Sanctified Waiting
The doctor’s waiting room is crowded and despite the fact that you have an appointment your expected ten-minute wait drags out to an hour of paging through the magazines you don’t really feel like reading. Meanwhile your stress levels increase considerably and by the time you are called in you’re ready to give the doctor a serve about keeping to schedules. Scenes like this are all too familiar for most of us. Maybe in your case it wasn’t the doctor’s…
God Words
As one drives up from Sydney towards Uralla on the New England Highway you enter Thunderbolt country. “Captain Thunderbolt” (Frederick Ward) was a notorious Aussie bushranger in the early 1800s. A little before Uralla there is an area with many huge rocks just off the highway which is known as Thunderbolts Hideout. Years ago I travelled that stretch of road frequently on my visits to Toowoomba from Sydney. On one occasion I noticed that someone had painted some “Christian Graffiti”…
Near death experiences
I note that there’s yet another book out about someone who claims they made a visit to heaven while being clinically dead. An earlier book on that theme sold more than five-million copies and ended up on the New York Times bestseller list. I’m tempted to say that the author must be laughing all the way to the bank – except that it would be very ungracious of me to say that – and besides, the author is a pastor…
How’s your Sehnsucht?
Some words that we use are very expressive. One such word is ‘homesick’. No! It doesn’t mean that I’m sick of being at home; it means that I’m sick because of my intense longing for home. Migrants typically experience homesickness. Some get over their homesickness very quickly; others struggle with it for a long time – even years. Some can’t get over their homesickness at all and decide to return to their former country. I have spoken to others who…
When the Jungle Takes Over
I guess we’ve all seen the documentaries where, in some thick rain forest, someone has discovered the ruins of some ancient civilization. The scene is one of crumbling masonry that has been almost totally overgrown by vegetation. The jungle now has a stranglehold on the remains of what was once a thriving human settlement. I can relate to that in a fresh way. When we moved to our new location in March last year Merle and I spend quite some…
Leaving our Children an Inheritance
Scripture says that “A good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s children” (Proverbs 13:22). As a result, many Christians defend and justify leaving vast sums of wealth to their children and grandchildren. I think in order to understand the principle behind this verse, we need to compare what an inheritance meant in biblical times, versus what an inheritance means in this culture today. In Old Testament times, passing on ownership of the land to children and grandchildren was vital.…
Winners and Losers
At the recent end-of-year Awards Night of our local Christian-Parent Controlled School it was a delight to celebrate the completion of another school year and to rejoice with the students as their gifts and labours were acknowledged. For a fleeting moment I questioned the giving of awards. Some students were bedecked with three or even four awards. Other students had to be satisfied with the book that all students were given to mark their transition to the next class in…
Advent time
It’s that season of the year when the Christian church is again making its Christmas preparations by focusing on the coming of Jesus. Last Sunday in church we were reminded that for us today it’s not only about the first coming of Jesus; we are looking today for His second coming. Often during the season of Advent I have found myself thinking, “Yes, but we’ve been looking for that second coming of Jesus for almost 2000 years now.” That’s a…
Walking away from it all
In a matter of one week I heard three very similar stories. The first was when a friend of one of my siblings died after a long battle with cancer. I heard that the lady’s husband had left her soon after she was diagnosed with the cancer and had begun the lengthy process of chemotherapy. He wasn’t able to handle that and threw away some thirty years of marriage to escape this painful and difficult family situation. I was still…
Urban Myths
If you’re not familiar with an urban myth let me enlighten you. Urban myths are really just a modern form of folklore. They are stories that do the rounds and those telling them usually (but not always) believe them to be true. Sometimes the stories have an element of shock or revulsion that is generally taken as quite believable. These stories tend to do the rounds for a while, often recede from prominence, only to take on a new lease…