Yesterday’s gospel reading of the blind man (Luke 18:35 – 43) resonates with much of what is wrong in this world today. This world has no place for believing faith. Here, the blind man was confronted by the world in a multitude of people and upon being told that Jesus was passing by cried out: “Jesus, son of David, have mercy upon me.” The multitude responded by turning on the blind man directing him to be silent.
How many of us in this world today prefer to keep silent about Christ in the face of the secular world? How many of us would turn around and declare our faith in Christ’s mercy? Would we not be cowered by the contempt and odium that the world has for those who believe in Christ? Would it not be easier to believe in Christ in private and lampoon and ridicule him in public as this world seems to enjoy doing? In short why shouldn’t we “run with the foxes and hunt with the hounds?”
There is a word for that sort of behaviour and the word is hypocrisy. There is no easy answer: either you are for or against Christ. Either when confronted you yell out with even greater fervour “Son of David have mercy upon me! “or you join the side of the world. As Christ put it : “ No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24).
Simply put if we want Christ to come to our aid and to make haste to help us then we need to prove worthy of that aid. How do we become worthy? That is easy to identify but tough to implement. Christ tells us: “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind and love your neighbour as yourself.” Moreover he declares that the entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments. (See Matthew 22:37 – 40).
If the two fundaments of all of the Bible are love for God and love for neighbour then our Bible has no place in the world today because believing faith has been shut off by the world. And, therein lies the tragedy: by the world shutting itself off from the truth of the gospel it embraces as its moral mantra the indulgence of self which in turn breeds individualism and through individualism grows the idea that it is we ourselves who individually can determine what is right and wrong. Thus we all become gods and act accordingly until that dreadful day that we must appear before the judgement seat of Christ. Then we may well remember that aphorism of “act in haste and repent in leisure”. For then the eternity that we have selected will stretch before us.
Programme for this week
Tuesday 5th December
7:30am to 9:45am – Matins and Divine Liturgy (St Savvas)
Wednesday 6th December
7:30am to 9:45am – Matins and Divine Liturgy (St Nicholas)
6:00pm to 7:00pm – Catechism and Renewal Class
7:00pm to 8:00pm – Adult Bible Study
Saturday 9th December
7:45 AM to 9:00 AM – Matins (Greek)
9:00 AM to 10:15 AM – Divine Liturgy (English)
Sunday 10th December
8:00 AM to 11:00 AM – Matins and Divine Liturgy
Raffle news
Our raffle closes on 9 December 2017. The time has now come for those who hold tickets, ticket stubs and money to contact me. If you don’t I will contact you in any event. We need to make certain that we have all funds in hand as well as all ticket stubs to go into the draw.
Flower and coffee roster
Sharing fellowship, getting to know one another over a cup of coffee and a bite to eat has proved a great success at our parish. It is now part of what we do on Saturday and what we do on Sunday after the Divine Liturgy (weather permitting). Carrying out and living the liturgy is a blessing given to us and we should all participate in it. To date, the Saturday morning group self regulates and works really well. The Sunday morning effort however, to the large numbers attending, needs a little bit more organisation. To that end we have a roster and I would invite you together with a friend to put your names down and take responsibility. This would include the setting up and the cleaning up (although experience teaches that people will in any event pitch in). It may involve bringing a plate or two of savouries or sweets but that is not the point of it. The point is for people to get to know one another.
The children take great delight in playing in the grass area. They are the ones that we are doing it for because we give them an opportunity to get to know one another better whilst we do likewise amongst the adults. So, stay and enjoy yourselves. However, as I said it does need and organising hand to take responsibility and I have every confidence that we will do this.
Likewise we have put out the first six months of the 2018 roster for flowers. These flowers do not have to be purchased. I’m certain that those grown with loving care in the gardens of our homes would do just as well if not better. The point is that we share the responsibility to beautify our church – and we all want that, don’t we?
Vema and Voice of Orthodoxy
Do not forget to collect your copy of the Vema to find out what the Archdiocese of Australia (and the rest of the world) is doing in respect of religious matters. It is a bilingual publication and offers much to each one of us. It is free so I urge you to collect it and take it home to read. Our church pays for the subscription. Accordingly, it is wasteful if all we do at the end of the month is discard it – especially so given the interest of the contents.
We also have available at the pangari the “Voice of Orthodoxy “– again, this is free so help yourself.
Improvements made to our Church
Our concrete pad for the shed that we are building to use as our storeroom has now been poured and is ready for the shed to be erected on it. We have replaced the concrete slabs in the path running to the kitchen with concrete and thereby we have eliminated steps to the toilets and the kitchen itself. We have eliminated the lip to the toilets which people found it difficult to navigate with walkers. We have done likewise for the entry to the church portico. This should make life a lot easier for those of our congregation who have difficulty with mobility and require aids for walking.
Thought for the week
Without wind a ship cannot sail – but everyday life provides more than enough tempests to engage our boat. Without an experienced helmsman however our ship will be lost on the rocks of that life. The question we have to decide is: do we trust in our own abilities to steer or our ship or do we do relinquish our hand from the tiller and rely upon the person the controls the winds to steer us to safe harbour. That is our choice – and that choice is a matter of life or death.
Till next time.
In Christ.
Father John Athanasiou – 0411 061 554
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