Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Lent 4A– 1 Sam 16 1-13 Ps 23 Eph 5 8-14 John 9 1-41

They say seeing is believing. Today’s Gospel explores this and its chilling opposite, wilful blindness. We begin with the disciples asking Jesus if the man was born blind because of his own sin, or that of his parents. It was a widely held view in the ancient world that unusual suffering came as a result of sin. We often ask a question that shows it’s not such an ancient perspective either – What did I do to deserve this? But what a question to ask about that man! Had he offended God before he was even born!? Had his parents offended God, and God made their baby blind to punish them? Who’d been spreading such ideas? Who was really blind?

A/Prof Kylie Crabbe reminds us that this story comes out of a time when disability would have been very common; very visible; a time when average human life expectancy was about thirty-five. So the amount of life when you might expect to have ‘normal’ health would’ve been quite short. Maybe it was a comfort to think everything was in God’s hands. You find a similarly cold ‘comfort’ in the eastern doctrines of karma and dharma

So who sinned? Jesus answers this confronting question by saying something that our translation this morning really distorted. It read, the man was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him. Do they mean God purposely put this poor man through blindness from birth just in order to reveal divine power sometime down the track? Surely not. I find the more literal ESV translation more helpful; and some different punctuation. It was not that this man sinned, or his parents. But, that the works of God might be displayed in him, we must work the works of him who sent me as long as it is day. The man experiences God as a blind person. It’s from there that he does what God’s calls from him, just as as we do in our lives.

Jesus introduces the healing by declaring himself to be the light of the world. Then he sets about ending the darkness this blind man has lived in from birth. He spits on the ground to make mud, and spreads it on the man’s eyes. Some commentators feel a bit grossed out by this. But knowing this is John’s Gospel, and that John so often links Jesus’ stories with others in the scriptures, it reminds us of another muddy story. It’s the story in Genesis about God making a person and animals from the dust of the Earth. Is John pointing to Jesus here as the one who can create sight from the dust of the ground? Is John showing us that Jesus, using the dust of the earth, can complete the creation of this person? St Irenaeus in the C2 certainly thought so: this very same Word formed the visual power in him who had been blind from his birth; showing openly who it is that fashions us in secret.  ^{Adv Haer V.15.3}

Jesus said God’s works might be revealed in this man born blind. And the gift of sight is the first we see. But there’s more. This man bears ever stronger witness to Jesus and what he’s done for him. First, he confronts the disbelief of his neighbours and acquaintances. They take him to the Pharisees. Some of them condemn Jesus for giving the man his sight on the Sabbath. Others, moved to wonder, debate this. They interrogate the man further. And again, he bears witness to Jesus. He tells them Jesus is a prophet. The Pharisees aren’t satisfied, and send him up the chain of command. Now Jewish religious leaders refuse to believe what they’ve heard. They summon the man’s parents to hear their testimony. His parents confirm what’s happened, but fearing expulsion from the worshipping community, they direct the inquisitors back to their son. By now any debate between the Jewish leaders is over. They’re in unanimous denial. There’s none so blind as the one who will not see.

So their second interrogation shows us the man born blind as the only one there who can see the truth. He tries to bring the Jewish leaders into the light, despite their reviling. Then they repeat that awful notion the story began with – you were born entirely in sins! In their fear, that cruel fantasy is what they choose to see. So they expel him; blacklist him from Jerusalem’s worshipping community.

Jesus hears he’s been driven out and finding him, draws him straight into new community. It’s a beautiful moment. It’s the first time the man born blind sees Jesus with his own eyes. Jesus asks him, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ And the man asks ‘who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.’ ³⁷Jesus said to him, ‘You’ve seen him, it’s me; the one speaking with you.’ ³⁸ He said, ‘Lord, I believe.’ And he worshipped him. Jesus shows him and us who God is really like!

Jesus, the light of the world has come. He opens our eyes to things once hidden. But John says his light will also cast shadows. We choose to turn to the light or to the shadow. This man’s physical blindness ended. We saw his courage in the face of the people who tried to shut down his witness. It was a powerful display of the works of God that Jesus told us to watch for. The man turned to the light. But his opponents moved from open debate and dialogue to blinkered, unanimous denial. Their slip of the tongue about being born in sin shows they believed the superstition that a disability is God’s punishment.

The man born blind turned to the light because of Jesus. He saw in Jesus who God really is. If seeing is believing, this Gospel really is Good News for us to share like that man did. Everyone needs to see Jesus and know the truth about God! Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Lent 3A – John 4 5-42

There’s a lot going on in this remarkable story! Jesus talked to a strange woman in a foreign place, defying strict cultural rules. A man and woman who aren’t married to each other were never to talk unchaperoned. Jesus also ignores another barrier. Jews and Samaritans weren’t on speaking terms with each other. Samaritans were hated outsiders. Yet in the gospels, outsiders seem open to recognise the truth about Jesus. This foreign woman is the first person Jesus tells who he really is; the Messiah. And in this remarkable story, she moves from a wary stand-offishness to real openness to who Jesus is. Then she proclaims him to all her fellow villagers.

And John is doing much more with this story, deliberately evoking the Jews’ and Samaritans’ common ancestry by telling us the encounter happens at Jacob’s well. You may remember Jacob’s story involved another well. He met his future wife Rachel by a well in the land of the people of the East ^{Gen 29} Samaria was effectively foreign soil for Jesus too. So today’s gospel presents us with Jesus at a well named for Jacob, another Jewish man who met a cousin at a foreign well. And like Rachel did, this Samaritan woman will also provide water from a well for a Jewish stranger to drink. Marriage will again be a major topic of conversation. And many listeners will know that the earlier well in Jacob’s story had a large stone covering its mouth; a stone which had to be rolled away to provide the gathered flock with its life-giving water. I’m sure John calls up this ‘stone-rolled-away’ image deliberately.

We’re told it was about noon. Do you remember last Sunday’s encounter between Jesus and his visitor, Nicodemus? It was night time then; Nicodemus didn’t want to be seen. But Jesus isn’t hiding his meeting with an outsider like Nicodemus did. His discussion with this woman would have scandalised his fellow Jews. It certainly shocked his disciples!

So a major focus of this story is Jesus going to people considered to be ‘outsiders’. But it’s not someone sick or demon-possessed this time. Jesus crosses a border. He enters Samaria, initiates a discussion with an unaccompanied Samaritan woman, and finally, he even accepts an invitation to receive two days’ hospitality from the Samaritan villagers. None of this was thinkable in decent Jewish society.

Jesus asks this woman for water. In today’s Psalm 95, it was God who provided life-giving water. Today, this strange woman gives water to Jesus. But soon, she will take the water of life to her town – the good news of Jesus. At this stage in the gospel, her only equals as witnesses to Jesus are John the Baptist and Mary.

And another extraordinary thing; Jesus and this woman have a serious theological discussion. She knows her traditions. She’s waiting for the coming Messiah. In the synagogues, men and women sat separately. Here at the well, Jesus and this woman sit and speak together about the things of God. This is really remarkable!

And as a theologian, the Samaritan woman is no slouch. She misunderstands Jesus at first. But Nicodemus, the religious leader also looked like an amateur doing theology with Jesus. This woman makes much faster progress than him. She starts from a position of scornful sounding doubt – ¹² Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it? Then she progresses to a partial understanding, but still confrontational ¹⁹ Sir, I see that you are a prophet. ²⁰ Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you [Jews] say … people must worship … in Jerusalem. Then she moves on towards the truth – ²⁵ … I know that Messiah is coming (who is called Christ). When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us. Finally, once Jesus has identified himself, she rushes to her village to share the good news. Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?

The most unexpected person can become the bearer of the greatest gift of all –the divine gift – living water; eternal life; bringing others to meet Jesus. An outsider can witness to the world. We outsiders can help people discover what those Samaritans soon proclaimed: ⁴² we know that this is truly the Saviour of the world. Insiders and outsiders? Jesus shows this up to be a complete furphy. John puts the story at Jacob’s well. Jacob was the ancestor of both Jews and Samaritans. Owning our commonality with others is essential; particularly at this time of the terrible war raging between the three sibling children of Abraham. How do we do this?

Jesus gave us our model today by walking straight into the point of no conversation and starting to talk. We know there are barriers being raised to prevent dialogue –barriers just as poisonous as those which forbade conversation between men and women, and Jews and Samaritans. But it’s only through conversation together about the hopes and dreams we hold in common that we will rediscover our real kinship. Jesus walked straight through the barriers and started the conversation. He showed us that’s how you find that your sister or your brother is just that; not your enemy; not a danger, but your brother; your sister.

We start by crashing the barriers. Jesus shows us how to do it. Today, let’s pray that we might find the courage and strength to ignore the threats and choose to fight openly for reconciliation; reconciliation between estranged siblings who are waging a war of unwarranted distrust and hatred that must break their parent’s heart. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Lent 2A – Genesis 12 1-4a, John 3 1-17

Has God ever challenged you to really lift your game? I don’t mean something simple and one-off, like being tempted to do something selfish, but feeling moved to decide against it because you’re a Christian. No. I mean a really big challenge; a challenge to change the way you live completely. Has God challenged you to make a career choice that doesn’t necessarily pay as well as the alternatives, but you choose it because you know God wants you to make a difference for other people? Would you change the place you live, leave everyone behind, risk their bad opinion because God has asked this of you?  These are frightening questions.

Today we’ve met two faithful people who heard this big, life-changing challenge, and they said yes; their names are Abram and Nicodemus. Today we’ve been eavesdroppers, listening in as each of them met God in a life-changing encounter. God challenged Abram to leave behind family and home and go to a place God would show him. And Jesus challenged Nicodemus, a religious VIP, to drop all his current ideas about how to serve God best and instead to be born again from above.

Both of them are told God’s purpose for this great change. Abram is told of God’s intention to bless him, and through him, to bless all families of the earth. And Nicodemus is first to hear the best known saying in the whole Bible—God loved the world in this way: he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. So both of them are challenged to be part of something that changes the world.

These two stories have tremendous significance for us. Their greatest message is what they say about God. They tell us the reason for all God’s calls and challenges to us; it’s God’s love for the world. No qualifications, hesitations, exceptions or prior demands – God loves the world. Another enormously significant message in these stories: they show us that people choose to respond to this love by hearing it as a call to action, and then rising to the challenge. And when we do, the world is changed, because a new way has opened for the world to learn of God’s love; a new way has opened for the world to experience God’s love.

How to respond to these stories? We hear three messages in them. And each message demands a response. The first message is that God loves the world unconditionally. God doesn’t first tell the world to believe or be good or anything before God will love us. No; God loves us first. God is like any good parent. Good parents don’t expect their babies to give them signs of love before they’ll love them back.

Parents love their children before their babies even know them – a bit like the way God loved you and me even back in Abram’s time. And if we are to respond to this, it’s because we see that this is what God is like, and like children do, grow to love just like that; to love the world like God does. Which is good because the second message our stories tell us is that God wants the whole world to experience that love. Again, just like any good parent, God wants the kids to grow up knowing that they are loved and loveable. Kids learn that by being loved; by experiencing love and care. It’s a tragedy if anyone grows up feeling unloved and worthless.

But experiencing love isn’t an automatic thing for kids or anyone. It only happens when people give it to them. And therein lies the third message of these stories. God sends people into the world to give people the blessing of God’s love. We saw Abram sent out, and we know Jesus as the one sent to us from God. And even Nicodemus would join in. They all willingly left behind what was familiar and safe, and set out – God alone knew where – to bring people to experience God’s love.

The conversation we overheard between Jesus and Nicodemus was God’s new call to Nicodemus to do what Abram and Jesus did. This deeply pious man who visited Jesus under cover of darkness would one day heed the call to become like Jesus – to go out in broad daylight and risk everything he had always stood for to bring others to a knowledge of God’s love; to give others a taste of God’s love for them.

The move from shadow to broad daylight – from blindness to sight – is only part of the journey of discipleship. Discipleship is about more than just personal change in the disciple. It sets us free from all that.

Choosing to be Christ’s disciple sets us free from having to find meaning and purpose in our lives just in how we look, or how clever we are, or what we can do, or how impressive our friends are. Imagine leaving all that clobber behind. One day, you wake up from a bad dream, open your eyes and know that you’re loved just for who you are. If, in that moment, you saw someone else crying out in their sleep – needlessly suffering, you’d want to wake them up and tell them they’re okay. You’re fine; God loves you. We’ve discovered God’s unexpected, un-earned love for us, and we know it’s there for you too!

So now it’s clear. God sent others; we’re next. We’re called to lift our game and do what we can to make sure God’s beloved know that that’s who they are: Wake up; it’s okay; God adores you.   Amen

Bishop Greg Thompson

Matt 4:1-11 St Johns

When I was consecrated as a bishop in the NT in 2007 I was told by another bishop that two things would change – my food will improve and I would never be told the truth again.

In Newcastle Diocese while we being examined by a Royal Commission for over 2 years, I quoted this to a senior lawyer and advisor to Newcastle bishops– he responded by saying that bishops needed to be protected. The Royal Commission described this leadership behaviour as wilful negligence.

Deception is as old as the genesis story of the serpent in today’s lesson, while in the gospel reading Jesus confronts the father of lies

How do we live with a world which seeks to deceive us?

St Paul describes this as not wrestling with flesh and blood but powers and principalities.

“This England’ TV series illuminates political deceit during the Covid crisis in the UK.

In the Gospel of Matthew the descending Spirit anoints Jesus in his baptism for his role and mission. Now the Spirit leads Jesus into the wilderness where his identity and mission will be tested.

Wilderness ‘eremos’ is deeply embedded in the memory of Israel, as the formative place of Israel’s faith.

Deut 8:2; Remember the long way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments.

It was in the wilderness, that Israel was called God’s son Hos 11:1 It was also the place of failure, danger and the demonic. In Leviticus, the scapegoat which carries the sin of the people is chased into the wilderness. It is in the wilderness that the great personal encounters with God take place.

When Jesus enters the wilderness, he is walking in the steps of generations. He is facing the absolute terror for the Jewish psyche of the demonic but also of the fearful encounter with Yahweh, the God of the desert. The Son of God must face the failures of the past and navigate a new course for his people and all humanity.

It is Jesus’ humanity, which is to be subjected to temptation –This is the human experience that Jesus enters as the Son of God. It is a wilderness from without and within that the Spirit leads him into.

Matthew provides the reader the equivalent of a passion play between the hero Jesus, and his enemy, the tempter to help us understand the trial he faced.

 ^“He fasted for forty days and forty nights and afterwards he was famished. The tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”

At one level, the three forms of the temptation focus on the three areas of life which were vital to Israel as the covenant pilgrims seeking the promised land – sustenance, protection and prosperity.

Jesus succeeds where Israel failed in the 40 years wandering and the many others that followed. Jesus vindicates the voice from heaven “this is my beloved Son” By so doing, Jesus defeats Satan and makes it possible for those who follow to enter the kingdom of heaven, the promised land, and enter a new freedom.

At another level each temptation is the very questioning of Jesus’ identity – “If you are the Son of God..” If you are the beloved, the One who carries the hope for the world, then you do not need to wait for God to vindicate you. It is the same temptation at the cross – “If you are the Son of God save yourself..”

Jesus risks everything by not giving in. He risks that his identity will remain ambivalent, contestable and unproved. In the face of temptation, what Jesus has is the word of God. He does not make up his replies, he does not search for an adequate rebuttal, or concoct a defence, simply restates God’s promise. He does not use his own power to overcome, rather he points to the One who sustains and loves. Jesus’ reply is the adoration of God. He turns to God alone to learn what he has come to do. This is his freedom – he has no pretensions of his own nor independence. No one could take Jesus’ life from him. He himself gives it. He might have refused. He might have kept his life. But he gives it. This is the humanity that Jesus embodies and it is the freedom he offers, to each who might travel with him through the wilderness towards the cross.

How do we respond to the wilderness of deception?

Know that Jesus has experienced this fully and is with you by the Spirit – be not overcome, overcome evil with good.

Know that Jesus has overcome the power of sin- both ready to forgive and restore the penitent. Do not make worse the burden of suffering on survivors by requiring them to forgive. This will come with time and grace. Let the burden of repentance be upon the offender and the institution.

Know that light overcomes darkness – let truth of God’s word and of your story illuminate deceit.

The royal Commission power was in revealing the deceit of individuals and institutions over 40 years. Break the power of silence over the harming of the suffering. Listen to those who bear the suffering of the powerful. As a bishop being examined by the Royal Commission it felt like walking into the terror of a maze and of not knowing which way to turn. But I found companions on the way, courage to articulate my story and to name the behaviour of the powerful and turn the maze into a labyrinth – the light of Christ love and purpose carried me to the place of being a witness to the suffering.

I still at times feel like I’m in the wilderness but I have found the inner strength to confront deception and break the power of silence, and to let go of grievance over the lies of my church, to let the peace of Christ settle on my heart.

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

On Palm Sunday last year, we raised fresh, green palm crosses aloft and cried out with the crowds lining the track from Bethphage to Jerusalem; Hosanna! Save Us!

Today, we bring these palm crosses back. They’re dried out and more grey than green. Have our hopes dried up too? We actually burn our palm crosses today. Does that mean we’re declaring our hope dead – the hope we shared with those crowds who thought He would change everything that day? Hosanna! Save us! What from?

I have an idea that burning our palm crosses is in fact a symbol of out solidarity with the one who gave his life for us – that we are prepared to join him in the hopeless despair of Gethsemane if that’s what’s needed.

As we look forward through Lent to Good Friday, it’s perfectly clear what we’re crying for salvation from. The ashes speak of our own death. Yet Good Friday will speak of the one in whose death is our salvation. So maybe there’s another way of seeing what our actions today might mean – burning the palm crosses, being marked with the ash, being reminded that we are dust.

We know that in six weeks time, we’ll hold fresh palm crosses aloft and cry out again to be saved. The challenge to us is to be transformed people by the time we do that – or at least, to be people willing and active in the transforming work God wants to do in us. The language we use in the Church is to say we die to our old self in order that God might call forth the new life in us. How do we die to that old self which separates us from God, from our neighbour, from our true selves?

Lent is the season where this question is our focus. We enter the journey of Lent today. What lies before us is a journey beset with obstacles we need to overcome like temptation to self-centredness, and full of challenges we must meet like renunciation and repentance. What does this mean?

Temptation does not mean enticement in Scripture. There, the one who tempts most often, is God, and God certainly does not entice us. When God tempts, what is happening is testing, testing the faith and obedience of God’s people.

Renunciation does not mean giving up chocolate or coffee. The word renounce is used at our baptism and it is used in the context of repentance – turning from godlessness to God – choosing God.

Do you renounce Satan, evil, sinful desires?”

Renunciation is our exercise of will for God. It’s a positive choice.

So it follows that repentance does not just mean feeling sorry for the mistakes of everyday life. Rather it’s an exercise of our will to serve God – setting out again on the journey in the direction we chose when we first answered Christ’s call; embarking again on the Way of Jesus.

How does that work itself out in everyday life? That’s what we seek on the journey of Lent. But a hint comes from today’s Gospel – the first words about giving alms.

Almsgiving was the prime act of piety in Judaism – true religion is this; to care for the widow and the orphan. ^{James 1.27}

So Lent isn’t a time for giving up, but rather giving for – giving for life, giving for love, giving for God. The one who hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord.

 Jesus went first on this Lenten journey. He is the one who goes before us; the one we follow. We know where his journey took him, and today, as we remember that we are dust, we commit ourselves anew to accompany him, even on that road.

Mercifully, we know that because of him, death is not the end of this journey. Rather it is an end which he transformed into new life for any who would follow him to his gracious Kingdom of faith, hope and love. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Transfiguration– Mt 17 1-9 ^{Bushfires and Transfiguration – Nature teaches resurrection life}

Often when we celebrate the feast of Jesus’ Transfiguration on this last Sunday after the Epiphany, parts of this Land are reeling from terrible bushfires. For me, that’s ironic. I choose the last Sunday after Epiphany to celebrate Transfiguration instead of its official day, August 6^th, because it’s so confronting then. August 6^th was the day in 1945 when the atomic bomb was first used in war.

So whichever way I go, it seems I can’t avoid jarring contrast. I dodge the contrast between the Transfigured Jesus’s blazing, living light and the deadly flash of the atomic bomb. But today, we’re praying again that life is protected from the deadly flames of bushfires that have brought such destruction to Victoria, and continue to do so around Deep Creek today. So is there something to say about the coincidence of deadly bushfires and Jesus’s Transfiguration – the living, breathing light his friends saw radiate from Jesus that day on the mountain? Let’s see.

I’m showing you a photo of something called an epicormic bud. It’s a bud that bursts out of the charred bark of gum trees soon after a bushfire. One day, nothing is green. As far as the eye can see, there’s just a forest of charcoal sticks with ash for undergrowth – a desolation. But then almost overnight, gum trees erupt with patches of green – the colour of life. They develop into shoots that grow amazingly quickly. The desolation is transfigured. The charred bark had concealed the life it protected; life that kept flowing, invisible to us, beneath its surface.

I see nature teaching us about what happened on the Mount of Transfiguration all those years ago. Life we can’t see suddenly reveals its presence; determined to break out; to transfigure death; to renew Creation. In his letter to the Romans, Paul wrote about this. ^{Rom 1.20} Ever since the creation of the world, God’s eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. And Paul had never seen a gum tree! So with epicormic buds in our hearts, let’s see what we can make of the astonishing revelation that was the Transfiguration of our Lord.

This time, the revelation wasn’t green; it was pure, brilliant light. Every time an icon is written / painted in the Orthodox tradition the artist begins with a wash of a golden colour. It’s called uncreated light. It recalls the first day of creation when God said ‘be light’, and light was. That light was the light of God’s very being. That’s why the Orthodox call it uncreated light. Our loving God is light. And that was the light we just saw Jesus reveal to Peter, James and John. Their teacher Jesus was that light – he is that light. It was a vision for them, and it’s a vision for us; a vision of who Jesus truly is.

So what’s Matthew the evangelist wanting to say to us by putting this story where it is in the Gospel?

Shortly before the Transfiguration happened in the Gospel, Peter had said to Jesus, You are the Messiah. But then Jesus talked about the way he was to suffer and die. Peter tried to put Jesus back in the ‘Messiah box’. Jesus rebuked him and explained that it’s all about servanthood not control. But how to get that across? Jesus told them, Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who won’t taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.^16.28 Today, for Peter, James and John, that’s just what we saw happen. Jesus took them up a mountain and his inner glory blazed out. Moses and Elijah appeared with him. So the disciples actually saw the Kingdom of God, come with power; come in the person of their teacher, Jesus. But now Peter tries to put all three of them in tiny houses. Boxes again. His motives are good. That’s what Jewish people have always learnt to do with sacred things; put them in a safe place where nothing can defile them.

Peter hasn’t understood the idea that the Messiah can die, far less rise again. So Jesus orders them all to keep quiet about this vision until after he’s risen from the dead; don’t tell the story until you can tell it all. You can’t explain who I am until you know the whole story. And they wander off, wondering what it can mean; this rising from the dead business. Yet there was this memory of an incredible vision that they’d never forget. A vision of life beyond; something more that they’re not ready to understand yet. We’re in a similar spot to the disciples, aren’t we. Every now and then, we can have visions of Jesus – who he really is. But like his first disciples we’re on the journey with him. For them, his rising from the dead was the mystery. For us, it’s his coming again and our being raised from the dead.

We live with mystery, but in the meantime, what does the transfiguration have to say to us? Jesus’ transfiguration reveals who he really is. As I started thinking about this sermon, I thought about the experience  we can have of suddenly realising there’s more to a person than we ever knew. And sometimes people can see that there’s more to you or me than we know ourselves. Sometimes other people are given the gift of telling us who we really are. Or we can do it for them.

I remember as a new Christian I’d done something stupid, said hurtful things, and I felt ashamed. When my priest asked me to do some tasks in the church, I said I didn’t think I should. Because of what I’d done, I wasn’t a good enough person. He didn’t agree. He said those hurtful actions and nasty words weren’t who I really was. That deep down, there was a more real me; one who could see those actions and words for what they were; one wanted to do better; to leave those old ways behind. In a way he held up a mirror to me. He held it on an angle to reveal what I couldn’t see. I pray that this is our gift to each other, and to our community. That we hold up a kind, heartening mirror that reveals a person’s inner life: that we reflect Jesus’s transfigured light as those called to be the light of the world. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Epiphany + 5 – Isa 58 6-12 – Ps 112 – 1 Cor 2 1-6 – Mt 5 13-20

Last Sunday, we heard the beginning of Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount – the Beatitudes – where Jesus said certain types of people were blessed. Beatitude means a state of contentment; happiness or blessedness. So it was surprising what type of people Jesus named; poor, grieving, meek, hungry people; people longing for something better; persecuted people. They’d hardly count themselves blessed, but Jesus says they are. And he promises the fulfilment of all their needs. These blessed ones are the local people gathered around him; people battling to make a living in a cruel world of military occupation, and in a religious environment where many in positions of leadership had sold out, serving only their own self-interest.

Today, Jesus goes further and says that these normal, local people are God’s salt and light; the ones to transform the earth. They’re the ones Jesus calls to join with him in bringing about the promises of the beatitudes: for the poor in spirit, the kingdom of heaven – for the sad, relief – for the dispossessed, an inheritance – for the starving, full bellies – for the compassionate, mercy – for the faithful, a true meeting with God – for the peacemakers, the peace of belonging – and for the displaced and deported, citizenship forever in the kingdom of heaven.

Ordinary, local people. And he meant it. Just before the Sermon on the Mount, we see Jesus choose his disciples. He picks ordinary, local people who know what it is to struggle for a living. He picks the poor in spirit, people who know the pain and struggle it can be simply to put a meal on the table – people who can’t do anything but put their trust in God.

Jesus calls these people to work with him to change things for the good. They’re the people who really know what’s needed, and who know we need God’s help to get there. Among these ordinary people, Jesus finds the salt of the earth and the light of the world. But more, Jesus becomes one of the poor, the sad, the meek, the hungry, the merciful, the pure in heart, peacemakers; people who’ve known persecution and bullying – people who know we need God. Jesus became one of us!

All this is wonderfully positive. But there’s also an edge to what Jesus says. Salt that loses its flavour is out. A lamp under a bushel basket is absurd. And anyone who thinks the Law and the Prophets go out the window is kidding themselves.

I think he’s talking to a different lot of people in the crowd with these words; not the ordinary locals, but the religious and political leaders who are always lurking in the wings wherever Jesus is teaching or helping people.

Jesus’s immediate audience was Israel, and Israel’s immediate context was its military occupation by Rome. Whenever Jesus taught about the law and the prophets, he did so in the context of a heated debate about the political and religious course Israel should be steering, given the context of Roman occupation. Edwin van Driel describes three main positions that people took. ^{(FotW Yr A Vol 1 p. 337)}

1^st The priestly caste based in the Temple – the Sadducees– followed a pragmatic course of action: collaboration to ensure survival. 2^nd At the other end of the spectrum were zealots who wanted to take up arms and fight the Romans. Many Pharisees belonged to this faction. 3^rd But some Pharisees chose what van Driel calls ‘the Ghetto option’; deep private study and practice of Jewish Law. They kept the 613 precepts and studied righteous Jewish living and doctrine. They did this to preserve Jewish cultural and religious identity while Israel waited for God to send his anointed and clear the invaders out. And that practice would later turn out to be an invaluable service that the Pharisees gave their people after the Temple was destroyed and Jewish identity faced utter oblivion.

But for Jesus, living a faithful life in hiding was anathema. He saw things like we just saw Isaiah see them. If you go through all the motions, but stop at the point where it might make a difference for the oppressed, the hungry, the homeless and the naked poor, you’re just serving your own interests; you’re part of the problem. To a people divided and confused by such anxious questions and varied answers, Jesus preached his sermon. It was a sermon to ‘challenge to Israel to be Israel.’ ^{N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (London: SPCK, 1996), 288.} And that’s what it means what he called people to a practical righteousness that exceeded that of the Pharisees. The Law had to make a difference for those in need. If it didn’t, practising religion was just salt that had lost its flavour; light hidden under a bushel – a pointless caricature of itself.

So what does that mean for us? We’re carrying on as a parish where a constant concern is whether we’ll survive or not too. And that makes us cautious about our financial resources. It makes us cautious in our public statements about justice for oppressed and needy people. So today I hear Jesus taking us to task in his words to us and anyone else who goes for the Ghetto option. Scripture tells us a tenth of all we make each year should go to the poor and needy; the oppressed, the homeless, the hungry and naked. As Isaiah says, they are our kin, and we shouldn’t hide from them. We’re drafting a budget for the coming year. Today Isaiah and Jesus charge this parish to name charities and causes we will support, and at our Vestry meeting on March 22, decide the ones we’ll give a tenth of our projected income in the coming year. Before anything else; salt and light are our witness. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Epiphany + 4A – Micah 6 1-8, Mt 5 1-12

Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount has always been the comfortable Church’s greatest challenge. I remember a Bible study group where the leader asked what we’d think if he stood up at sermon time and simply read out the Sermon on the Mount – three chapters of Matthew’s gospel. One person said they’d be disappointed. Was it disappointment that the preacher wouldn’t prepare a sermon himself, or because the Sermon on the Mount is so very challenging. I’ll never know. But all of us squirm hearing Jesus’ words about the Law, about anger, retaliation, judging others and all his other teachings, because we know there’s no other valid response but obedience.

Today’s Gospel gives us the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount; the Beatitudes in Matthew’s version. The hardest of Matthew’s beatitudes for people like us to interpret is the first one; Blessed are the poor in spirit. Who are they? I imagine they were the people Jesus went out to – the ordinary people he gave this teaching to. Many of them would have been on the lower end of the social scale among a people who’d been colonised; the bottom rung on the ladder of a subject people.

They’d have been materially poor, that’s for sure. They’d have lived a hand-to-mouth existence. And their poverty would also have been expressed in poor health, haphazard nutrition, a low life expectancy, and a shocking infant mortality rate. Their social influence as farm workers or boat hands on the lake would’ve been negligible. There’d have been little they might even imagine they could do to make life better for themselves or their loved ones. Their horizons would have been very limited. Their spirits would have been effectively imprisoned by their poverty.

Blessed are the poor in spirit. We comfortable Christians are mostly screened from this de-humanising type of poverty; it’s invisible to us. But like the humble folk who gathered around Jesus in Galilee, most people in today’s world would be able to receive these words as a blessing offered directly to them. And not just a blessing, but a promise to hold on to as well; yours is the kingdom of heaven.

Exploited workers and unemployed in every country can hear this promise as their own. So can suffering Ukrainians, Sudanese, Burmese, Palestinians, Indigenous peoples and 120 million forcibly displaced persons. Jesus speaks directly to each of them, and many respond in trust. He speaks to people with little influence – like children. I hear an echo of his revolutionary promise when Jesus rebukes his disciples for stopping little children from approaching him. ‘Let the little children come to me, and don’t stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.’ ^{Matt 19.14} I’ll bet those children’s parents told them about that one!

These are the people I imagine Jesus meant when he declared the poor in Spirit as blessed. Occasionally, we number among them in times of grief and helplessness. It may sound strange, but I think those times when our power is gone are moments of opportunity. We must seize on those moments when we might actually sense our utter dependence on God’s grace; seize on them and hold onto them. Because we have to be in a space where we know the poverty of our own spirits if we are to enter the Sermon on the Mount with hearts open to Jesus’ power to disciple us.

In his ten beatitudes, Jesus names the qualities of those who are blessed. Those qualities are diametrically opposed to the ones sold to us as signs of blessing by our dominant culture. It’s always been the case. We heard Paul tell the status-driven Christians of Corinth that they had to understand the dramatic difference between the values of God’s Kingdom and the shallow obsessions of their new rich society. They had to hold firm; to realise that those who are counted as blessed among the people of the Cross will be rubbished as fools in a world which, like ours, values wealth, power and control above everything else.

In our society, it’s very tempting to go with the flow. It’s very hard to hold on to the treasure that it is to be poor in spirit, to mourn, to be meek, to long for righteousness, to be merciful, to be pure in heart, to be peacemakers, and to accept as a reward for all that, ridicule, persecution and false accusation. Staying in those places of weakness – of foolishness – is to be where we can engage in the deepest compassion with people for whom there is no choice; the poor in spirit. The nine beatitudes which follow this first, defining one, speak to the same people. People in mourning. Decent, kind people who have no say, who just seek peace and a fair go.

The message for us in our comfortable world is pretty much the same as we heard last week. Our children must be able to learn from our example that everyone is loved and valued for who they are, and not for what they might accomplish.

They must live in a world where we nurture justice, mercy and faithfulness as our deepest values, regardless of the consequences to our material or social power. The Sermon on the Mount challenges every impulse that tempts us to worship status and wealth. The Beatitudes challenge us not to keep smiling when we’re aching inside. They challenge us not to defend our turf; but instead to stand up for kindness and justice even though it’s much easier to turn our eyes away; to choose to be trusting and kind, even if that makes us look gullible; to work for peace even at the risk of our own safety. When we need to remember this, remember the prophet Micah, who put it all absolutely plainly; do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God?  Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Epiphany + 3 – Vigil of 26 Jan: –Matt 4 12-25

I’m sure that like me, you’ll be shocked and saddened by the divisive behaviours of some political leaders both here and around the world. Add that to the activities of influencers online and partisan media outlets and you wonder what can be done to stop the apparent slide into chaos that threatens world and national order. As I’ve been praying about this, I’ve been asking God to show me if and how the Church might offer a healing unity that makes a real change; that’s the unity our leaders are all saying we need. As we’ve been approaching tomorrow’s national day, I’ve been praying for the church to reel in the chaos and instead offer healing and unity; peace.

So I was excited when talking with David Hilliard on Friday to hear him describe how the Methodist Sunday Schools in South Australia helped shape their local communities. I’d had no idea of the amazing size and influence of SA’s Methodist Sunday Schools up until the mid-1960s. In 1964, they shaped the values of 44,000 children (compared with the Anglicans’ 14,000). What inspired me particularly was David’s description of the Methodist Sunday Schools’ very strong emphasis on teaching all these children to be kind to other people and to do something to help the less fortunate. These children learned that Christianity should be expressed in action. I suspect this has had a profound influence on the character of the SA community.

I confess to coming from another state. And when we moved to SA, I noticed something very different about the sense of community here. Even parliamentarians were polite to each other! That was a startling contrast to where I came from. In the light of what David has told me, I have to wonder if this SA community character that struck me so profoundly might have been shaped by all those thousands of children who’d been formed for kindness and compassion by their Sunday Schools; together living out the values they’d been given in their childhood years. Can a church community that forms its children to embody kindness and compassion in action shape the character of a whole state? It seems plausible to me.

So what guidance does our church give us as we approach a national day? Our prayer book urges us this weekend to seek reconciliation with first people. The invitation to confession reminds us that the oneness of the peoples of this land has been broken by acts of oppression and the failure of compassion. The prayer of the day asks the Spirit to bring forgiveness, reconciliation and an end to all injustice. It names where the rubber hits the road for all people of faith. The world should be able to trust people of faith to model God’s justice and mercy; God’s peace.

The atrocity at Bondi Beach last month was one of many recent, terrible betrayals of that trust which have shamed faith communities of all stripes around the world. Twisted teachings of hatred and prejudice can so blind believers to God’s love and compassion for all people that they commit grotesque violence, and claim it to be God’s will.

One overwhelming response to such perversions of faith has been a cry to seek unity. The pundits tell us that a goal of terrorism is to divide us and so weaken us. But you have to wonder if terrorism is really a symptom of divisions and weaknesses that are already there. The call to seek unity is more a call to repair what we have let things sink to; not a call to reassert a unity that’s been violated by a single act. We weren’t united before Bondi. Bondi was a result of divided faith communities. If we people of faith want to help foster unity, we must first turn from our own divisions.

Right now, there’s little commitment to unity. A committed few urge us to stay in touch with our fellow people of faith. I struggle with the lack of interest there is in ecumenism and inter-faith movements. Churches Together SA (formerly SACC) was closed down last year by the heads of churches; a tragedy. All faiths should be fostering connection and unity. It’s an issue for every faith community and every Christian denomination. Churches won’t share full communion with each other. And within each denomination, we’re split up into literalist, liberal, evangelical, liturgical or pentecostal. How might our disunity hurt the wider community?

Last month, we saw this disunity erupt in the most brutal way; violence that had elements of religion, revenge and ethnic hatred behind it. It happened because a growing culture of scorning, ignoring, othering, despising and cancelling people we disagree with is smothering the old tolerance and unity, kindness and compassion, we all should have learned as children.

It’s not the place here to go into a detailed programme of how we rebuild the mission of our church to form children who will bring the healing of compassion and kindness to rebuild a nation’s life. But we’re working on that here this year. What I want you to remember from today is Jesus’s response to John’s arrest and the threat it represented. He withdrew from the location of that threat; no use tackling it head on now. He then proclaimed his message: Repent – turn from bad ways of living – because God’s realm is knocking at your door. Then he gathered people to do his mission with him, and together, they did the mitzvah thing the Jewish community has been asking us to do; they did something kind to help the less fortunate. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Epiphany + 2 – Isa 49 1-7, Ps 40 6-13, 1 Cor 1 1-9, Jn 1 29-42

The Season of Epiphany is about Jesus being revealed to the world. So our readings prioritise mission and witness; like God’s words of inspiration to Isaiah today: I’ll give you as a light to the nations so my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Those words remind me that Jesus commanded us to be like Isaiah when he said: Go and make disciples of all nations. ^{Mt 28.19} The mission is ours now. And the light we Christians are called to spread is the Good News of Jesus; the Gospel.

In last week’s Gospel, we heard Matthew’s account of the Baptism of Jesus. Today it may feel like we’re hearing the same story again; this time, from John’s Gospel. There are shared elements in Matthew’s and John’s accounts. There’s the Baptist’s insistence on Jesus being more important than him. And there’s the Spirit descending on Jesus like a dove. But beyond that, our patron saint, John the Evangelist presents us with some enigmatic details that weren’t there in Matthew’s account – and they don’t appear anywhere else in the Gospels either.

They start when Jesus comes down to the Jordan River where John is baptising, and the Baptist tells the gathered people, Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. I imagine the Baptist saying these words might pass almost unnoticed for us, and many other Christians. We come from a tradition where we sing or say those words every time we gather for Holy Communion – Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. But I think we’re meant to sit up and take notice, because Lamb of God is there twice in today Gospel. It appears nowhere else in the Bible. It’s a witness to the world about who Jesus is: it’s an Epiphany.

So our two Johns – John the Baptist and John the Evangelist – what do they mean to say to the world when they name Jesus the Lamb of God? What would all those people down at the river with the Baptist have thought he meant when he said it?

They’d have had the Hebrew Scriptures to guide them. Lambs that you read about in the Hebrew Scriptures are mostly sacrificed as sin offerings; sort of fines people paid for failing to live as faithful people of God.

But there are a few mentions of lambs in the Hebrew Scriptures that spring to mind for me particularly. One is the lamb that should’ve been offered when Abraham and Isaac went out on the journey that almost saw Abraham offer his only son Isaac as a sacrifice. ^{Gen 22} For Christians reading that, the idea of the sacrifice of an only son has a strong associations with the crucifixion of Jesus.

We read about another lamb in Isaiah’s last servant song; the lamb that was to be sacrificed because the Lord laid on him the guilt of us all. ^{Isa 53.6-7} Again, for Christians, that has very strong associations with the crucifixion of Jesus. Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The Baptist may well be foretelling that Jesus will be our crucified Saviour.

But the lamb in the Hebrew Scriptures that strikes me as being most immediately evoked by the Baptist’s words is the Passover lamb of Exodus 12. When God’s people were about to be freed from slavery in Egypt, they had to paint their doorposts and lintels with the blood of a sacrificed lamb. That lamb’s blood was a sign on their houses that would protect them when the Lord struck the land of Egypt. The Lord would ravage the land of Egypt that night, but seeing the lamb’s blood on their doorway, pass over their house leaving them unscathed.

When we sing the Lamb of God just before we take communion, it’s a reminder that the blood of Jesus – the Lamb of God – shelters us from the consequences of our alienation from God. Because of the blood of Christ, we are spared the spiritual consequences of actions and failures we’ve remembered and confessed at the beginning of our gatherings.

But it’s not just a private matter – a comfortable arrangement between a select few people and God. The Baptist opens our eyes to a whole new level when he says Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Jesus hasn’t just come to shed his blood for God’s historical chosen people, or faithful church-goers. He’s come for everyone – and indeed for everything living. I guess that’s why this reading is set for us in this season of Epiphany. It must be an Epiphany for us too

Thus enlightened, what are we meant to do about it? … It’s all there in today’s Gospel. The Baptist points to Jesus and says who he really is. Andrew and his brother respond; they follow Jesus. He turns and asks them: What are you looking for? They ask him: Where are you stopping? And he says simply: Come; you’ll see.

Such a simple invitation. We practised doing it two weeks ago at the feast of the Epiphany when we chalked our doors. That’s why the first Passover story is my pick of the lamb references. The Hebrews daubed their doorways with blood. We marked our doors with chalk to say: What are you looking for? … Come; you’ll see.

Today, Jesus showed us how to do it. Ask people; What are you looking for? If it seems like what they’re looking for is to belong to Jesus here, or anywhere else you may be stopping, just invite them: Come and see. It’s that simple.  Amen