The Rev’d Dr. Susan F. Straub

 Introduction

The twelve days of the great Festival of the Nativity came to an end with the Feast of the Epiphany. The three kings arrived with gold, frankincense and myrrh, portents of a time yet to come in the life of the child, Jesus. They had rightly identified the child as the king springing forth from the people of Judaea: king of the Jews, chosen servant of Adonai, the Lord, Jewish king in truth unlike Rome’s appointed rulers, sons of Herod the Great.

 Isaiah 42:1-9

In our first reading from Deutero-Isaiah, we heard words written to console, comfort, and give hope. The people of Israel were in exile in Babylon but Cyrus of Persia was on the horizon. Cyrus would defeat their Babylonian captors, help the people return to Israel and re-build the Temple. Verses 1-7 comprise the first of four ‘Songs of the Servant of Yahweh’. ‘The Servant’ was one chosen to be God’s gift of salvation to the people in their hour of need. The Servant’s person and deeds proclaimed purity of motive, faith in God alone, and showed God’s justice as impartial and life-giving. In ‘The Servant’, God established a new covenant with his people.

Mary and Joseph had named their baby son ‘Jeshua’: ‘God saves’.

Matthew 3:13-27

Today, we heard from the gospel of St. Matthew that Jesus was among many who came to his kinsman, John, for baptism in the River Jordan. Among the crowd were Pharisees and Sadducees. Pharisees were often leaders and teachers in the synagogues. Sadducees held positions of even greater authority and were responsible for worship in the Temple.

However, Matthew introduced the baptism of Jesus this way (Matthew 3:7-12, NRSV):

7. But when he (John) saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance.

8. Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.

10. Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

11. I baptise you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

12. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.

Now, Matthew’s gospel upholds the importance of Judaic Law more than any other gospel. In this passage, John the Baptist berated the Pharisees and Sadducees who also upheld the importance of the Law. Devotion to the Law was evidence that a person was righteous. The crucial difference between Matthew and the Pharisees and Sadducees was that Matthew had experienced Jesus’ ministry. The repentant tax-collector understood that the Law was necessary but not sufficient for salvation.

In the gospel, it’s clear that John regarded many of the Pharisees and Sadducees as seeking baptism to show how very righteous, and deserving of heaven, they were: the self-promoters we can recognise in every age and amongst us today. As Julie Szego wrote (Weekend Australian 10/01/2026):

‘Enough with flattering the world view of pampered radicals spewing hate while believing themselves the embodiment of virtue, even as bodies pile up on the beach.’

However, for the quiet righteousness of his kinsman, Jesus of Nazareth, John had the greatest respect, first demurring, then consenting to baptise him. On 14^th December 2025, we saw quiet righteousness – decency – become heroic in Ahmed al-Ahmed, Boris and Sofia Gurman, and others on Bondi Beach.

For Jesus, baptism was a way of emptying himself of ego. He had kept the Law. He was righteous in the world of men and women, a leader, but to fulfil all righteousness required something counterintuitive. It meant becoming a follower: in all humility following Abraham, and the long line of his ancestors, including Mary and Joseph. Like them, to fulfil all righteousness, he had to surrender his life totally to God, the One who had given him his life. It meant keeping the Law but not relying on it for righteousness, not serving the Law blind to the needs of the people who shared his daily life. In sum, it meant living his life in faith, doing whatever God put before him, however difficult that might be for him. Think of those people we have remembered today. In the waters of the Jordan, Jesus let go of all that had made him who he was. He rose from the waters ready be The Servant, the Son of God the Father, and to be anointed by the Father’s spirit, the Holy Spirit. Jesus would begin a new life with new powers. What an image for our time.

Acts 10:34-43

Through, the Roman centurion, St. Peter learned that the gospel of Jesus Christ was for all people. He was not to allow even the prohibitions of the Law to stand in the way, but to have faith in God who had given him a vision and understanding of impartial justice, such that ‘… in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.’.

Conclusion

Stephen Westfall wrote of his experience of spiritual re-birth (‘Within and Without’, In Moody, R. and Steinke, D. (eds.) (1997) ‘Joyful Noise’.), and I warn you of an impolite word in one place.

‘My own spiritual rebirth was initiated several years ago, when I had come to a place where my own resources could not carry me an inch farther. I was heartbroken, pissed off, a physical wreck, preoccupied with loss, and finally frightened enough to ask for help. I can’t be sure whether fear was the sole motivator of my sudden willingness or if there was a simultaneous surge of creativity from within that took surrender as its gesture.  I do know that I nearly instantaneously felt a flood of peace.  Part of what I had held to tightly as my identity died in that moment and in its wake left a spaciousness for contemplation, and action unobstructed by the fears and rationalisations that had been there moments before.’

Whether at our baptism or when we pray, in that gesture of surrender, the spaciousness of heaven opens before us and we are brought home, into the loving presence of God. As we celebrate the baptism of Jesus, let’s remember that the life of faith, life in the Spirit, has its beginning when we each become a child of God. As God looks at you, like a father or mother at son or daughter, realise that God is committed to you in a relationship of love that has no end. This is the light of the new covenant Jesus brought into the world:

‘I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.  I am the LORD, that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to idols.’ Isaiah 42:6-8

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Epiphany – Isa 60 1-6,  Ps 72 1-7 10-14,  Eph 3 1-12,  Mt 2 1-12

For centuries, the ancient Jewish people longed for the appearance of God’s anointed one; God’s Messiah. Today’s Psalm is full of that longing; for a king whose rule would be an era of justice, peace, shared prosperity, of safety and care for the needy; an era when the whole world would know God’s love. At Christmas, we celebrated the fulfilment of that longing; the king had come. But then what?

Today, Epiphany, we mark another step in the fulfilment of that longing. The word Epiphany means to make known or to reveal. For us in the Church, Epiphany is the moment when ancient Israel’s God was first revealed to the Gentiles – to the non-Jewish nations – to us. In today’s gospel, we witness that event. The nations of the world, represented in the gospel by the three foreign Magi, meet the God of Israel in the child Jesus.

Our church tradition says the Feast of the Epiphany is about a visit. Today’s Gospel recounts the coming of the Magi to Bethlehem where they meet Jesus. For the Church, Christ being revealed to the Magi says God’s original promise to Abraham and Sarah is beginning to be fulfilled – God’s promise that through their offspring, all families of the earth will be blessed. ^{Gen 12.1-3}

The Magi came to pay homage to the child who, they said, was born a king; not crowned like royals usually are. The Magi were strangers; they weren’t of the child’s faith; they weren’t of his race. But they sensed something so extraordinary about Jesus that they journeyed a very long way to see him. Our tradition says they were the first people to meet Jesus who weren’t Israelites. So for us Gentiles who have also come to Jesus, the Magi are our earliest forerunners; the first of us non-Jews to acknowledge him as Lord. And like them, we’ve been received as his guests, strangers though we were.

If Epiphany signifies the revelation of the God of Israel to the nations – to us –what sort of God has been revealed? What do we learn about God? And is what we find out something new – something people didn’t know about God before? Let’s see.

The first thing it means is that God is trustworthy and keeps promises. God’s ancient promise to Abraham in you, all families of the earth will be blessed ^{Gen 12.3} began to happen in this meeting of the infant Jesus and the Magi.

The second thing is that God is not what people say. God is not an almighty, remote-controller of everything – who gets blamed for everything that goes wrong. That god is a paper tiger, and not at all the God we believe in. This baby is what God is really like: trusting, vulnerable, approachable; gently offering friendship; willing to pass the time of day with us.

The third thing is that God’s not fussy about who God should keep company with. Everyone’s in. Without any diplomatic pre-meeting negotiations, the title chosen people is summarily expanded from one nation to all nations. Jesus’s place in Bethlehem had no bouncers. The people welcomed in to meet Jesus were not asked any questions about their religious or interpersonal or political preferences.

The fourth thing is that God is with us in our troubles. Because of the Magi’s visit, the new king is, as VIPs do, about to embark on his first international trip. But it’s no state-sponsored junket he sets out on. Jesus will flee as a refugee.

So today, what sort of God is revealed to you? Is this an Epiphany for you too? Is this the God you thought you came to worship today? If not, if this is a different God from the one you expected, what do you do with this surprising discovery? Is this a God you’d recommend to friends? A God they might consider? Sometimes among the guiding of the star, the wisdom of the Mages, the palace intrigues in Jerusalem and the cost and meaning of the gifts, we need reminding that our tradition simply says the Feast of the Epiphany is about a visit; about the honour guests do a host by coming to visit, and the honour of hospitality hosts offer guests.

The chalk inscription on the lintel of our church’s street door is a reminder to us that our church doorway is there to be open; and most particularly, it’s to be open to all comers. It’s a reminder that the church door is not so much our entry to our church, as it is an entrance beckoning all travellers – different people from us – telling these people, come into our midst and receive the welcome Christ would offer you.

The chalk marks are a sign of welcome to the traveller. They’re also a sign to us. They’re a call to us to make sure the light of Christ burns brightly here, and shines out from this community to guide travellers to sanctuary amongst us. What we do by honouring guests here transforms and heals. But of course, the important flip side is that it also transforms us who are honoured to offer this hospitality.

Let’s pray. Christ Jesus,…though you existed in the form of God, you did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied yourself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in our likeness … humbled yourself by becoming obedient to the point of death…^{Phil 2.6-8} Thank you.  Amen

Rev’d Dr Elizabeth McWhae

Ist Sunday after Christmas: Holy Innocents – Isaiah 63 7-9, Psalm 148, Hebrews 2 10-18, Matthew 2 13-23

Introduction:

Well, did you survive Christmas day? To be honest I find this time of year tricky. There are lovely times of peace and quiet. There is a sort of kindness in the air. There are festivities. There are endless shopping opportunities. There is catching up with friends and relatives. There are beautiful church services. There are breaks from work. But there is also carpark rage. There is heartache for the breakdown of family relationships. There is sometimes too much alcohol. There are the overlooked and forgotten ones, left on their own. And there are sick and dying ones in hospitals who will not see another Christmas. And to add to this list, there are now Jewish families mourning the loss and injury of innocent loved ones. And there are 2 men, one alive and one dead, who caused mayhem at

Bondi. What does our faith have to do with any of this?

Point 1:

I believe there is a great need to put Jesus back into Christmas. The baby has mostly been thrown out with the bathwater. Instead of the birth of the Christ child at Christmas, we have been left with mas. Mass shopping events. Mass drinking. Mass eating. And a massive oversight of the fact that Jesus is the reason for the season. And now that Jesus has mostly gone from Christmas, we the struggling faithful, are left with the task of showing our secular culture, that Jesus does matter. So how do we tell those around us that this baby born from an unwed, but betrothed teenage mother, whose birth happened in a stable and whose life was cut short by crucifixion in his early 30s over 2000 years ago, was and is the most important and life changing and life affirming event for everyone in the world. Because this Christ event, starting with the birth of a baby boy in a manger, in a stable, although appearing like any other birth, was not like any other birth in history.

Point 2:

According to Matthew’s gospel, there was someone who understood the importance of this birth in particular. It was Herod. After the wise men had left the house, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him. Because Herod’s plans were thwarted, in his rage he issued a decree that all male children from birth to 2 years in and around Bethlehem, should be killed.

These are the youngest martyrs referred to as the holy innocents, hence Holy Innocents Day. Why was Herod so fearful of the Christ child? I’m sure there were many reasons, but the main one was that he was fearful of losing his grip on power, like any despotic leader. The thought of a new king terrified him.

Point 3:

In contrast to Herod”s vengeful and horrific crimes there stands another man, a much finer man, called Joseph. A brand new unmarried father who is spiritually aware and listens to God and the angel of God. He takes Mary and Jesus and they flee by night as a refugee family to Egypt. Joseph takes them all to safety. They stay in Egypt until it is safe to return to Israel, which is once Herod has died. I really wish we knew more about Joseph. From the day he got together with Mary he was in for a very unpredictable and precarious journey, which he did not shy away from.

The contrast between these 2 men could not be greater. Matthew wants us to see that this Jesus is precious and his life needed to be protected. This Jesus had a mission to fulfill and Joseph wanted to make sure he could fulfill it. At this early stage in Jesus’ life, I’m sure Joseph would not have been aware of how things would end up. But he was a father that wanted the best for his child.

Conclusion:

These verses from Matthew’s gospel relating to the holy innocents are a shocking and uncomfortable tale of what human beings are capable of. We have learned this firsthand here in Australia very recently at Bondi. But this is not the whole story. Those left behind to mourn the holy innocents and those killed at Bondi, may be forgotten by the media now that the event is old news, but they are not forgotten by their family and friends, by us and by God. They are all offered new life and hope because Jesus himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested. Whether we are Christian or Jewish or  Islamic or agnostic, Jesus shares our life and death in order to bring us new life and new hope. This is what the message of the good news is all about. That this baby, born so long ago, both God and man, Immanuel, God with us, is always with us and available to us. This is the true meaning of Christmas that this season offers to all the world. This is the one gift or present we need to give to our world. And we need to ask people to unwrap it. 

Herod hoped that he could eradicate this child called Jesus. When he could not, he eradicated others. Herod is no longer with us. But this Christ child lives on and on and his story is what can transform our broken and needy world.

No one has been able to eradicate this one who is God with us, Immanuel.

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Christmas Morning 2025 – Isa 62 6-12, Ps 97, Titus 3 4-8, Lk 2 8-20

Once upon a time, the Maker of the universe came among us as the first-born child of an unmarried teenager, and God took no special precautions for a safe arrival.

Why? Well, it seems that God just wanted to be with us on our own terms; you can’t really be with people if you set yourself apart. That would have made Jesus something like a tourist in an air-conditioned bus who doesn’t bother getting out; just waves at us through tinted windows as the bus roars off to the next attraction. But God didn’t want to just look at us; God wanted to be with us – Emmanuel. So, once upon a time, the God of the universe became one of us – a newborn child.

If a great ruler needed shelter and hospitality from us and asked for it, didn’t order us to give it – that’d feel strange, wouldn’t it; that ruler and us – on equal terms. But that’s what God has done for us; the Maker of the universe came among us as a newborn child, needing shelter, needing food, and not too much later, even needing to flee persecution as a refugee. By coming as a baby, God changed us somehow; called us to care for God – to learn how to be more like God – givers of love and care. God’s need; God’s vulnerability; God’s helplessness – they call something from us which can heal the world’s ills far more wonderfully than power can.

Power is one of those perennial concerns we plague ourselves with. With all the problems in the world Jesus was born into, we wonder why didn’t he come as a super-hero and stop all wars, end social injustice and wipe away the evils of hatred, dishonesty, greed, poverty and illness? Wouldn’t that have been better?

I don’t think it would. It’s hard to argue why, but essentially, it’s best demonstrated in the story of the life of Jesus. Once upon a time, the Maker of the universe became one of us – a newborn child. God is born, grows up, and lives an ordinary life like ours; works, eats and sleeps. God takes the time needed to win our trust. God starts doing this in the baby we honour today; Jesus.

You can trust a baby. We can deal with someone who’s just like we are; we know where they’ve come from. We don’t feel threatened; we don’t think they’ll ask for more than they need, or think too little of us if we fall short. This is what God did for us; God took the time and embodied the shape needed to earn our trust. And because of that, when Jesus grew up and started telling us about the Kingdom of Heaven, we could get what he meant because Jesus spoke in a language that emerged from human experience. Think of his parables; Jesus spoke our language.

When Jesus healed and forgave people, he scandalised those in power – and also many of us who prefer to see ‘real justice’ done. (We probably mean revenge). But slowly, gently, Jesus taught us God’s way of healing, accepting, life-giving justice, peace and mercy. And we accept it from him because we know him; we can trust him. We can see the depth of his commitment to us. So in this baby, we are invited to see who God is. Jesus comes gently to open up channels of empathy with us that don’t threaten us. In Jesus, God models love and commitment and understanding and acceptance and everything else we need to become more fully human ourselves – everything we need to live lives of emotional and spiritual wholeness.

Jesus the Christ Child has done this; called on us to look out the real resources of our humanity; to be there for each other just like we’d do for anyone we’d known as a baby – ready with our compassion, our care, and our wish to nurture.

God offers to form us anew through Jesus; the baby of Bethlehem. In Jesus, God is one of us so trust and understanding can be complete. We’ll let him touch us; we’ll listen when he tells us there’s a world beyond our own perspectives; beyond our pride and fear and guilt and loneliness. It’s called the Kingdom of Heaven.

So when once upon a time, the Maker of the universe came among us as a child, needing shelter, needing food, and soon, even needing to flee persecution as a refugee, God offered a new us. God our shepherd somehow lifted us from dwelling on our battles and our fears and weaknesses, and called us to be shepherds too. At Christmas, God calls up our capacity for transforming love from deep within us all.

When we meet this Child, God begins a slow, intricate process of calling from our most profound selves the greatest gifts and the truest strengths our humanity can give birth to. God calls up our true selves, made like this child we worship, in the image and likeness of God. And that’s something no superhero can be.

These are the qualities humanity is crying out for in this present time of war, violence, grief, anger and mistrust. God gave time and gentleness to earn trust. Jesus offered forgiveness and love to any who hurt him. But most important of all, he was – and remains – with us. For us to follow his example takes a lifetime’s formation to learn, and a grace that the world desperately needs. He was born the Prince of Peace. Ours is to choose to follow his example, and bring to the world a choice for kindness and grace in every circumstance. That’s the Spirit of Christmas, who has come to dwell in us. The Maker of the universe, become one of us – a newborn child. God bless all of you and yours this Christmas.  Amen.

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Christmas Eve 2025 – Isa 9 2-7, Ps 96, Titus 2 11-14, Lk 2 1-14

Christmas is astounding. It celebrates the wildest, most astonishing event. One day, the Maker of the universe was born as a tiny, helpless baby; a real one; vulnerable to all the hazards of a dangerous world. Why so vulnerable? Why did God need to come as a tiny, helpless baby? Scripture says God would send someone to save the people. That’s a big promise, and it raises the ‘big question’: If there is a loving Maker of the universe, why is suffering allowed to happen? That’s the ‘big question’. People have always asked it, ever since we were told that God loves us. If there is a loving Maker of the universe, why is suffering allowed to happen? 

We’ve been witnesses to human suffering on a shocking scale over recent years and days. Violent people are waging terrible war on innocent, vulnerable people. And we’ve seen just days ago that nowhere is immune from people who feel entitled to do violence to others. What sort of a God lets that happen?

We aren’t the first to ask the big question. Everyone who’s endured slavery, war, famine, colonization or exile has asked it. Our Gospel began with an account of an emperor bullying simple people. They asked the big question too why does God let this happen? Their question had always been answered with a promise. God would raise up someone extraordinary who’d sort things out. We just heard Isaiah say this special leader would be born to the Hebrew people; born a descendant of King David. He’d have the authority and the power, finally, to bring lasting peace; peace which he would uphold with justice and righteousness.

Jesus was far greater than the prophets ever expected. But he didn’t come in great power as some invincible warrior. He came in the most scandalously defenceless way imaginable. One day, the Maker of the universe was born as a tiny, helpless baby. Just before he was born, his unmarried parents had to find emergency lodgings 100 km from home. Jesus’s first bed was an animal’s feed trough. The first visitors invited to come and visit him were scruffy strangers, shepherds. Apparently they turned up in the middle of the night; just what every new parent needs! And soon after, this family would be on the road again as refugees.

One day, the Maker of the universe was born as a tiny, helpless baby; vulnerable to all the hazards of a dangerous world. Why in the world must any family endure such humiliation? Why claim that this baby is God’s answer to the ‘big question’. If there is a loving Maker of the universe, why is suffering allowed to happen? This question has a built in assumption. It is that we expect that a loving God should free us from tragedies. Really? How would a loving God do this?

If a loving God stopped wars and turned weapons into farming tools, would that fix relations between nations? No. If a loving God fused the world’s tectonic plates together, stopped all storms and got rid of mosquitoes, would that make Earth a suffering-free zone? No. If a loving God abolished disease, injury, put a force-field round all vulnerable people, made bullies behave, would that stop us suffering? No. It wouldn’t address the human heart. So God did something beyond expectation. God came to be with us; Jesus – Emmanuel – God, one of us, in all that mess.

One day, the Maker of the universe was born a tiny, helpless baby; vulnerable to all the hazards of this dangerous world. Jesus was born among animals and insects in a stable – so non-human life has God with them too. Shepherds were the ancient world’s equivalent of street people. So they have God with them. Early on, Jesus became a refugee who had to depend on the kindness of others just to survive. So asylum-seekers have God with them. Jesus loved and cared for people who were sick in body or mind, or they were hungry or lonely. So they all have God with them. He treated women as equals and protected children. So women and children have God with them. Jesus was arrested, tried and executed by the state. So prisoners and those on death row have God with them. Everyone can be told that Jesus is their Emmanuel – God with them. All of us. God was born, a living, mortal organism on planet Earth. So every creature, the air we breathe and the land we walk on has God with us. Jesus is God. He was then – and always is – God with us.

But what about that question of suffering? It’s not been forgotten. As the height of his ministry, Jesus would take it all to the Cross. He willingly had all wrong and all evil crucified in his own body, and took it to the grave where it belongs. And on the third day after his death, when he rose, alive again from the grave, all that suffering – even death itself – lay defeated at his feet.

We still experience suffering. We’re still not in the last days. But the Good News is that while suffering has an end, we do not. Just as Jesus came to be with us in our suffering, he promises that when we die, he will come and take us to be with him in his risen life. ^{Jn 14} We’re promised that after the last days, God will make a home with us in a renewed heaven and earth, and wipe every tear from our eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more. ^{Rev 21}

Christmas celebrates the wildest, most astonishing event. One day, the Maker of the universe was born a tiny, helpless baby; vulnerable to all hazards of a dangerous world. He came to share in our life, and to share his life with us, all out of sheer love for us. He came so we might have God with us in every moment, in every place. And we always will. Thanks be to God for such gracious love to us!  Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Advent 4A – Isa 7 10-16, Mt 1 18-25

The Australian government has declared today to be a National Day of Reflection. This is so the nation may stop together and unite to turn our thoughts to everyone impacted by the Bondi Beach attack, including the families and friends of those who lost their lives and those injured.

We in SA are invited to light a candle at 6:17 pm and together with family, friends and loved ones observe a minute of silence as part of a united, national act of remembrance. This is a moment to pause, reflect and stand together with our Jewish community, to share in their grief, and affirm that hatred and violence will not divide us. We will thus stand united with Jewish Australians and remember those who lost their lives and who were impacted by this event. https://www.pmc.gov.au/news/national-day-reflection-bondi-beach-attack

The words together and united here are very important. Because doing things as a united community, with all the love and respect and consideration and compassion that implies, choosing to be an intentionally united community, confronts and rejects divisive evils like hateful racial or religious profiling. It can also begin to support healing of the wounds that were inflicted to separate people out from the community as a whole.

Being together says that everyone belongs; everyone is cherished; everyone is us. It’s not an aggressive reaction; it’s simply love in action. And that’s what we as the Church of God are particularly called to be. So remember 6.17 pm our time. Set an alarm for 6.00, have a candle ready and be together with the national community. A candle gives a good long time for reflection.

The Song of Mary reminds us that the use of power and violence to divide people into categories of insiders and outsiders, haves and have-nots, slaves and owners – Mary’s song reminds us that these curses have dogged humankind for a very long time. And around the world in recent years, and now most immediately at Bondi, the blight of human cruelty and hatred towards people artificially branded ‘other’ seems to be sinking to ever deeper lows. There is an answer to this in intentional unity. But even then, it can seem like that’s not enough. Many of the world’s people still feel isolated from being heard; from having any say. They feel invisible.

We’ve just been presented with a compelling response to this. Today, in her song of joy, Mary declares that no-one is alone in their struggle to belong; to be heard; to be seen. As a teenager, she’s practically invisible in her 1st century community. Yet she bursts out with a song of such radical challenge to the powers that be, that it’s been banned by authoritarian governments as recently as the 1970’s and 80’s; not to mention by the British Raj in India. They didn’t want people getting ideas about God casting down the mighty from their thrones and lifting up the lowly!

Mary may have been invisible to the decision-makers of her community, but one of the first things we hear in her song is that she knows God has seen her: my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, who has looked with favour on his lowly servant. God sees me, sings Mary. I belong. I’m visible. I’m heard, and I can’t be silenced. Can you imagine what it was like for the young Jesus to be raised by a mother like this? No wonder he turned out the way he did!

Mary knows God. She experiences God as her great Saviour; God has done great things for her. And that gives her the confidence to compare the way she sees her world being run with the will of God she has heard revealed in the scriptures. A cruel foreign regime divides her people to rule them. And she knows God will have none of it. So she sings confidently of God’s deep kindness for the lowly and the hungry. She knows from Jewish history that God has had a short way with corrupt rulers. So she sings confidently of God doing that again, scattering the proud in their conceit, casting down the mighty from their thrones, and lifting up the lowly. Filling the hungry with good things and sending the rich away empty.

God’s judgment has a distinct pattern for Mary; judging for the poor and needy, but holding the rich and powerful to account. They live as though there is no God, so they’ve made their own bed. They’re to be sent from God’s presence empty; lonely; unseen. The tables are turned. A community of people together will remain.

That’s the vision we hear in her last verse. Mary remembers God’s promise to Abraham; that through him, all families of the Earth will be blessed. In the end, for God, everyone belongs. Unity replaces division; love conquers hatred. What a wonderful conclusion from Mary, that young Jewish teenager, on this day of reflection. And what a Son she’ll be sending to the world at Christmas! Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Advent 3 A – Isaiah 35 1-10, Matthew 11 2-11

Sustain us with your love on our journey to meet the One who is coming

Today’s collect prayer says we’re on the way to a rendezvous where we may be called to change utterly. Are we up to it, or should we just turn and go back; keep our heads down; stick to what we know? No, we just prayed for God to keep us coming; strengthen our weak hands, make firm our feeble knees, and open blind eyes to the dawning of your kingdom, so that our hearts may rejoice as we behold the majesty of our God. We prayed that God would help us keep that rendezvous.

Rendezvous? Yes. Because we’re on a journey to meet someone who’s also on our road. The One who’s coming from the other direction to meet us. We don’t have to cover the whole distance in our own strength. In fact, if we fell and couldn’t go on, the One who’s coming would meet us anyway – meet us where we fell. In Advent, we take time to think about what that journey is like. On this 3^rd Sunday in Advent, we think about it with the example of John the Baptist’s journey before us.

John’s whole life was framed by the way he saw his journey to his rendezvous with Jesus. His understanding was shaped by the way he read the OT prophets. For him, they spoke first of wrath and judgment that would do away with evildoers, and then of blessings which would come to those who’d kept the faith. He understood the prophets to say that judgement preceded blessing. John preached this without fear or favour. Remember his greeting last week to the religious leaders – You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?  No fear or favour there!

Today, we meet John after he’s taken this to another level. We meet him in prison today because he’s rebuked Herod Antipas for running off with his brother’s wife. In his cell, John has time to think about his life-long understanding of the coming Reign of God. Sure the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; … the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. ^{Isa 35.5-6} We all heard that this morning too in Isaiah. But wouldn’t that come after the judgement? Doesn’t the Messiah come and sweep out the old order first?

From his prison cell, John hears of the ministry of ‘Jesus the Messiah’, He’d baptised Jesus; proclaimed him to be the One the prophets said would come. But apparently there’s been no final judgement. This makes no sense! Is he the One? John sends some of his own disciples to ask Jesus: ^3.Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another? ⁴ Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: ⁵ the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.’

John believed God had sent him to proclaim a fiery judgement; to call people to repent, because this fiery judgement was to cleanse the way for the Reign of God. But the message Jesus sent him effectively said that the Reign of God had already arrived, but without the judgement. This left John confused – how can blessings be poured out before it’s even been established who deserves them? How can John’s belief in the sequence of justice before paradise suddenly get subverted like that?!

John the Baptist travelled the road we are on in Advent: the road to his rendezvous with Jesus. But today’s episode tells us that after their meeting, nothing much really changed for John. He just went on proclaiming the fiery judgement that he’d been preaching all along. He didn’t follow Jesus – he didn’t change his preaching to accommodate the fact that Jesus was doing something totally different. And we read today that John kept disciples of his own; the ones he sent to Jesus with his question. That didn’t change as time went on either. You can read in Acts 19 that Paul ran into people in Ephesus years later who were still John’s followers. And in fact, there are still many followers of John the Baptist today, called Mandaeans.

John’s rendezvous with Jesus left him unchanged. But the whole point of meeting Jesus is that it confronts us with the question, are we his disciple or not? Matthew tells us today that John the Baptist met Jesus, but didn’t decide to become his disciple. He simply went on preaching fire and brimstone. He missed the fact that while we were not yet good enough, Jesus brought the blessings of God’s Realm to the world. John couldn’t accept that those blessings be offered without judgement; couldn’t grasp Grace.

How could he have missed this – John the Baptist of all people? He’s like Moses, who saw the Promised Land, but never entered it. In prison, he sounds like someone who’s thinking about joining a community, but waiting ‘till he finds out if it’s good enough. We mustn’t get into that prison with him.

The Gospel is this: God did not wait until we were good enough before blessing us; before sending Jesus to meet us. We must return the compliment: we mustn’t get ourselves so tied up in our preconceptions that we can’t move to where Jesus calls us. Ours is a gospel of Grace, not perfectionism. Love is our rule, not safety. We are not called to an obsessive fixation on other people’s worthiness or our own. We are called to tell them that Jesus loves us all just as we are. It’s his love that does the transforming.

In Advent, we’re on the way to meet a special person – a wonderful person. It’s natural to feel nervous. Those nerves are a good thing in a way. Maybe if we don’t feel too confident about the way we see things, we might just let Jesus show us how to see things the way he does. Then that transforming prayer we offered today might do its work in us: God… open blind eyes to the dawning of your kingdom, so that our hearts may rejoice as we behold the majesty of our God.  Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Advent 2 A- Isaiah 11 1-10, Psalm 72 1-7, 16-20; Rm 15 4-13, Mt 3 1-12

Today – Advent 2 – is the Sunday of those meddlesome people, the prophets. They drove the old kings of Israel mad; perpetually interfering in matters they didn’t understand; naïvely obsessed with unaffordable luxuries like justice, mercy and truth – nothing to do with a cost-effective, smooth-running regime. So do we, in our time of productivity gains and cutting red tape, do we have any use for prophets?

A prophet is not a fortune teller, but someone who speaks God’s mind on what’s happening. Prophets say inconvenient things we know are true; like, the measure of a civilisation is the way it treats its most vulnerable. That’s a prophetic truth, justly aimed at regimes that forget or abuse defenceless people. A prophet sees the wrong, names it, and says how God wants things to be; says it without fear or favour.

In secular societies that prophetic role is entrusted to special officials like a judge, ombudsman or commissioner. We’ve sometimes heard prophetic voices speak when memorable judgements have protected poor and vulnerable people from the agendas of huge enterprises and even governments. But does the rule of law plant God’s passion for the powerless into the hearts and minds of a nation? Rarely at best. So we see protesters emerge, prophetically challenging their regimes about climate policy, housing policy, gender and racial equality, justice, mercy and integrity.

But judges, ombudsmen, commissioners and particularly protesters are more and more being publicly attacked themselves; attacked by people and organisations who want questions of justice silenced; attacked by those whose priority is their own wealth and power, no matter the cost to others. Because of these power mongers, those whom justice and law should protect often see their lives ruined.
People of faith know right from wrong. We do because in Church, Synagogue and Mosque, we still read the prophets. Isaiah, Amos, Micah and the other prophets repeatedly tell the great truth of God’s care for the poor and downtrodden; that God loves all alike. Prophets speak into real situations where the poor and needy are abused or neglected. They declare God’s love for them and God’s disgust at the abuse they suffer. What prophets say – the sheer poetry of their words – can plant God’s passion for the powerless in the hearts and minds of a whole nation.

Prophets remind us that our humanity is incomplete when we disconnect from the God who loves all alike. Prophets can tell if God reigns in our hearts or not. It may irk us when they nail us for our hypocrisy. But hearing their challenge is cause for hope. God hasn’t forgotten us.

Today, we sang a Psalm from a remarkable prophet-king. David offered it as a prayer for himself and his son, Solomon: that their reigns might embody God’s will; that God’s reign may be known on earth. 1Give the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to a king’s son. He names the heart of that reign to be the king’s special care for the weakest members of the community. 2… judge God’s people with righteousness, and God’s poor with justice.4… defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the needy, and crush the oppressor.

The world marvels at a leader brave enough even to pray such words. In Advent, we wait for the coming of the leader who will make this happen forever! This is our Advent hope. 6This one will be like rain that falls on the mown grass, like showers that water the earth. 7In whose days righteousness may flourish and peace abound. This coming one fulfils the prophets’ expectation; the blessing of all nations, when the whole earth will know the glory of God. 19Blessed be God’s glorious name forever; may God’s glory fill the whole earth. Amen and Amen. This is our Advent hope – God’s Kingdom come on earth. We hope for this new beginning.

How does that speak to us in this comfortable, secure democracy we enjoy; in our polarised, post-truth world; a world where one side is absolutely right and all other views are ridiculed as nonsense? All the while, the poor and oppressed suffer more than ever. Their prayer, their Advent hope, whether spoken or not, is prophecy – your Kingdom come on earth. Our readings from the prophets call us to expectancy – pregnancy – that a leader will return and bring in this reign of justice and peace. We Christians believe it is Jesus who will come again. Isa 11. 4 with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth.

We’re called to bathe in this language – to let it soak deep into us and transform us. Prophets keep God’s concern for the powerless and the vulnerable before us. This is the source of the moral authority borne by those who protest against oppression and injustice, regardless of how the political and economic powers might try to denigrate them. Prophets call the Church to bring the Kingdom to people by risking a life in harmony with God’s love for the helpless poor; first peoples and women oppressed in every society; people of inundated Pacific nations; homeless people suffering the consequences of a financial structure that empties their pockets into those of the rich.

On this Sunday of the prophets, let’s hear the Advent call. Let’s live as a prophetic people. Let’s turn to God and live lives of justice, mercy and faithfulness. Let’s embody God’s Kingdom come, so that, as the great prophet commanded us today, our church might bear fruit worthy of repentance. Amen

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Advent Sunday A – Isa 2 1-5, Ps 122, Rom 13 9-14, Mt 24 36-44

Watching; waiting. Time spent waiting is time when I get lots of unexpected things done. I’m at the airport waiting to collect someone and they’re delayed. There isn’t anything else I’d planned. I’d rushed to be there on time, and now as I wait, and everything comes to an unplanned standstill, my thoughts and prayers start arriving one by one as they catch up with me. There’s no excuse for postponing them now. It’s good. God seems to create just such times to help me put my house in order.

Today, we officially start waiting together. It’s Advent. Jesus is on his way. Jesus, the Christ-Child of Bethlehem. But also the Cosmic Christ – the Son of Man who will come again like a thief in the night. We don’t know when, but we’re given an inkling of how. Jesus says, as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. It’s going to be a big change. The end of what we know; a brand new reality. And we need to be ready for what comes; we need to prepare ourselves for it.

How do we make sure we’re ready? Our waiting needs to be active, not passive. What should the Church be up to while we wait for Jesus’s Second Advent? What’s best to be up to as we wait? Sleep’s not an option. Would it be wise to let other people know Jesus is coming – wake them up? Hardly popular, but if we already know about it, and they don’t, we need to try at least. And if we’re looking at a new reality where, as Isaiah promises, peace and justice are to be the way of things, should we be acclimatising to that new situation? It will help people get ready to welcome the Son of Man if they see compassion and kindness as the chief mark of his followers. They might choose to embrace those ways too. A new, good real.

We’re readying ourselves and the world for a reign of peace with justice; utterly different from the reality most people experience. As Isaiah put it this morning, God shall judge between the nations…arbitrate for many peoples; they’ll beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Tyrants may ignore the UNO and the International Court of Justice, but they can’t ignore God.

Today’s scriptures say wrongs will be righted. And we lit a candle to acknowledge our call to be part of that process. We don’t do it for self-preservation. The focus isn’t about our danger, but about God reaching out to the world. We’re called to recognise God’s kindness, and then respond in thanksgiving by shining out with it ourselves. People followed Jesus because they were responding freely to a grace, a truth, a depth, and a love that their deepest selves had always yearned for. And in a fragile, faltering, and yet unmistakable way, we can create and nurture the experience of these qualities as the Church. It means turning from the enculturation that surrounds us in a broken world. It means instead we choose to be formed by God; a community from all nations who live out the grace, truth, depth and love for everyone that God modelled in Jesus.

I only have time today to speak about one way that this choosing can happen in the Church community to distinguish us from the broken world that we live in. We’re marking 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. It’s far more important than we might imagine. I remember being stunned by a study in the early 1990’s which estimated that female infanticide meant there were 100 million women missing from the world. A follow-up study in 2020 revealed the number had risen to 126 million. ^{https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/where-are-all-the-missing-girls} That’s double the death toll of both world wars! The war against women is the most insidious war Earth has ever known – insidious because it’s fatal, yet so embedded in human cultures that we don’t readily see it.

In Australia, one woman a week is murdered as a result of intimate partner violence. In one such murder in the news over the past week, the coroner concluded that this was a meticulously planned execution after a long period of coercive control. But she said media often disguise this fact by suggesting that such murderers are acting out of character, or just snapping for an instant. That’s a lie.

Where does this start? In war, dehumanising the other – reducing them to an object of one’s contempt – is what makes it okay to do unspeakable things to them.

I’ve seen this dehumanising happen in a lot of workplaces where men are in the majority. The pictures on the office walls are still there. Conversation among the men routinely demeans and objectifies women. A woman walking past the workplace will still be subjected to cat-calling and whistling. But blaming women for the clothes they wear lays responsibility with them. This is de-humanising behaviour, and it lays the foundation for the terrible violence that has long been acceptable in our culture.

The Church is no angel in this regard. A survey recently revealed that the level of domestic violence in the Australian Anglican church is the same or worse than in the wider community. The Church is still patriarchal, and in world terms, still largely dismissive of the idea that God might call a woman to public ministry.

But some churches, including our own, welcome the ministry of women at the very highest level. Here are St John’s we’re glad that the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally, is a woman – but it’s not universally welcomed. Some parts of the Anglican Church still offer a model to other churches, and to a world culture of the glass ceiling and wage inequity for women.

The world culture seeps in. Men in church communities still make denigrating references to women as though it’s funny or even normal to do so. That’s not a culture we should allow to shape us. As we stop and wait this Advent, may the prayers and thoughts God sends catch up with us; prayers for a just and safe world for women; prayers that form us into a church that models just that. Amen.

Rev’d Peter Balabanski

Christ the King Sunday C – Jrm 23 1-6, Ps 46, Col 1 11-20, Lk 23 33-34

Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom – Today you will be with me in paradise. That second criminal talks of Jesus’ Kingdom as though it’s somewhere in the future, but Jesus says it’s today. They’ll be there today. There are two other times such todays occur in Luke. And as we farewell this gospel for three years, I’ll remind you of them. The first is at the launch of Jesus’ public ministry – Luke 4. He goes to Synagogue in Nazareth, and the attendant gives him the scroll to do one of the readings. It’s the Isaiah scroll, and he reads this passage from it.

¹⁸ “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he’s anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He’s sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, ¹⁹ to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.” ²⁰ And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. ²¹ Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

This is the today that Jesus offers the criminal who’s on a cross next to him: release from captivity, recovery of sight; liberation from oppression; God’s favour – today!

The other time this today word comes up is in a story we know very well in Luke 19. Jesus looks at the tax collector Zacchaeus up in the sycamore tree and says hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today. And shortly afterwards, when it’s clear to everyone that Zacchaeus’s heart’s been released from greed for service to the poor, Jesus tells him, today salvation has come to this house.

This change of direction – this turning from a former way of living to face Jesus – is what happened in the heart of that second criminal crucified with him. He replies to the taunts of the other criminal, saying We’ve been condemned justly, … we’re getting what we deserve for our deeds…’ And then he turns to Jesus to ask him, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’

What we see here is the complete transformation of a human soul from criminal to saint. He names what he has been, renounces it and turns to Jesus. He calls on Jesus’ name and asks to be remembered when Jesus comes into his kingdom. And Jesus receives him immediately – takes him at his word and receives him. Today you will be with me in paradise; restored to the fulness of life. There, on a cross?! Cynical people mock gallows repentance. But Jesus sees the truth in our hearts.

This is an astonishing scene. The people Jesus keeps company with here – and habitually – show that none of us should ever imagine ourselves beyond the reach of Jesus’ love – none of us should ever imagine ourselves beneath Jesus notice.

In pastoral ministry, I’ve often come into contact with people whose mental state is so sad that they’re convinced they’ve been forgotten by God, or locked out of God’s love. These people have often exhausted the resources of their families and friends too. Their cyclical bouts of depression or recurrent, chronic illness have led them and their supporters to lose hope. I’m constantly shocked by the terrible burdens so many people carry in life. So many people on the cross.

If you’re on the cross yourself, the suffering is often made worse by feeling that you’re cut off from everybody. You’re stuck with your pain while everyone else seems to be free to go about their lives. When I find someone is in that sort of pain – their pain made much worse by feeling isolated – I know the only one who can help is someone who knows the same feeling: who knows what it is to be on the Cross. I want them to be able to look beside them, and there, on a friendly neighbouring cross, meet the one who is always with them; whose love can bring them healing and wholeness.

So, often, I’ll talk with them about today’s scene in Luke’s gospel. We can wonder together what it meant to that second criminal who turned to Jesus – what it meant that he turned to someone who knew what their pain and despair felt like; if that criminal couldn’t have turned until that moment. And if he’d not been welcomed there and then, would he have sunk back into despair at his helpless, tortured state? Could he have done so sooner?

There are things we need to draw from this scene. Things about our discipleship to Christ the King – about our imitation of his example, and our role as his body on Earth now. Can people turn to us as that second criminal could turn to him? Do we have to be in pain before we can be of any use to others who suffer? There’s certainly something to be said for the Christian who is a wounded healer; one who can honestly say I understand someone else’s pain.

But Jesus didn’t go looking for pain. Someone else inflicted that on him. If we want to follow Jesus, we don’t measure our success by how much pain it costs us. We measure it by the choices we make: by our hospitality, our kindness, our commitment to the poor, to the captive – and to overcoming spiritual blindness – things that make us vulnerable and present to others whose pain isolates them . But whatever we do, whoever we are, it’s about being that person today – doing it today.

There’s a plaque on the entrance to the Epworth building in Pirie Street. It says, I expect to pass through this world but once, any good therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now, let me not defer it, nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Let’s do it now; TODAY!

And yet, is doing something the point? That second criminal was utterly incapable of doing anything. But Jesus wasn’t fussed by that. The acceptance – the welcome – the love – they had no other condition required than a wish – a need to receive them.

We’re called to open our hearts to the awesome majesty of the one in whom all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and who, at the same time, is utterly committed to us – reconciling all things to God in selfless love – by making peace through the blood of his cross.

It gives our imaginations whiplash to contemplate such contrasting extremes. But for today, when we know we can turn to him and ask him, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom,’ please know that we can do it – today.  Amen