Just Been Thinking

Thinking on politics…Sometimes a door opens and as a Jesus follower you have to decide whether to walk through it. If you are fair dinkum about following you don’t leave your God clothes in a pile by the door - you just wear ‘em and walk on in. Mine don’t come off…and they are always clean and fresh, He washes me daily!

Government isn’t ‘Christian’ - only people are, but the more of Jesus’s family in that government who hold His values and love people - all people - the better the government will be. Esther of the Bible is a prime example - she was invited into a pagan king’s harem…Personally I’d rather my gig!

Selah.

I will be running as a candidate for Family First for the electorate of Corangamite in this 2010 federal election.

Why?

Because I believe we Jesus followers need to be available to serve God and people wherever and whenever He calls.

Because I believe the great wealth of Australia isn’t in what we dig out of the ground and sell overseas or what we can cream off people in taxes, it’s in our people. We are a unique, generous-hearted, open and gutsy bunch who have much to give in community and into the world. We live in a wonderful land, and we need to look after it and each other. That is worth standing up for.

Politics can be a tough game. I hope I can engage directly and respectfully. See you on the other side!

love Ann

British scientists have made a startling discovery re ‘which came first, the chicken or the egg?’

They say the chicken came first because a protein (OC-17) crucial to the formation of eggshells is produced in the ovaries of pregnant hens. Ergo, according to science, a chicken must have existed to make the egg. They haven’t yet figured out how the chicken got there in the first place…

I love science. I love the detail and the big picture stuff. I find it fascinating and wonderful to dig into and try to grasp. I can only imagine how fascinating it would be for those who are discovering and expanding our understanding of the natural world.

What I don’t like is when arrogance takes over and science is paraded as the only ‘mature’, ‘educated’, ’sane’, ‘intelligent’ position to take (or any number of other patronising barbs at people of faith) on the mysteries of life, the universe and everything. Let’s face it, even in the average suburban life, there are many inexplicable mysteries of soul, of spirit and of our existence in this biological sphere. Life just does not often fit into neat analytical, double blind trial triumphs of logic and prediction. Science is a helpful informant, it is not the blueprint.

Is it irrationally simplistic to say God created creatures, not eggs? That the Designer planned and created the capacity for a creature and a species to replicate and adapt to change over time.

Science may help to explain what God has done but science will never ever substitute for God.

The divine Creator is not man’s construct, man is God’s construct.

Selah…

Love, Ann

I was looking at the internet the other day and came across this quote, spoken in a different world to the one we live in now, but it got me thinking…

Abraham Lincoln, 1862, addressing the second annual Meeting of Congress, said:”The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country.”

This profound quote, spoken nearly 150 years ago, still resonates with me as we personally and corporately weather change across societies, cultures, environments, nations and time.

We need to very wisely navigate our values, our faith beliefs, our assumptions, our absolutes and our choices. The ground under our feet is shifting and changing rapidly, particularly in our western world (hate that phrase: its ‘eastist’!!). An unjust divide continues to widen between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ as human society develops. Many of us are just swept along in this river, with a sense of unease and a yearning for more balance between simplicity and the inevitable adaptation needed with change. The poor, wherever they are, still have to find food, shelter and try to stay alive, distilling their lives into patterns and directions most of the developed world is either immune to or removed from.

Those of us who are wealthy enough to have the ‘burden’ of choice, whilst eating, sleeping and working in relative comfort, are under growing pressure, and often exhausted by, finding our way through an increasingly complex landscape of structures, expectations and ‘necessities’.

This brave new technological world is not so brave and not so new anymore. The Tower of Babel that is westernised culture continues to reach higher and higher at greater speed, separating it’s inhabitants from simpler patterns of life and perhaps from each other too.

In the intensity of these changes the world is experiencing, somehow we need to rise to these challenges with discerning, creative vision and equally, a sense of justice that stands up for those who are disempowered, ignored or victimised by the pace or direction of the cultures we are part of. Fundamentally, we must determine to take with us, or in some cases retrieve, the virtues of kindness, generosity, love, peace, courage and a deep respect for the world, and those we share it with.

The “rising with the occasion” Lincoln speaks of spans all aspects of our humanity and challenges us to look critically at why we do what we do, what we believe and how we express that, what is precious and to be carried forward and what is for yesterday and needs to be left there.

We may well need to lighten our load as we move forward. Our western culture (how else do I say that?) is heavy with greed, fear and self absorption and needs much adjustment. Change will force that upon us but choice may help us walk more freely forward.

Hi there folks, been a while. Are you still there?

I got weary of words so I stopped saying so much. Bit tired of hearing my own voice. Can’t really turn it off though. We’ve had a fair bit of activity going on in our family in the last twelve months so my attention has been somewhat focused into those circumstances. But…the world and the life of this Jesus follower are still turning and they keep producing words in me. So I’ll write them down occasionally and spin them out to you. One thing I would ask…send a few back every now and then so I know what you’ve been thinking too…

May I indulge in a word of unsolicited encouragement to the editor of this online treasure trove…Thanks David….You are patience personified and I love your work! Hmmm wonder if he’ll edit this before you read it? Nah, go on Dave, I dare you (Ed - after careful review, have decided to leave it in!)

Write soon…

Shalom, and love, Ann

I occasionally throw a question out on Facebook to prompt some discussion so thought I’d send it out through the blog too. It may seem a little ‘unChristian’, perhaps provocative. But I’ve just been thinking….

Question: Do I have to be ‘nice’ ‘cos I am a ‘Christian’? Can I be honest and respectful and bold? Or do I have to be ‘nice’? I don’t like nice…It’s like a dead fish handshake.

My anti-nice sentiment at the moment is actually springing out of the fact that I have been disappointed to experience, in Christian community, and even in the wider community, an avoidance of direct commentary or activism on areas of our society and communication that are destructive or anti-Christ. Now I’m not talking about the aggressive, abusive rant of anger but a respectful, considered engagement. I know I get frustrated by the toxicity of some of our culture and surprised that it seems so tolerated, or maybe that we seem so silent.

Talking and listening to many people, it seems we swim in a warm soup of spiritual confusion and compromise and it makes me really concerned for how those who have chosen to follow the way of Jesus will cope with the inevitable and increasing pressure on their lives and lifestyles.

Warmth, generosity, honesty, love, courage, encouragment, challenge, desire for a life that reflects Jesus…but nice?

It seems a shallow form of stronger virtues, flying under the radar to avoid detection or engagement.

Love…now that’s a different story.

There is so much going on and so many ways to go with one’s thoughts…

So I am just plucking this thought out of the air and sharing it with you, ‘cos I was on the phone recently making some enquiries for someone I love who needed support for their adult child.

Actually, it’s a question for the Victorian State Government who may not be listening…But then again someone may.

Of the ‘approx’ $1.6 BILLION being raised through gambling in Victoria, how much is being spent on helping the victims (addicts, families, children) of this tax raking monster?

Oh…and here’s another question - Of that ‘approx’ $1.6 BILLION, how much is being put aside to build residential rehabilitation programs, and ongoing recovery support for individuals and families caught up in the devastation of gambling addiction?

Oh…and up pops another question - Is there any money left over to increase the number of short term and long term beds in mental health services for people who are no longer able to function safely out in the jungle? Or do we just let them get eaten alive?

A $1.6 billion bucket is a big bucket.

(If anyone is aware of any residential rehab programs in Victoria, please leave a message)

Just been thinking…

If we build the vessel, the box (ark), the building, God will come? Will God come? Who or what is the box for? Is it still relevant?

Why, back then, did all mighty, all knowing, omnipresent God allow or want His presence particularly manifest in a tent, ark or tabernacle?

Was it to focus His people and to give them a sense of person and awe by being in one place even though He is everywhere?

Was it to separate their understanding of God as a person from the gods of the time? Maybe to intensify their sense of His reality and presence?

Then Jesus came and God was present in human form, not in a building. So was the ‘God building’ still relevant? Why? How? In what way?

Then Jesus went and God was present again in the Holy Spirit, but in those who followed Him. So it’s not the building, it’s the gathering of the vessels within the building.

So we are the box? God has come. So we take God out to people? Or do we still expect them to come in to us? Why? What’s the God building for? Is it a big box for all the smaller ones?

Why do we need a collection point? Should there be a God building (big box) or is it past tense? Genuine question. What do WE come together for? Hebrews 10:25

It’s no longer I that lives but Christ that lives in me…in-dwelling…as in, living in. That makes me a ‘box’, or vessel for Him to be in.

I get that, it’s Christianity 101.

But when I focus on that one thought and its implication…One who is chosen to carry God…and the plural - ones who are…

Oh boy!! Changes how I look at what I ‘do’ and why I ‘do’ it. What we do, why we do it. Changes who I am. Changes who we are?

One life, already 46yrs old…surrounded by others similarly called. And others that may be similarly called but don’t yet know it. Haven’t heard!

Don’t waste a day.

Selah.

Howdy comrades,

I’ve given you something a bit different this time. It’s a link to a message I gave recently that gives the Gospel story from the apostle John’s angle…I think…though he may want to have a chat with me about that when I see him! How cool will that be?!

See I’ve been thinking a lot about getting God’s truth and heart out there for people to hear ‘cos so many don’t understand. I’m guessing some people won’t understand what I’ve said either…but some will. I don’t have to fish the whole ocean do I, hopefully you are out there too…So even though it’s not technically brilliant or ‘polished’, here it is.

I finally managed to edit it into four parts for YouTube, which I have discovered will not take anything longer than 10 minutes (now that’s a real challenge!). So hopefully it’s still worth watching, even though quartered.

I hope it reaches in deep whereever it goes.

You can find all four parts here…

Should work…the grand experiment continues!

Love and light to you… Ann x