Pastoral Letter 98
Dear Members of St. Andrew’s Uniting Church, Friends and Adherents,
Greetings to you all in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
By God’s grace we ended the year 2021 and we are in the first Sunday of the year. This is a good time to have a quick look at the past year and what we went through with the world pandemic hanging on us. But our heavenly Father was gracious enough to keep us safe and well. We should never forget that our God is great and good; He loves us, He has been with us in the challenging times and took care of us.
By now you should have received my earlier email informing you that this Sunday we will worship at home by the decision of the Elders and the Church Council for practical reasons. I have been in close contact with people with the virus and being conscious of the rules and restrictions for staying home, we have agreed not to congregate to worship together on this first Sunday of 2022. This is not ideal, but our safety comes first and as such sadly we will miss the Sunday fellowship. So, please join the others and worship from home, following the attached Order of Service, light a candle, have a small piece or roll of bread and a cup of wine/juice, sing along the hymns, pray and read the message.
In the meantime, please continue to pray, remembering those who need care, support and love.
Here are some prayer points for this week:
- Pray for the New Year to be peaceful and a fresh start with the hope that it will be a good year for all and manageable with Omicron, the new variant of COVID.
- Pray for the poor, the sick, the vulnerable, the struggling and the stressed.
- Pray for all those who are suffering under hardship and poverty.
- Pray for world peace and ask for God’s blessings.
- Pray and give thanks with all you have and remember that everything is given by God with His grace.
- Pray for each other and as Paul says, pray also for me, “that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should” (Eph. 6:19-20)
Please let me know if you or anyone else has prayer points.
As we start a new year, I wish you all Happy, good and safe year.
Best Regards
Krikor
New Year New Beginnings
Revelation 21:1-7 Ecclesiastes 3:1-14
As we enter the New Year, like many people we have made plans to make a new start, a new beginning. We’ve probably made new resolutions for the New Year. Resolutions of different kinds which have to do with our plans for the year, our physical well-being, having a different attitude towards things in our daily life, making new friends, being more compassionate, kind, humble, gentle, patient, forgiving and loving and the list goes on. We are urged to clothe ourselves with these pieces of clothing, as Paul says in the Colossians passage that we looked at last Sunday.
The New Year is the start of new beginnings… the old is gone.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to start all over?
A new start, with a clean slate; all the mistakes from the past, gone. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
But that is exactly what God gives us when we enter into a personal relationship with Him.
2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. “
When you enter into a personal relationship with Christ, “if anyone is in Christ”, all things have become new. What this is saying is, no matter what your past may have been, no matter how many times you messed up or failed, your slate is wiped clean; “old things have passed away”.
Let’s take a look into God’s Word and see how we can look at the New Year with a different and new attitude. Today we will look briefly at 5 new things that we can experience in the New Year.
1- A New Song
David in Psalm 96:1 says: “O, sing unto the Lord a new song“.
Let us decide that 2022 is going to be the year for the church to sing a new song. It’s time for us to sing a new song about God’s love, goodness, mercy, joy and grace. We need to change our attitude in life, the attitude of defeat, loss, depression and negativity. And as we sing our hymns let us put in a spirit of joy and happiness. All the hymns that we sing should tell the people around us about the greatness of God, the love of God and the great things that God does in our lives.
Let’s enter 2022 with a new song in our hearts and on our lips.
2- A New Heart
Ezekiel in 36:26 says: “A new heart I will give you“.
A new heart! What a wonderful gift for the New Year; a gift that only God can give.
Thousands of people all over the world have their names on a list waiting for a new heart. Sadly, few of them will receive a new heart to have the joy of sustaining their life for a longer period.
That’s not the case with this new heart that God has promised to us. Everyone that asks for this new heart will receive it, free of charge, no strings attached, no waiting list. All we have to do is to ask in faith and we will receive it!
We need to have a new heart at this new stage of life.
We can all receive a new Spiritual heart in 2022; a heart full of love, compassion and kindness toward our fellow man.; the heart of Christ.
3- A New Spirit
Again Ezekiel 36:26 says: “A new spirit will I put within you”.
God has promised to put a new spirit within us. I like that idea because there are times when we don’t have the right spirit within us. There are times when we have a wrong attitude and a wrong spirit. Sometimes we are short tempered and grumpy. But, thanks to God that with the new spirit we can have a totally different attitude in life and the way we treat people.
God has promised to put in us a new spirit, a Spirit of love, righteousness and mercy.
A new spirit; His own Spirit!
4- A New Covenant
Jeremiah 31:31 says: “The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah“.
God is a Covenant God. He is a God of Promises. He has made a new covenant with us! Not just for 2022 but for all the days of our lives. We are no longer bound by the old covenant.
The old covenant demanded a sacrificial lamb for the atonement of our sins but, through this new covenant, Jesus Christ himself became that sacrificial Lamb and paid the debt for our sins once and for all. The old covenant said that we could only approach God at certain times and even then, we had to go through the high priest.
This new covenant says that we can approach the throne of God boldly.
This new covenant has made us Heirs and Joint Heirs with Jesus!
5- A New Name
In Revelation 2:17 Jesus said- “Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches. To everyone who conquers, I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone, and on the white stone is written a new name that no one knows except the one who receives it“.
When we receive a new name, we are no longer known by our old name. If someone calls us by our old name, we are under no obligation to respond or even acknowledge them. When we accept the Blood of Christ that was shed at Calvary, we receive a new name. We are no longer the sinner that we once were. We are now the righteousness of God in Christ.
The sad truth is that many people in the Body of Christ are still going by their old names. They are hung up in the past or bound by their family history.
I have good news friends; we can enter the New Year with a new name which is worthy and presents us as a child of God.
I challenge you to enter the New Year with a new song, a new heart, a new spirit, a new covenant and a new name.
Amen!