in Uniting Church congregations each Sunday in SA would have no preacher! We are blessed at BCUC with 7 accredited Lay Preachers, 5 retired accredited Lay Preachers and 7 more people not accredited but who preach within our congregation from time to time. Thank you for the faithful exercise of your ministry among us. Those who have been gifted by God to preach are examples of those who the Spirit is using to equip us as a congregation for Christian living. The purpose of such gifting is that we may be unified in faith and grow to maturity in Christ. Ephesians chapter 4 on which my sermon for today is based, indicates clearly that the ascended Christ gave various gifts to the infant Church for its growth in faith, service and unity. Using the ‘body’ analogy, Christ is the Church’s head, and as each one of us joined together in him plays our part, the body grows and builds itself up in love (Eph. 4:16). Thank you to all who preach in our various services of worship. Your faithfulness and commitment to proclaim the Word of God inspires us for our daily living and brings us fresh insight from God for our personal lives and our life together as a congregation.   … Continue reading →

Being the Beloved   Holy Communion is one of the central moments of a church’s worshipping life. Participating in Holy Communion is, according to the National Church Life Survey, one of the most significant elements in a person’s spiritual life.  Why so? I guess there are many reasons, but one, I think, would be that Communion is a microcosm of what the Christian life is about. It reminds us of who we follow and how he lived, and then calls us to the same. It’s about our identity; it’s about our reason for being. In the Gospels we read the words with which we are no doubt aware: “Taking the five loaves (he) blessed and broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the people…” (Mark 6:41) If those words sound familiar, it is because they are the same words used at the Last Supper (Mark 14:22) and also when the resurrected shared a meal the two travellers on the Emmaus Road (Luke 24:30). Taken, blessed, broken and given. Why the repetition? Henri Nouwen suggests it is because these words summarise Jesus’ life and the life to which we are called. Our lives are taken, that is we are chosen by God. We are blessed; to be blessed is to have good things said about you. We know that in life we experience brokenness; but through that brokenness we are enabled to nourish others. And our lives are to be given to and for others; we are a unique and valuable gift to this world. We truly are the beloved children of God. … Continue reading →

Interrobang   In 1968 Remington-Rand introduced a new key on its typewriters. It was a punctuation mark called the Interrobang. It was first proposed in 1962 by Martin Speckter in an article he wrote for “TYPEtalks Magazine” and was the first new punctuation mark proposed since 1671. As you can see it is a cross between a question mark (?) and an exclamation mark (!). The name comes from printers jargon where a question is called an interro and the exclamation mark is called a bang. The reason why Remington-Rand introduced it was because they said it filled a gap in our English language. There are times, they said, where neither the question mark nor the exclamation mark is quite the appropriate symbol. The interrobang would come at the end of sentence where we might find a series of question and exclamation marks: !?!?!?. They would be sentences which express both astonishment and curiosity, wonder and uncertainty. In this punctuation mark we have been given a new way of looking at faith and life because there are times when neither the ! or the ? is the appropriate symbol for what is happening. These are the times in life where we both want to affirm and question what is going on. It comes at a point where what we know and do not know meet, where faith and doubt converge. It comes, for example, in the face of terrible tragedy where we want to ask how this could happen? Why? What’s the point? But at the same we are not left in the world of questions and uncertainty. We still can affirm our faith in life, the goodness of creation and a loving God. In summary then, the Interrobang means: “We must never allow what we do know to blind us to what is yet to be known. We must never allow what we do not know to rob us of confidence in what we do know.”   … Continue reading →

Have you ever lain awake at night, longing for the morning?  Sometimes the night seems endlessly long, and we can’t wait for it to be over.  (Perhaps it’s an older person’s complaint – I don’t remember feeling like this when I was young!) The psalm set for today, Psalm 130, talks about watching and waiting for God throughout the night, longing for God more than any watchman would long for the morning light. The psalmist says, “…your forgiving love is what makes you so wonderful.  This is why I wait upon you, expecting your breakthrough, for your word brings me hope.  … O Israel, keep hoping, keep trusting, and keep waiting on the Lord; for he is tender-hearted, kind, and forgiving. He has a thousand ways to set you free!”   (The Passion Translation) Sleeplessness can come for many reasons – anxiety, discomfort, an over-stimulated mind, or anticipating an early alarm call.  But whatever reason keeps us awake, we can join with the psalmist in hoping, trusting, waiting on the Lord.  After all, he has a thousand ways to set us free! … Continue reading →