Brief  History

In 1872, the property for our present church building was deeded to the Trustees of the Wesleyan Methodist Church.

Our church has Methodist and Presbyterian roots.

From 1925 to 1939 Alliston had two United Church congregations, Wesleyan United Church and Knox United Church.

In July 1939, these two churches joined, becoming St. John's United Church.

Burns United Church (Essa) was closed in 1969. Their membership roll was transferred to St. John's Church.

                                  The Archives Ministry

        =============================================

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

            "History" (sort of) - Classic Sermons - (worth keeping for a while)

                        ---------------------------------------

March 6th, 2011                Rev Dr Alf Dumont

"Have you ever gone to the mountains?"

I did, when I was a candidate for ministry.  As a student minister, I was required to serve in two separate pastoral charges, in two separate years before I could be ordained.

I accepted an appointment to youth ministry in the small town of Jasper, Alberta.

A year previous, I had volunteered at Bathurst United Church as their youth minister, and two years previous,

I had been placed in the two small rural communities of Crestwynd and Quincy, in Saskatchewan – just southwest of Moose Jaw. 

So in those early years I experienced God’s Spirit on the city streets and in the plains of Saskatchewan. 

Now I was  going to the mountains, to experience God’s presence in a different way.

Each time we experience life we see God in new ways.

I learned in the city streets that God does not always appear neatly dressed and sometimes God comes to us not wearing deodorant and sometimes, perhaps all times, those who are hooked by the spirit in the bottle are really a searching after God’s Spirit.

I learned in the plains that you had to have more than one sermon if you were going to last the summer.

 I learned that you had to work hard, and drive for hours on dusty roads to get to isolated farm houses, so that you could to listen to stories of how God’s Spirit blew across the plains into the homes of a deeply spiritual people.

I learned that, as a minister, you are ministered to, by the people of God, more than you minister. 

I learned that with every blessing you share, you are enriched twofold.

I learned the lesson of humility on the streets and in the plains.

 

That summer in Jasper, I gained other lessons.

Some lessons I did not even seek.

Those became the more valuable lessons to have.

The Spirit provides us what we need,

if we are open to listen and to hear.

 

That’s what I thought of when I read the stories about Moses and Joshua ^[1]and the stories of Jesus and the disciples^[2] going up into the high mountains to be with God.

Because God said to them, “Come!” and they came.

They heard the voice of God clearly and followed that voice into an experience.  And those who went with them also had an experience: the Joshua’s and the disciples. 

We don’t often think of what they experienced.

 Sometimes we don’t know what is in store for us when we hear voices, but when we listen and summon up the courage to go there, we find amazing teachings, amazing experiences, we otherwise would not have had.

 

I returned the other Sunday from a Guatemala Team 2011 meeting and that meeting reminded me of listening to the call for Barb and me to be leaders in 2009.  It was not just a call from those on the Darling Bequest Committee asking us to consider being leaders. 

It was also a call from Spirit.

And that is what makes these decisions so rich,

when we realize

that it is not only the voice of people calling,

but is the voice of God’s Spirit through the people. 

It is then that our experiences become much richer much deeper.  It is then that you realize that everyone you meet has something to teach you and something to share with you and every experience takes on new meaning.

 

That is what happened to me in the mountains surrounding Jasper…not only at Mt. Pyramid but also Mt. Robson.

Along the journey up Pyramid Mountain, I met a family of grizzlies, many whiskey jacks, eagles, spirit beings and deer some who were miles away and other beings

who were as close to me, as to be within reach.

 I watched and I listened and I learned.

Some of the lessons I learned were not written on stone tablets but certainly became etched on my heart and in my mind, which is a lesson that Jeremiah said was to be the main lesson in the first place.^[3]

 

I remember sleeping in the cold night in my sleeping bag trying to get warm and then being wakened by one of our leaders, an Anglican minister named Ron, and told to get up and collect my things for the climb up the glacier. 

He and I had been selected to go on ahead and meet the people who were supposed to pick us up,

after we had hiked around Mt. Robson. 

We had become lost and the boys we were with were being taken back three days to where we began the hike,

and Ron and I were supposed to meet the  drivers and organizers in two days, on the other side of Mt. Robson to tell them that we had become lost, because a river changed courses because of runoff and that they needed to go back, to where we began the hike, to pick up the boys. 

Neither Ron nor I knew exactly where we were going, except around Mt. Robson. 

It certainly became a faith journey. 

I never fully agreed to take the journey on.

I was sort of volunteered. 

And I didn’t say “No!” 

And that was called volunteering.

I think many of you know that kind of volunteering.

Amazing what that kind of volunteering can lead to,

especially when you get up at 3 a.m. in the morning to climb a glacier and you have never climbed a glacier before.

You did not come prepared with hiking boots or hiking gear, or crampons^[4].  You just hiked in the same old work boots with smooth soles that you had used at the sawmill for many summers. 

And that is where faith comes in…lots of faith!

“Okay God, he I am, and here we go!”

 

God seems wonderfully silent at those times!

It’s only the crunch of the frost on the fallen branches that you hear as you try to walk silently in the woods, but silently and walking, sleepily, don’t always go together.

Then it is the cold of the snow in the early hours, that you notice, as you begin to go, above the tree line, up the glacier,

kicking toe-holds for yourself as you go up the slope,

remembering that it is better to do this at 3 or 4 a.m., in the morning, because if you did it at 3 p.m. in the afternoon,

with the sun beating down on the slopes you might cause an avalanche.

Funny how those thoughts are so real at times like that.

And then you realize that 12-15 boys are relying on you reaching your goal,

 so survival is not the goal,

the goal is reaching those who are looking for you,

so the boys can be rescued and taken home. 

So one toe-hold leads to another and before you realize it, you reach the peak of the glacier and watch one of the most beautiful sun rises that you will ever see in your life.

You feel alive!

You experience God in that moment!

And you say,

“Wow!  That is why I accepted this call to go to the mountains!”

 

You stay in the moment for a long time.

 Then Ron says, “Now we have to go down the other side.”

You think to yourself that going up was hard.

Think of going down tied to another man,

almost like a marriage contract.

Quite binding!

You think to yourself:

Slippery soles!   Slippery souls!

You and a rope holding you to another human being!

You begin going backwards down the slope,

digging toe-holds in this backwards way,

 as you edge your way down, slowly,

knowing each move that your partner makes could lead to death or injury, in this 'way outback wilderness’,

 far from help,

knowing that every move you make could jeopardize your partner’s safety.

 

But there is the exhilaration of climbing,

even it is down

and even if it backwards.

And you have the memory of the sunrise,

of being with God

and that keeps you going!

 

Eventually you reach a safe place, closer to the bottom of the glacier, or so you think.

 

Ron runs for joy!

And, because you are attached, you run too!

 

Then in the exhilaration of the moment,

 because you know you’re safe,

or, you think you’re safe,

 you realize that you have smooth soles and no grip.

And you recognize that you are sliding down the mountainside at incredible speed.

And you go by Ron and yell at him that you can’t stop.

Ron grabs hold a boulder that he is passing, one that is protruding through the snow.

And as you go by running, skating and sliding, you realize:

 

  “This ain’t as safe as I thought it was!

Maybe we should have continued to go slowly!

But what can I do now!”

 

because there are many boulders protruding.

You could get seriously injured.

And, just then, then the rope jerks!

You slow down!

Then you see another boulder, and you grasp hold of it,

and it slows you to a stop.
 

And you think:

 

 “How slippery the slope of life and of faith can be,

when you do not go slowly in expressing your faith,

or put into perspective the exhilaration

at experiencing God on the mountain top,

before you share it with those who are waiting for you.”

“Sometimes we don’t know what is in store for us when we hear voices, or follow others who hear voices, but when we listen and summon up the courage to go there, we find amazing teachings, amazing experiences, we otherwise would not have had.

And we find that we can share our stories and experiences with others who have had these amazing experiences as well.

And we learn that this is what makes the spiritual faith community such a rich community to belong to.”

THANKS BE TO GOD
 

^[1] Exodus  24:12-18

^[2] Matthew  17:1-9

^[3] Jeremiah 24:6-8; 29:10-14

^[4] Crampons are attachments to outdoor footwear that feature metal parts to provide traction on snow and ice.

                           --------------------------------------------

 

October 31st, 2010        “Radical Tradition”        Rev Dr William S Kervin

Psalm 149; Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-26

Anniversary Sunday, All Hallow’s Eve, Sunday of All Saints, Reformation Sunday  

Allow me to begin by expressing my appreciation and thanks for the opportunity to be sharing in this service of worship with you today, and to wish all of you here at St. John’s a very Happy Anniversary. It also my privilege to bring to you greetings from Emmanuel College. The connections between this congregation and Emmanuel are many and significant and long-lasting, though past and present ministers, staff and interns. We deeply value your partnership in theological education and your commitment to preparation for ministry in this place. The relationship between Emmanuel College and congregations like yours is not simply helpful or merely desirable, it is absolutely essential. Without your work, we could not do our work.

Of course it’s also great to reconnect with friends and colleagues today, with both Kenneth and Alf who are such respected leaders and Elders in The United Church of Canada. At Emmanuel we are particularly proud of both of them as distinguished recipients of honorary doctoral degrees from Victoria University and Emmanuel. And last, but by no means least, it’s also good to be here to check up on – I mean touch base with! – Paul. You, too, make us proud.

I.

There is much to celebrate today, on this your Anniversary Sunday. In fact, this day brings with it several celebrations, a dizzying array of converging traditions to consider: we have Anniversary Sunday; but it is also All Hallow’s Eve, the Eve of All Saints Day, better known as Halloween (which you may recall was a Christian festival before it was a sugar fix). And that means that tomorrow is also All Saints Day. Many churches celebrate the Feast of All Saints today, on the Sunday closest to November 1. And, if that isn’t enough, many Protestant Churches also celebrate today as Reformation Sunday. So that’s four very special occasions, four traditions with which to deal in one service. I expect we should be finished by about 3 pm!

Okay, perhaps we should consider another approach. On a day such as this, a day of converging traditions, let’s take a few moments to reflect on the meaning of tradition itself, on the role and place of tradition in our faith and in our lives.

The classic Broadway musical, Fiddler on the Roof, has a great opening sequence about the meaning and significance of tradition. How many of you have seen the musical, or perhaps the great film version by Canadian film director Norman Jewison? If you haven’t seen it, you really should. Even though it’s almost 40 years old, it still it holds up remarkably well. It is the story of a poor Jewish milkman named Tevye, who has five daughters, and his struggle to hold on to his faith and tradition. It’s set in Russia in 1905, a notorious period in history, a time of escalating pogroms and increasing violence against Jews. Meanwhile, at home Tevye’s daughters are being influenced by many new ideas and beliefs circulating at the time. In particular, they each in turn reject the old Jewish tradition of matchmaking and arranged marriages and decide that they want to choose their own husbands. One of them even chooses to marry a Gentile, a Russian Orthodox Christian, to particularly tragic results. Along the way, Tevye is forced to grapple with the meaning of tradition in the midst of a rapidly changing and challenging world, both within his family and beyond.

In the opening scene, Tevye speaks of the need to keep what he calls “balance” in life. “How do we keep our balance?” he asks. “That I can tell you in one word: tradition!” And he goes on to explain: “Because of our traditions, we’ve kept our balance for many, many years. Here in our little village we have traditions for everything,” he says. “We have traditions for how to sleep; how to eat; how to work; how to wear clothes.” “For instance,” he says, “we always keep our heads covered and always wear a little prayer shawl. This shows our constant devotion to God.” “Now you may ask,” he goes on, “How did this tradition get started? I’ll tell you,” he says. “I don’t know. But it’s a tradition.” “And,” he concludes, “because of our traditions we know who we are and what God expects us to do.”

Because of our traditions, we know who we are and what God expects us to do. For Tevye, tradition is about identity (who we are) and faithfulness (doing what God expects us to do). And finally, Tevye concludes: “Without our traditions our lives would be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof.” (Or perhaps for people here at St. John’s the appropriate metaphor might be, as shaky as a church spire!)

II.

Today, many Protestant churches are also observing the tradition of Reformation Sunday. It commemorates the symbolic beginning of the Protestant Reformation, when on this day, 493 years ago (October 31, 1517), legend has it that Martin Luther posted his controversial 95 theses on the church door in Wittenberg, Germany. Here, is another clue to the deeper meaning of tradition. Notice how Reformation Sunday celebrates the tradition of reform, renewal, even revolution – which is rather paradoxical, when you think of it. It is about the “tradition” of change! We often associate tradition with lack of change, with the way things have always been done, with permanence and constancy. But, in fact, the more you probe the meaning of tradition, the more you discover embedded within it the call to renewal and transformation.

And that, of course, is precisely why Luther chose All Hallow’s Eve, the Eve of All Saints Day, to issue his call for reform. He knew that to celebrate what Paul calls in our reading from Ephesians “the glorious inheritance of the saints” – to celebrate all that we have been given by those who have gone before us – is not a mandate for clinging to the past, but a call to be inspired by the transforming power and promise of God’s unfolding future.

Jaroslav Pelikan, the late church historian of Yale University, put it well when he wrote: “Tradition is the living faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.” Think about that: Tradition is the living faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.  As an Easter people, we are interested not in traditionalism, but tradition. We are interested in a living faith, a living tradition. To be part of this tradition is to be part of a living, breathing, growing, and even changing, faith – one in which sometimes the traditionalism of certain beliefs and customs needs to be shaken up, transformed and given new life for our time and context.

III.

The Gospel writers knew this. One of the long-standing traditions associated with All Saints Day is the reading of the Beatitudes, that series of blessings from Jesus’ sermon recorded in two of the gospels, the verses of which begin “blessed are….” (They are called Beatitudes because in the Latin the first line in each verse is beatus.) The Beatitudes have long been understood as a blueprint for the Christian tradition. In other words, they are the key to understanding our identity (who we are) and our faithfulness (what God expects us to do).

Some of you may be old enough to remember having to memorize the Beatitudes in Sunday School. Growing up in the Baptist church I had to memorize 12 passages of scripture, beginning with the shortest, “God is Love” (1 John 4:8) and progressing through increasingly long passages until you came to the 9 verse version of the Beatitudes in Matthew, chapter 5. And if you succeeded in memorizing the Beatitudes, you received that much-coveted prize: a laminated bookmark!

Some of you may have noticed, upon hearing the reading from the Gospel of Luke today, that Luke’s version of the Beatitudes is significantly different from Matthew’s more familiar version. That’s your homework for today, go home and compare Matthew 5 with Luke 6. In Matthew, the Beatitudes are part of Jesus’ so-called “sermon on the mount.” But in Luke, Jesus gives his sermon not on a mountain but on what Luke describes as “a level place.” The Lukan version is sometimes called “the sermon on the plain.” In both Matthew and Luke, geography is always theology. Matthew has several moments of great revelation take place on mountain tops, while in Luke mountains are places to which Jesus retreats for solitude and prayer. So Luke has Jesus preaching on the level, always identifying with the people. Luke’s Jesus is, you could say, much more down to earth.

This is especially evident in the different versions of the Beatitudes themselves. In Matthew it is “blessed are the poor in spirit,” but in Luke it is simply “Blessed are you who are the poor.” In Matthew it is “blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness,” but in Luke it is “blessed are you who are hungry now.” And finally, in Matthew there are no woes or curses, only 9 blessings. But Luke has 4 blessings and 4 parallel woes:            

            Blessed are you who are poor; woe to you who are rich.

            Blessed are you who are hungry; woe to you who are full.

            Blessed are you who weep; woe to you who are laughing.

            Blessed are you when people hate you; woe to you when people speak well of you.

Contemporary biblical scholars agree that both Matthew and Luke are working with the same oral tradition, but they are interpreting it in significantly different ways; they are each speaking to their particular context and to the concerns of their time and circumstance. So, you see, they understand the oral tradition of Jesus’ words as a living, breathing tradition of relevance to their immediate time and place. And they are inviting us into, and challenging us with, a living tradition.

In particular, in Luke’s version of the Beatitudes we are being invited into what could be called a radical tradition. Luke’s down-to-earth Jesus cares deeply about earthy problems and challenges, and he is calling us to that level of concern in our faith and in our world. (That’s what the word radical means; it means the root, origin, or beginning of something.) Luke’s take on it all is to challenge us to consider that it’s not only about being “poor in spirit,” it’s also about the very real problem of poverty in our society. It’s not only about “hungering and thirsting after righteousness,” it’s also about the reality of hunger in our world. And, yes, it’s also about the problem and challenge of wealth and affluence in a world where hunger and poverty persist and, indeed, are on the rise.  Friends, this radical tradition of Jesus has something unavoidable to say to us about our identity and our faithfulness, about who we are and about what God expects us to do.

IV.

Now, of course, as a guest preacher, I have the luxury of raising questions, and giving few answers, and then leaving town. But let me leave you with this. Have you noticed, recently, that much of our energy in the churches is being taken up with questions of survival and growth. But interestingly enough, these are not the questions at the heart of the Christian tradition; these are not questions of identity and faithfulness; these are not questions about who we are and what God expects us to do.

Perhaps the question is not so much “How will we survive as a church?” or “How do we grow as a church?” Perhaps the question is: “How do we live into our identity as followers of Jesus in the world?” …which is really to ask:

            “How do we serve others?

            How do we live with respect in creation?

            How do we live with integrity in this world?

                        -- the world God loves, the world for which Jesus died?

To be an Easter people is to live out of this kind of identity, and to live in to this kind of faithfulness.

And we have a word for this radical tradition; that I can tell you in one word: resurrection!

May God bless to us our traditions,

            and may they give us life,

                        and new life,

                                    for the whole world.

                                                Amen.

                        **********************************************

August 29th, 2010        "Risky Business"        Rev Elaine Longland   

Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16    Luke 14: 1, 7-14 

The writer of the book of Hebrews this morning provides us with a practical, if not lofty, list of what it means to live in God’s way.  We are called to love one another, welcome newcomers, remember those in prison and those who suffer, and respect the bonds of marriage.  The followers of Jesus are to be free from the love of money, being content with what we have.  We are reminded that God will never abandon us, which gives us the courage to love boldly.  But are we really aware that to love boldly is risky business?

The generosity of spirit, of time and material goods that is implied here stands in contrast to the way many of us live.  We tend to be more self-focused, worried as we are about the future and what it holds for us.  We prefer to be more careful. 

Yet this passage paints for us a picture of folk who are true to their faith.  They don’t worry about the future.  They are risk-takers.  They associate with the weak rather than the powerful.  They have a startling ability to keep things in perspective, to be willing to do the right thing and only worry about the consequences afterwards.  Their focus is on those who are in need of help.

And then we move to the description of the party that we read about in Luke’s gospel.  Based on what we read, I’m glad I missed it.  It could not have been very pleasant for anyone: tension is thick and almost everyone seems to be worried about the impression he or she is making.  Except for Jesus, there are no risk-takers here.  The religious leaders are watching Jesus and Jesus is observing the behaviour of both host and guests.

It starts out awkwardly for the host when Jesus chooses to heal a sick person on the Sabbath.  Bad timing.  Then Jesus challenges the customary behaviour of the guests, who are scrambling for a better place around the table.  Jesus reminds the guests of the wisdom from Proverbs about allowing the host to invite them to an honoured place rather than choosing the best seat for themselves.

But isn’t it scary to risk being overlooked?  Maybe the host won’t notice me if I am not in view.  Worse, people might conclude that I am best suited for the lower position, if I make no effort to promote myself. 

Then Jesus addresses the host about hospitality.  Don’t worry about your status or how you may benefit when you welcome people, he says.  Overcome your preference to focus on useful or reciprocal relationships.  Do something really different, Jesus suggests.  Invite to your parties people who seem to bring little with them; the people who don’t usually get invited to parties   Wow!  That’s risky business.

A boatload of Sri Lankan refugees comes to Canada.  In their homeland, they face persecution and prejudice.  They have short-circuited Canada’s immigration process.  They will cause a further drain on an already over-burdened health care system.  Are these the people Jesus wants us to invite to the party?

A Muslim community in New York City seeks to build a mosque just a few blocks from the site of the former World Trade Centre.  Those who lost loved ones on 9/11 say that to have a mosque so close would be like rubbing salt in their wounds.  Are these Muslims the people that Jesus wants us to invite to the party? 

Our faith calls us to have confidence in God’s larger purposes.  As followers of Jesus, we are called to risk inviting what might seem to be the wrong people to the party.

There was a couple in Lowville, ON, a village just north of Burlington who went to Maplehurst Correctional Complex in Milton each week and lead the inmates there who were interested in a bible study.  Then on Sunday after church, they went to Maplehurst and brought 2 or 3 of the men to their home for lunch.  Risky business!

I want to tell you a true story told by the Rev. Steve Willey, a former minister at Humbercrest United Church in Toronto. 

A community chaplain working in the heart of Toronto was invited to speak at a breakfast at one of the downtown churches.  His ministry was with men who had been recently released from prison.  His job was to help them make the transition back into the mainstream of society by offering them pastoral care and personal support.  A noble undertaking to be sure!  A silence came over the audience when he told them that he had most recently been working with a man who was one of the city’s most notorious sex-offenders.  He told those gathered that every Tuesday morning, in the very room where they were now sitting, a small group of men met with this fellow to encourage him to stay with his treatment program and to offer him a supportive community that would hold him accountable on a weekly basis.

For months, this man had no permanent residence.  The group went from one church to another with an appeal for assistance in helping this man find an apartment, but there was no response whatsoever.  Nobody wanted him in their back yard, and they frankly didn’t care where he went or what happened to him.  Finally, through a contact in an Alcoholics Anonymous group, they were able to rent an apartment.  They could have stopped there, having done more than anyone would have expected for such a disreputable person.  But they didn’t stop, because there was one last thing to do: they threw him a house-warming party!

This party is a remarkable sign of God’s gracious kingdom precisely because it takes place against the backdrop of our loathing for the honoured guest.  A man with a history of being a sexual predator is the lowest of the low.  Our society has given us permission to hate and ostracize him.  But, instead, a group of Christian men committed not to personal gain or glory, but to restorative justice, have taken him into their fold.  They don’t condone what he did.  They don’t make any guarantees that he won’t re-offend.  They are convinced, however, that he is less likely to harm someone again if he is supported by a community that will embrace him as a fellow sinner.

The scriptures call us to love boldly and that is risky business.  The writer of the book of Hebrews reminds us, however, that God is our helper.  To believe and trust that we are loved and sustained by God gives us freedom to give generously of ourselves and our resources.  It gives us the courage to risk.  We find that we can show hospitality to needy strangers, spend time with prisoners and share our resources with the poor.

Then we can proclaim with the writer of Hebrews: The Lord is my helper.  I will not be afraid.  What can anyone do to me?  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

                            ----------------------------------------

August 22nd, 2010    

            "Remembering the Sabbath"   Rev Elaine Longland

Jeremiah 1:4-10        Luke 13:10-17

I came upon this statement made by the bishops of the Church of England when they met in 1888.  They were concerned about observance of the Sabbath.  It reads:

The principle of the religious observation of one day in seven is of Divine and primeval obligation, and was afterwards embodied in the Fourth commandment.  The observance of the Lord’s Day as a day of rest, of worship and of religious teaching has been a priceless blessing in all Christian lands in which it has been maintained.  The growing licence in its observance threatens a grave change in its sacred and beneficient character...The increasing practice on the part of some of the wealthy and leisurely classes of making the day a day of secular amusement is most strongly to be deprecated.  The most careful regard should be laid to the danger of any encroachment upon the rest which on this day is the right of servants as well as their masters, and of the working classes as well as their employers.

The language is a bit dated, but I wonder what those bishops might have to say now, in today’s fast-paced, technological, consumer-driven society about Sunday observance?

Certainly we are instructed by scripture to set aside a day for rest and worship.  The Jewish tradition had a whole body of teaching about do’s and don’ts for the Sabbath and clearly in our gospel lesson this morning, Jesus has crossed the line by healing this woman on the Sabbath.  The synagogue ruler was concerned about the ritual purity of Israel of which strict observance of the Sabbath was an important part.  Jesus, on the other hand, was concerned about human need which he put before ritual purity.  In the gospels, Jesus has many conflicts with Jewish authorities regarding Sabbath observance and in Mark’s gospel, he sort of sums up his position by saying, “The Sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the Sabbath.

But the world we live in seems to have forgotten the Sabbath.  Life for many has become a mad race of striving and grasping.  We see people push their bodies beyond their limits.  We see parents who do not have time for their children when they are hurt or afraid.  We see people who are so preoccupied with achieving that they miss the quiet moments where their spirits can be nourished and refreshed.  We see people who do not feel safe enough to be kind and generous to one another.  We see people who cannot take time to taste the blessings of the world around them.  The whole experience of being alive seems to melt into one huge obligation and the chorus goes up, “I’m so busy!”

I’m so busy...  And we seem to say that to one another with a certain amount of pride.  The ability to withstand stress has become a mark of real character.  The busier we are, the more important we seem to ourselves and others.  This has become the model of a successful life.

Silly us.  How have we allowed this to happen?  How did we get so terribly lost in a world so saturated with striving and grasping that there is little time for joy and delight.

The bishops of the Church of England of 1888 thought they had problems!  They spoke about what a blessing a day of rest was in all Christian lands.  In today’s global community, where do we find a day set aside for rest?  Accommodation has been made to people with other customs and religions who recognize other days of the week as Sabbath.  As well, the power of the voices that represent commercial enterprise has made the day almost obsolete.

Wayne Muller, in his book entitled Sabbath, provides a wonderful example of the way consumerism drives the world in telling the story of the Kellogg’s cereal company.  I may not have all the details right on this as I read it a few years ago, but it goes something like this.  During the depression of the 30's, instead of laying off his workers, Mr. Kellogg gave everyone reduced hours.  His employees very much enjoyed spending more time with their families and having the opportunity to pursue hobbies in their leisure time.

As the depression eased, the workers chose to remain on reduced hours and more workers were hired.  During the war, however, when the labour pool was reduced, the workers were required to return to full-time labour.

Some years later, the company was responding to a recession and again, Mr. Kellogg suggested that everyone return to reduced hours.  A new mind set had emerged, however, and the workers refused.  Consumerism had set in.  Rather than enjoy the opportunity for more leisure time, the workers now wanted to maintain the lifestyle to which they had become accustomed.

Sabbath is a God-given gift.  The bishops had the right idea.  It is a human need to take time out, to give thanks for the beauty of the world around us and the blessings that have been heaped on us. 

It would seem that a Sabbath day has gone the way of dial telephones.  Perhaps we need to redefine ‘Sabbath’.   Rather than a day set apart, perhaps we need to regard Sabbath as a state of being that allows us to find peace in the midst of everything else that is going on.  But, where can we find Sabbath given the world we live in?

I was part of a study group a few years ago where we wrestled with this question.  I will share with you some ideas I heard there.  One couple celebrated each evening meal when neither of them needed to rush off to a meeting by having lighted candles on the table and quiet music in the background.  They used the time to really listen to one another and connect as a couple.

Another woman has a severely disabled child that needs her constant attention.  She told us that she has learned to take Sabbath time when she is standing in line at the bank or supermarket.  She doesn’t fret about another line that is moving more quickly, but instead enjoys the peace of merely ‘being’.

A rich industrialist came upon a fishermen lying lazily beside his boat, smoking a pipe.

“Why aren’t you out fishing?” said the industrialist.

“Because I have caught enough fish for the day,” said the fisherman.

“Why don’t you catch more?”

“What would I do with them?”

“You could earn more money,” was the reply, “With that you could buy a motor and go into deeper waters and catch more fish.  Then you would make enough to buy nylon nets.  Those would bring you more fish and more money.  Soon you would have enough money to own two boats ... maybe even a fleet of boats.  Then you would be a rich man like me.”

“What would I do then?”

“Then you could relax and take life easy.”

“What do you think I’m doing now?”

Sabbath is a gift of God.  It may be a day or more, it may be a few moments.  It is an opportunity to “be”, an opportunity for rest and peace to wash over our harried lives to refresh and renew.  It is an opportunity to give thanks, to wonder, to re-connect with God and those around us. Sabbath was made for humankind.  Remember the need for Sabbath time and keep it holy.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

                               ----------------------------------------------------------

August 1st, 2010        "Soul, Mind and Body"        Rev Arch McCurdy

One of my father's favourite hymns, written by John Keble, nearly 200 years ago, was

Sun of My Soul. He would play the pump organ and sing. I can remember it yet:

        Sun of my soul, Thou Saviour dear,

        It is not night if Thou be near;

        O may no earthborn cloud arise

        to hide Thee from Thy servant's eyes. (1)

 

The word "SOUL" is disappearing from our Christian vocabulary.

It used to be used even in the secular press.

When the unsinkable passenger ship the Titanic hit a huge iceberg and sank in the

Atlantic April 14, 1912, the headline in the Halifax newspaper read

        "1500 souls perished at Sea"

 

Thus when I was walking through Chapters a month or two ago, my eyes lit on a book by Deepak Chopra: the title:

        Reinventing the Body, Resurrecting the Soul (2)

The first thing I do, when picking a book off the shelf, is read script on the inside of the

paper jacket to see what the author is up to.

The first thing I read is that Deepak Chopra is the author of over 50 books and

translated into over 35 languages.

 

This is not one of your average "self-help books". The opening chapter or

"breakthrough", is the bringing to our consciousness the forgotten miracle that

        Your physical body is a fiction. (3)

He backs up that startling statement with his experience, first as a medical student

where he was told that

        the body is a machine assembled from moving parts, and

        like all machines it wears out over time. (4)

 

When he included quantum physics in his studies he discovered otherwise.

People live lives that are filled with meaning, purpose, dreams, hopes, courage.

Machines do not function that way.

He raises the question,

    What would give your body its highest meaning, purpose, intelligence and creativity?

Chopra's answer to that question is what heightened my interest in his book.

        Only the sacred side of our nature.

 

This led Chopra, he says, to the phrase, "resurrecting the soul".

Chopra takes 271 pages to flesh out his thoughts on soul, mind and body. I am trying to

pick up relevant thoughts about a subject which connects with our spiritual or soul

pilgrimage.

I begin with a flat out statement:

        The soul is divine; it connects us with God. (5)

 

What is fascinating about that statement is that it takes us to early church history when

differences of opinion or belief arose in the early Church.

The Western or Roman branch of the Church interpreted Jesus as the "Light"

that points us to God.

A large group of early Christians, called Gnostics, on the other hand, believed

that there is a divine spark within every one of us, including Jesus.

 

The life of Jesus is a living example of nurturing that divine spark, until his

awareness of God was so all encompassing that he chose the family term

"Father" to describe his relationship to God.

 

It is no surprise that the early Church Fathers understood Jesus as the "Son of God."

He is. But, so are you - sons and daughters of God.

 

I believe the Gnostics got it right. I am also concluding that the closest we can come to

defining that divine spark is the word "soul".

First, a bit more about the body - inasmuch as body and soul are so intertwined that we

cannot understand one without the other.

This new understanding of body-soul relationship is a recovery from the medical,

scientific model which for the past two centuries separated body and soul.

 

Isn't it interesting that in the past 100 years or so, the creation stories, in various

translations of the Bible, describe the creation of humankind in these words:

        Then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into

        his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living beinq. (6)

 

Now, turn to the King James Version of the creation story, published in 1611, before the

"The Enlightenment" of the 17 and 18th centuries, and the story reads:

        Then the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his·

        nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. (7)

Although the NRSV is a much improved translation of the Bible, in this particular

instance the translators of the KJV got it right.

 

We now return to Chopra and his understanding of the function of soul:

        The soul is divine; it connects us to God. Insofar as life contains love,

        truth and beauty, we look to our souls as the source of those qualities.

        It is no accident that a perfect love is called a soul mate. (8)

 

Chopra gives a few examples of how our body is connected with all bodies of nature:

Our physical evolution ceased around 200,000 years ago. You don't possess liver,

lungs, heart or kidneys any different from cave dwellers.

        Indeed you share 60 percent of your genes with a banana,

        90 percent with a mouse,

        99 percent with a chimpanzee (9)

To separate ourselves from the animal world we have to go beyond the physical.

We make physical changes to our body through the mind or emotion.

        Any change in mood is conveyed via "messenger molecules" to every

        part of your body, altering the chemical activity of each cell.

        Your immune system gets stronger or weaker in response to being

        in a loving or unloving relationship.

        Using your mind keeps your brain young; not using your brain, leads

        to its decline. (10)

 

One of the things biologists tell us about the brain is that it is not fixed at birth. In fact it

is quite plastic.

An experiment was undertaken with a group of Buddhist monks who were hooked up

to an MRI which registers changes in the brain.

The monks were told to focus or meditate on the emotion "compassion".

 

As they did so changes in the brain were registered with the focus on that part of the

brain associated with happiness and positive thoughts. (11)

It must be said that these monks had been meditating for years, so don't try

this exercise overnight and expect to thus change your brain waves!

It isn't going to happen!

 

But what the experiment does show is that

        mental activity alone can alter the brain (12)

I tend to take that revelation literally.

Bruce Lipton's breakthrough book The Biology of Belief clearly discovered, after 20

years of research, that our cells, which contain our DNA and genes, are not closed

envelopes as assumed by medical science, since medical science discovered our

human cells. (13)

Instead our cells have receptors with the result that they can be influenced, not only by

chemicals or drugs, but also by thought.

Therefore the two scientists, coming from difference approaches, come to the same

conclusion.

        Our bodies are in a state of constant change.

        Whether the change is for better or for worse, positive or negative, is dependent

        primarily upon our thought processes.

        If our thought processes are negative, the results will be negative.

        If our thought processes are positive, the results will be positive.

 

Now we come full circle to the opening statement of Deepak Chopra:

        What would give your body its highest meaning, purpose, intelligence,

        and creativity? Only the sacred side of our nature.

 

Thus we need to recapture our sense of soul- the sacred side of our nature.

Our soul is nurtured by what thoughts are going on in our head, and most often

negatively by the stresses which we experience in this fast-moving world.

 

One final word: Just what do we mean by soul?

If I say I have a soul, I am making soul a thing - the same as saying I have a car, or a

house. Soul is not a thing. Soul goes far beyond the bonds of self.

 

Soul is awareness - awareness of the Presence of God in one's life.

It is the awareness of that Presence which formulates within us an attitude:

    an attitude of gratitude, compassion, forgiveness, creativity.

These we strive for above all earthly riches, because only then are we truly free.

 

On the human level, when one is deeply in love with another person, there is an

awareness of that person, just below the surface, which profoundly influences one's

thought and behaviour.

How will my decisions affect the one I love?

 

The joy of that love relationship is that one's thoughts and behaviour are not

motivated by fear of punishment, or alienation, or even reward - one is: motivated by

unselfish love.

        How do we get there?

        Jesus summed it up in these wonderful words:

            You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and

                with all your mind.

        You shall love your neighbour as yourself. (14)

 

When you and I are motivated to that depth of love - then we have resurrected Soul.

                                                                                                                                Amen.

                                                                ----------------------

(1)  The Hymnary #556

(2)  Harmony Books, New York 2009

(3)  ibid p. 20       

(4)  ibid p. 1          

(5)  ibid p. 3

(6)  Genesis 2:7  New Revised Standard Version

(7)  Genesis 2:7  King James Version

(8)  Chopra:  Reinventing the body, Resurrecting the Soul  p. 3

(9)  ibid p. 8

(10)  ibid p. 9

(11)  ibid p. 25

(12)  ibid p. 25

(13)  The Biology of Belief, Bruce H. Lipton, Hay House Inc. Revised Copyright 2009

                        --------------------------------------------

November 15th, 2009    "Interpreting the Signs of the Times"    Rev. Dr. Harold Wells

        Isaiah 32: 9-17; Matthew 16: 1-4

I was invited by your Mission and Outreach Ministry this morning specifically to speak about Kairos and its work. 

Kairos is an ecumenical coalition of the Christian churches in Canada working together on matters of social justice and the environment.  Nearly all the major churches of Canada are involved: the Presbyterian, Lutheran, United Church, Roman Catholic, Anglican, Mennonites, Quakers, and Christian Reformed.

The Greek word Kairos, with a capital K, means the Critical Time, or Time of Opportunity, Time of Decision.

Kairos has a professional staff of researchers, writers and educators, located in Toronto, who work full time providing leadership and resources for the work of Kairos across the country.  Kairos speaks to government on behalf of the churches, and seeks to educate the public on crucial moral and ethical issues facing the country. 

For the last couple of years, and for a few years ahead, the focus of Kairos is Climate Change, especially as it relates to energy.  What I will say this morning on these issues derives partly from the many books and articles now published on this topic, but also from the research and resources of our Kairos staff.

Our Old Testament text this morning was pretty dark, wasn't it? At least the people Isaiah was speaking to all those centuries ago must have been alarmed by what the prophet was saying.  He was addressing a time of dire national crisis, one of social injustice and of international conflict.  But his words seem to fit our present time.

"Rise up, you people who are at ease, hear my voice; you complacent ones .... In a little more than a year you will shudder, you complacent ones, for the vintage will fail, the fruit harvest will not come.  Tremble you ... who are at ease, shudder, you complacent ones .... "

Isaiah was interpreting the signs of the times.  It was a Kairos time, a critical time of decision, and he was calling the nation to change direction.  He didn't fear to get concrete and to 'talk politics'.

In the gospel lesson we read this morning Jesus also tells his followers to "interpret the signs of the times."  In other words, be alert to what's going on around you.  The people were asking Jesus for a supernatural sign to back up his message.  But he said, No sign will be given to this generation.  No sign but the sign of Jonah.

Now Jonah was a prophet sent to the city of Nineveh to warn the people of disaster to come.  The only sign, says Jesus, will be the warning of a prophet.

Sometimes we glimpse a tough side to Jesus.  This gentle, loving man was not naive about the harsh realities of life.  He was a shrewd observer of the power dynamics of the world he lived in.  He knew where the power was, who was getting rich at the expense of others, and who was getting hurt.  As his followers we must take him seriously when he says "interpret the signs of the times."

Well, if we consider the "signs of the times" today, probably the most serious thing that's going on in the world right now is a huge crisis with the environment - climate change and global warming - as these are connected to fossil fuels as our chief energy source.

Why talk about this in church?  Isn't this politics?  Isn't this science?  What does it have to do with religion?

The answer is that our problems around energy and environment are, at their root, moral and spiritual in nature.  Because our relationship to the world of nature is a spiritual relationship.  Our United Church creed affirms this, when it calls us to "live with respect in creation."

This implies that we must honour and cherish the natural world, and live in harmony with it. We are part of the natural order, and when we do harm, it will respond with violence.

A famous author, James Lovelock, a distinguished geo-physiologist, wrote a book called The Revenge of Gaia.  He sees the planet earth as a living organism, which he calls 'Gaia' (the name of a Greek goddess) .

Gaia, he says, will rid itself of any organism that threatens its overall well-being.  He thinks that if we abuse the world of nature, it will have its revenge upon us, and our very survival as a human race is at stake.  An ancient prophet like Isaiah would have seen this as a kind of judgment of God, a kind of justice falling upon us, if we fail to change direction.

If we read the newspapers, we know that the planet's revenge is beginning to happen now.  We are facing a double crisis: one about energy, the other about environment, and the two are closely linked.

First of all, as for environment, we can observe that there has been more violent weather lately.  Hurricanes, and tornadoes, and other extreme weather conditions, have become more numerous and more intense than ever.  Katrina, at New Orleans, was a dramatic depiction of what may lie ahead.

But it's not just subjective impressions about the weather that we go by.  Fine measurements of the layers of ice in the polar regions have revealed to climate scientists the history of the earth's climate, showing an unprecedented heating up of the planet in recent years.

Of course we've all seen it on TV, especially on David Suzuki's programs, warning us of the melting ice in both the north and south polar regions.  It seems there's no doubt about it now.  The scientific consensus is pretty well unanimous.

During the twentieth century, average global temperatures have risen by 0.6 degrees Celsius over the pre-industrial age, - doesn't seem like much, but, we're told that such a change can have enormous implications for weather patterns; it can result in drought, the drying up of lakes, the alteration of the gulf stream in the oceans, the destruction of plant, fish, and animal life.  It can create deserts, bring on forest fires, and make human life unviable in most of the planet.

But we also have to be aware of economic relationships.  Who benefits from the present situation?  Who is getting rich from oil and gas production and the continuing use of fossil fuels?

Let's consider the most elementary facts.  We know now that climate change is largely a result of the burning of fossil fuels.  Namely COAL, especially for producing electricity.  And NATURAL GAS, also used to generate electricity, and to heat our houses and other buildings.  And OIL, used especially for petroleum, to empower our cars, trucks, ships and airplanes, and to empower industries and agriculture.

Forgive me if I'm telling you elementary things that you already know, but in case some of you are new to this subject, the burning of these fossil fuels puts carbon dioxide into the air, which rises and produces a kind of ceiling, rather like a greenhouse roof on the planet earth, which traps heat in the atmosphere.  It makes the planet like a greenhouse, through maintaining heat that would otherwise exit into outer space.

Now we know that life can exist on the planet earth only because we are located at exactly the right distance from the sun, which provides just the right amount of heat, so that the rich life of this wonderful planet can thrive.  That's what we are messing with when we heat up the planet with carbon dioxide emissions.

And this is increasing rapidly with expanding industrialization and never ending "economic growth," in North America and Europe, but also now in places like China, India and Brazil.

Recently we've hard a lot about capturing the carbon dioxide that's coming out of coal, oil or gas, and storing it underground.  This is hopeful, though I understand that the technology for carbon capture and storage is still uncertain, and the process very expensive.  We would have to expend a lot of energy, first to get the fuels out of the ground, and then, also, pump the carbon back underground again.  So carbon capture and storage would need to be sufficiently inexpensive so as not to negate the value of the energy source itself.  In the meantime this technology is in its infancy.

One of the most alarming aspects of our human carbon emissions is the rising of the seas, because of the melting of the polar ice caps.  Apparently this is no longer a theory; it's already happening.  Recently I saw a TV program showing that parts of the coast of England are now being reclaimed by the ocean.

At a recent Kairos event we heard from a young girl from the Solomon Islands in the Pacific, telling us that the rising sea is already claiming parts of her country, now submerged underwater.  Coastlines all over the world will be threatened by rising seas, producing vast poverty, and huge refugee populations.  Imagine the destabilization of the world, as millions flee the rising seas.  Imagine the international conflict generated by these circumstances.

Now unfortunately, our life style is totally dependent on these carbon producing fuels, particularly oil.  This brings us to the other side of the crisis: the depletion of energy resources.

The fossil fuels, which took millions of years to develop under the ground, are finite resources, especially oil.  Perhaps you've heard of 'peak oil' - i.e., the assertion that the accessible oil in the ground is about to peak, that in just over a century, we've already used about half of what's there.

As our industrialization expands, not only in our part of the world, but in parts of the Third World, oil consumption is rising rapidly.  But the supply won't last forever, and at some point in the next few years it's likely to become far more scarce, and much more expensive than ever before.

I suppose that in the long run this could be good news for 'Gaia'.  But meanwhile it will have huge implications for the future of industry, transportation and agriculture.  Unfortunately we are totally addicted to our cars, and some of us are addicted to air travel, which is one of the very worst contributors to climate change.

Unfortunately we are also addicted to eating, and have become highly dependent on the transportation of trucks, to say nothing of farm machinery, pesticides and fertilizers, much of this dependent on oil.

This means, to begin with, tearing up vast regions of boreal forest, so far an area about as large as the whole of the maritime provinces.  Imagine tearing up the whole of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island to get oil!  That in itself contributes to climate change, because forests function to reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Now most of the bitumen is actually very deep, up to 600 meters below the surface, and has to be extracted by sinking deep pipes, through which hot water and steam is pressed to separate the bitumen from the clay, and to bring it to the surface.  This process uses up great amounts of precious natural gas, to heat up the fresh water, to produce the steam.  Then this very thick bitumen has to be upgraded, using again, great amounts of energy and water, before it gets shipped off to refineries.

So we are using up natural gas and clean water to obtain dirty oil.  This has been compared to using gold to obtain lead.  The natural gas, after all, is a finite resource, extremely important for heating purposes in Canada.  It will not last forever, but we are rapidly using it up - why? To obtain oil.

Or, I should say, the Americans are using it up, because, under the NAFTA agreement most of the gas and oil produced in western Canada is piped south to the U.S. (While we in eastern Canada import oil from places like Algeria and the Mid-East).

Not only that, but great amounts of fresh water are being used from the local lakes and rivers, and evidently much of this water is not recoverable, but sits in huge toxic waste ponds.  Fresh water too is a priceless, indispensable commodity.

And, even more important, we know that the abuse of the rivers and lakes in the region is also threatening the lives and livelihood of the indigenous people in that area - through an increase in cancers, and the loss of fishing and hunting grounds.

There are a number of American and European companies making profits from the tar sands, but Canadian companies too, which earned a total of $26.4 billion last year.  Despite the great profitability of these companies, the Canadian government subsidized them to the tune of $1.4 billion. It's hard to believe that these companies would do so badly without government charity.

And, true enough, it also provides lots of jobs to ordinary workers. So there's lots of public. support for the tar sands, and its subsidization, especially in western Canada.

Meanwhile, we might ask: Is it in someone's interest that we keep driving gas guzzling vehicles?  Consider what could be done with an extra 1.4 billion dollars if it were invested in the development of green cars, and generally assisting the transition from an oil economy to a green economy.

Everyone knows that we're going to have to move to alternative energy sources, massively, and very soon.  In other words - solar, wind, biomass, geo-thermal, and so on, need to be developed rapidly, and massively.

Maybe the good news is that we're not all that helpless.  Maybe we can be part of a solution.

There are two levels at which solutions can be found: the systemic level, and the personal level.  By systemic I mean the level of large systems and structures.  I mean it would have to be governments that enact laws with teeth in them, regulations regarding carbon emissions, tax incentives and appropriate subsidies aimed at green development.

Some countries in Europe are far ahead of us - especially in Scandinavia and Germany - with their enormous wind, solar and geo-thermal developments.

Energy self-sufficient buildings - yes, isn't that exciting? - energy self-sufficient buildings are possible - even energy self-sufficient churches?  It is possible for a house or other buildings to be energized by solar and geo-thermal sources.  By geo-thermal I mean heat in the winter, and cooling (air conditioning) in the summer, from underground.

But such a development in buildings generally is not likely to happen unless governments use tax policies, or cap and trade systems, to make it happen.  And, in turn, governments will only enforce these things if the public wants them to do so. Governments will only do what people demand, to get themselves elected.

That's why it's worth pressuring governments to act, and rewarding them when they do. Political parties need to be rewarded, rather than punished, when they have the courage to speak out on these things.

But if we're going to ask political parties and governments to stick their necks out, maybe we have to act personally as well.  At the personal level we can all be part of the solution, - by becoming part of a new ecological consciousness, a new ecological culture.

We can do some of the obvious things we already know about: use energy efficient light bulbs, turn off the lights, turn off the computer, turn down the heat, install better windows, check the efficiency of insulation in our homes, use cloth bags rather than plastic bags for our groceries. (Plastic, remember, is made with oil, and therefore also carries a carbon footprint.)

Then there's our cars and trucks.  Maybe the next time we buy a new car, some of us should seriously think about purchasing a smaller, more fuel efficient car, maybe a hybrid or electric car.  We might wonder, Why is it taking so long to get those electric cars going?  Big expensive cars are not cool anymore.  You know what's really cool in transportation?  Those little smart cars, or preferably scooters or bicycles.

Have you heard of WWJD?  What would Jesus do?  It's an old joke, but maybe some of you have not heard it. WWJD now means: 'What would Jesus drive'? This Jesus who rode a humble donkey.  Can you imagine him driving a big gas guzzler?

All these things I've mentioned are small things, but if we all did them together, it would make a huge difference. "Small things count," as the hymn says. 

As I said, this is at root, a spiritual problem. It has to do with our consumerism, of course.  Our worship of things, and our essential greed.  Surely Christian people, and the churches, ought to be leading the way in the cultural change that needs to occur.

Small things count, even a small thing like signing a petition, asking the government to act decisively, so that Canada can play its part in global change.  A petition is available to you this morning after church.  Kairos has already accumulated 100,000 signatures on these petitions, from churches across the country, and hope to have another 100,000 before the Copenhagen conference on climate change next month.

The Kairos petition, follows the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations.  The recommendation is science based.  It says we have to reduce carbon emissions by 25% from 1990 levels by 2020, - 25% from 1990 levels, within 10 years.

That is a very ambitious target.  Only a huge worldwide social mobilization can make it happen.  Something like a mobilization for war, where everybody gets involved.  If we don't do it, global warming will reach a tipping point, and take off irreversibly.

So would you please sign the petition, and add your voice to a great throng of people demanding decisive action on climate change.  Will you do your small part, in your personal life style, and in your role as a citizen, to bring about change.

This is up to us. There will be no supernatural intervention that will solve this problem for us.  As Jesus says in our text this morning: No sign will be given to this generation, but the sign of Jonah.  That is, the warnings of the prophets who tell of judgment and destruction to come.  Let us heed his warning: Shudder, and tremble, you complacent ones, says Isaiah.

But there is also promise in this text.  The Spirit of God will lead and empower us: "When the Spirit is poured out upon us, .... Justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field.  The effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever ....  "

Amen.

Some Sources for Extra Reading:

Kairos,  Creating a Climate for Justice. (Available from www.kairoscanada.org)

James Lovelock,  The Revenge of Gaia

Thomas Homer-Dixon,  The Upside of Down

George Monbiot,  Heat: How to Stop the Planet from Burning

Kenneth S. Deffeys,  Beyond Oil: The View form Hubbert's Peak

Linda McQuaig,  It's the Crude, Dude: War, Big Oil and the Fight for the Planet

Richard Heinberg,  Powerdown: Options and Actions for- a Post-Carbon World.

                        ---------------------------------------

October 25th, 2009        "Walking in the Way"        Rev. Elizabeth Eberhart-Moffat

Reflections on the Camino   --  157^th anniversary

Texts: Genesis 17:1-8,15,16 and Matthew 5:1-12

Looking through the bulletin yesterday, I knew ahead of time that by this point in the service I would be feeling quite emotional. Moved by the words of the liturgy; previewing the line - up of sacred song that Ken and the choir have prepared for this anniversary; knowing I’d be back in these hallowed walls where Peter and our little family experienced significant moments in our journey together; and looking out upon a congregation in which many treasured souls who were there back then, would be celebrating with me, .. well, I just knew that by now .. I’d be feeling what my mother always described as “beyond all beyonds”. “Beyond all beyonds”. It was her way of naming what the Spirit does to us when we are transported to another realm, slightly off the earth’s surface.

Thank you for the opportunity to be among you again as this year’s Anniversary Speaker. You may remember that I was supposed to have been in this place last year, but had to be spelled off by a compassionate colleague in the person of Harry Oussoren, who I know served you well that day. My absence had to do with the birth of our first grand daughter, Allison Elizabeth Dickson Moffat, and the postponement of a long anticipated trip to Spain with six other women. So, a year later now, I wish to share with you some highlights from the pilgrimage we made together, conscious that our 31 day walk across northern Spain, last October, had a lot to teach me about the journey we share as Christ’s disciples.

All of us know that the theme of ‘journey’ has been an integral part of our faith story ever since the ancients first theologized around their campfires:

·                           Adam and Eve, unhappily expelled from their paradise home in Eden;

·                           Noah and his menagerie aboard the Ark, hoping for new life even amidst an earth-embracing flood;

·                           Abraham and Sarah and a Covenant which promised them many descendants, yet required of them a departure from their well established home and a journey toward a new Land;

·                           Jacob and his journey to the land of his Uncle Laban;

·                           Joseph’s journey into Egypt, as one who had been sold into slavery; then ..

·                           Moses, the Exodus and 40 years of wandering in the Desert of Sin;

·                           Joshua who finally led the Israelites across the Jordan into the Promised Land of Canaan.

·                           “Take up your cross and follow me,” Jesus said, as his own faith journey led him ever on toward a date with destiny in Jerusalem;

·                           And those who dared to follow? They soon became known as people of ‘The Way’.

2000 years hence, and we are gathered here on your 157^th year as a congregation to celebrate the ‘Saints’ in your history, your present and in your future, who in hearing God’s call, have followed, and will follow in the difficult Way of faith, becoming true pilgrims.

To literally participate in a pilgrimage, has also been an important way to demonstrate and express faith down through the ages. It was also a way to do penance and receive forgiveness. I was told by my genealogy-loving Dad of an ancient Eberhart relative of ours, who over 500 years ago, led 40 pilgrims of faith from their home in Stuttgart, Germany to the Holy Land and back. The full journey took them seven months, lasting from July through February. And in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, it is recorded, that Eberhart felt so moved to dedicate his life in faith, that he made a pledge to God: He would give the rest of his life on this earth to the cause of theological education. And, as a sign of this pledge, he would never again cut his beard.

He thus became known as ‘Eberhard im Bart’ (Eberhart the Beard) and was instrumental in the establishment of Tübingen University, one of Germany’s oldest institutions of higher learning and internationally known for its humanities program.

Perhaps this story, which captured my early imagination, had something to do with the urge I felt last fall to walk the famous Camino de Santiago de Compestola with six other women. I do know that in a moment of compassion for a friend of mine, who loved Spain and who was dying so prematurely of cancer, I found myself promising that I would walk the Camino in celebration of her brave life. This promise seemed to pluck a chord on the strings of her heart. I was now committed.

So, on September 16^th, we flew from Toronto to take up a pilgrimage that ranks third in significance for Christians who visit Jerusalem and Rome. Pilgrims in the tens of thousands each year set out from their front doorstep or popular starting points across Europe or fly in from around the world to share the 800 kilometer experience of walking or biking the Camino de Santiago de Compestola, the Way of St. James, patron saint of Spain.

Having spent 33 years in public ministry as an extrovert, it was my hope that this trip would finally allow me the intense personal time I craved to deepen and broaden my personal faith. Somehow I imagined it possible to walk all those kilometers for the most part in meditative silence, believing that God would be able speak to me with more significance in this manner. How laughable it seemed on completing the Camino, to have had confirmed instead - a truth I have always understood really .. that the ‘Way’ of faith is not a singular way, but a way peopled by an amazing community of human souls.

First, were the other pilgrims from around the world with whom we daily rubbed shoulders.. in the albergues (or dormitories) where we slept in bunk beds lined up beside each other, or at table together sharing the traditional ‘pilgrim meal’. The very first night on the road in a small community called ‘Uterga’, a 17 km walk from where we began in Pamplona, we gathered hungrily with 20 others around one long table to be served by two delightful sisters, who were the innkeepers and our hosts . A member of our group had brought a traveling ‘peace candle’ with the hope of carrying it all the way to Santiago. But that first days walk up and down commanding hills with a heavy pack, had convinced her that the peace candle would make a much better gift for these sisters. A ceremony of offering felt somehow demanded by the moment, so we rose to address the group and waited as translations went around the table in Spanish, French and German. Everyone was asked why they were on the Camino. And, in short order, the stories began to move among us and bind us together.

A man named Eddie from Germany had come to the Camino to honour his wife, who had died that year of cancer; Anne from Texas needed to break away from her stressful work and to leave technology behind for a time; Jarren and Pam, young Christians from California, were seeking direction for their lives. One young man from Santiago was told by his psychiatrist that he needed to be on medication. He responded to this prescription by saying, what he really needed was to be on the Camino instead. José, a grandfather who gave us Spanish lessons on the way, had made walking sections of the Camino each year, a discipline for his life. He used a special staff that had been the gift of a former pilgrim. A French couple had walked from their home to celebrate their life of companionship. Two New Zealanders in their 80’s were walking with their granddaughter. Many on the road were honouring significant changes in their lives .. a time of retirement, an entry into a new decade, recovering from an illness, an operation or a loss.

During that first night on the Camino, we began to feel the work of the Spirit among us, weaving each of us into a colourful international tapestry of story and faith that offered both comfort and strength for the long journey. Everywhere people along the way in small towns or at work in their fields and vineyards, waved to us or nodded and encouraged us with the traditional blessing of the ‘Way’. “Buen Camino”, they would say. One special morning on the outskirts of Pontferrada, a grape grower traveling to market, offered each of us a large clump of green grapes from his trailer. Never was anything so sweet or delicious, since Joshua brought back giant grapes from the Promised land to encourage the Israelites! Truly this was the fruit of the gods! So together there on the road with grapes and bread, we celebrated a spontaneous agape meal.

Yet the legion of saints we encountered on the road were more than those immediately with us. Walking down old stony paths, along ancient walls and over Roman bridges; looking up into the shady canopy of giant chestnut trees and walking amidst the earthy pungency of their primordial roots; finding stone markers along the way covered with the pebbles of people's prayers piled up as they had passed by; visiting the churches and monasteries and cathedrals along the way, or seeing hundreds of crosses made from branches, woven into chain link fences by the highway .. all bore witness to the saints who had preceded us in time on this journey. Their presence in the Spirit was palpable to us.

Especially this was so as we reached one of the highest points on the Camino, just past the mountain top town of Foncebadon. Here at a summit of 1504 meters, is a giant iron cross, the ‘Cruz de Ferro’, where pilgrims have traditionally left their remembrances, pictures of lost loved ones, trinkets of remembrances and intercessional prayers that have piled up into their own sizeable hill. In all there were seven women from Parkminster for whom we walked as the ‘Camino Chicas’, seven women whose life journeys had been prematurely cut short by cancer. And it was here in this place that we felt them moving us to actually do something commemorative for them.

So, on a large rock, we wrote with big letters from a black marker pen that miraculously emerged from a back pack, these words: “In celebration of your lives, lived with such remarkable courage: Susan, Barb, Amy, Wilma, Carol, Nesta and Pat. Buen Camino, Chicas.” Placing this rock at the very foot of the cross, confirmed our teary connection with these sister saints across time and space and even death itself.

In retrospect I can’t imagine ever having found the strength or courage to complete this epic journey without the other six women who graced my days with their wisdom, their friendship and their wonderful good humour. Who ever thinks we can successfully make this journey of faith alone? It would all seem like some unreal dream if we did not have each other to confirm our shared experience, to remember all the precious moments of intervention by the Spirit, to collectively learn from our experience, and to celebrate in worship the privilege of this ancient and blessed journey.

On October 19^th, my friends and I had the supreme joy of attending the Pilgrim’s mass at the Cathedral in Santiago. Pilgrims who had been arriving that week were gathered. There was standing room only. A nun with the voice of an angel, taught us and prepared us for the musical liturgies that would follow in the service. The choir, in wonderful harmony that echoed through that magnificent acoustical setting, sang an ode to joy. The priest welcomed us and embraced us with his strong and vibrant voice. We were an international community, he said, of Protestants and Catholics from many places around the world. Then he named us by country and the places from which we had started. He talked about the history of the pilgrimage and the tradition we shared. And he told us that we must now turn from being pilgrims to becoming missionaries, taking back into the world the vision of a unity undaunted by differences, of which we had all become a part.

Later, on the steps of the cathedral by a bubbling fountain, pilgrims who had perhaps shared a meal together on the journey, had walked and talked and slept beside each other and shared their stories .. embraced one another there in the sunshine, recognized each other as ‘the saints’ whom God had provided on the journey, and together in many languages, bid farewell as lives turned homeward to loved ones and families and commitments that awaited us all.

“Happy are those who are spiritually poor, with only a back pack of resources to sustain them on the journey. Happy are those who mourn, those who are humble and those whose greatest desire is to do what God requires. Happy are those who are merciful to others and pure in heart. Happy are those who work for peace and are persecuted because they put the priorities of God first.” This ‘Way’ of Jesus we are called to follow as pilgrims of faith, is not an easy Way. It goes uphill against a mountain of greed and fear and worldly resistance. But it is peopled by the saints, who accompany us, who comfort us and have mercy for us, and who show us just how privileged we are to be making this journey together.

On this anniversary day, as we celebrate the rich history of 157 years that has brought you thus far as a congregation .. and as together we draw on the Spirit’s strength for the challenges and the blessings that still await us – on the Way .. may I thank you for honouring the small part our family played in your sacred story, and may I personally bless you with the words of the ‘Pilgrim Prayer’:

Guardian of our souls,

Guide us on our way this day.

Keep us sage from harm.

Deepen our relationship with you,

Your earth, and all your family.

Strengthen your love within us

That we may be a presence of your peace

In our world. Amen.

‘Buen Camino’ faithful friends. May God go with you.

                        --------------------------------------

August 30^th, 2009        "When Talk is Too Easy"        Rev. Elaine Longland

            James 1:17-27            Mark 7:1-8, 14, 15, 21-23

The primary gospel focus for this lectionary year is Mark’s gospel. For the past few weeks, however, we have taken a slight detour into John’s gospel. This morning we have returned to the Gospel of Mark. Just to bring us up to date about where we are in Mark’s gospel and to put this morning’s lesson into context, I’m going to provide a bit of a review.

By the time of this encounter with the Scribes and the Pharisees, Jesus is considerably into his ministry. Already he has preached some of his most memorable parables–the sower, the lamp under the bushel, the harvest, the mustard seed. He has demonstrated his power in the feeding of the five thousand and walking on the water, not to mention the healing of every sort of illness.

Everywhere Jesus goes, his reputation draws multitudes. They come out of curiosity and hope. People are asking new questions of their faith: what it means to be God’s people. There is controversy, energy and wonder in the air. And in the midst of it all, the Pharisees ask, “But did you wash your hands before dinner?”

“How blind and arrogant can they be?” we ask. We like Jesus’ stinging rebuke, “This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.” Serves them right.

And yet how easy it is to condemn! Especially when we, like the Pharisees, have a built-in set of rules of our own about what is acceptable and appropriate and right. How many of us would have problems taking advice from a young man who was covered in tattoos and body-piercings and wearing a bandana? How many of us would be upset if the young woman sitting beside us this morning seemed to be dressed more appropriately for the beach? How many of us have difficulty being friendly to the family on our street who has noisy parties every weekend?

Where do these rules about what is acceptable come from? Our parents? Our teachers? The Bible? Or does it just seem that is the way it has always been for us.

Those built-in rules define who we are. We are the people who do this and this and this. We are the people who honour these rules whatever they may be. And we seem to seek out friends who hold the same values which tends to make us even more sure that the values we hold are the right ones.

One of Hitler’s naval officers, George Duckwitz, warned Danish leaders, and on the night of October 1^st, 1943, at the risk of their own lives, Christians hid Jews in their homes and smuggled them through the streets to the waterfront. They loaded men, women and children onto fishing boats and pleasure craft. In the darkness, evading Nazi patrol boats they smuggled 7, 300 people across the Oresund Strait to neutral Sweden.

Many of those who escaped to Sweden returned after the war and took up business again in the shops their Christian neighbours had kept open for them until they returned. Christians are known by their love: a love that is lived out in acts of risk and sacrifice.

I no longer believe in a god who keeps track of such things as how often we say our prayers, how often we have communion, how we spend our Sundays. I believe in a God who has planted within each of us a need to be generous and compassionate and caring. And it is when we respond to this need within, by reaching out to others, that we identify ourselves as Christians. Thanks be to God. Amen.

                        --------------------------------------

August 9th, 2009        "Spirituality and Healing"        Rev. Arch McCurdy

      Psalm 103 VU 825        Mark 1:21-28 

The subject comes from a request from the hospital in Alliston, to present an In-Service to the hospital staff on Spirituality and Healing.  And not wanting to overwork my brain, I decided that with appropriate modifications to preach this sermon on the same subject.  Perhaps it would be helpful, if I shared with you the conclusions and then proceeded to explain how I got there.

The conclusion comes from a scientist by the name of Bruce H. Lipton. (You can learn oodles about him on the internet.)  His discovery, on which he has been working for 20 years, is that our cells  - about which the average human has about 30 trillion-  are not closed envelopes, as medical science has long believed.  Within each of these cells are vitally determining agents  - our genes and our DNA.

 Instead of the cells being closed envelopes, Dr. Lipton – now verified by others, discovered that our human cells have tiny receptors through which our genes and DNA can be modified  by the environment surrounding the cells.

Now you may think that these may be exciting new discoveries in the field of medical science, but what has it to do religion?  What caught my attention is that these discoveries have a great deal to do with our religion, our faith and our belief.  It is for this reason that Dr. Lipton titled his book The Biology of Belief.  Furthermore to quote from the jacket of his new book, The Biology of Belief,

            This book will forever change how you think about your own thinking.

            Stunning new scientific discoveries about the biochemical effects of the brain ‘s

functioning show that all the cells of your body are affected, not just by chemistry

of our bodies, but by our thoughts.

                                                       Bruce H. Lipton, PhD. The Biology of Belief, 2008

 

The first question that came to my mind was:  If I always think holy thoughts, will I become a more holy person?  I will leave that question open ended!

 

You see, It reminds me of that 'old saw' of the difference between an optimist and a pessimist.

The optimist wakes up in the morning saying “Good Morning, God”

The pessimist wakes up and says “Good God, morning”!         You know where you fit!!

 

 But … if a person who is suffering from an illness really believes that he/she will recover, such thoughts can have a profound effect on the healing process.  Often this is referred to as faith healing.  Now, this is not a new discovery.  What is new is the bio-chemical processes that make possible that which is sometimes experienced as “miraculous healings”.

A Flashback of  Miracles of Healing --   A woman who had been suffering from haemorrhages for twelve years touched the hem of his garment: Jesus said to her Daughter, your faith has made you well, go in peace. (Luke 8:43.48)

The one and only means for healing was faith.

Faith was the result of belief in God.

Belief in God put you into the arms of religion,

which in turn brought you into the church.

Salvation and Healing – these were the primary rewards which belief, and the Church, had to offer.

 

Since the church taught that the planet is the centre of the Universe, we earthlings had it made.  Then along comes Nicolas Copernicus, who published his scientific discovery in 1543, that the earth was not the centre of the Universe, but rather it circled around the sun.

This was a profound challenge to the “infallibility” of the Church.  Science eventually displaced the Church as Western civilization’s source of wisdom, for understanding the mysteries of the Universe.   (Ibid p.32)  People, including Christians, began to put God on hold.

The second challenge to the Church was the publication of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of the Species 1859.  It wasn’t that Darwin didn’t believe in God, rather that he implied that chance, not Divine intervention, was responsible for the character of life on Earth.  Darwin further suggested that “hereditary factors” passed from parent to children controlled the characteristics of an individual’s life.

Thus dawned the age of Evolution.  We humans were not created full blown as we were taught in Sunday School.  Genesis 1 &2 have interesting insights, but it’s not history.  God was put a little further on hold.  

Scientists began to scramble to discover what forces or agents were at work which resulted in inherited family traits.  Intensive studies of the human brain resulted in amazing discoveries.

When I worked in the chemistry lab in 1947-48 the smallest entity was a molecule.  Now we are in the Age of Genetics.  It is those genes which determine whether I fail to retain my hair, or you are left handed!

One of the negative results is that it leaves people highly anxious that on some unsuspecting moment they will be struck down with a heart attack.  The fear is based on the fact that the father or uncles died of heart attacks.

 There can be and often are many other factors other than genes that result in sickness in whatever form: such as life style, diet, excessive stress, and on it goes.

Let’s move on to the past twenty years or so.

Bruce Lipton, in his book, The Biology of Belief, tells how he made the connection between quantum physics and biology.  If you haven’t dozed off, one small statement has to be made about quantum physics.  Quantum physicists discovered that physical atoms are made up of vortices of energy that are constantly spinning and vibrating; each atom is like a wobbly spinning top that radiates energy.          (ibid p.70) 

The end result of this discovery is the realization that energy and matter are one and the same.  That is what Albert Einstein recognized when he developed the famous equation  E=MC2.

I always thought the universe was made of physical objects (matter) separated by dead space.  The new paradigm – at least new to me is this:  The Universe is one indivisible, dynamic whole in which energy and matter are so deeply entangled it is impossible to consider them as independent elements.           (ibid p.71)

It naturally follows therefore, that the mind, which is energy, and body, which is matter are bound, although Western medicine has tried valiantly to separate them for years.

The breakthrough about which Dr. Lipton writes, is that  Thoughts, the mind’s energy, directly influence how the physical brain controls the body’s physiology.

Two questions remain:      How does that happen?    and   What are the consequences?

The “how” is answered by the discovery that the walls of the brains cells have identity receptors which pick up influences, including thoughts, which penetrate the cell walls and can effect changes in the genes within the cell.  Genes are not the final determining factor, as has been understood since they were discovered.

If you considered your body as a television set, the physical television is the equivalent of the human cell.  The TV’s antenna, which downloads the broadcast, represents our full set of identifying receptors and the broadcast represents an environmental influence from outside the cell.

Lipton tells an interesting story to illustrate of the power of these changed cells.

          One conservative, health-conscious New Englander, Claire Sylvia, was astonished

          when she developed a taste for beer, chicken nuggets, and motorcycles

after her heart-lung transplant.

Sylvia talked to the donor’s family and found she had the heart of an eighteen-year-old motorcycle enthusiast who loved chicken nuggets and beer.  She wrote a book, A Change of Heart, in which she outlines her transformational experiences, as well as similar experiences of other patients in her transplant support group.   (Ibid  p.161)

The conclusion is that our “traits” are not controlled by our genes, but by the environment in which we are situated.  Because the environment represents “All that is” (God) and our self-receptor antennas download only a narrow band of the whole spectrum, we all represent a small part of the whole . . .a small part of God      (ibid p.162)

Lipton, who began his scientific studies and experiments as an atheist, has become a believer in a Divine Being, and is in all probability the Energy which is essential to our survival.  We are made in the image of our “Environment”.

That reminds me of Genesis 1 where God created us in God’s own image.

What we do with that image is influenced by the kind of environment with which we are associated.  Those cell walls can be penetrated with thoughts that are loving, compassionate, and forgiving.

It seems to me that is what the Church should be all about.  A community of like-minded people who are moving toward advancing human civilization by realizing that the Survival of – not just the fittest – but the Survival of the Most Loving, is the only way to go.

You can’t put God on hold.           Hello, God are you still there?   – I am listening.               Amen.

                           -------------------------------------

June 3rd, 2007           ---        Rev. Lorne O'Neill, Minister Emeritus                         

        Three Bible Stories You Don't Have to Believe   

Have you ever gone to a church and been told, "Don't ever come back!"?  That happened to me a few months ago.  But I don't suppose you want to hear about that. … Oh, you do?

Well, last year at this time I spoke about bringing the Kingdom of God on earth.  As part of it I spoke of Noah's Ark, and pointed out that the story holds some great truths passed on to us by generations past: the world is a mess; and we bring judgment on ourselves; but we have another chance to get things right.

But these truths are put across in a story based on how people saw their world and their God back then.  To them, the world was flat; the sky was a solid dome, holding back millions of litres of water; and rain came, not from the clouds, but from God opening a window in the dome.

Even their picture of God was primitive.  He made us, they said, and was sorry He had done so, and wiped out everyone except Noah and his family.  Then, they said, He was very sorry again for what He had done, and promised never to do it again.  And apparently they thought He had a poor memory, saying He put a rainbow in the sky to remind Him of His Promise!

I used that sermon at another church, and one family that runs things there was so incensed that I didn't have their literalistic view of the Bible that I have been told as long as they are in charge, I will never be invited back!

That doesn't bother me.  What bothers me is this: "What would intelligent and educated young people in that community think of a religion that insisted they believe in a flat earth, a solid dome over it, and a forgetful God who drowns a whole world of people?"  Such a belief would really be a barrier to their faith.  There are many stories that, taken literally, become barriers to faith, while if they are recognized as parables, can teach us a great deal.

The first is the story of Creation.  We still have a conflict between those who believe in evolution, and those who take literally the account at the beginning of the Bible.  If fact, there are two stories, in the first two chapters of Genesis.

The first one tells us that God created everything in six days: the light, the sky, vegetation, sun and moon, fish and birds and animals.  And finally He created mankind - male and female - in His own image.  In other words, both sexes are created equally together, and are the culmination of His creation, which makes it hard to understand why women have so often been treated as second-class citizens.

The second account says that when there was as yet no herb of the field, God created a man.  Then knowing that man should not be alone, He decided to make a partner for him.  So He created birds and animals and brought them, one by one, to the man.  But not one was a suitable companion until finally God created a woman, and only she could fill the bill.

Both these accounts are told to share a people's understanding of God and of His purposes for us - in story form.  But they are stories of faith, not of science.  The people who take them literally think the world was made in six days, about six thousand years ago.  Scientists tell us there were rudimentary life-forms 3-1/2 billion years ago.  I usually put it this way: the Bible tells us who made this world, and why; Science tells us how He made it, and when. They are two different realms of truth. (Ephesians 2:10)

Recently a museum in the U. S. planned a display showing the evolution of life on this planet over millions of years.  There would be records from geology, dinosaurs, fossils, carbon dating and so on.  A group of Biblical literalists arrived and demanded that the Biblical creation story be given equal billing.  When the Museum authorities agreed to show both accounts, representatives of a native American tribe came and said they had their own Creation story, and wanted it shown too.  Then the representatives of the local Hindu temple arrived with their creation story.  Eventually there were seven different displays of creation, but a sign on the first one said. "This is the only creation story that can be proven scientifically."

Never get your religion from a book of science, and never get your science from a book of religion.

Here is the Word of God:  "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."  This Word is cradled in the stories of creation, but the stories are only the crib; it's the baby in the crib that is important.

Let's look at another story.  In the Bible, God calls Abraham to be the founder of a new tribe of people obedient to this God called Yahweh.  When He tells Abraham that he will be the father of a new people, He also says, "You will be a blessing to the world."  Apparently they are to share their knowledge and understanding of God with others.

But the Jewish people became in-grown in their faith, and put up barriers between themselves and others.  "We are God's chosen race, and you are not.  We will have nothing to do with you."

Because of their disobedience, God allowed them to be conquered by the Babylonians, and great numbers of them were taken into Exile in Babylonia.  They felt that they had been swallowed up by a terrible monster.  They were held captive for forty years, until the Babylonians were defeated and the Exiles allowed to return home.

During the Exile, people who worshipped other Gods had moved into Judea, and the exiles on returning, found these strangers, and began to intermarry.  Then there was a religious revival, during which Ezra the priest told the Jews that they were to be pure-blooded, and to divorce their foreign spouses, and to send them away with their mixed-blood children.  What a heart-breaking situation that must have been, with homes and families ripped apart.

There was a man whose name we do not know, who saw this a terrible wrong, totally against the will of God, and he wrote a parable to show the utter foolishness of his people.  It's a story of great exaggerations, but I suppose so people wouldn't take it literally.

He created a character to represent the Jewish people.  This character was commanded to preach about God to foreigners.  Well, he wasn't going to do that!  He wasn't going to give God's word to those pagans!  God was supposed to judge the Gentiles, not save them!

So Jonah boarded a ship going the other way.  When a storm came along, he was thrown overboard, and was swallowed up by a great fish, just as the Jews had been swallowed by the Babylonians.  After three days in the belly of the fish, he was spit out onto dry land, and was again told to preach to the people of Ninevah.  Reluctantly, he did.  According to the story, Ninevah would have been easily three times the size of Toronto, from Scarborough to Mississauga.  And every man, woman and child, from the king down to the lowliest beggar, repented and turned to Jonah's God!

Now if I preached a sermon and one or two people were converted, I would rejoice!  Not Jonah!  He converts an entire city, and is he ever mad!  He was hoping to see God's judgment fall on these foreigners.  How dare they repent!

But he sits, watching the city, still hoping to see the judgment.  While he waits a vine grows near him and a large leaf shields him from the sun.  Then a worm chews on the vine, the leaf withers, Jonah is exposed to the heat, and he is angry again.  And God says, You fool.  You get upset over the death of a vine, but you'd like to see the death of every man, woman and child of Ninevah!

It's a parable you see, denouncing the exclusiveness of the Jews.  How sad that some people insist on taking it literally.  It's like the fellow who said, "It's in the Bible so I believe that the whale swallowed Jonah, and if it was in the Bible, I'd believe that Jonah swallowed the whale."

To insist that people take literally what was written as a parable is to put up barriers to faith.  The Word of God is that we are to be a missionary church.  This Word is cradled in the story of Jonah, but the story is only the crib; it's the baby in the crib that is important.

Now, the third story.  When Jesus had walked this earth, people realized there was something very special about this man.

He was tempted; he could be hungry and tired; spiritually worn out; he could suffer; and he could love.  He enjoyed a wedding.  In other words, he was as human as we are.

Yet they knew there was something different about him.  He was unique in his relationship to God.  He spoke as one who had authority.  People were healed at his touch.  "God was in Christ", Paul said.

But how do you pass on to your children that Jesus was both human and divine?  Well, two thousand years ago you wouldn't know anything about genetics or DNA, about sperm and egg, so you would tell a story about a young woman named Mary who becomes pregnant by the Holy Spirit, and has a baby by a virgin birth.  It was their way of saying that Jesus was both human and divine because he had a human mother and a divine father.  And we rejoice to repeat this story every Christmas.  While in the back of our minds we must wonder: a virgin birth?

There are some problems with this story.  For instance, Matthew tells the story, but he has another story along with it.  He knows the prophets say that the Messiah will be a descendant of King David.  So he writes the genealogy of Jesus, starting with Abraham as the father of Issac, and Issac the father of Jacob and so on to David, the father of Solomon, and Solomon the father of Rehoboam, showing the line of the fathers all the way down to JOSEPH!  If Joseph wasn't the father of Jesus, then why trace Jesus' ancestry through him?  The two stories don't agree.

There's another thing: after the Virgin Birth is mentioned at the beginning of both Matthew's and Lukes' gospels, you never hear of it again.  Jesus never says, "Believe in me because I was born of a virgin."  In fact He calls Himself the Son of Man.  His disciples, like Peter, Andrew, James and John, never mention it.  If fact, St. Paul speaks of "Jesus who was descended from David according to the flesh and designated Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead."  (Romans 1:4)

The Christmas story is a beautiful parable to put across who Jesus is - Son of God and Son of Man.  But you don't have to take it literally.  The disciples and Paul and Jesus himself didn't.  Because I know what this parable means, I have no problem singing, "Silent night!  Holy night!  All is calm, all is bright,  Round yon virgin, mother and child…"

But suppose a person comes to believe in Jesus as his Lord and Saviour, and is ready to commit his life to Christ - then you ask, "Do you believe in the Virgin Birth?"  And when he says he has difficulties with that, do you say "Sorry, you can't be a Christian?"  This person believes in the truths that the story tells - that Jesus is both human and divine, and you turn him away?  We are in danger of putting up barriers to faith in God!

The truth of the story is that Jesus is the bridge between God and us.  This Word is cradled in the story of the virgin birth.  But the story is only the crib.  It's the baby that is important.

Three stories containing Gods' truth - but they are parables, not history.

The truth of the first is that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".  The creation story is the cradle in which we find the Word of God.

The truth in the second is that we are to be a missionary church, spreading the good news to others.  The story of Jonah is the cradle in which we find the Word of God.

The truth in the third is that Jesus was one of us, but also that "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself."  The story of the Virgin Birth is the cradle in which we find Jesus, the Word of God.

Maybe next year I'll tell you more stories.  Or, after this sermon, I may not be invited back here again!

        ====================================================

 

April 8, 2007                           Rev. Dr. Alf Dumont

        "WHAT IS EASTER ALL ABOUT, ANYWAY"                                                                    

What is Easter all about?   Easter is the time we celebrate the journey that Jesus took in life, towards death, into new life through the resurrection:

- he was born, in a humble setting, to two ordinary people;

- he was baptized by John in the Jordan; 

- he taught, he shared, he healed, he inspired;

- he confronted, he challenged, he prophesied;

- he had his last supper with his followers;

- he prayed alone during his time of need;

- he was deserted by his closest friends;

- he was arrested;

- he was arraigned in court;

- he was judged;

- he was crucified;

- his body was placed in a tomb;

- he appeared 3 days later to the disciples because the tomb could not hold him.

Very early on that morning, over 2000 years ago, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them[1] went to the tomb  taking the spices that they had prepared[2], so that they could prepare the body of Jesus for burial, as Jewish custom demanded.  This was according to the Gospel of Luke.

However, Mary was alone, according to John?s gospel, not with the other women, as recorded in Luke, when she noticed that the stone had been rolled away.  At that discovery, as it would be true for any one of us, she needed to tell someone else, to share her experience. 

So according to John?s gospel, Mary ran to find Peter, and she said to Peter, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him."

However, the "we" that Mary uses, in John?s gospel, seems to indicate that she was not alone but was with others ? perhaps it was the same group of women recorded in Luke -  and there also seems to be an intimation that the friends of Jesus had taken him to be buried elsewhere, in a secret tomb, because this was Joseph of Arimathea?s tomb.  That friends took him away is intimated because she spoke to Peter, as if, he might know where they laid him.

In Luke?s gospel the women did not immediately seek out Peter, for they were "perplexed about this, [when] suddenly two men, in dazzling clothes, stood beside them.  The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, "Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.[3]"

When they returned "from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest"[4].

In John?s gospel, Peter and the other disciple ran to the tomb to see for themselves, after Mary shared with them.  The other disciple ran faster than Peter and got there first.  But he did not go in.  Peter did. Perhaps the other disciple was frightened.  It would take courage to walk into a tomb where you'd expect to see the body of a dearly loved friend, or, to face the fact that the body of your friend was not there and you wanted to see for yourself.

Peter went straight into the tomb and the other disciple followed.  It was this other, less impulsive, more thoughtful disciple who immediately realized the significance of the folded grave clothes.  John?s gospel states, of this disciple: "and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.[5] 

What did he believe, if they did not understand scripture?  Did he believe that there was something greater at work, than he could understand?  When they witnessed the empty tomb, and saw the grave clothes neatly folded, they went home!  It seems such a mundane thing to do: to go home!

You'd have thought they might have rushed excitedly over to their friends, to break the news and discuss, in an animated fashion, what this might mean.  You?d have thought they might have wanted to drag other people back to the garden with them, so that they could all stand there in astonishment and work out between them what had happened.  But they didn't. They went home! 

And where was home, since the one they followed, Jesus, once said, "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head."?[6] 

Maybe home is that place where we all go when we are troubled and cannot figure life out.  We go to that place deep inside ourselves where we feel at peace, where we feel secure, or, we go back to those places of our early childhood, where we knew comfort, or, maybe we just go back to where we have established, in the present, as a home and seek to be alone for a while, until we can gain perspective again. 

Later in John?s gospel, after Peter and the disciple left, Mary remained behind and had a dialogue with Jesus, whom, at first, she did not recognize.  The dialogue concludes this way:  "Jesus said to her,?Mary!" She turned and said to him in Hebrew, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher).  Jesus said to her, "Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ?I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.? "[7]

Who were the brothers Jesus refers to: his brothers, James and Joses and Judas and Simon[8] or the disciples, his brothers in the spirit?

Peter and the other disciple and the other women did not stay. Mary was alone when the risen Christ appeared.  

Perhaps they were in too much of a rush!  We are always too much in a rush!

Perhaps they were they were not ready!  Are we ever ready? 

Perhaps it would have been too much, at that point, for them, to absorb and then believe!  Perhaps that is the way it is for us!

Perhaps Mary saw Jesus, in John?s record, and perhaps Mary and other women saw the angels, in Luke?s record, because they had reached that level of acceptance at Jesus? death, for they did not have the feelings of guilt that the other disciples had, at deserting him.  At any rate, at that point, the disciples did not seem to have much regard for Mary's feelings.  They were captured in their own feelings, as we all are in grief.

Somehow, in both Luke and in John, Mary was the one who saw the angels and experienced the presence of Jesus as he shared with her.

In John?s gospel, Jesus asked Mary why she was weeping, which seems an odd question.  It must have been obvious why she was weeping, especially to Jesus.  But perhaps he knew Mary needed to articulate her feelings of pain and loss, at this, first stage in dealing with grief, and in being able to find new life again.

Yet her answer too was unexpected.

You'd have thought she might be weeping because Jesus, the man she loved and followed, had been executed.   Or perhaps because of the shock of finding the grave empty on top of all the other traumatic events of the previous couple of days.

Although it may have been all of that, it was more, for she said that she was weeping because:  "They have taken away my Lord and I don't know where they've laid him."[9]  She was weeping because she could not fulfill her duty to one whom she loved and honored.  She could not bring closure to this tragic death.  So many tears are shed because we cannot make closure.

Mary?s life changed from that encounter with the risen Christ.  She went straight away to all the other disciples.  She didn't allow them to push her out of the way, this time.  She knew she had to tell her story no matter how she would be received.  She told them her story: "I have seen the Lord!"

All encounters with the risen Christ change people.

This is our Easter promise.

This is the Easter story.

Resurrection is expressed in many different ways.

Resurrection is expressed in many different stories.

Resurrection is expressed in our stories.

What is Easter all about?

Easter is a journey.

Life.  Death.  And resurrection to new life.

Easter is believing that:

God is stronger than death.

Hope is stronger than hopelessness

Love is stronger than fear.

THANKS BE TO GOD

 

[1] Luke 24:10    [2]Luke 24:1    [3] Luke 24:4-7    [4] Luke 24:9    [5] John 20:8-9    [6] Luke 9:58    [7] John 20:16-17    [8] Mark 6:3    [9] John 20:13   

                    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

October 29, 2006                          Rev. Dr. Harold Wells

TO LIVE WITH RESPECT IN CREATION               Genesis 2: 4-15.

It’s good to be in an old Methodist Church, and to celebrate our Methodist and United Church heritage here in this place. 

Our Methodist founder, John Wesley, was, as you know, a powerful evangelist, who led a great revival in England in the 18th century, a revival that spread into Ontario in the 19^th century, and established itself here in Alliston as far back as 1851.  Wesley and his Methodist movement were notable for their warm and passionate preaching of the love and grace of God, and reached out especially to the working classes of England. 

Many people don’t know that there was a strong social justice emphasis to Wesley and his preaching. Both in England, and in Canada, the Methodist movement championed the poor, opposed child labour, supported the early labour movement, and ardently opposed slavery.  We in the United Church also have a history and tradition of standing up against social evils. 

In pioneer Ontario, about the time when this congregation was founded, one of the great evils was alcohol - yes - the bottle! and Methodist women especially, in the Women’s Christian Temperance League, were campaigners against the abuse of the bottle.  Today the problem of alcohol is still with us, not to mention other serious addiction problems, but now we have other greater social ills.

This morning I stand very much in that Wesleyan Methodist tradition when I address a controversial issue that faces us in our time, namely the crisis of the environment, especially regarding water and global warming.  I don’t pretend to be an environmental scientist, or expert on international economics.  But I should make clear that I’m not just expressing my own personal, rather amateur opinions here. 

I’m speaking with information provided by the organization called ‘Kairos’.  Kairos, in Greek, means ‘the critical time’, or the ‘time of decision’.  Kairos is the national ecumenical Christian organization that addresses social and ethical questions, - supported by all the major churches, - Presbyterian, Lutheran, United, Roman Catholic, Anglican, Mennonites, Quakers, - these are all part of this national organization that addresses social concerns.  

All of these churches, through Kairos, are promoting information and action about an impending world-wide water crisis, as that relates to global warming.  And what could be more ‘newsy’ just now than global warming, considering the new ‘Clean Air Act’ which the federal government has just announced?

Why should we talk about this in church?  Isn’t this a matter of politics?  Well, we should talk about this in church, because environmental problems are, at root, ethical and spiritual problems.  That’s why ministers, and the churches, must have something to say about this - one of the most pressing  spiritual dilemmas of our time.

So, we begin with the Bible.  In that ancient creation story of Genesis chapter 2, we find sublime Hebrew poetry.  Genesis is not in competition with science or history; rather it’s ancient wisdom and insight into God as Creator, and our calling as human beings.  The poet tells us that God caused it to rain upon the earth; and a spring rose up from the earth. God created the garden of Eden, and a river flowed in Eden to water the garden.  It also speaks of four other great rivers.  Notice how often water is mentioned in this creation story?

We also hear that “the Lord God formed the human being from the dust of the ground , and breathed into its nostrils the breath of life.  And the human being became a living soul.”  And “the Lord God put the human being in the garden to till it and keep it.”   The poet is telling us that we should see the world as a ‘garden’, which implies that it requires cultivation and care. The task of the human being is to take care of garden of the planet Earth:  To help it blossom and flourish, to nurture it, so it realizes its full potential.  It’s a gentle image, recognizing the special place of human beings in the created order. 

But it does not suggest that we are to dominate or control the earth, and certainly not to own it.  The poet is saying not that the earth and its creatures are here to serve us.  No, it seems that we are here to serve it!  As our creed says: “We are not alone. We live in God’s world.” And we are called to “live with respect in creation.”   “Respect!”  So we are not to look down upon other creatures, - animals, trees and plants, the soil, the water.   We are not to be masters of the earth, but, gently, to cooperate with its sacred balance. 

The poet goes on in the next chapter, Genesis 3, to tell of human sin.  The man and woman, in Genesis 3, are tempted to “be as God” - to take all power and authority unto themselves.  The result of their sin is conflict between themselves, and between them and the earth, and the earth’s creatures. 

What was to be faithful stewardship has become rapacious domination of the earth itself, and gross injustice among human beings.  Notice that sin, here, is not just a matter of personal moral failures.  So much of our tradition has stressed sexual misdemeanors.  But sin, in this text at least, has nothing to do with sex.  Rather, it has to do with “playing God,” wanting to be “as God.” 

Sin in our time manifests itself especially through our use and abuse of modern technology, and our relentless quest for domination of the earth, for our own profit, luxury and comfort.  Maybe that’s the most significant form of sin that we’re involved in today - both as individuals, and as a society, and as a species.

The question today is whether we can, as a human race, repent with regard to the environment - in other words, - can we change direction in time to avoid colossal environmental disaster?  Can we rein in our own tendency to domination in order to avoid destroying our habitat, and so destroying ourselves in the process?

Now the focus of Kairos this year is the water crisis, - one fundamental part of the larger environmental danger facing our world.  But do you believe that there is a water crisis?  Lots of people don’t.  We don’t feel like we’re in a water crisis here in Ontario.  We’re able to turn on our taps and find good drinking water.

In fact Canada as a whole is marvellously blessed with fresh water.  Do you know that less than 5% of all the water on earth is usable, fresh water?  But Canada has 20% of all the freshwater in the world!  Here in Alliston, I understand, you have plenty of water piped in from Georgian Bay, and from your own local underground aquifers.

And, in proximity to the Great Lakes, why should we worry?  We’re sitting on a gold mine, right?  It’s even better than oil wells.  We have water galore.  The most precious substance in the world.  So, for now, Canadians generally are well off for water.  With some exceptions, like some of our native peoples on First Nations reserves.  But the rest of the world is in serious trouble.

Already many parts of Africa, Asia, and even of the United States - especially the American midwest - are seriously water hungry.  Already 31 countries are facing water shortages.  This situation is expected to get much worse in the decade or so ahead of us.

There are a number of complex factors behind this growing crisis: the most important of which is global warming, which promises to create an extremely unstable world.  We in Canada cannot hope to be untouched by global warming.  In a world that’s heating up, we can expect, not so much oil wars, such as we’ve had recently, but water wars.  The world, including the United States, will be clamoring after Canadian water.  

Now water shortage and global warming are intimately connected.  The scientific communities are virtually all agreed now that the earth is warming dangerously, mainly because of human use of fossil fuels and so-called greenhouse gases, which trap heat in the atmosphere.  We’ve noticed warmer winters - which is kind of nice,  - and hotter summers.  We’ve seen more extreme unstable weather conditions in the last few years - more powerful, more destructive hurricanes, tornadoes, which have also been linked to global warming.

Katrina at New Orleans turned out to be far more destructive than 9/11.  Maybe instead of a war on terrorism we need a war on global warming.  Not only that, but greater heat means, among other things, swift evaporation and depletion of the precious surface water needed for drinking and agriculture.  Greater heat means more forest fires and crop failures. 

These things are already dramatically visible in central Africa, and to some extent even in North America.  As some of us saw on a TV documentary just the other night, even the Canadian prairies have experienced serious water shortages, and B.C. and northwest Ontario are experiencing a great increase in forest fires. 

At the same time, the Arctic ice is ominously thawing and fresh northern waters are draining into the ocean; icebergs are melting, polar bears disappearing.  The vast expansion of cold Arctic water flowing into the Atlantic threatens to disrupt the warm ocean currents that moderate temperatures in Europe and parts of North America.  If the gulf stream is disrupted - and this could happen any time - we could be faced with a wildly different climate, and a completely different kind of world.

So all of this is already happening and may be irreversible.  People like David Suzuki have been warning us about this for a long time.  But we’ve ignored them.  It is a spiritual problem, you see. We’ve known about this danger for a long time, but we don’t want to face unpleasant realities.  We don’t want our comfortable life styles questioned.  After all, we’re OK, aren’t we?  So far?

Well, can anything be done about this colossal problem, or should we just give up and accept the inevitable?  Some experts say that we’ve passed the tipping point.  It’s already happening and it’s going to get worse, no matter what we do.  Others say, Yes, it is already happening, but, if we act decisively now it can be at least alleviated.  We can at least minimize the damage, if we act now to diminish green house gases.

But that would imply huge investment in alternative sources of energy; vast investment in the development of solar power and wind power, major conservation efforts, and cleaner energy systems for our cars.  Development of such new technologies may not all be sacrifice; they might even produce employment and prosperity.

But our governments haven’t been able even to progress toward the modest goals of the Kyoto accord.  And our present government is not even committed to that.  If our governments were going to lead us into such massive changes, they could only do it with solid public support.  People like us would have to be convinced, and mobilized, as if we were going to war.

It would take fundamental changes in our attitudes to fend off global warming, and its accompanying water crisis.  For example, it would have to become unfashionable to drive large gas-guzzling cars and trucks.  Not only unfashionable, but laughable.  Little cars will have to become cool.  Maybe WWJD would be useful here.  WWJD?  What Would Jesus Do?  Lately this has been translated: What Would Jesus Drive?  Jesus, who entered Jerusalem not on a camel, but on a humble donkey.

What would this donkey-riding Jesus be riding in our time?  Can you seriously imagine Jesus driving a big Mercedes, or a big SUV?  No, he’d be driving one of these tiny little ‘smart cars’, or more likely, Jesus would be riding a bike, or, taking a bus.  Well, I know you’re not all going to go right out and sell your SUV or van tomorrow.  But if we own a big car, maybe next time we buy one, we should consider getting into something smaller and less destructive to the environment.

Maybe we should all start thinking about alternative vehicles, - electric?  hydrogen? Or whatever.  Though I do drive a small car, I can’t really get too self-righteous about this, since I do fly in airplanes from time to time, and airplanes are huge polluters. 

But, so far, there’s no sign of any such widespread changes of attitude, or of political will to really grapple with this problem. 

Unfortunately one of the major responses so far, where water is concerned, is privatization.  Privatization - taking water and water delivery systems out of public control and allowing private companies to manage them.  In other words, some people have figured out how to make money off this crisis.  Smart people have become aware that water is fast becoming the new ‘oil’.  You can get rich by selling water.  Especially in the poorest regions where the water crisis has already struck. 

The World Bank has been insisting that poor countries, if they want debt relief, must privatize their water systems.  The International Monetary Fund, dominated by the United States, and of which Canada is a member, has required fourteen less developed countries to privatize their water delivery. 

And who are the new owners of water and water delivery systems?  Giant international conglomerates, whose bottom line is not providing water to the people who need it, but, of course, profit for their shareholders.  Among them are certain companies that we know well: Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola are now major bottlers and sellers of water! 

Nothing wrong with private business, nothing wrong with making a profit.  But keep in mind that such businesses do not exist to provide an essential resource to all the people.  They exist to maximize their own profits, and therefore to maximize usage by those who can pay.  Since they sell water at a profit, they want as much water used as possible.

But, - can anyone rightly own the sacred resource of water, without which no creature can exist?  When water is controlled by private interests, and sold for a profit, of course it will go to those who are able to pay.  So water will end up being restricted to people who can pay for it.  This is already happening massively in parts of the Third World.

We can be sure that in the years to come there will be enormous pressure from the United States for Canada to privatize its water and to tank it, or pipe it south, and sell it to those who can pay for it, to fill their swimming pools and wash their cars.  We will have to be vigilant about this if we are to avoid a two-tier water system, even in Canada.

Incidentally, it’s not hard to guess who are the most water-deprived in Canada already.  Yes, the First Nations folk.  On some southern Ontario reserves, water supplies are not drinkable, Native folks in some areas of Six Nations reserve have to buy bottled water!

Now bottled water is another form of privatization: large water companies buy up agricultural land, then draw water out of underground aquifers, and sell it for a profit. When the wells are drained dry, they just move on to the next one.  I’ve heard of farmers whose wells have dried up, because water bottling companies have bought up nearby land and drained the aquifers of water, faster than it can be replaced.

Do you know that our United Church of Canada, at General Council last summer, asked all of its people to avoid using bottled water.  Why?  Because water is not a commodity to be bought and sold.  It is God’s free gift to all creatures.  Water must be seen as a right of all people, not something available only to those who can afford it.

As I said, it’s very interesting that, in the old days of the Methodist Church here in Ontario, from this very pulpit, there must have been powerful preaching against ‘the bottle’.  Drinking booze was a sin in those days.  But times have changed.  Now our church is preaching not against ‘the bottle,’ but against bottled water! 

Why?  Because those underground aquifers belong to all of us.  A resource which belongs to us all is being sold for a profit.  Not only that, but the throw-away plastic bottles are massively ending up in land fill sites, where they slowly decompose and seep toxic substance into the soil. 

So what can we do about all this?  We can start by being aware.  We can contribute to the groundswell of public concern that must grow, if anything is ever to be done to address these questions.

At the back of the church this morning there are letter forms that, if you wish, you can sign and send to the government.  This lets the government know that there are lots of people out here who want action on water and global warming.  They have to know that public support is there before they will act.  And we can begin to make those small changes in our own personal lifestyles to contribute to environmental well-being.

The bottom line is this: Water is God’s free gift to all creatures.  It is not a commodity to be bought and sold.  Clean water belongs to all of us equally; a sacred trust and the right of all people.

Wesley and his Methodist movement, in their day, fought the evil of slavery.  Our Methodist pioneer forebears fought the evil of drink.  Today we have new battles, even more urgent.

As Christian people, we are called to repent, to change direction; or, to put it in the words of our creed: “we are called to be the church..... to live with respect in creation, to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil.........”  

Thanks be to God.            Amen.