Pastoral Letter 75

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

Grace and peace to you all.

Sadly, it’s the fifth week of the lockdown, and we’re not having our regular services in our beautiful church sanctuary, with our organ music and missing the fellowship with each other during Morning Tea. It seems that this will go on at least another month. But we look forward with hope and anticipation that soon we will be able to return to normal. Let’s continue to pray and hope.

On a positive note, the Lower North Shore Uniting Churches Study Series on Zoom, based on Dr. Kenneth Bailey’s book “The Good Shepherd – A Thousand Year Journey from Psalm 23 to the New Testament”, commenced this Wednesday at 7:30 pm and will go over following four Wednesdays: 28 July, 4, 11 and 25 August. We have to skip the 18 August, due to the Sydney Central Coast Presbytery meeting. The short one-hour sessions included a 30-minute video followed by a 30-minute discussion. I am glad that this past Wednesday, 33 people joined the session on Zoom.

Join Zoom Meeting

https://uca-nswact.zoom.us/j/94813548762

Meeting ID: 948 1354 8762

Also, Ivy has gone through a successful knee surgery and she is doing well. She will stay in the hospital till next week and go straight to rehab for a week or so, before she goes home. She wants to express her thanks for remembering her in our prayers.

An update about our sponsorship and fundraising for the Demirchian family in Artsakh. To date we have raised $1850 from the total $3000. At our congregational meeting we committed to raise the money needed. We believe with few more donations we will be able to achieve our goal.

Also, please remember to make your Sunday offerings for the Sunday’s we missed. The easiest way is to make a direct deposit into the church account.

Bank details are as follows:

Account Name:   St. Andrews Uniting Church Longueville

BSB: 032085        Account Number: 810147

As the restrictions go on, please pray and join the rest of the members Sunday morning for worship from home following the Order of Service, sing along to the hymns chosen and read the Message. Thanks to Mark for suggesting hymns every Sunday. This Sunday again the majority are from Mark’s suggestions.

Continue to pray, remembering those who need our care, support and love.

Here are some prayer points for this week:

1. Pray for our Service tomorrow and hope soon to return to our face-to-face services and weekly activities.

2. Pray for the local and federal governments, as they struggle with the vaccination rollout and controlling the spread of the virus.

3. Pray for those who need care and support, especially at these difficult times.

4. Pray for Ivy, as she recovers from her knee surgery she had last Thursday.

Please let me know if you or anyone else has prayer points.

Remember, whatever challenge we face, God is with us to keep us safe. Thanks be to God.

Krikor

Incredible and Amazing Deeds

John 6:1-15

‘Incredible’, ‘Immeasurable’, ‘Amazing’ – something that is too extraordinary and improbable to be believed, seem difficult or impossible. Using the word ‘incredible’ doesn’t mean we think something is impossible, it just means that we can’t see how that thing can be possible. When we consider all the approaches and possibilities, we just can’t see a way to do something.

This is where Christ comes in. When something is so incredible to us and seems impossible, Jesus makes it possible. He does incredible things. According to Paul, Christ is He “who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us” (Eph. 3:20). In other words, He is able to do immeasurable things more than we can imagine. Just because something appears to be impossible for us, it doesn’t mean it is impossible for the Lord.

In our passage today we see that Jesus gave His disciples an “incredible” task. He looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward Him, He asked to Philip: “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?”

Matthew, in his gospel spells out the words Jesus said before the question. Matthew records: “I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way”. And the disciples answered with a question: “Where could we get enough bread in this remote place to feed such a crowd?”

This was a reasonable question for something that seemed impossible. What Jesus was requiring was something which was incredibly difficult to accomplish.

But the word teaches us that nothing is too hard for God and in the hands of Christ, the incredible becomes conceivable.

Looking closer to today’s passage, we can see the following points.

1. Jesus asked an incredible question

Jesus asked this question to test the spiritual depth and the level of the spiritual maturity of His disciples. For some time, they have followed Him and have witnessed the miracles He performed, which were sufficient proof for His position of heavenly powers.

How we view the incredible problems that arise in our life is a great test of how much we’ve grown as believers in our faith and how much we really trust Him. This was a great test for the disciples. How would they react? How would we respond if we were suddenly faced with an incredible situation?

Today we are facing once again challenging times, with the spread of the Delta variant of the COVID virus. People are in stressful times, under so much pressure, asking so many questions. How are we going to get out of this situation? Is it safe to take the vaccine or which one to take? Are we going to survive this test? The government is urging us to do the right thing, but we are questioning the decision taken and the tough restrictions and measures put in place.

We don’t know where to turn, so we are asking incredible questions.

2. Philip made an incredible calculation

In our story today, we see that Philip considered a rough estimate of the number of the people and made his calculation and came up with an impossible answer. A denarius was a man’s expected wage for each working day. Philip concluded that he could work for eight months and still not be able to give each person a bite or mouthful. Since Jesus asked Philip the question, Philip obviously felt it was his responsibility to come up with an answer. And hence his calculation was incredible.

When we are dealing with incredible problems, we cannot restrict ourselves to make human calculations. We will never be able to find solutions for those kinds of problems.

When we are under the immense pressure of this pandemic, we are not sure where to turn or what to do. We sit down and do our own calculations and we find out that we don’t have the solution or the answer we are looking for. Somehow, we try to find the solution and the answer to our problem according to our understanding and our comprehension. Sure, we have our ability to think and make the right choices, but we forget that we are just humans, and our calculations and discernment will be within human limits.

Philip’s human calculation was not the answer Jesus was looking for. Similarly, our calculations won’t be the answers that Jesus is looking for. So, we should lift and elevate our thinking and try to go a step further and think of other options, which may be someone else has it, as we see in this story.

3. Andrew suggested an incredible solution

Most probably Andrew was standing near them when Philip told the Master that there was no answer for this incredible question and that humanly it was not possible to provide the food needed to feed the multitude. Most probably the food that the little boy had were small pieces of bread, like crackers, and two small, pickled fish from the Sea of Galilee. What Andrew found, was just enough to be a small boy’s lunch and that it will not be sufficient for the incredible crowd, and he said: “But how far will they go among so many?” This was all he found but he offered all.

Incredibly, Andrew found at least something to start with. He did not distress himself as Philip did and panicked asking the incredible question of “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” In contrast to Philip, at least Andrew looked for other options or possibilities, which was not going to be sufficient to solve the problem of the five thousand hungry congregants. But at least he tried to find a solution. And there was a young boy with two small fish and five barley loaves of bread, just enough for him and may be share with one or two people. That was all he got, but incredibly and apparently was happy to share it with the others.

Sometimes what we have represents an incredible solution for many more needs. But we should be aware that what we have can never be enough, God’s power makes our limited resources sufficient for many more needs.

During this lockdown because of the spread of the virus, people are in need, as many are forced to stay home and to work if they can, but there are some who are in desperate need, as their income has ceased. The Governments try their best to inject some financial assistance, but it will never be enough to sustain life. And hence the question is asked:

“What should we do?” “Will we be able to go on or fall short?”

That’s the case with so many businesses shutting down, construction workers are forced to put down their tools, children forced to study from home, missing the healthy face to face interaction, and so many other cases.

So, what is the solution? What can we do to sustain life and be able to be calm, patient and try to look for something positive in the current challenging times?

4. Jesus served an incredible meal

What Jesus did that day was incredible; He made a little into a lot. He gave the people more than a bite; He gave them as much as they wanted. The hungry people ate all they wanted from the 5 barley loaves and the 2 fish until they had been completely satisfied. What was considered to be a very small meal of a young boy, became a feast for the big crowd who had come to listen to the Lord. 

This is a divine picture of what Jesus wants to do for all those who trust in Him. He doesn’t just give us life. He gives us a life that is both satisfying and worth living. Jesus took what the disciples had and made it into something that would be talked about for over two thousand years. If we give Him the little we have, He can change that into something special.

In the current situation, people need to trust God and believe that He will take care of us, as Jesus did that day for the big crowd. All we have to do is to go to Him and put all we have in His hands, be it talents, money, possession, time, abilities and even weaknesses, and He will make something incredible out of the little we have, through His amazing grace.

5. The people arrived at an incredible conclusion

After the people saw what Jesus did that day, they came to the conclusion that He is the One they were looking for. They saw with their own eyes what He did and how He performed the incredible miracle. He fed the 5000 with just five small loaves and two fish. No one else could do such a thing. Therefore, He should be one they had been waiting for.

Based on all the evidence these people certainly arrived at the proper conclusion.

How about us? What are we saying about Him?

If we give Him all we have, in return He’ll give us all He has. If we give the little we have, He will do great things, incredible things, and immeasurable deeds. We have to let Him make something incredible out of our lives.

When Jesus makes incredible things out of our lives and out of what we have, He makes it through His grace, His incredible and amazing grace. He will do the imaginary

The lessons we can learn from this incredible story is:

1. It doesn’t matter how young or old we may be, God can still use us in His service to bless others.

2. We must trust in the Lord, obey Him and do what He says step by step.

3. When we are faced with a humanly impossible situation, we must be thankful for what we have.

4. Regardless of stressful and challenging times, we can put our complete trust in Him, the Almighty, who is in control, and He will go with us through the storm and the waves of life we face and bring us safely to the other side.

When we learn to give our little bit to Jesus, He is able to bless us with over and above. No matter how humanly impossible our situation may be, if we give it to Jesus, Jesus can bless us over and above.

All we need to do is trust Him, believe Him, have faith in Him, rely on Him, obey Him, have confidence in Him, delight in Him, commit to Him, and He will do the rest because in the hands of Jesus there is salvation, there is power, there is deliverance, there is forgiveness, there is love, there is peace, there is joy, there is provision, there is righteousness, there is holiness, there is eternal life, there is abundant life.

Whatever we need, we can find it in the hands of Jesus Christ. Holy hands that do incredible, immeasurable and amazing deeds.

Amen!