Easter Message 2020

Easter greetings to all who may visit this blog.I trust you are ok wherever you are and pray that God will comfort anyone who may be suffering the loss of a loved one.

The Virus Crisis

 

Underground Church Coober Pedy, South Australia

Almost every blog, every youtube Channel and every News Broadcast seems to be talking about the Coronavirus Pandemic.

With good reason.

It is a very challenging time.

Many people are living in fear which is being bolstered by the bombardment by the media.

It is causing many to reflect on life and consider their place in the universe.

Some are fearful it is a precursor to the end of the world.

Thankfully there are many fine people working on solutions and also the treatment of those affected.

As a Christian I think it is a good time to consider God, consider Jesus, consider Faith, consider the message of Easter that is fast approaching.

Below is a link to one of my Easter messages from the past.

https://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com/2017/04/easter-sunday-parkrose-united_16.html

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From the Wayside Chapel by Graham Long

Dear Inner Circle,

As a young man, I liked to think I was pretty bright. In my mid-twenties my head was awash with Freud, Ellis, Berne and the like. I wanted to serve people well but in the process I ran a solo commentary on how the world worked. I look back in horror and embarrassment at my pretentious twenty-something self. Knowledge comes through books but wisdom comes through pain.

In the little town of Waikerie, South Australia, I ran a visiting service for a government department whose primary responsibility was child protection. The office I used had no receptionist and no telephone; just a sign on the door to say that I’d be there on Fridays. No one had thought of mobile phones in those days. I started each visit with a full waiting room and I’d work until everyone had gone. They were often long days with no way for me to make enquiries for people or ask for help when my way got difficult.

One day a woman walked in with her daughter who I imagine might have been four or five years old. I will never lose the image of the little girl’s face. Her facial expression was akin to a snarling dog and yet she said nothing. I’m not sure she could talk. She seemed to be hiding a hand and so I gently pulled her arm up so that I could see her hand. Her little fingers were badly burned and blistered. The pattern of the burns suggested to me immediately that the burns were caused by a hotplate. The sore hand had received no medical treatment and had swollen to become as large as my hand. “How did this happen?” I asked the mother. She replied, “She tells lies”. I felt sick. Nothing I had ever learned was any good to me. I had no phone and no one to ask for advice. Under all my fundamentalist Christian formation was a question that gnawed at me for years. Where was God when that little kid’s hand was being held on the hotplate?

A couple of months later, I helped another mother with seven kids run away from the domestic violence of her drunken husband. The family lived on a part of the Murray River that was miles away from anyone or anything. On the day of escape, two of the children were unexpectedly with their father and so we escaped with Mum and five kids. When the husband returned, he was so incensed that his wife would leave him that he took his five-year-old daughter, put her in a weighted bag and lowed her into the river. The child died. My soul numbed for years until I could bare to ask myself where God might have been when that little girl was being lowered into the river.

It took me years to be able to ask my question let alone move toward an answer. Today, I know where God was when the little girl was mercilessly lowed into the Murray River. God was, “in the bag”.

Easter makes no sense except to reveal that there is no God-forsaken place where God isn’t. There is no person who is too far gone. The is no hole you can fall into where there is not goodness and hope at the bottom.

That is my Easter message for this year. When you are bewildered by Christians who observe this season and seem to honour what looks like an act of unspeakable brutality, understand that they know; God is in the bag.

Thank you for putting up with my odd religious message and thank you for being part of this inner circle,

Graham


Rev Graham Long AM
Pastor and CEO
The Wayside Chapel
Kings Cross
http://www.revgrahamlong.com/
http://www.thewaysidechapel.com/




 

What price,forgiveness?

I follow a blog by an Anglican minister ,Daniel Owen, who lives in Ireland.
In his Good Friday sermon just gone he starts off with an amazing story of a man being pardoned by his victim's mother.
Daniel's sermon you can read in full if you follow the link below.
Also you will find the link on the story just mentioned.
It is wonderful the young man was pardoned but how sad that so called "blood" money was required to obtain his release and forgiveness.
Each of us in this age of Grace have the wonderful privilege that Jesus offers us forgiveness of Sin, eternal life and so much more through his death and resurrection and the shedding of His blood.

http://imprintsoflight.wordpress.com/2014/04/19/sermon-for-good-friday-2014/

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-27070087

The Cross

Well Easter is upon us so time to reflect.
I have attached a Bible study on the Cross of Christ by Frank Hunting.
May the real meaning of Easter be real or become real for you this Easter.

See also the link below.

http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2009/09/cross-of-christ.html

What If?

What If? Palm sunday 2007




Luke 19


41As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42and said, "If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. 44They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you."


A friend of mine at work recently asked me this question.


Geoff is there anything in the Bible that if the whole world practiced it then there would be peace and not the mess we have?

That’s not word for word but pretty much what he said. I immediately thought of the Great commandment.

“Love the the Lord your God with all your heart body and your mind and love your neighbour as yourself .”

He said to me well the neighbour bit is fine but I can’t subscribe to the first part.

I revisited the question the other day when I heard on a tape one of our past ministers say in a sermon that if the following passage was practised then the world would be a vastly different place.

Philippians 4:8 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)

8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

I started to talk about this but someone else interrupted the conversation with some frivilous attempt to tackle the question although I think that person is also searching for answers.


It is intriguing ,but in a way very sad that many people long for peace and they sense that the Bible has the solution, but they stop short of embracing Jesus as the answer to their quest.

A distant relative the other night sent me an email that was asking where in the Bible some certain passages were found.

He seems to be drawing closer to God from where he once was but I guess time will tell.I wonder if He will really be able to see who Jesus is as for many years he was involved in a cult.


The Bible says that at just the right time Jesus came into or lives, those of us who are Christians. In the passage in Luke, as Jesus
approached Jerusalem on what we call palm sunday, He said that the people had not recognised the time of God’s coming for them and He wept because of this.

As we meet around this table this morning let us be thankful that those of us who are Christians have recognised God’s coming in Jesus and through His death and Resurrection and our receiving of Him we can know the peace that only Jesus can bring. but are we weeping with Jesus for those who do not yet recognise Him?

If, as you meet here this morning and contemplate the message of Christ as we approach Easter and you don’t know God’s peace ,see if you can recognise God’s timing in your life now and that He has come for you.

These emblems the Bread and the Cup, represent the body and blood of Jesus and remind us of His great sacrifice for us . We will give thanks and remember the time He came into our lives ,but more importantly ,He still is our Saviour and still lives in us though His Holy Spirit and intercedes for us constantly.

Nb. I am now retired from the workforce.This was presented at communion in my church in 2007. Palm sunday was of course the sunday just gone.