Genesis | Alt*red state: A text of terror brings good news

The usual interpretation of the binding of Isaac is that God may require us to sacrifice everything, even, if asked, our own children: but a contextual awareness changes everything. 

Read here or listen here.

Isaiah | The city of joy

A city of joy, its people a delight: this is what God promises through the prophet Isaiah. Sounds wonderful! So, what are the elements of this joyful city? First, says Isaiah, health and wellbeing ...

Read here or listen here.

Galatians | Victoria's new Child Safe Standards, culture change, and the law

What does it take to be a truly child safe organisation? Reflecting on this through the lens of Galatians. Read here.

The gift of God's words in a world turned upside down

Over the last two years, our world has been turned upside down. We used to meet inside the building for church, but last week we were on Zoom; and this week here we, worshipping in the garden. We used to leave the house for school and work; but during the many months of lockdowns, most of us learned to work and study from home ... 

Read here or listen here.

Luke: A story of family

In Luke's account, Jesus is born into an ever-expanding family into which we are all invited. Read here or listen here.

Five loaves, two fishes, and a pocketful prayers

Here we are in lockdown again, and life is feeling small. We don’t see enough people; we don’t share enough meals; we don’t get enough exercise; the walls are beginning to close in. Even when lockdown eases, we know from previous experience that it will take time and energy to reengage with the world. We’ll have new restrictions to navigate and new fears to manage. And after all these months of infrequent socialising, some of us will decide that it’s all too hard; we’ll choose to stay home.

Read here, or listen  here.

The parable universe

The kingdom of God is like a Facebook post with zero 'likes' ... a man who leaves the workforce ... a woman who fears she's lost her marbles. Read here or listen here.

We need to talk about hell

Some of us grew up with threats of hell, that burning lake of fire and brimstone into which the sinful will be cast at death to their everlasting fiery torment. Given how regularly hell comes up in many a church’s preaching and in popular culture, and given how graphically it is described, you might wonder why I never mention it here. Am I avoiding all the nasty bits of the Bible? Well, no—but I think it’s time we had that little chat: we need to talk about hell ...

Read here, or listen here.

Blessed are the school children, and other humble people

A reflection for our kids as we prepare to bless them for the coming school year.

Have you ever noticed how few people at this church drive a Porsche? Or how little time and money most of them spend on fashion? Have you noticed how rarely they go on big fancy trips? Or how often they buy things second hand or fair trade? Do you understand the choices that many of them have made? ...

Read here, or listen here.

Seeing through God's eyes takes practice

Here we are, forty-one days after the hype of Christmas and just starting another year at kinder or school. We are a group of lovely ordinary people with lots of children among us, and we are gathered tonight to worship God and receive a blessing, just as, two thousand years ago, like every other ordinary Jewish family, Mary and Joseph went to the Temple forty days after their firstborn son’s birth to worship God and receive a blessing.

Read here, or listen here.

Terrified by global warming? Follow the children!

This week, thousands of children around Australia participated in the School Strike 4 Climate Action, and it was magnificent! Like too many adults, whenever I think about climate change, I feel overwhelmed. We are facing the catastrophic collapse of vast ecosystems on which our lives depend; countless other species are hurtling towards extinction. Out-of-control wildfires dot the globe; terrifying hurricanes and storm surges wreak havoc; formerly arable land has been turned into desert. All around us, governments and disaster capitalists and environmental hoodlums keep chopping down trees and mining the land and opting for coal and pumping carbon into the atmosphere. They will not change, and there seems to be nothing I can do ...

Read here.

Visions of an Angry Prophet

I recently came across the idea of a life verse: that is, the idea that there is a Bible verse for each of us which encapsulates who we are, and guides our journey of faith. I rolled my eyes. Straightaway, two verses hit me. From Jonah: “It is indeed right for me to be angry, even unto death.” And from Psalm 139: “You knit me in my mother’s womb; I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” 

A reflection given to the BUV, 20 October 2018, and expanded for Sanctuary, 28 October 2018. Read here, or listen here.

The God Made Known in Every Child

You were born, and you were not perfect, and gradually you realised that no one else is, either. We have lumps and bumps, weaknesses and foibles, rashes and allergies, disabilities and mucked up biochemistry and over-reactive guts, crippling anxiety and fear and depression and doubt—is this what divine handiwork looks like? Read here, or listen here.

A reflection on Psalm 139 and 1 Samuel 1:1-10 given to Sanctuary, 14 January 2018

The Liturgy and the People of God

Several months ago, we heard the story of two disciples walking away from Jerusalem. Jesus had been killed, and they were fleeing the city, full of doubt and fear. There on the road to Emmaus they met a stranger. They told him everything that had happened, and he explained the Scriptures to them. Then, as they ate together, they recognised the Risen Christ. I remind you of this because, early last year, when I was visiting and observing you all, what I saw were a lot of tired, doubting adults walking away from church ... Read more here, or listen here.

(Image shows Communion by He Qi.)

A Passion for Life

Tonight's story is often called “The Birth and Childhood of Moses”, or similar. We care about Moses, because he grew up to be the person who led God’s people out of slavery in Egypt. But in this story, Moses is just a baby, with no special qualities; it’s the women who are interesting. The midwives disobey and mock Pharaoh. Moses’ mother marries, conceives, labours, hides the baby, builds the ark, places him in it, and finally nurses him again. His sister stands, watches, suggests, runs and arranges; Pharaoh’s daughter walks, sees, opens, pities and names. Moses is passive: things happen to him. But these women are active. They all embrace God’s passion for life so wholeheartedly that they defy Pharaoh and the powers of empire: and they act...

A reflection bouncing off Exodus 1:8-2:10 by Alison Sampson, Sanctuary, 27 August 2017 (AP16), is now available online. Listen here, or read here.

Love despite fear, fear despite love

What sort of crazy person would buy this building?

I have staggered to the end of another semester, a semester in which I overcommitted to study, kept working, kept raising children, kept combing out nits and cooking meals and sweeping floors; and somewhere in the midst of everything, a whole new surprising project took root. Now I am emerging from the fog of study and the chaos of family life and the demands of work to discover that I am moving to a regional city in a few weeks’ time to start a new church. I should be thrilled and excited—and there are many times when I am—but I am also just as likely to feel overwhelmed. I think often of Leunig’s observation that there are only two emotions, love and fear, for the new project certainly arose out of love, and yet it fills me with fear.

God gives us a future

It is the darkness which measures growth only in numbers, and ignores growth in the important things: faith, hope, and love; courage, generosity, hospitality; acts of creativity; acts of humble service; depth of spiritual life; commitment to prayer...

To read more, click here.

In which I discover that a lounge room is more important than I thought

Above: My new, streamlined study

In the middle of last year we tried an experiment. We got rid of the lounge room and set up a study in there, instead. It was good for a while, at least for me. I found it easier to work at home, but we missed having a room where people could stay; we missed watching movies together as a family. Then one day my nine-year-old and I were in an op shop looking for a dress when she spied a big brown modular couch, ran over, flopped on it, and ordered me to buy it.

I don’t usually take interior design instructions from a nine-year-old. But when I flopped on the couch, I too was sold. We bought it, it was delivered the same day, and the desk is now in the shed. And I am again without study.

Mostly, it’s been okay. It hadn't realised how much we like to watch movies together; and as my daughters get older, this will only become more important. I love cuddling up to my girls as we laugh our heads off at Inspector Clouseau, or sigh at Elizabeth Bennett and all her pretty sisters. And I had underestimated how much I like having friends come and stay, something they could not do while the room was a study, but can now it is a lounge room again.

As for my work, I’ve been working in public libraries, or at the kitchen table, or, when the kids are home and the libraries are closed, in a nursing chair in a corner of my bedroom, laptop balanced on my knees. Some days I feel like a pushover, sacrificing my needs to that of my family; other days, I graciously accept that, at this stage, the needs of the family and the demands of hospitality are more important, and I am lucky to have libraries, quiet kitchens and nursing chairs to work in. The current arrangement forces me to be streamlined, and that is a blessing to this messy person; all the same, it is frustrating not having anywhere to leave things out. Everything must be packed away before the next meal or when the library closes, then pulled out again at the next opportunity.

So it's a mixed decision. There are times when I fantasise about houses with studies, or extra rooms. Yet we used to live in one of those houses; but other values impelled us to move here, instead. And it’s not that our current house is too small. It has enough rooms. But the big lounge is at the front of the house, where nobody much hangs out; while the small reading room is just off the kitchen, and is everyone’s favourite place. The small room would make the better study, but the family will not forfeit it, even though it doesn’t fit a couch; the big room really is too big for a study, and contains the piano and the telly. If only I could swap the location of the small room and the big room, so that the big room opened off the kitchen and the small room was up the front - then everyone would be happy!

My husband suggests building a studio in the garden where I can write and think. But my kids fight up in the tree house; the little boys next door constantly wail for their mum; and the boys on the other side kick a soccer ball until midnight several nights a week. It’s noisy out there; building is expensive; and I’m not sure it’s a good option. More realistic is to accept that important values led us to this situation, and then do what so many parents do: wait a decade until the kids move out, and take over a bedroom.

Or maybe just move house.

There should be more dancing

A friend threw a ceilidh for her birthday. She organised a band and a caller, and a big hall, and food and drink, and a heap of friends. The music started, the caller called, and many people danced. It took me a while to warm up. I had a few glasses of champagne, and chatted with a dozen people. But finally my daughter dragged me in and I danced, and I remembered. I remembered going to barn dances when I was a kid; clubbing in my early twenties; and dancing at school trivia nights in my thirties (sad, I know). I remembered a friend’s wedding, and dancing in red heels until it was well past time to carry sleepy children home. I love to dance around my kitchen, but I had forgotten how much fun it is to dance with other people.

We did the heel-and-toe polka, a square dance, and a reel or two. By the end of the night, adults were skipping and giggling and throwing each other around by the elbows as we shot up the reel, and the kids were almost getting good at it. On the way home, my daughters said, ‘We should do this every week,’ and I agreed. There should be more dancing.

Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven is like a wedding banquet”. But I’m not convinced it’s like the stuffy middle class Anglo Christian wedding banquets I’ve had to attend, with lame speeches and bland food and dealcoholized wine. Jesus was Jewish, so I reckon that if heaven is like a wedding, it’s like a Jewish wedding. A friend once told me that one of the good things about being Jewish is that she had to learn to dance. At every wedding there is dancing, and absolutely everyone dances, young or old. Anyone who tries not to looks like an idiot. They are squashed against a wall as the party goes wild, until some old lady grabs them by the hand and drags them into the fray.

So, the kingdom of heaven is like a Jewish wedding. Or, perhaps, a ceilidh. At my friend’s party I watched balding men dance with their young daughters, and a two-year-old totter up the reel, and girls on the verge of puberty dancing with each other, and people in their sixties who couldn’t count to four and did every step wrong but kept dancing anyway. There were friends from other countries and friends with intellectual disabilities and straight people and gay people and country people and city people and Christians and atheists and a pagan priestess. Together these people laughed and danced and communicated across the boundaries of age and sex, culture and capability; and I saw the kingdom of heaven.

I look around the churches, so full of people who find it hard to dance. Like me at times, they sit against the wall and watch, but turn down invitations to participate. And I wonder whether we will enjoy the heavenly wedding banquet, and what we will say when Jesus puts out his hand and requests the pleasure of this dance.

Must I always remember my mother by my failures?

Here we go again: the anniversary of my mother’s death. This year, like every year, it has crept up on me and has been marked not with gentle ceremonies of remembrance, but by my failures.

Friday: I forgot my middle daughter’s athletics carnival. We arrived at school to find athletes buzzing – and my daughter in tight jeans. “Go home,” she said in panicky tears, “go home, and get me some shorts!” I ran to the office and checked when the bus was leaving: three minutes. I asked if they had anything she could wear. They found a pair of bike shorts in her size: brilliant. Eight dollars and two minutes later, my daughter was dressed and ready for the bus. Problem solved; but in the initial forgetting, I felt like a failure as a mother.

Saturday: “I have an itchy bottom,” said someone. “Me too,” said someone else. Worming tablets, eight loads of washing, a whole house cleaned, and five showers later, I was exhausted. And this inability to impress upon my children the importance of washing their hands felt like a reflection of my crappy parenting: yet again, failure.

Sunday: We went for a swim at the pool. Afterwards, my oldest daughter and I decided to stroll home separately from the others. I hadn't brought my bag, just some money in my pocket. I thought we could pop into an op shop and a café, and have a little mother-daughter time. But the bright low sun caught in my eyes, and the whirling sparkles of migraine began. Without my bag, I had no phone to call for help, and none of the pain medication that I usually carry. We staggered home with me on her arm, blind, and I collapsed into bed. So much for op shops, cafés, or mother-daughter time. These things happen; but what a failure.

Monday: We arrived at school. My youngest daughter’s friends were all holding books. Everyone had attained the required reading level, and their teacher had declared a class party. They were bringing in their favourite books and some food to share; we had forgotten. My usually calm daughter looked shocked, then began to weep. I lifted her seven-year-old self into my arms, and crooned and rocked. She wouldn’t come to the library and find another book; she wouldn’t borrow a book from a sister or a friend; she just clung onto me, and wept. The bell rang and I gently lowered her down. I left her in line, a fat tear rolling down her cheek. Fat tears rolled down mine, too. Three hugs from three friends later, and I’m still tear-y.

Yesterday a friend sent me a text: If only your mum could see what an amazing person you are. Weird, I thought. Almost everything I ever did was wrong, according to my mother. Just imagine how she would have ripped into me these last few days, as I failed and failed and failed.
And then I realised my friend had sent the text because it was the anniversary of her death: yet another thing that I had forgotten.

It’s been fifteen years since she died; and fifteen years of me trying to learn that I’m a good enough parent, and a good enough person, for this world. But at this time of year, every year, I forget these lessons along with everything else. All I do is fail, and notice and remember my failures.

Will there ever come a time when I mark this anniversary with the good things about our relationship, the things we held in common? The love of stories? The hours spent in galleries? The relishing of small jokes? When will I remember our joint passion for nooks and crannies and creaky old houses? For serious conversations held with small children? When will I rest in the pleasure we shared sucking the marrow out of lamb chops, and out of life?