| New Book now Available Here is an anthology of over 1100 brief prayers and thought-starters, for each day of the year, with almost 400 original prayers by Bruce Prewer. Included is both a subject index and an index of authors-- an ecumenical collection of about 300 different sources. |
 |
| Title: Brief Prayers for Busy People. Author: Bruce D Prewer ISBN 978-1-62880-090-6 Available from Australian Church Resources, web site www.acresources.com.au email service@acresources.com.au or by order from your local book shop or online on amazon. |
28 August-3
September
Matthew 16: 21-28 (Sermon 2: “Don’t Give an Inch?”)
Romans 12: 9-21
Exodus 3: 1-15 (Sermon 1: “God without a Handle”)
Psalm 105: 1-6, 23-26, 45c
PREPARATION
Ours is the God for all seasons.
On this last Sunday of winter,
with Spring arriving during this week,
we welcome you to this house of prayer:
in the name of the Son of God,
in the assurance of the love of God,
in the company of the Spirit of God.
Amen!
Be thankful, call on the name of your Holy Friend,
publish God’s actions
among every race.
Sing praises, sing your hearts out to God,
recount the wonderful
things that have happened.
OR
As you gather here,
let your love be free of insincerity,
shun evil, cling to God’s goodness.
We give thanks to our
Maker,
we call upon our
Redeemer’s Name!
As Christ’s family,
show affection to one another,
give each other a boost up.
We are truly God’s
children,
the heirs of promise,
chosen to serve.
Celebrate the hope that is in you,
be patient in the midst of troubles,
ground each day in prayer and praise.
We will sing, we will
sing psalms of joy,
we will sing of all
God’s wonderful works
and rejoice with all
who love the Lord.
PRAYER OF APPROACH
Most loving God, as the new life
of springtime prepares to awake around us, by your Holy Spirit awaken us to
brighter hopes and livelier faith. While bird and beast and flower praise you
by fulfilling what they are created to do, help us to lift up our hearts with
the wonder and praise for which we were made. Stir the music in our hearts, so
that songs may be on our lips. Arouse the neglected melody in our souls until
our prayers and creeds turn a glad commitment. Through Christ Jesus, the joy of
loving hearts.
Amen!
CONFESSION AND
ASSURANCE
The love of God is for all, seeking the rehabilitation of ever sinner.
Let us pray.
Holy God, we don’t always admit it, but we are creatures who need a Saviour. We are pleased with the good we have done, the loyalty we have displayed, the love we have shared. But that is only one side of the story. In many situations we have fallen short of the target which Christ has placed before us, and we have spoilt or neglected the happiness of others.
Please continue to
save and heal us, loving God.
Save us from the
temptations that rush upon us like a blast of loud music,
and from those temptations that
arrive with false modesty,
hiding behind the skirts of good
intentions.
Save us from the sins
that brazenly corrupt and dis-love us,
and from those that surreptitiously
eat away like termites,
and undermine our values and good
resolves.
Save us from the guilt
that shouts at us and condemns us,
and from the cunning guilt which
slides sideways into excuses
which soon sound plausible to the
soul willing to listen
to the folly and lies of our human
ego.
Merciful God, you forgive us and mend our fractured nature. Grounded in Christ Jesus, may we rediscover that eternal springtime where all things are made new. In your love may we be renewed, and in your service may we be fulfilled. In the name of your holy Son, our Saviour.
Amen!
FORGIVENESS
It is written: “By love you are saved through faith; and even your faith is not your achievement but is a gift from God.”
Take up this precious gift of salvation, and live boldly as the children of God.
The peace of the Lord Jesus Christ is with you all.
And also with you.
PRAYER FOR
CHILDREN
Dear God,
You must have noticed
what bossy nerds
we can often be?
You know how eager we are
to tell others what they should do,
but we are full of silly excuses
when it comes to doing it ourselves.
There are some of our prayers
when we even tell you, God,
what you should do,
rather than listening
to what you want for us
and for other people around us.
Dear God,
please make us less bossy
and more content
to be humble and caring
like you special Son, Jesus.
Amen!
PSALM 105:1-6, 45.
Be thankful, call on the name of your Holy Friend,
publish God’s actions
among every race.
Sing praises, sing your hearts out to God,
recount the wonderful
things that have happened.
Take utter delight in the Holy Name,
seek with hearts overflowing with joy.
Seek and find remarkable strength,
seek God’s presence
all the time.
Remember the wonders that that have happened,
the miracle of love
and the words of truth.
Live like the spiritual children of Abraham,
like the chosen
children of Jacob;
So that you may freely do God’s will,
and fulfil God’s law with praise!.
Ó B D Prewer 1997
OUR TEMPTATION
Matthew 16: 21-28
My life’s my own!
I want to hoard
and count each precious day!
My friends conspire
with this desire
and say it’s quite okay.
Get
lost Satan!
These
rebel thoughts
are
not the living way!
Bearing a cross
is an option
for which I have no flair!
Slick friends agree
and say to me
the things I want to hear.
Get
lost Satan!
Your
easy yoke
I
can’t afford to wear.
Though finding life
through losing it
is not a pretty thought,
My Lord does call
to give him all
and I won’t sell him short.
Get
lost Satan!
Your
phony world
is
nothing but a rort.
Ó B D Prewer 1993
COLLECT
Loving God, through Jesus you
call us to that which is the costly best, and refute that which the world deems
smart and easy. Make our ears sensitive to his voice among the cacophonous
pleading and bullying of this age. Give us the courage to pick up our own cross
and follow Christ wherever he leads, not counting the cost but rejoicing with
the company of lovers with whom we journey towards the city of God, from where
flows the river of life for the healing of the nations. Through Jesus Christ
our Lord.
Amen!
SERMON 1: GOD
WITHOUT A HANDLE
Exodus 3:1-15
“Take off your shoes,
for you are on holy ground”.
For millennia the believers of many religions have tried to get a handle on God. Especially they like to obtain the name of God.
For earlier cultures, to have another’s name was thought to give power over that person. To know the name of God, or the names of many gods, was the key to using the power of the gods for themselves. The name was a handle.
Vast amount of religion comes down to this vain attempt to have power over God. Sacrifices, incense, burnt offerings, vows, fasting, pilgrimages, reciting prayers, waving prayer flags, wearing holy medals, can all become little more than trying to manipulate God to serve our own purposes.
Some cults specialise in reciting the name of God in a hundred different languages. Some think they have God in their definitions and creeds. Others imagine they have a handle on God when they try domesticate him into showing favours to their cults and chapels and families. When Jacob left his father-in- law Laban, his wife Rachel; purloined some of the family gods and hid them in her saddle bags. Numerous people would like a god they could carry in their baggage.
I appreciate the honesty of the prayer of the gipsy boy who carried his little yellow god in his jacket pocket:
“Sweet little god,
please give me everything I ask. If you let me steal a loaf and brandy, I will light a candle for you.
If the strangers enter
my tent but cannot find any of their stolen property, I will light two candles for you.
If police search me
and find nothing stolen on me, I will offer you three big candles.
For you are my sweet, little yellow
god.”
.
Jews were no exception to the desire to get a handle on God. Remember Jacob wrestling with the Stranger who came in the darkness? “Tell me your name” Jacob asked. He wanted to have power over God; to get a handle on the power he knew to be Divine.
With the Jews a number of different names were employed. El was a basic word and appears in place names such as Bethel. Elohim, a plural word, was a general word for God or the gods. The word we recognise as Yahweh or Jehovah, was regarded as a special, very holy name. So holy in fact, that the Jews stopped saying that name.
JEHOVAH OR WHAT?
This led to one unusual result. The sound of the name was irretrievably lost. Let me explain. In the Hebrew alphabet, there are no vowel letters. That’s like, for example, in English writing CT for cat, or BDRM for bedroom, or DNNR for dinner. No vowels, just consonants.
The Hebrew special name for God (what Christians for a few recent centuries called Jehovah or Jahweh) is in fact JHWH. That is how it appears in the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament. JHWH. It became the custom when the Scriptures were read aloud in the synagogue, never to dare pronounce the name. Instead, the word adonai, meaning Lord, was always substituted.
I first realised how much the devoted Jew protects the name of God when I was a student sitting under the brilliant Jewish linguist, Prof Goldman at the University of Melbourne. He himself was a formidable character. We were in awe of him. At the start of one session he called on me to start reading the twenty third Psalm from the Hebrew Bible.
The first Noun in that psalm is of course the special word for God. Naively I started reading, trying to pronounce JHWH. Shock and horror came over the face of the Prof . “The name! The Name!” he shouted. Urgently he told me never to do that again but to always read it as Adonai, meaning Lord.
That is how holy the name became to devout Jews. And that is why over the centuries they lost touch with the original vowels with which it was pronounced.
When in the sixth and seventh centuries AD, some Jewish scholars decided to create vowel letters, they did not know what to put when they came to the sacred name. They solved this by supplying the vowels from that other word for lord, adonai. It was not until 1520 that Christian scholars created the word Jehovah; it was an entirely guess work.
Which is bad luck for the Jehovah’s Witnesses who put great store on the word Jehovah. In fact they seem to think that whenever they utter the word “Jehovah” they have do have a magic handle securely fixed on God.
For scholastic reasons I cannot bore you with at this moment, Jahweh is far more likely to be the correct pronunciation. But we are not 100% sure.
However, the much more important matter is for us to humbly learn from the ancient Jew’s reverence for the name of their God. They were in awe of Yahweh. God was too mysterious, too awesome, too other-than-anything-we-can-imagine to try putting a handle on. In the practice of their faith which has survived multiple of persecutions, they treated the name of God with a holy agnosticism.
MOSES AND THE NAME OF GOD
This takes us to Moses in the desert of the Sinai peninsula, standing in front of a burning bush; one that although is was in flames was not consumed.
Which is one big jump from where we were last Sunday. In last week’s OT reading, Moses was a baby in the bull rushes, being rescued by a princess of Egypt. Then as a child and youth he was educated as a nobleman in the court of a daughter of the Pharaoh.
Between then and today’s reading, he had murdered an Egyptian slave master and fled to Sinai. He married into the clan of a sheik named Jethro and became a desert shepherd for forty long years.
Now God speaks to Moses out of the burning bush and asks him to go back to Egypt and rescue the people of Israel from their slavery. Moses is not keen on the idea, but God insists. The reluctant Moses asks for one favour; he says to God, “Tell me your name.” It’s another case of “let me get a handle on you.”
God answers in a wonderful way: “I am what I am”. That’s the nearest thing Moses would get to a name from God. It is more a verb, not a noun. It is the Hebrew verb “to be”. This is great stuff! After all these years I still find it exciting! God does not give a handle but a living Mystery.
Once again we have a problem with the Hebrew letters. Because no written vowels were created until well after Jesus, we don’t know what the sounds were. The consonants we have in the Scriptures could mean a number of things. Maybe it was “I am what I am” as commonly translated. It could be “I am whatever I will be.” Or “I will be what I am.” Or “I will be what I have been”. Or “I am what I have been.” [Maybe some of you had their ideas shaped by the great twentieth century philosopher A. N. Whitehead, believing it might have been “I will be what I am becoming.”]
Traditionally we have stayed with “I am what I am.” That’s fine, as long as we learn our lesson from the Jewish sense of awe and admit we do not really know. It is a name that is not a name. A holy agnosticism, a sense of awe and wonder, is the right way to go.
God is nothing; that is, “no thing”. Things can be named and handled. We can name a child and a mountain. We can name an idol or a poodle. We can name a fruit or an insect. We can name a planet Mars and we can name the Southern Cross. We can name the Milky Way and we can name the remains of dinosaurs and name subatomic particles electrons. We can name anomalies in the heavens and call them black holes, and we can calculate the beginning of all creation and call it the Big Bang.
But we can never, never name God! God is not a thing in the universe to be named. God is not even the sum total of the universe that we can name. God is the ultimate Mystery, the awesome Identity that precedes all things; the glory that cannot be imagined, and before whom humble worship is the sanest response we can make.
YAHWEH IS KNOW BY HIS DEEDS
Does this mean that we know nothing and should stay silent? Get together and recite nothing but Ohm-m-m-m-m? Not at all. For as Moses was to find out, this God will be known as by significant activity.
God revealed aspects of the Divine character by special deeds; by rescuing and reshaping the descendants of Sarah and Abraham as the chosen people; by recommissioning them to be a blessing to the whole world. God chose to be self revealed as a Saviour, as a Shepherd, as abounding in mercy, as a Being of exalted moral practice, as a reliable God who keeps the covenant, as a lover of the oppressed and the hungry, the widow and the orphan. And much more.
God is holy activity, known from deeds in creation and redemption, not from being measured or calculated. From our limited understanding God is a verb not a noun.
I-will-be-what-I-will-be, I-am-what-I-am, this is the nearest thing to a name that you will get. Not a handle but an awesome activity to whom we can respond and find fruition, or from whom we can turn our backs and reap the whirlwind.
Whatever the exact original meaning, what is really intended is the sovereign freedom of God, to be what God will be, not in any way defined or manipulated by human beings. We are denied the opportunity to fix a handle on God. Handles are idols.
Mystery: always Holy Mystery, “Take off your shoes you are on holy ground....”
THE HANKERING FOR A HANDLE
Many people are not satisfied with this. They demand certainty. They want to get a handle on God.
Therefore we meet those who try to make handles of the great Creeds and Confessions: Apostle Creed, Nicene Creed, and that of Chalcedon, or Westminster Confession and the Thirty Nine Articles. They try to get a firm grip on God; a convenient handle.
Others look for security in the works of great Christian thinkers: They let these heroes do their thinking for them. As in- Augustine’s Confessions, The Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther’s 95 Theses, the Institutes of John Calvin, John Wesley’s Sermons, or in the last century the Church Dogmatics of Karl Barth.
Others, are fixated on the actual name of God. Jehovah’s Witnesses I have already mentioned. But also in the rituals of some new age types there is an emphasis on reciting at length many of the names for God as used in numerous religions. Some take pride in being able to repeat the 107 names of God.
Yet others believe they get a handle on God when they repeat certain religious phrases
like “born again,” “the second blessing” and “the precious blood of Jesus.”
More extreme are those who insist their handles are right but everyone else is wrong. Such as “the truth as proclaimed by Jesse Washington Smith Junior, in the first true Bible Baptist Church, Cincinnati.” Or maybe “the gospel according to Pastor Aussie Wilson, founder of the Diboll (Bernie, More, Kangaroo, Gerald ton, Murray Bridge?) Christian Revival Centre.” Or “the Gospel as guarded by the Apostolic faithfulness of the Bishop of Rome.”
Handles! Handles! Millions look for handles on God.
But God remains utterly free and sovereign. God stays divinely slippery: “I am what I am,” “I will be what I will be,” “I am what I will be”. God refuses to accept our handles! Always the Spirit of God flows when and where it will.
There was no name given to Moses. No handle. Moses had to get on with the job. To follow what God was calling him to do, without receiving the grip on God that he wanted. Moses had to trust the sovereign freedom of God to be and do whatever was infinitely wise and loving.
That was a massive leap forward in understanding God.
GOD IN CHRIST, DOES NOT GIVE US A HANDLE BUT A HAND
Yet we have one massive advantage over Moses. We have the deeds and parables and the very character of Christ to point us to the saving activity of the God whom we worship. God who is a verb, an activity, came close enough for men and women to see, hear, touch and hug and follow.
“I am that I am” does the most remarkable thing of all in
the wonderful Son of Mary. At the sight of a burning bush that was not
consumed, Moses found it was right to take of his shoes because he was on holy
ground. In the presence of Christ, we do well to take off our shoes. If not
physically, certainly mentally we should humble ourselves. Jesus does not make
God less awesome, but more so. Such beauty! Such love! Such costly, saving
love! Take off your shoes, you are on holy ground.
SERMON 1: GOD WITHOUT A HANDLE
Exodus 3:1-15
“Take off your shoes, for you are on holy ground”.
For millennia the believers of many
religions have tried to get a handle on God. Especially they like to obtain the
name of God.
For earlier cultures, to have
another’s name was thought to give power over that person. To know the name of
God, or the names of many gods, was the key to using the power of the gods for
themselves. The name was a handle.
Much religion comes down to this vain
attempt to have power over God. Sacrifices, incense, burnt offerings, vows,
fasting, pilgrimages, reciting prayers, waving prayer flags, wearing holy
medals, can all become little more than trying to manipulate God to serve our
own purposes.
Some cults specialise in reciting the
name of God in a hundred different languages. Some think they have God in their
definitions and creeds. Others imagine they have a handle on God when they try
domesticate him into showing favours to their cults and chapels and families.
When Jacob left his father-in- law Laban,
his wife Rachel; purloined some of the family gods and hid them in her
saddle bags. Numerous people would like a god they could carry in their
baggage.
I appreciate the honesty of the
prayer of the gipsy boy who carried his little yellow god in his jacket pocket:
“Sweet little god, please give me everything I ask. If you let me
steal a loaf and brandy, I will light
a candle for you.
If the strangers enter my tent but cannot find any of their
stolen property, I will light two candles
for you.
If police search me and find nothing stolen on me, I will offer
you three big candles.
For you are my
sweet, little yellow god.”
.
Jews were no exception to the desire
to get a handle on God. Remember Jacob wrestling with the Stranger who came in
the darkness? “Tell me your name” Jacob
asked. He wanted to have power over God; to get a handle on the power he knew
to be Divine.
With the Jews a number of different
names were employed. El was a basic word and appears in place names such as
Bethel. Elohim, a plural word, was a general word for God or the gods.
MOSES AND THE NAME OF GOD
T oadya we read of Moses in the
desert of the Sinai peninsula, standing in front of a burning bush; one that
although is was in flames was not consumed.
God speaks to Moses out of the
burning bush and asks him to go back to Egypt and rescue the people of Israel
from their slavery. Moses is not keen on the idea, but God insists. The
reluctant Moses asks for one favour; he says to God, “Tell me your name.” It’s another case of “let me get a handle on
you.”
God answers in a wonderful way: “I am
what I am”. That’s the nearest thing Moses would get to a name from God. It is more a verb, not a noun. It is the
Hebrew verb “to be”. This is great stuff! After all these years I still find it
exciting! God does not give a handle but a living Mystery.
We have a problem with the Hebrew
witing. Because no written vowels were created until well after Jesus, we don’t
know what the sounds were. The consonants we have in the Scriptures could mean
a number of things. Maybe it was “I am what I am” as commonly translated. It
could be “I am whatever I will be.” Or
“I will be what I am.” Or “I will be what I have been”. Or “I am what I have
been.” [Maybe some of you had their
ideas shaped by the great twentieth century philosopher A. N. Whitehead,
believing it might have been “I will be what I am becoming.”]
Traditionally we have stayed with “I
am what I am.” It is a name that is not a name. A holy agnosticism, a sense of
awe and wonder, is the right way to go.
God is nothing; that is, “no thing”.
Things can be named and handled. We can name a child and a mountain. We can
name an idol or a poodle. We can name a fruit or an insect. We can name a
planet Mars and we can name the Southern Cross. We can name the Milky Way and
we can name the remains of dinosaurs and name subatomic particles. We can name
anomalies in the heavens and call them black holes, and we can calculate the
beginning of all creation and call it the Big Bang.
But we can never, never name
God! God is not a thing in the universe to
be named. God is not even the sum total of the universe that we can name. God
is the ultimate Mystery, the awesome Identity that precedes all things; the
glory that cannot be imagined, and before whom humble worship is the sanest
response we can make.
YAHWEH IS KNOWN BY ACTIONS
Does this mean that we know nothing
and should stay silent? Get together and recite nothing but Ohm-m-m-m-m? Not at all. For as Moses was to find out,
this God will be known by significant activities.
Especially by rescuing and reshaping
the descendants of Sarah and Abraham as the chosen people; by recommissioning
them to be a blessing to the whole world. God chose to be self revealed as a
Saviour, as a Shepherd, as abounding in mercy, as a Being of exalted moral
practice, as a reliable God who keeps the covenant, as a lover of the oppressed
and the hungry, the widow and the orphan. And much more.
God is Holy Activity, known from
deeds in creation and redemption. God’s “essence” cannot be measured or
calculated. God is a verb not a noun.
I-will-be-what-I-will-be,
I-am-what-I-am, I-am-what –I-have-been. These are are the nearest thing to a
name that you will get. Not a handle but an Awesome Activity to whom we can
respond and find fruition, or from whom we can turn our backs and reap the
tares.
The sovereign freedom of God, to be
what God will be, is not in any way defined or manipulated by human beings. We
are denied the opportunity to fix a handle on God. Handles are idols.
Mystery. Always Holy Mystery, “Take
off your shoes you are on holy ground....”
THE HANKERING FOR A HANDLE
Many people are not satisfied with
this. They demand certainty. They want to get a handle on God.
Therefore we meet those who try to
make handles of the great Creeds and Confessions: Apostle Creed, Nicene Creed,
and that of Chalcedon, or Westminster Confession and the Thirty Nine Articles.
They try to get a firm grip on God; a convenient handle.
Others look for security in the works
of great Christian thinkers: They let these heroes do their thinking for them.
As in- Augustine’s Confessions, The Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas,
Martin Luther’s 95 Theses, the
Institutes of John Calvin, John Wesley’s Sermons, or in the last century the
Church Dogmatics of Karl Barth.
Yet others believe they get a handle
on God when they repeat certain religious phrases
like “born again,” “the second blessing” or
“the precious blood of Jesus.”
More extreme are those who insist
their handles are right but everyone else is wrong.
Such as “the truth as proclaimed by Jesse
Washington Smith Junior, pastor of the first true Bible Baptist Church,
Cincinnati.”
Or maybe “the gospel according to
Pastor Aussie Wilson, founder of Wagga Wagga (or perhaps the Kangaroo Flat,
Woollongong, Kingaroy, Humpy Doo, Pinjarra, Gumeracha ) Christian Revival
Centre.”
Or “the Gospel as guarded by the
Apostolic faithfulness of the Bishop of Rome.”
Handles! Handles! Millions of
benighted souls itch to get handles on
God.
But God remains utterly free and
sovereign. God stays divinely slippery: “I am what I am,” “I will be what I
will be,” “I am what I will be”. God refuses to accept our handles! Always the
Spirit of God flows when and where She will.
GOD IN CHRIST, DOES NOT GIVE US A
HANDLE BUT A HAND
Yet we have one massive advantage over
Moses. We have the deeds and parables and the very character of Christ to point
us to the saving activity of the God whom we worship. God who is a verb, an
activity, came close enough for men and women to see, hear, touch, hug and
follow.
Moses found it was right to take of
his shoes because he was on holy ground. In the presence of Christ, we do well
to take off our shoes. If not physically, certainly mentally we should humble
ourselves. Jesus does not make God less awesome, but more so. Such beauty! Such
love! Such costly, saving love! Take off your shoes, you are on holy ground.
Through Christ we do not get a handle
on God. Sometimes better happens; God in Christ stretches out a hand to us. It
is a scarred hand. If we take that hand we will find that it is more than
sufficient for our needs.
SERMON 2 Part A : DON’T GIVE AN INCH?
Matthew 16: 24-25
Ted’s story
“Don’t give them an
inch,” old Dermot said, sucking the wind in through his gold-capped teeth.
“That’s the way to go, is it?” I (Ted Jjnks) asked, affably. I was not just being polite
to the old bloke. He deserved more than a servile response.
After all, he had made
it big. Started as a yard boy, stacking tiles, sorting and racking timber from
demolished houses, pulling out endless nails. Yet he has ended up as the proud
owner- manager of a chain of lucrative scrap yards.
“The only way, kid; don’t give them a friggin inch. Don’t give them bloody anything. But take a yard y’self. No pun intended, son. Yea, take a yard whenever y’ can but keep out of my way. son. The space ain't friggin big enough for two of us.”
“I’ll remember that,
no fret,” I answered, taking a swig from the bottle he had handed me in “the
friggin office.”
-------------------
---------------------
--------------------
At that time I was
just a second year undergrad, studying economics. It was summer vac. I was
working to help pay my fees for the next year.
I had been employed to do the kind of work the old boy had done, many
years ago. But when his secretary cum play clerk cum coffee maker had caught
glandular fever, he dragged me in the help in the office. I can’t say I was sorry. I found the yard
work almost intolerably boring. And the stuff in the office was relatively uncomplicated.
I think the old bloke
had taken a shine to me. I reckon Dermot liked the way I was willing to bend my
back and get really dirty.
He and his wife had
brought up two daughters. On the profits of his business he had sent them both
to elite private schools. Big mistake.
They became snobs and married “professional men”. Neither of them wanted
to have anything to do with their Dad’s low status, scrap business. Nor were
his two grandsons interested. They borrowed shamelessly from the old man of
course, and hoped they would feature in his will, but they did not fancy the
hard yakka of the unglamorous scrap business. One grandson fancied himself as
an actor and another had gone into racing motor bikes.
---------------------
----------------------
-------------------------
“Mind you, son, it
ain’t easy. No way. Y’ll have to toughen up.
I was a sucker early on. Fell for a friggin a sob story or two. Not now.
No more. Tough as an old cast iron
pot-belly stove. Don’t give even a bloody millimetre!” He snorted, and slapped
his side, “Heh, heh, heh, heh!”
I grinned. He went on.
“What do you think you’ll do when you finish
whatever you are doing, you know, after all that study and stuff?”
“Not sure, boss. I
never have been sure. Life’s a bit of a lotto, huh?” I said.
“Dunno, kid, I sort of
found a gold mine in a scrap yard. Heh, heh, heh, heh! But jeez, I had to dig
friggin ‘ard! Whatever y’ do, kid, go for it hard. Don’t let any mongrel get in
y’ way. Y’ must ’ave a mean streak in y’ to be a success. If y’ aint got it,
then y ‘ad better learn it fast. It’s more ‘portant than the stuff they’ll cram
into y’ skull at the university.”
“If you say so, boss.”
“Yea, I do say so,
kid. Money is the only thing that counts. I know that. Y’ know it. Everyone
friggin well knows it. But it don’t grow on trees. And when y’ get a wad of it,
then ‘ang on to it.” He took a long swig
from his bottle.
“Don’t go listnin to
all them bleedin ‘earts. There’re too
many o’ them friggin waste-o-space whingers around. They’ll suck you dry if y’
let ‘em. If I ‘ad my way, they’ld be all lined up against a wall and shot. Heh,
heh, heh, heh.”
That sounded a bit
rough to me. But I could not think of a suitable response. I looked down and
fiddled with the bottle of beer.
-------------------
------------------------
---------------------
Then I was stupid
enough to say: “Boss, would you say that you have had a good life. Is it all
worth it? Are you....well... happy?”
“Wot sort of a
smart-ass question is that? I’m wealthy aint I? I’m me own bos, ain’t I? I can
buy anything I want. Fact is, I can just about buy anybody I want. Heh, heh,
heh, heh. Yea, kid, cos I’m sort of happy. Must be. I’m proud of wot I’ve made
of meself.”
He stood up. Slapped
me on the back. “Y’ think too much, kid. Best get back at the friggin desk,
son. we got work to do.”
At the door he paused
again, and stared back at me.” I don't know what shit they unload on y’ at
university, son. But y’ won’t get better advice than I’m givin y’. Staple it to
y’ skull. Rivet it to y’ ears: Don’t give an inch, but grab a yard, I say. Screw them before they screw ya. Got that,
huh?”
‘I got it loud and
clear, boss.”
“I bloody hope so,” he
muttered as he went out of the door.” Cos I reckon y’ could make somethin of
y’self, if y’ wanted to.”
-------------------
-----------------------
----------------------
I was only 19 when I
worked in that scrap yard. I sort of knew old Dermot was wrong, even then; I
felt it in my gut. He was tough, hard working, prosperous, and yet was very sad
old bloke. Something was wrong with his philosophy. Yet the world appeared to
agree with him. Money was what it was all about. And my economics studies
opened up my mind to plenty of ways to make money, most of them within the law.
It’s taken me 26
years, 2 broken marriages, and 3 maladjusted kids, to wake up to myself. It’s
time for me to return to that gut feeling I used to have when I was a student,
and see what is left there for me. As I stare at the white ceiling above me and
hear the electronic beeping around me in this coronary ward, I wonder if I’ve
left it too late to change?
-------------------
-----------------------
----------------------
Part B DON’T GIVE AND
INCH.
Jesus of Nazareth
says:
“What profit shall there be if a man
can buy the whole world, yet lose his own soul? What is there in this world that is worth his very soul?”
Tough stuff. Plain speaking by Jesus.
It was spoken after an incident in which Peter was fiercely rebuked by his Master. It happened in the aftermath of Peter’s confession of faith. Jesus had asked: “Who do you say that I really am?”
Peter at that moment had a flash of light, and declared that Jesus was truly the Son of the living God. Wow! There and then Jesus had pronounced Peter richly blessed.
Then it was time to move the disciples on in their spiritual pilgrimage. Jesus solemnly proceeded to warn his friends that things were not going to get pretty in Jerusalem. Far from it. In the Holy City he would be dealt much suffering and abuse, which were already being plotted by the pious leaders of temple and synagogues. Things would get even worse than such abuse. He would be dragged off and slaughtered. And on the third day he would rise again.
They hardly heard the last bit. If they did, it might have sounded like the proper religious thing to say. To express hope in resurrection. Good piety.
What they did hear, yet did not want to hear, was that suffering and death lay ahead for their Master. And by implication, if their master would receive such awful treatment, what about his followers?
Peter would not stand for such gloomy thinking by Jesus. It
was a weakness; morbid stuff. How could his Master, the true Son of the living
God, ever become so despised and rejected? It was not on. So Peter turned to
his Master and presumed to rebuke Jesus: “Nothing
could be further from the truth, Lord. That kind of thing shall not happen to
you.”
This drew a stinging retort from Jesus.
Jesus spun around and spoke to Peter."
You Satan, get away from me. You offend
me. Your thoughts are set not by God
but by men.”
I imagine Peter was stunned. For once the big fisherman was lost for words.
THE COST
The Lord went on to talk about the cost of discipleship.
He spoke about self denial and carrying a cross.
Whoever tries to save his own life
will lose, but he who loses his life for my sake
will find it.
(That sounds to me a bit like the opposite of old Dermot. Like giving a yard and being satisfied with an inch. And then finding that the inch is of much more value than the yard.}
Jesus continued, saying:
“What profit shall there be if a man
can buy the whole world, yet loses his own soul? What is there in this world that is worth his very soul?”
That’s really laying it on the line. Blunt. The bare, brutal truth.
Jesus of Nazareth was not a sentimental nice guy. He was a loving, truthful person. He knew what led to happiness and what let to discontent He knew what inducted one’s life into a realm of light and joy, and what sentenced a human being to darkness and misery. He loved people enough to tell the truth, no matter how unpalatable, no matter how much it hurt, no matter how much the truth would cost him.
He stood at the farthest point possible from those who would say: “Don’t give and inch but grab a yard. Screw them before they screw you.”
ANOTHER DIMENSION
Young people especially, are likely to have inklings of the spiritual dimension.
Most of us, especially in our youth, have a gut feeling that Jesus is right. High School kids can write wonderful, idealistic essays on the theme: “Man shall not live by bread alone.”
But too many are soon corrupted by the greedy jostling of the world around us. Ideals are eroded by communal opportunism and cynicism. If you can’t beat them, join them. We succumb, and go on to accumulate possessions but also inherit the discontent, or often the misery, that we most wanted to avoid.
Yet even then, there is some purer voice in us, like a gut feeling, that protests. There is within us but of divinity that is seeks things more precious than money, power, fame, or unlimited pleasure seeking. This something is never (and I mean “never”) satisfied by an ostentatious life style, by power in board rooms or in Canberra, by fantastic 5 star holidays, a dozen BMW’s or Mercs in the garage, a variety of “the body beautiful” sexual partners, the most select of gourmet dinners every evening, luxurious apartments overlooking Sydney harbour, and the voluminous, yet shallow, sycophant praise of all those underlings who work and live around us.
We were made for something better. We are something more beautiful and yet fragile and vulnerable. Some tender self lives very close to our better gut feelings. We are a soul. It is not so much that our body has a soul but that our soul has use of our body. (The moment I say that, I know it is too simplistic, yet the truth it contains is far more than the reverse attitude)
In our saner moments we recognise that this soul thing is the true us. We speak of “soul music” or “soul places” or “soul mates” or “food for the soul.” It is the vital core of the mysterious, self-conscious being that we are. It is the “many splendor thing” at the heart of our humanity.
I fear that we, fed on materialistic propaganda in this possession-manic culture, have been conned by those who seek to reduce humanity to a collection complex, living cells, which, via the intricate wiring of the brain, creates a mind. Many suppose that this brain causes self. But self is far more than a body, or a mind which the brain creates. We are a profound soul. A spiritual entity.
SOUL FOOD
The soul needs food and drink that satisfies it
Our soul can use and enjoy the faculties of the mind just as it can use and enjoy the faculties of the body. But it is not the product of body and mind. Nor can it be satisfied with just the stimulation of body or mind. The spirit can only be nurtured by things of the spirit. Such Nurturing agents are only found in the territory of love, beauty, truth, justice, and free love. Things that are qualities of God.
If the soul is not heeded and loved, if the soul is not honoured and nurtured, if the soul is not fed with spiritual food and exercised by the vigorous activities that are based in love and shaped by love, then the soul will shrink and lose its splendour.
Junk food is bad for the body. Junk food with all its fats and sugars and artificial flavours can reduce the efficiency of the body, clog our veins, damage our liver, kidneys and heart. There is also a junk food that clogs the spirit. Materialistic values, selfishness, greed, unbridled egotism, the fleeting pleasure of promiscuous sex without love, the insatiable thirst for more and more possessions, these are among the junk foods that will damage the soul.
The more we try to love things and use other people as if they were things, then the more the very arteries of our soul will become diseased and clogged.
OUTER DARKNESS?
Is there a point of no return?
If Jesus is to be believed (and I would believe him before I would trust the advice of any other man or woman, past or present) then this soul can not only shrink and become dull, maybe it can go beyond the point of no return, slip into the darkness beyond darkness (where there is nothing but “wailing and gnashing of teeth) and die.
Many of my Christian friends, who would gladly share my affirmation of the splendour of the soul, do not share my fear that the soul can totally wither and die, either in this world or the next. They have a much more benign view of things. They argue that the love of God cannot, in the last resort, be defeated. Every soul will be redeemed. That the love of Christ who was lifted up on the cross will ultimately (in this life or the next) “draw all men unto me.”
That to me seems a tidy, and neat and satisfying proposition. However, I cannot myself embrace it. To me there is a corrosive Dark Side which seems to have the capacity to shrink the soul into narrowing dimensions, and finally into ultimate darkness.
I do believe that we can irrevocably lose our own soul. We can lose the remnants of the image of God in us. Not just temporally in this life, with a chance to be resented and recast through some purgatory-like experience in the next life. I believe that there is darkness and then there is Darkness. A point of no return. A total loss. I fear that I have occasionally encountered, and more often read about, characters who are very close to the final boundary of the Darkness beyond darkness.
Jesus said
“What profit shall there be if a man
can buy the whole world, yet lose his own soul? What is there in this world that is worth his very soul?”
IT’S OUR CALL
We have a choice between a kingdom of wonder and a
kingdom of darkness. It is our call.
We can live by the advice of cynical old Dermot, if we so choose. “Don’t give an inch but grab a yard. Screw others before they screw you.”
There is another alternative. The losing that is finding yourself. The dying that is vibrant with boundless life. Choices. Always choices. Choices lead to certain inevitable results; to destinies.
In Dean Koontz novel “Odd Thomas” the unlikely 20 year old hero, who has unusual psychic powers, says:
“I tend to believe in
the traditional architecture of life and afterlife. This world is a journey of
discovery and purification. The next world consists of two destinations: One is
a place of the spirit and is an endless kingdom of wonder, while the other is
cold and dark and unthinkable.
Call me simple-minded.
Others do.”
There is a warning those words which should jolt us and make take stock.
I
BELIEVE
In God I believe and place my
trust.
I
believe in the Holy Friend,
whose
name is unspeakable yet whose peace is ineffable,
who can never be found by our
efforts yet is always here for us,
whose
wisdom is unsearchable yet whose care is accessible,
who is jealous of our well being
yet respects our free will,
whose
glory is unspeakable yet whose meekness is knowable,
who knows all our names and
bears our joys, sins and sorrows,
whose
Spirit is indomitable and whose Christ is most lovable,
who cannot be contained by the
universe yet who lives in our hearts.
I
believe in the Holy Friend.
In God I believe and place my
trust.
PRAYERS FOR OTHERS
Loving Friend, prayerfully we bring our patchy love for a few people, and link it with your seamless love for all people.
FOR THOSE ON WHOSE WORK WE DEPEND.
We pray for those who each day do monotonous jobs for us. Supermarket workers, mail sorters, men who fill potholes, women who do the laundry, those who deliver news papers or who weed public gardens, cleaners in offices and hospitals, factory workers, cooks and waiters and parking attendants.
We pray for those who do exacting work, where every detail is important. Nurses, bus drivers, tool makers and pharmacists, pilots and pathology technicians, cabinet makers, psychiatrists, tailors, and lawyers, accountants and opticians.
We pray for those whose work is always under critical observation. Councillors and politicians, doctors and social workers, teachers and school principals, students and police officers, secretaries and shop assistants, bricklayers and all who cook family meals.
FOR THOSE WHO ARE TODAY IN A CRISIS
We pray, loving God, for those who for whom life has become unexpectedly difficult. The victims of road accidents and their stunned loved ones. People who discover that they have contracted a serious illness, or whose loved one is dying or has died.
We pray for once-loving relationships that are falling apart, and for parents who are distressed for their runaway children; for single parents and parentless children, and the victims of domestic abuse whose cries for help have gone unnoticed by family or friends.
We pray for any who have just lost their jobs, or have been long unemployed; those who continue on in most stressful work situations; those who suffer racist or sexual discrimination, and the many whose desperate need for employment has been exploited by ruthless greed.
FOR THE CHURCH
We pray, loving God for the church in its many denominations, and with its numerous parishes in city and country.
Bless those faithful and active members who are the backbone of each congregation, those lay leaders who carry uneven loads, the elderly members who regret that they can no longer serve the church as they once did, and the young folk who are keen for some responsibility.
Give your love to all ministers and priests. Renew within them the gifts of enthusiasm and patience. Help them to recognise their deficiencies and to exercise their particular gifts with
grateful joy. Remind them often that they are servants of the servants of God.
Give wisdom and humility to governing bodies, and those elected to high office in the church.
Enable them to be willing students in the school of Christ, and to know that those under their care have much to teach them of your ways.
God of all things seen and unseen, friend of all people, please receive our prayers and set them to work for the greater glory of the commonwealth of Christ Jesus. In whose name we pray.
Amen!
DISMISSAL
Whether invoked or ignored,
your God will be with you.
Amen!
You may forget God,
but you will never be forgotten.
Amen!
Go on your way, therefore,
realising how richly blessed you are,
and take time to be a friend to others
as God is a Friend to you.
Amen!
The love of........
OR--
Not one of us knows what might happen to us
during this new week.
But we do know that
nothing will happen
that God cannot weave
into his loving purposes
for us and for those
whom we love.
So take your leave with a peaceful heart,
a positive frame of mind,
and a rejuvenated spirit.
Amen!
The peace of God, which outstrips all human understanding,
keep you hearts and minds in the loving of God,
and in the reconciling ways of the true Son, Christ Jesus,
and in the happy outreaching of the of the Holy Spirit
now and forevermore’
Amen.
THREE BOOKS BY BRUCE PREWER
THAT ARE CURRENTLY AVAILABLE
BY ORDERING ONLINE
OR FROM YOUR LOCAL CHRISTIAN BOOKSHOP
