Mailout for 23 October 2022 (Pentecost 20, Year C)

Dear People of God

Grace to you and Peace

I remind you that next Sunday, 30 October, we will observe both All Saints and All Souls Days. If you wish to attend a special All Souls Day service as a stand-alone occasion there will be special services at East Maitland and other churches where there is a priest in residence. For our commemoration of All Souls there is a list at the door of both of our churches today for you to add the names of those whom you wish to have specially remembered before God. If you will not be in church today, for whatever reason, you can email me or leave a message on my phone. Details, as per usual, at the foot of this letter.

DO NOT FORGET THAT NEXT SUNDAY IS THE FIFTH SUNDAY OF THE MONTH AND THERE IS ONE SERVICE ONLY (9:30, St Pauls) FOLLOWED BY MORNING TEA

We are still looking for volunteers to sell raffle tickets in Beresfield for the Christmas raffle. $2 per ticket and some excellent prizes to be won. There are also some signs for shop windows to advertise the Christmas Market.

Parish Council last Sunday agreed that we would lodge an Expression of Interest for a subsidised Youth Worker, funding to come, on a reducing basis over four years, from the Yondaio Trust. The Expression of Interest is being lodged in conjunction with two adjoining parishes, since none of us have the finances available to apply of a stand-alone basis. We recognise the critical importance of this specialised ministry: our traditional young peoples outreach of large youth groups, wholesale Special Religious Education and Sunday Schools have been sidelined by the rapid changes in society and unless we find and fund new ministry ventures we fail in the overall mission of the Church to proclaim the Gospel in our world.

Sector ministries are an important and specialised area: youth, Defence, prison, industry, aged care, schools, indigenous and so forth. Having spent most of my ordained career as an Industrial Chaplain I can attest to the importance of these ministries, many of which are beyond the reach of traditional parish ministry. Please keep all of these sector ministries in your prayers.

Parish Council is also addressing the backlog of maintenance issues in the parish. All of our buildings have outstanding repair or maintenance to be attended to and we need to embark on a programmed round of care and maintenance. It all costs money, but if we don’t do something about it NOW, the costs will be so much greater when intensive remedial work needs to be done. (If anyone has a spare few thousand dollars to contribute……)

The Lord be with you

Fr George

gmainprize@bigpond.com

04010 586 119

Propers for Pentecost 20 (Trinity 19, Ordinary Sunday 30)

Sentence

Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. (Lk 18:17)

Collect

O God, who alone can probe the depths of the heart, you hear the prayer of the humble and justify the repentant sinner: grant us the gift of humility, that, seeing our own faults clearly, we may refrain from judging our neighbour but rely solely on your saving grace. We make our prayer through you Son, our Saviour, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen

Readings

Joel 2:23-32 God’s Spirit poured out

Psalm 65 Praise for God’s goodness to Israel

2 Timothy 4:4-8. 16-18 Paul’s final instructions to Timothy

Luke 18:15-30 Jesus blesses the children; the encounter with the rich man

Sermon (Fr George)

In the Name of God. Amen

Over the last few Sundays we have been hearing from Jeremiah. Today there’s a change of pace: Joel. Oh, he has to be different, doesn’t he? No more doom and gloom? WRONG! More doom and more gloom. Well, he was doom and gloom just before this portion when he is telling the people to get their act together, but here he is proclaiming the promise of the Lord when their act has been gotten together. At this point in the history of the development of religious thought God was thought of as very much an active participant in the life of the Jewish people: he fought their battles, issued harsh judgement and showered his abundance as he chose. And when the prophets proclaim restoration and abundance they have the Jewish people foremost in mind as recipients of that goodness (and the penalties, for that matter).

The ministry of the Prophet was to proclaim to the people what they perceived to be the leading of God in their communities. You’d be worried if they went around saying something like “you’ve all done very well”, like old Mr Grace in “Are you being served?” Much in the same way, we should be worried now if the modern leading figures were saying “You’ve never had it so good” (as many of them are indeed saying) when it is patently obvious that we are presently heading for hell in a handbasket.

To put Joel into context. Apart from the name Jo-El, where the “el” suffix relates to God, as in Micha-el, Gabri-el, Beth-el (but not Jor_El, he was Superman’s father, or Ko-El because that’s not the bird of God, but rather an early morning nuisance in Australia, being the Australian cuckoo), he was active according to the scholars, probably during the era when Persia was the dominant power (531-331 BC) and more closely analysed as between 400 and 350 BC and from a textual analysis we learn that he had more than a passing familiarity with the cultic, or priestly, rites of the second Temple which was built after the exiles had returned from Babylon. When he writes there has been a major locust plague over the country, which has devastated farming: crops have been destroyed, livestock are starving for lack of fodder and so it goes.

Joel interprets these events as the judgement of God on a nation that has once again apostatised, and is calling them to repent and turn again to God, who wants to bless creation in spite of what people do to it. He sees the locust plague in terms of the irresistible, devouring army. If you have ever seen a place after the locust swarm has been through you will know exactly how it is left: not a green blade or standing ear of grain to be seen.

Now, I do not belong to that school of Biblical study that takes a verse and forces an all-time rule from it. Nor do I believe that the prophets are foretelling events of future times. They are directly addressing the community in which they live and pointing out the consequences of present behaviour. In the same way, we can take note of what they are saying and look at what is happening in our own times and apply the lessons in ways appropriate to the 21st century, given our present knowledge and scientific insight.

God is not capricious: he does not visit plagues and prosperity on a whim. Neither does he directly intervene in the course of human history in response to our requests. However we are equipped with choice: if we choose to behave in certain way we also choose to live with consequences of those actions, whether for good or bad. We are presently living with disastrous floods across the country when we are not enduring a prolonged drought. What then is “repentance”, to which Joel, Jeremiah and virtually all of the Prophets called the people of their time. “Repentance” in our time might actually be expressed in terms of the not insignificant costs to our economies and our hip pockets in the transition to renewable energy systems. By the same token, if we condemn people to living below the poverty level, repentance might be expressed in terms of the investment required to provide meaningful employment or appropriate income support.

Actions have consequences. The writer of Deuteronomy puts it thus: “See, I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live…” (Deut 30: various vv)

Amen

Intercessions

We hold before God all the concerns of our hearts for the world and its people:

For the World

Nations that are at war within themselves and with each other, their leaders…..

Political instability and internal dissent …..

This nation, politicians, commerce and industry, justice and social cohesion …..

Opinion shapers in press and social media …..

Lord, in your mercy hear our prayer.

For the Church

That we may be drawn together across our barriers of tradition and difference …’

The Anglican Communion, Justin at Canterbury, the constituent national churches ….

The Australian church and the Defence Force Chaplaincy

This Diocese, our partner Diocese of Guadalcanal; Bishop Peter; parishes of Kotara South, Lambton, Merewether, and Lakes Grammar School; our sister of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle ….

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer

For this Parish

Fr George and Deacon Gail; the OpShop volunteers and their whole ministry of service and care; developing ministry within the wider community especially the new residential areas; our own families; the ministry of the Salvation Army

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer

For the Sick and those in need

Laurie, Betty, Jenny, Val, Mandy …all those on our regular prayer list

Those deprived of work and livelihood; those trapped in poverty, addiction, domestic violence …

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer

The Departed

At their anniversary: Amy Smith, Colin Gregory, Louise Woods, Neville Phillips …..

All those whom we have loved and who have passed from this life …..

That they all may find joy and delight in God’s nearer presence

Holy God, you have promised to hear us: grant that what we have asked in faith we may, by your grace, receive; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Saints and Commemorations of the week

23 James of Jerusalem, brother of the Lord, Martyr (62)

24 Inauguration of the United Nations (1945)

25 Crispin and Crispinian martyrs at Rome (287)

26 Alfred the Great, West Saxon king, scholar (899)

28 Simon and Jude, Apostles and Martyrs

29 James Hannington, bishop, martyr in Uganda (1885)

And finally

Something to smile about…..

Testimony

An extraordinary, far-fetched story of long, long ago, with the most exciting part at the beginning and the dull bit at the end – unlike most stories – whereby the teller spellbinds a congregation with a fantastic tale of debauched sex, drugs and rock‘n’roll, drink, gambling, dancing, wickedness, sin, and insider trading, at great length and in the greatest detail – leaving nothing whatsoever to the imagination. At the end he or she says that they don’t of course, do any of these things any more – and the whole congregation thinks to themselves “What a shame – sounded exciting.”

(from “The Church English Dictionary”)

Note: of course, nothing like this would ever happen in this parish! (Fr George)