Pastoral Letter 233

Dear Members of St. Andrew’s Uniting Church, Friends and Adherents,

Grace and peace to you all in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

My thoughts and prayers are still with the people of the Middle East, and particularly the people of Lebanon. Sadly, the people are living in tragic times as they face the threat of more escalation.

The Acting President of the Union of the Armenian Evangelical Churches in the Near East and the President of Haigazian College, Rev. Dr. Paul Haidostian, says: “In Lebanon today, there is an extreme and sad feeling of powerlessness. A state that is not able to do much for its institutions and people to protect them socially and physically, an economy that had been crumbled a number of years ago, a demographic explosion with refugees from neighboring lands and now with internal displacement of high proportions, a vacuum in the presidency of the country and in many other official positions, and a health/hospital system that is under extreme pressure.  But even more critically than the above, in recent weeks, people in the country have the feeling that they are a population under unprecedented attack without a free willpower to act internally or externally, without an exit from war and death, without rights that shield them, without protection from ever-present reconnaissance planes and war machines preying on them.

In the powerless Lebanon, there is much that is being done and can be done. The global church is praying, supporting and encouraging us. Relief efforts are at a very high level, and local hospitality is at work. Despite the infuriating disorder and crowdedness in many areas of Beirut, there is an increased level of gentleness among the people. While internal disharmony persists politically, there is also manifest intercommunity empathy.”

Let us continue to pray for the situation in Lebanon, Israel and Palestine, hoping that peace soon prevails in the region and people are safe.

As I have mentioned in my last week’s Pastoral Letter, I will be on leave 14-23 October to attend the AMAA Annual meeting in Montreal, Canada. On Sunday 20 October 2024 we will join the Crows Nest Uniting Church for Sunday morning worship at 10:00 am. As the minister Michael Thomas is on leave, Bob Minton is taking the Service. You can stay for a multicultural lunch planed after Morning Tea. If you wish, you can bring a plate with you.

John Flynn Service will be a Combined Service with Lane Cove and held on Sundy 27 October at 9:30 am at St. Columba’s. We will have with us as guest speaker Mr. Rob Floyd the National Director of Frontier Services. Following the Service, we will have Morning Tea, as well as the Great Outback Fundraiser BBQ at 12 noon.

If you are not able to join us for worship tomorrow, please light a candle and worship with us following the attached Order of Service.

Here are some prayer points for this week:

1. Pray with all the congregations of the Uniting Church for Lebanon, Israel and Palestine, as they are living in constant fear.
2. Pray for the de-escalation of tension and war in the Middle East.
3. Pray for the sick, the poor, the homeless, refugees the lonely and those who have financial burdens.
4. Pray for Virginia, Frank and the family as they go through a very though time.
5. Pray for our future plans as we continue our conversation with Lane Cove Uniting with the Presbytery.
6. Pray for my safe travel to Canada and the AMAA’s Annual meeting.

In Christ

Krikor

MESSAGE

It is Our Choice!

Mark 10: 17-31

When I was a little boy, I loved to watch Western Movies. There was a classical line in the movies: “Your money or your life?” It is a question that leads you to make a choice. Usually in the movies we saw the hero making a choice and acting in such a way that he saved his money and his life. The thought was if you give your money, you will give your life too. It was a difficult choice and yet our heroes made it simple and predictable.

But choices in life are always difficult to make. Some choices have only a limited consequence for the moment, like “What am going to eat, or what am I going to wear, or where am I going today”. Other choices involve consequence that could be life changing, like “What am I going to do with myself and my life. How am I going to live. Whom shall I marry”. And then there are other choices involve not only life now, but life for eternity. “Do I believe Jesus is my Lord and my saviour who has given me the gift of eternal life?”

Our gospel lesson this morning can be seen from many different levels, one that is usually used is the level of stewardship. Stewardship meaning, how do we use what God has given us? Thus, having wealth makes it difficult for people to give the priority to God; making their hope of being in the Kingdom of God so difficult, similar to the camel going through the eye of the needle.

But I want us to see this text as more than just in light of stewardship. I want to look at the choice that this man had to make in the midst of a decision he had to take about his life, because this text is a text that can help us to see where you and I place our values in life.

This man approached Jesus. Notice Mark doesn’t call him the Rich Young Ruler, but only a man; a normal human being, someone like you and me. This man approached Jesus with the question: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” He was worried about his future. He certainly knew that there was a life after this earthly life. In other words, he knew that something was missing in his life, he was looking for help to find it. He sensed that something was lacking in his life. His life didn’t seem complete, there was a strange emptiness. There was no feeling of self-sanctification, a feeling of self-worth in his life. So, he went to Jesus asking for help to find the missing piece or the missing link.

But it is interesting that he was thinking in a different way. He thought that he can inherit the eternal life by doing something. He had the understanding that to inherit the eternal life it is required to do things. In this case it was keeping God’s Law. Referring to his answer to Jesus’ question, he was actually doing what was expected normally from a dedicate Jew.

The seen pictured by Mark is very lovely. Mark says that a man ran up to Jesus and fell on his knees. This was a very good sign of respect. Respect to a teacher. The Pharisees and the keepers of the Jewish Law were not happy with Jesus, His teachings, His preaching and His actions. They were unhappy with His ministry. And yet here we see a good Jewish man, who had kept the Mosaic Law since his childhood came to Jesus kneeled before Him and calls Him “Good teacher”.  It is clear that the man had heard Him speaking and performing miracles and he wanted to come to Him and ask his heartburning question about his future.

Jesus according to His good habit answered the man with a question. “Why do you call me good?” No one was and is good except God. So, if you really believe that I am good, then I am God or Son of God as I had proclaimed. The man did not argue about that, and Jesus then asked him if he had been a respectable man. If he had lived the right kind of life and kept the commandments, which was required from every Jew to keep and obey. And the man answered that he had. He had kept the law, and he had not really done anything wrong. But he was not happy with the way things were going. Jesus clearly saw the man, who he really was and what he had done or not done. He saw his heart which was respectful of God and His Laws. Jesus loved this man, but He found out that there was something missing in his life. Jesus found the missing link, he saw this man’s heart and found that yes, he hadn’t done anything wrong in the way he had lived life, nor had he done anything worthwhile. He had not dared to risk. He had just lived the safe life. He hadn’t done anything for anyone. He had chosen just to follow the rules, and he was expecting to be rewarded. Does this sound familiar? We are good people, we follow all the rules set out by the government and the state, we even go to church, worship God, respect the people around us, help people who are in need and so on.

This man had done likewise. He had kept the Law. But then Jesus hit the nail on the head.

Jesus told him to take a risk, to sell all that he had and give it to the poor. He asked the man to risk himself for Jesus and others. Sell everything, not to rely on material things and to follow Him. Jesus asked him to make a choice, to give up comfort, to give up security and to give up respectability all for Christianity. Jesus, time and time had told this to His disciples and the listeners in different ways. To follow Him, to serve and to love God with all the heart, mind, soul and strength. This requires leaving everything and serving Him wholeheartedly. A true believer cannot love God and Mammon at the same time. He or she has to make a choice.

The difference between respectability and Christianity is to live the faith in action. Jesus told this man that yes you have lived a respectable life, a good life, but you haven’t committed yourself to anything but yourself. You have taken all of this time to dwell on yourself, your own respectability, but what have you done for someone else. What have you done to improve the life of someone around you? What have you committed your life to? Jesus saw this man needed to make a decision concerning his life. Jesus asked him to commit himself to something other than himself, to give of himself, to risk himself, to put his being on the line for something, or someone else besides himself. Jesus asked him to live for Jesus through his neighbour.

Notice, Jesus asked him to do this not because it is a new law, but because Jesus loved him, had compassion on him. Jesus wanted him to find the fullness of life. The text says: “And Jesus looking upon him loved him“. Jesus came to him with the good news of the gospel message, the good news that lets him live life outside of himself, to live life for Jesus and others. Jesus came to him with a message of freedom, a message of liberation. Jesus gave him a way out of his frustrations with life, but the man had to decide whether he will take it or not. He had to decide whether he will regard this message of freedom or ignore it and go about living as usual playing it safe, living for himself instead of others.

I would like to suggest to you that the story in this text is an example of how Jesus comes to each of us with the message of His gospel that demands to make a choice about how we are going to live our lives. Our choice doesn’t necessarily involve our possessions, but it may be how we will use our lives for Jesus. But the point being, I think Jesus asks each of us to make some hard choices in life concerning those things which are of value to us and to him.

This man had to choose. But unfortunately, he decided to leave. Mark says that his face fell, and he went away sad.  Why? Because he was wealthy. This does not mean that all wealthy people leave the scene with a sad face. Today there are thousands and thousands of well to do people who give with joy from their fortune to help the poor and the needy, as well as bring their love offering to the work of God. But it is a very hard choice.

As in the case of this man, people’s wealth hinders them to receive the Heavenly treasure. That becomes hard. And then follows the short parable of the camel and the eye of the needle. Jesus’ this short parable has two meanings.

1. The eye of the needle is the small door in the big gate of the city. For people to enter the city they could use the small door, but when the camel comes with the heavy load on it, they needed to open the city gate to make it possible its entrance. A common teaching says there was a gate in Jerusalem called the eye of the needle through which a camel could not pass unless all its baggage first removed. After dark, when the main gates were shut, travellers or merchants would have to use this smaller gate, through which the camel could only enter crawling on its knees!

2. Some references say that the words camel and rope have similar spelling in Greek kamilon meaning camel and kamiilon meaning rope. Also inAramaic, the language Jesus spoke most of the time, the words for camel and rope are the same: gamla, possibly because the ropes were made from camel hair. So, it means that it is impossible to put the rope through the eye of the needle.

That’s how hard it is for the rich to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Or in other words that’s how hard it is when it comes to our choices.

The disciples were amazed with this and concluded that it is impossible to anyone to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

But Jesus assured them that whatever seems impossible for man, it is possible for God. As long as we are ready to make our choice and choose the right, then the rest God will do. It is a matter of will. The expectation from the followers of Jesus is to leave everything back and follow Him. We see that Peter jumped forward and said that they have left everything to follow Him. And they have made their choice.

If we do the right choice the rewards are big. Whoever leaves everything and follow Christ will receive hundred times more here on this earth and then eternal life. This means if we make the right choice then the result will not be loss but gain. And I am sure that is everyone’s desire.

This is a choice of commitment to Him and His way.

Someone said: “Commitment is a relationship with Christ that enables you in the midst of life’s greatest comforts, to be willing to die, and in the midst of life’s greatest trials, to be willing to live.”

Commitment to Jesus does mean living with Him in all aspects of life, the good and the bad.

As we search for the meaning of life, what will we do?

Play it safe, or take a leap of faith and allow Jesus to give meaning and purpose to our lives?

It is our choice!

Amen!