“DELIVER US FROM EVIL”

      

Not again! We shudder once more when we turn on the news only to hear that somewhere else innocent people have been senselessly murdered by persons known or unknown. How do we explain it to ourselves, let alone to anyone else, why this keeps happening?

Commentators try, not too successfully, the wisdom of hindsight and to second-guess what could be happening. Demagogues vainly look for a single reason or a blanket target for blame and retribution as if it could be that simple. We want easy answers and straight forward solutions. We look for the disgruntled disadvantaged or those mesmerised by false promises of reward in an afterlife for their destructive self-sacrifices.

I am drawn to read from Ephesians 6, “For we fight not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers, against spiritual wickedness”. We are forced to recognise that these forces are more than human. It is evil itself using human beings to sabotage God’s will for his kingdom of heaven on earth by taking it all out on soft targets somewhere.

Evil does this but goes further. It seeks to further divide people into mutually hostile camps, creating long-term chaos and destruction as we see only too well. Well might we pray, “Deliver us from evil”, for we feel powerless to quench it. The more we struggle against it the worse it seems to become.

I am encouraged by a seemingly obscure verse from that mysterious book of Revelation where a picture is painted of the archangel St Michael and all his angels overcoming the dragon and all its angels in a giant heavenly showdown. It tells me that while all human attempts to overcome evil appear futile, it is in the end a spiritual battle, for evil itself is spiritual.

So, what are we doing when we pray, “Deliver us from evil”? Yes, we do pray that though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death we may fear no evil to come upon us or upon our loved ones in such a vulnerable world. But we pray for more than that. We are praying that the evil that can attack us does not itself take us over so that we become embittered enough to transfer the same evil on down the track to others as we have so often seen. To be able to remain strong in the face of evil and not give into it becomes our part in this unrelenting battle against it.

We take Jesus as our model. He was cruelly attacked by evil yet was not captured by it. His love casts out our fear and gives us that hope that in his strength we can do the same.

“HERITAGE OF THE SPIRIT”

How is your glow going now that winter is finally upon us? It was only a few weeks ago we brought out our red gear and glowed our way into church and through a heart-warming service remembering the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church’s birthday. We cooled down into Trinity but we are still within the Pentecost season until Advent will again burst upon us with blossoms of jackaranda and agapanthus.

We may or may not have remembered it but May 24 was a special day. On that date in 1738, John Wesley went most unwillingly to a Moravian meeting in Aldersgate Street to hear Luther’s Commentary on Paul’s Epistle to the Romans. He described that about a quarter to nine, when the penny dropped about justification by faith alone, his heart “felt strangely warmed”. The Evangelical Revival in Britain commenced and the rest is history, our history.

Many times our churches have tried to replicate this experience but truth to tell we have struggled. The drift away from the churches continues all over the western world with every setback making matters worse. The media all but ignore the good news this sick world sadly needs in favour of this unsavoury appetite for bad news.

The truth is that Wesley’s experience was not entirely man-made. He would have been the first to say that it was for him a work of the Spirit encountering him when he most was in need for this refreshment as was the England of his time. Before Wesley, England was run by self-centred men. The then king neglected his queen in favour of mistresses and the Prime Minister promoted a corrupt parliament. By the end of the century, the king promoted faithfulness in marriage and William Pitt became the most dedicated Prime Minister in history. There were changes both in church and state brought about by the Spirit inspiring John Wesley.

We cry for the Spirit to come and renew us both church and world. But are we listening? The boy Samuel heard God’s call in the middle of the night when grown men should have been listening. Samuel heard, reflected, and acted.

The experience of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit has been among us for generations. Those of us who trace back our family histories notice that no matter how far we go back in time, our ancestors always seemed to have been baptised in church. We fill in our census forms describing our faith allegiance. We have all the visible connections of being available for the Spirit to live and work in such a way that both church and world can flourish in the ways of God that would have us all love the Lord our God with all our heart, our mind, our soul, and our strength, and our neighbours as ourselves. So, is it happening?

In quiet ways it is but not necessarily in the way it is most needed. This is a time where we need to reflect upon how our faith has come to us in the first place. As Elisha looked to Elijah his mentor, so we have received faith through our mentors who have left us something of the Spirit to carry the baton while surrounded by a host of witnesses who have gone before us.

What sort of heritage will we leave? I’m not talking about what we put into our last Will and Testament but what sort of Spirit will we leave for others to pick up from us? What sort of church and world will we leave behind us where the Spirit has opportunity to move in the way that is essential to move?

We ourselves have been mentored along the way. Who will be mentored by us in such away they can be open to the Spirit so their hearts as well may be strangely warmed that the world may believe that Jesus sets us all straight so that the world may work in the way it has always been meant to work?

“BELLING THE CAT”

         

Aesop tells us the fable of the Mice and the Cat. There was a nervous group of mice whose number was steadily diminishing by a cat stealthily sneaking up on them and quietly carrying them off one by one. The mice assembled for a secret meeting to decide what they could do to preserve themselves from this silent predator.

After much discussion, one bright young mouse came up with the idea of hanging a bell round the cat’s neck so they could then hear it coming and escape in time. This received enthusiastic approval from all the mice except for one old mouse who remained silent. They thought he was deaf and began to explain their proposal in detail. He stopped them with one question – who will actually put the bell round the cat’s neck?

Uh oh! So many worthwhile plans fall at the hurdle of implementation, and by now you are wondering what this has to do with Easter anyway. Ahhh! The bottom line of the fable is not only to remind us how reality impedes all our idealism but that to achieve something worthwhile and essential is often impossible without cost and self-sacrifice. We cannot have our cake and eat it too.

We see this so plainly in what happens in the world around us. US Presidents and other leaders have been assassinated when they promote peaceful and just diplomacy over violence. We see Barack Obama copping it for trying to institute fair healthcare in the US. We see German Chancellor Angela Merkel pilloried for her courageous generosity in helping Syrian refugees find safety in her country. We ask why it is so risky, dangerous, and costly to do what is good in the teeth of vested interests determined to milk the vulnerable.

There are two events in the Acts of the Apostles where Paul suffers from doing what is good and right. In Philippi he heals a demented slave-girl fortune-teller from her suffering only to have her owners, now thwarted from their easy income, have him and Silas thrown into prison. In Ephesus Paul preaches a God not made with hands to the ire of the silversmiths who cause a riot because their income would be threatened so they force Paul into house arrest for his own protection.

Now the penny drops about Easter. Jesus sets his face towards Jerusalem knowing full well he is unlikely to leave it alive despite the protestations of his disciples who want to see him achieve the Kingdom by force.

But that would have defeated the purpose. The true Kingdom that needed to come required running a relentless gauntlet into ultimate self-sacrifice.

            There is something in what we call human nature (which is anything but truly human) that resists that Kingdom coming in which God’s will is done on earth as it is done in heaven. We keep expecting God’s will to be done in heaven as it is done on earth. One only has to look at Syria, Manus Island, and too many other places to know all human beings seem able to do on earth is to establish hell instead.

            Belling the cat is going to be dangerous and costly if it is going to work. Jesus takes up the self-sacrifice himself, not because of any perceived wrath of God but because of the wrath of human beings who will not co-operate with God’s Kingdom or any other rule where one cannot receive the lion’s share in it. And it’s all because we as human beings have since time immeasurable have insisted on our advantage that it became necessary for Jesus to take on the disadvantage that would then have to occur.

            This is why Jesus has become the most avoided person in history because we know all too well that it’s not God but ourselves who are responsible for putting Jesus on the cross. We call the day Good Friday because Jesus with eyes wide open gave himself for us. In the words of children’s hymn writer Cecil Frances Alexander, “He died that we might be forgiven. He died to make us good.” We call the season Easter because our crucified Lord has risen and he has risen in us. “You ask me how I know he lives. He lives within our hearts”. And we are the Church because we can experience and share our new lease of life. Go out and live.

“THE SHOCK OF LIFE”

  

Yes, I know I missed last issue again. Will my excuse of stopping breathing (temporarily, of course) on 21 Oct 2015 do? I collapsed upon my couch at home early that afternoon and awoke to find 5 pairs of eyes staring intently at me before I was briskly carted off to Royal North Shore Hospital in an ambulance. On the way in, I was told that my son had performed CPR on my by then bruised chest and so enabled my life story to continue. Otherwise I might never have known about the condition of aortic stenosis, often described in medical circles as the silent killer.

Open-heart surgery was prescribed and performed so that the clogged valve could be replaced into my heart by one from an unwittingly generous animal. I can now be identified by a thin red line down the front to match the yellow streak down my back. Three months after hospitilisation, I have been brought home to complete my recovery. My thanks to so many of you for your prayers and kind attention all of which has surely helped my healing process.

I never knew how easily and so quickly and quietly life can end. The difficult bit happens as one experiences the shock of life with the slow and challenging journey to recovery to live the life so graciously extended for me. Innumerable angels in many guises have appeared before me upon whom I have depended to help me recover. Those words, “No man [sic] is an island” thudded back into me, day by day.

We are beginning a new year. Epiphany comes to us in many ways and the best gift the wise men (and women) can bring to us is the wisdom accumulated from the experience of life. There is much stupidity and cruelty within this world so that we are left wondering how on earth we can ever change it. Like a “brand plucked from the burning” (Amos 4:11) – words quoted by Susannah Wesley when her 5 year old son, John, was rescued from the burning rectory at Epworth – we have been given the opportunity to do so and to ensure we leave the spirit behind us to those left to take up the challenge.

Epiphany with Lent about to come brings again to our attention the person of Jesus, hastily delivered from the sword of the soldiers of Herod the Great to put his own life on the line in his own time that we may live lives freed from the greed and violence that destroys so many. Yes, we too can be shocked into life that we may continue to follow Jesus on his journey so that lives may be lived in all fullness.

2015 Xmas letter

            On Dec 4 last year at North Shore Private I received a laparoscopic insertion of a Tenchkoff catheter. This necessitated my discarding all my belts in favour of braces. January saw my learning how to manage the exit site of my catheter requiring the exacting focus akin to dismantling a hand grenade given the risk of peritoneal infection hovering over the procedure. My son Andrew moved down here from Brisbane to put the finishing touches to his PhD thesis.

            I was also taken through with Andrew the procedures for home peritoneal dialysis treatment involving about 30 precise steps taking every precaution to avoid infection. Each dialysis exchange, including setting up and cleaning up afterwards takes up to an hour and I am required to do an exchange four times daily, first before breakfast, second before lunch, third before dinner, and the fourth before bed. I have found this commitment keeps me off the streets somewhat.

            My hands took some time to adjust to all the necessary applications of pink sterilising liquid and they still require regular application of moisturising cream. Andrew shopped on my behalf for necessary medical equipment and storage, effectively refurbishing an area of my unit to enable me to function in this new and daunting chapter of my life. He has been and still continues to be a Godsend. I have been learning how to renew my mind – how to get out of ruts and instead get groovy.

            The first monthly load of boxes of dialysis fluid was delivered to take up a wall of my unit. Andrew finished his thesis abstract and dispatched it. February was the month, the provost of the University of Queensland informed Andrew he has been awarded finally his PhD. We walked round Sydney to buy him a congratulatory watch, settling upon a Victorinox.

            Early in May, I commemorated the 100^th anniversary of my great-uncle Alec’s death at Pope’s Ridge in Gallipoli. This inspired a flurry of Cranston family history exchanges which has occupied me on and off when I can. Later in the month I found my dialysis blocked so I was admitted to Royal North Shore Hospital (RNSH) in the kidney ward. An X-Ray found my catheter inside had been dislodged. It righted itself once the blockage was cleared by medication and I was released within a week.

            My kitchen oven ceased working in June so I bought a new one and had it installed with my microwave above it. I noticed my eyes were not seeing long distance as well as they used to (funny that) and I was fitted for full spectacles. Andrew and I replaced my home phone set and my mobile phone now both much easier to manage while I’m doing my dialysis before he flew to Glasgow for an International Aeronautical Conference to present a paper based on his PhD thesis.

            About a week after my 76^th birthday, I had a turn while walking to Top Ryde on a freezing though sunny morning. I took things quietly for a while afterwards. Several days later I was found to have contracted peritonitis and to report back to RNSH. While I was being treated there, the resident doctor admitted me to cardiac because of the discovery that I had had a “heart event”. Because this signalled potential heart failure, an angiogram was organised. After consultation with Joanna, I began organising for assisted home care, including Webster blister pack to organise my now increased medication.

            Eventually I went onto a UnitingCare Home package which includes cleaning, laundry and shopping so that I avoid heavy lifting and exertion. Friends from church visited me. During August I crumpled to the ground on my way up the street. I had my heart medication altered accordingly but I can tend to run out of power like a wound down clockwork toy and have to find somewhere to sit down. Andrew arrived home here from his European tour on his way home from the Conference.

            During September I entered Kamilaroi Retirement Centre, Lane Cove for 17 days respite, the longest period of time away from home for years until a few weeks later. I returned home early October to experience a few dizzy spells and a chest infection until on Wednesday, October 21^st I collapsed suddenly onto the couch at home and that should have been the end of my story. I emerged from the floor with 5 pairs of eyes staring intently at me and anxiously calling my name. Four pairs belonged to paramedics and one to son Andrew who had been with me at the time. I was stretchered off in an ambulance straight to emergency at Royal North Shore Hospital. On the way in I heard that Andrew had noticed I’d stopped breathing and applied CPR which he’d learned from Scouts, also calling 000, so here I still am miraculously.

            I had experienced an aortic stenosis, mostly fatal, and was soon wheeled in for open heart surgery to replace my clogged aortic valve. I spent the next 5 days in the Intensive Care Unit, then 6 days in Advanced Care Unit before another 10 days in a private room, then 3 weeks in Hunters Hill Rehabilitation Hospital. At time of writing I have moved on to Wesley Gardens, Belrose for Transitional care where I expect to be over the new year. In all this Andrew continues to be my rock while minding the unit. He flew up to Brisbane with his mother to receive his much-deserved doctorate. Can anyone trump a PhD and a CPR in the same year?