Eternity - December 2021

November 2021

Proclaiming ‘Jesus All About Life’ in 2022 A year to reach out confidently Deadly storms, heroin addicts, cancer and my faith Christmas and COVID

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When fame, power and money aren’t enough Sid Tapia working on his latest picture in his studio

Anne Lim

S

id Tapia is a handsome guy in the South American style, with an impressive array of artistic and physical talents, along with a fine intellect and a poetic way with words.

Born in Sydney to Ecuadorean parents, he became a famous skateboarder who was courted by sponsors in his youth, then made his name as a graffiti artist and mural painter on the Sydney urban scene. It seems that everything he turns his hand to, he conquers.

Case in point, he has just won a prestigious portrait-painting award, Western Australia’s Lester Prize, for a small but incredibly detailed picture of a homeless man he befriended in Sydney, and with whom he has pledged to share the $50,000 prize.

So perhaps it’s understandable that when Sid went looking for the meaning of life, he based his search on what would make him better, more powerful and more famous.

“When it came to sponsors, I was very popular in magazines, TV shows and commercials, so there was a lot of these external things that were upholding my sense of character,” he tells Eternity after a morning of outdoor sketching near his Sydney home.

“What was elevating me was my gifts, my talents, my looks, the style I had, my dress sense – all these very worldly, superficial things, which are fleeting – sustaining me and giving me a lot of reward.”

But “when the curtains closed,” he still felt like

the vulnerable child from a broken home who had endured constant abuse, violence and insults growing up. In the absence of a father, he searched for guidance from friends, seeking out all the good things they were doing and trying to emulate them.

“I’d hear other people talking, ‘Oh, that guy is so good at what he does.’ This word, ‘good.’ Like, why is it something that I keep wanting to search out and adopt that good thing that they’ve got in order for me to attain it?”

Soul-searching, Sid started reading intensively about different religions and their leaders, as well as a lot of new-age books.

For years he fasted and prayed several times a day, seeking freedom and enlightenment but “obviously falling short all the time, simply because all these different ways would be leading me to all these things I had to do. And it was this rule of constant struggle.”

When Sid asked himself what he was really searching for, it all centred on himself, his mind captive to the world’s creed of self-belief.

“I was on a search for ‘me,’ like I want to be better, and my idea of being better was to be more famous, better at my talents, better at all these things that I already do, but to somehow manage them to a point where everyone can just applaud me.”

His search for the most famous person in the world and the most powerful thing in the world eventually led him to Jesus. He reasoned that love

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was behind everything – even the quest for money and power.

“People want money so they can give it to the ones they love or they can be pumped up for people to love them. I guess people want power because they want more self-love or they want to be able to have a greater sense of power for themselves. That’s twisted love. So, ultimately, it’s all leading back to love and I thought, ‘ah, this love thing is definitely the most powerful thing in the world.’”

Searching out the best teacher on love, Sid looked up Jesus’ words in the Bible “and, lo and behold, I was like, ‘hold on, everything this guy’s talking about is love.’

“I thought I’d hit the jackpot. I thought I found the most famous man in the world and he’s talking about the most powerful thing in the world – love.

‘Okay, cool.’ So, I started really reading the Bible a lot – Jesus’ words, in particular.”

If this story were to follow a predictable course, you would expect that the power of God’s word would soon lead Sid to become a disciple of Christ.

Unfortunately, there was a lot of crazy trouble and strife to come before that was to happen.

“I came across one thing that Jesus said which put me off completely,” he confesses.

“I said I’m going to become this guy’s student, but then there’s a moment where he says, ‘if you want to be my disciple, you’ve got to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me.’ That’s where I pulled the

“He’s definitely transformed me through his word; that’s at the core of it, and the fruits of that have been from being the man who I was to the man I am today. You know, I’ve been married now for 13 years to a wife I honour with all my heart, and I have two beautiful young girls.

“That’s a massive transition. That’s a massive change. Like God’s working through me in marriage and family life because there’s so many ugly sides that come out in us as people, and I no longer have a heart that is just okay with doing wrong.”

In fact, it was Sid’s sense of devotion to his family that prompted him to turn to oil painting two years ago. “I was doing a lot of graffiti and murals that are out in the streets. And as much as I still love doing that, I wanted to make a transition because, as I get older, I want to be close to the home with a family, spend more time with them. Some murals can take days on end and that’s time away from home.”

He is greatly encouraged that his work has been recognised in winning the Lester Prize – which is currently on show at the Art Gallery of WA. “There’s something so romantic about oil painting, something so rich and authentic, especially when it comes to portraiture work,” he says.

“Portraiture work is what I love. I love people and I love creation. When you look at God’s work, I guess as an artist, I’m able to see that everything within itself has a form of life and beauty to it.

“So you see people for who they are – a person created in the likeness and image of God. And it’s so wonderful because ultimately, as we know, God is love. God is light. God is good. So when you see someone you relate to, you’re able to see that embodied, you’re able to see the master’s work within that and it’s alive, it’s moving and it’s very intriguing.”

The portrait of homeless man Sia, which won the Lester Prize 2021.

brakes. I was like, ‘hold on, deny myself? I’m here to better myself. I’m here to get myself out there more, to be more famous, to be more about me, so I don’t really agree with that.’”

Unable to get past Jesus’ words about denying himself, Sid started doing even crazier and wilder things, going out with multiple women and cheating on them.

“A lot of people saw me as a really good-looking bloke and I had that ego-driven sort of thing that ‘I’m the man,’ so to speak, but ultimately it’s because my heart was just so black. I was broken, broken.

I’d always fought with depression through my upbringing and it started getting worse through breakups, and I was getting very, very suicidal.

“There was a moment where I was about to end my life and I had something happen where God definitely intervened,” he says.

“One night, I was about to end my life and I had a Bible open as well, crying out, like just flooded with tears, just crying because of this breakup and just all the brokenness in my life, while on the outside I’m one of the most celebrated skateboarders in the country. I decided that I was going to go to the bathroom to finish it all. And as I made the decision and as I stepped up to go, the phone rang.

“I was just about to end to end my life. But now the phone’s ringing. It was so profound because a phone meant ‘I want life to continue.’ Whereas the bathroom meant ‘I want like to end.’ And I was caught between the two.”

After a struggle, Sid picked up the phone to hear a former girlfriend from six months earlier asking if there was something wrong with him.

“She’s crying and saying, ‘Please tell me what is wrong? Something’s wrong with you.’ I got scared and at the same time embarrassed. So, I didn’t tell her what was wrong.

“But obviously that’s a good thing, that’s a God thing, that’s a loving thing and that’s what our God is. He is a God of love. He’s a God of goodness.”

Eventually God drew Christian people into Sid’s life, including his next girlfriend, a “very cool chick,” who took him to church for the first time.

“We didn’t end up getting married, but that introduced me to church and introduced me to people. I was blown away that young people go to church. I thought that was huge. Cool kids that just love life and just want to do right by others.

“This blew my mind. I just thought church was old people and a priest up there, murmuring stuff and singing strange hymns that people would just recite.

I was like, ‘wow, this is something new.’ So that was my first encounter with church at age 28 and I ended up just coming to know Jesus through that.”

Twenty years later, Sid is still unable to stopping tell people about his powerful encounter with Jesus.

The very morning of our interview, while out sketching, he had chatted for an hour to a woman walking a dog, sharing about the changes that only God could make in his heart and life.

“Where I’m at now is so powerful that you can’t help but tell the good news,” he says.

A measure of how radically Jesus changed Sid’s character is that when he courted his wife, he pledged not to kiss her until their wedding day because he wanted to get to know her as a person before introducing anything physical.

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Sid Tapia’s winning work, along with other finalists for the Lester Prize, are on display at the Art Gallery of Western Australia until 29 November.

A Tapia portrait, painted on a skateboard.

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Guy Mason on hope and fear at Christmas 2021

‘Oh Holy Night’ CHRISTMAS & COVID

This Christmas, as we come out from lockdown and dust off our Christmas trees, set your eyes on Jesus.

I

t is Christmas Eve, 1968.

It has been a year of unprecedented pain for our world. One of the worst years in the bloody Vietnam War – an unrelenting mess of violence, chaos and death.

And tragically, 1968 was the same year that the world mourned the assassination of the great civil rights activist and Baptist preacher Martin Luther King – shot dead outside Room 306 of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis.

But as the year reaches its end and a weary world sits anxious, alone and afraid, there is one ray of light. Bill Anders, Jim Lovell and Frank Bormon are aboard Apollo 8.

Remarkably, on Christmas Eve the three astronauts do something unexpected. As Apollo 8 orbits the lunar surface they turn their cameras on and broadcast to earth from the heavens above.

In that moment, over two billion people huddle around TV sets in bars, shops and homes.

And it is here, that these three astronauts do something that takes everyone by surprise.

Opening the Bible, they each take turns to read from the book of Genesis.

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

And God said, ‘Let there be light: and there was light.’” It was in this moment, Christmas Eve 1968, that we saw our world in a whole new way.

As we approach Christmas in 2021, we find ourselves united with our past and once more immersed in a sea of anxiety and despair.

Our world is still reeling amidst a global pandemic that has plunged us into a vicious spiral

of chaos and confusion. Here, in my hometown of Melbourne (the most locked-down city in the world), we’ve seen hard-working Australians lose their jobs, churches and local businesses have closed their doors. Hailed the most liveable city in the world, we are now fractured and sick.

And yet this Christmas we too are not without hope. As we “deck the halls with boughs of holly” we can thank God for the success of the vaccine which has prevented death and offered us a way out of the mess. And, for the body of Christ, we can rejoice, for the long-awaited return to physical gatherings.

Our hope is found in Christ alone.

At Christmas we set our eyes on the one “who is the image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15). The one in whom “all things were created, in heaven and on earth” (Col 1:16). The one who is “the head of the body, the church” and is “reconciling all things to himself ” (Col. 1:18, 20).

In stepping onto the stage of human history, Jesus comes close and lifts our eyes to something far greater than ourselves. In entering this world, Jesus not only embraces our chaos and suffering, but drives a dagger into the heart of the serpent and pushes back the darkness with his light.

Recently, I was talking with my youngest daughter about COVID-19. She’s five and so half of her life has been marked by playground closures, social distancing and headlines of sickness and death. Cuddling on the couch, I asked her: “Lilly,

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do you think the coronavirus will ever go away?”

To which she replied in emphatic fashion, “No.” “How come?” I asked with a smile.

“Because of sin!”

I said to her: “What do you mean? What does sin have to do with COVID-19?” To which she rolled her eyes and said: “Dad! You should know this …”

And indeed, I should. Because, while the origins of this pandemic are somewhat of a mystery, we know there is no conspiracy when it comes to who is ultimately responsible for all division, disease and death.

Author Don Carson, says, “If God had perceived that our greatest need was economic, he would have sent an economist... If he had perceived that our greatest need was health, he would have sent us a doctor. But he perceived that our greatest need involved our sin, our alienation from him, our rebellion, our death; and he sent us a Savior.”

Just as God spoke light into the formless void of this world at the beginning of creation, so the world sits in silence at the light of Christ. He has lived a life we could not live – a life without sin – and he has died the death we should have died – the death for sin. In rising to new life, this same Jesus has secured victory over death and sealed his promise “to make all things new” (Rev 21).

This Christmas, as we come out from lockdown and dust off our Christmas trees, set your eyes on Jesus. Let the King of all glory carry your burdens and wipe your tears. Invite the suffering servant to heal your wounds and the great I AM draw you close. And let him, who was there when the stars and the moon were flung into the sky, lift your eyes to the glory of his kingdom that reigns now and forevermore.

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2022 - A year to reach out confidently John Sandeman on the return of Jesus All About life Three keen evangelists walk into a podcast… It sounds like a joke in search of a punchline, but instead, it gave me a bit of a revelation.

It was the middle of lockdown season and Baptist Karl Faase, Dave Jensen of EV Church, and David Robertson the Scottish pastor turn evangelism mentor for the Sydney Anglicans were discussing gospel campaigns with Dominic Steele on his “Pastors Heart” podcast.

The idea of an umbrella campaign to raise awareness – and which would allow local churches to tailor their own evangelistic efforts – struck a chord with all of them. But they differed on the tagline. It should centre on the word “Jesus”.

Another one of the evangelists thought “life” was the key word.

I felt like shouting at my laptop. In fact, I might have done just that. Because I was aware that the creatives at Bible Society – which publishes Eternity – were working on updating “Jesus All About Life.” (JAAL) This was a true umbrella campaign that ran in the late noughties across several states. In NSW, for example 1600 churches held 2000 events, and the red and blue banner could be seen on church buildings for years afterwards. It got over 500 mainstream media mentions.

“Together we have the opportunity to proclaim the centrality of Jesus to the nation,” says Chris Melville Bible Society’s head of mission. JAAL aims to encourage and refresh our ministry leaders and congregations in providing resources in preparation for Easter 2022.

Bible Society Australia will facilitate Jesus All About Life as an annual church-owned campaign under the already established brand. “This could be the single largest evangelistic and church revitalisation effort in Australia, uniting churches

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of all denominations to point people to Jesus this coming Easter,” says Melville. “As we have done previously, Bible Society Australia will promote JAAL and build interest through media channels to start a national conversation about Jesus.

“Churches have the opportunity to partner with this well-known brand for their own evangelistic mission and be provided resources they can tailor to their local context to reach their communities with the good news of Jesus.”

Find out more at biblesociety.org.au/jesus

A shepherd’s word to the church Pastor Bill Vasilakis

I

write at a time when our nation is moving quickly towards ending painful lockdowns and gradually easing the awful restrictions we have endured with great patience!

I am praying and believing the Holy Spirit will give us the wisdom, sensitivity and courage to guide the leaders and church boards of our congregations to follow these evolving mandates in the coming weeks.

It’s looking like some of our governments will mandate (and have already) vaccinations for all religious workers because they run public church services with vulnerable people, conduct weddings and funerals, visit hospitals, prisons, schools etc.

They may also restrict unvaccinated people from attending some of our religious services.

My CRC Churches National Executive Team met recently to talk through the implications of all this and to pray for our wonderful nation. We resolved to strongly appeal to all our pastors and church boards, to adhere to the regulations for

the jurisdiction they are under. As law-abiding and peace-loving citizens, we submit to our government even if we disagree with them at times regarding some of their decisions.

I’d like to now share my personal reflections as a local church pastor, which is my primary ministry role in life, rather than a denominational head. I am a shepherd at heart and have been happily leading my church, the Christian Family Centre, for 43 years, and I cherish my people.

I’ve been greatly exercised on how Jesus’ law of love is to be outworked in this most unique ministry season. I have come to the place where I will consider the medically vulnerable in my church as of the highest priority.

I feel a huge spiritual responsibility to protect people in my church and the wider community whose immune systems are compromised due to life-saving chemotherapies, or who have a diseased immune system and other illnesses that have proved especially dangerous with COVID. In a large church like the Christian Family Centre, we have a host of people in this position, and everything within compels me to cover the most vulnerable people in my sphere of ministry.

I am not referring only to the elderly who may have co-morbidity factors like diabetes, high blood pressure, heart and lung problems etc. Even if the immunocompromised (whether they are young or old) are double vaccinated, the awful evidence is that they will face a huge life battle if infected by the COVID virus.

My pastors and I are examining how we can make our facilities, our services and all the ministries we run, safe environments for the

vulnerable. I encourage all lead pastors of churches to consult with their denominational leaders on this. For independent churches, I encourage you to seek counsel from a denominational leader you know to draw from their movement’s collective wisdom. Let’s be careful and caring as COVID restrictions are gradually lifted across Australia.

Let’s also continue to lovingly connect and shepherd the people in our churches who choose not to be vaccinated, even though this may be a small number. It’s estimated that 95+ per cent of our fellow Aussies will be vaccinated by early 2022.

I’m deeply saddened when good people (and some are family and friends who I love dearly), see vaccination and restrictions as a religious freedom issue and not as a temporary public-health emergency. It’s heartbreaking to see this happening, even over wearing masks, which is such a simple request from our health officials.

I conclude with an appeal. Let’s not allow this socially divisive issue across our land to divert us from the church’s primary role. Fellow soldiers of the cross, we are called to preach the gospel about God’s free saving grace available for all people; to reach out with Christ’s love to people in our personal world of influence; to plant new churches that authentically engage with our local communities; to produce biblically grounded disciples who sacrificially serve others like our master; and to facilitate our people’s hearts towards fulfilling our world missions vision.

Bill Vasilakis is Senior Minister, Christian Family Centre Churches in Adelaide, National Chairman, CRC Churches International and Chairman, Australian Pentecostal Ministers Fellowship.

Cases go up for a bit and then they come down, without lockdowns or other restrictions.

My family’s taken a cautious approach. We isolated from March to July of 2020. When we came out of isolation, much slower than our friends and colleagues, we wore masks even though it was largely perceived to be unnecessary, unChristian and unpatriotic.

I’ve spent my time in Tanzania trying to get into the headspace of Tanzanians and see things from their perspective and live as they do. Wearing a mask felt like a betrayal of those values. Yet, it was my physical health at stake and I felt compelled by love of others to do what I could to protect them.

It’s not that there are no precautions. The main one people take is handwashing, perhaps because it fits with established cultural practices, so it’s more easily adopted. When you go to church – and churches never stopped meeting, at least not Sunday services – there are handwashing stations outside. Social distancing is not really a thing with all the singing and dancing that goes on in Tanzanian worship, though people do wrist bump

instead of shaking hands. Even for our church, which is full of young, urban professionals, online doesn’t cut it.

In March of this year, President Magufuli died suddenly and his vice-president, Samia Suluhu Hassan, succeeded him. She has taken a different approach to President Magufuli, one more in line with the global response to COVID, even wearing a mask herself, which makes it easier for us to do so. Yet, vaccine hesitancy in Tanzania is extremely high, with less than three per cent of people vaccinated. People wonder about the speed with which the vaccine was developed or they read misinformation about how it will affect their fertility. This suspicion may be motivated by the global history of medical testing on black bodies but I think it’s more likely informed by experiences of well-meaning aid donors giving poor-fitting solutions in Africa, and seeing cast offs from the West turning up in African markets.

Our denomination here issued a statement to all members saying that people must not be criticised whichever path they take; this may seem a more tepid response than urging people to be vaccinated but it’s a pretty strong statement in Tanzania because it’s only those who do get vaccinated who face criticism. Most people keep it a secret if they do: there are no “Vaxxed!” social media filters here.

In amongst all this, a friend who chose to take the vaccine did so saying that even if it is dangerous to him, he trusts that Jesus’ power will still protect him.

Tamie Davis ministers in Tanzania.

COVID: A view from Africa Tamie Davis

I

n March of 2020, the first case of COVID was detected in Tanzania. The predictions were dire. Melinda Gates said people would be dying in the streets. Lockdown was not considered economically viable but schools closed and large public gatherings were cancelled. Expats evacuated en masse in emergency flights. We who chose to stay braced ourselves.

And then, nothing.

I mean, there were some cases and some deaths but there was no exponential loss of life, even allowing for little testing or poor data collection.

The government stopped reporting numbers of cases in May but there have been local ways of keeping tabs on how things are going, such as looking for an increase in funeral notices.

Then in June of 2021, Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli declared that Tanzania was COVID-free after three days of national prayers against COVID. Schools reopened. Critics scoffed at Magufuli’s religious explanation; now the disaster would strike. And still, nothing, really.

And that’s kind of how it’s been in Tanzania.

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Deadly storms, heroin addicts, cancer and my faith I never intended to be a Christian says Nick Hawkes. An Atlantic storm and a gang of Chinese heroin addicts are to blame ...

The twin

I

had the good fortune to be born a twin. My brother, Tim, was born one month early. I was content to stay to full-term but was unceremonially hooked out into the world seven hours later. And, so, I was provided with a lifelong soulmate, competitor, fellow adventurer, role model and encourager.

My father was an Anglican priest from the high-church tradition. I can never remember him speaking about his faith or exhibiting any particular fondness for it. For him, faith was “duty.”

Mum was a Sydney North Shore girl. She’d been a journalist and a budding actress – so came down to earth with a bit of a bump when she married an impecunious curate from rural South Australia.

She was a closet atheist, or Deist at best … who faithfully did her duty by Dad. Mum was pretty, fun and witty.

Dad became a chaplain in the Australian army, and this began our global wanderings. They started at South Australia’s Woomera rocket range (a great place to collect lizards), then on to Malaya (exotic, strange and slightly dangerous because of the Indonesian confrontation).

This slightly odd education came to an abrupt end when my father transferred to the British army.

At the age of 12, my brother and I were packed off to an English boarding school.

The storm The boarding school made up in antiquity what it lacked in academic rigour … and the school was

the second-oldest school in Britain (founded in 604)! It did, however, offer sport. My brother and I excelled at it and competed fiercely. The same could not be said of our academic pursuits. We turned this into an art form of mediocrity. Neither of us learned to think until we left school.

When we were about 15 years old, a young physics teacher joined the faculty. He was socially awkward, had a high voice, and didn’t play rugby – which instantly relegated him to subhuman status.

I was therefore shocked to learn that this mildmannered Clark Kent (real name, Tim Millward) sailed small boats in dangerous places. My brother and I had learned to sail while on holidays with my parents when they lived in Germany, so I volunteered the two of us to be his crew on his next voyage.

And so it was that we planned to sail an open sailing dinghy around the southwest coast of England. For those who have not watched Poldark, let me tell you that the coastline is characterised by unforgiving cliffs.

We sailed down the River Severn, pushed the boat over a weir at night, negotiated quicksands when walking beside the boat in the shallows … and sailed out to sea.

You’d be forgiven for being mildly curious about how three young men could sleep while sailing a small dinghy. Two people could sleep either side of the centre board casing in sleeping bags protected by a waterproof cover. This left one person sailing the boat. If things got hairy, he’d just kick one of the sleepers awake to give him a hand. On some occasions, we ran the boat up a beach for the night.

Tim, the teacher, had designed a tent that fitted over the boom. Three of us could sleep underneath it because we rigged a bamboo hammock (made

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of garden stakes), which hung a few centimetres above the noses of those underneath.

Unsurprisingly, a few dramas occurred. One in particular was to prove significant.

I’d not learned much about God at school, despite having to attend school chapel almost every day. Our chapel was actually Rochester Cathedral but its grandeur did nothing to commend God to me. The cathedral did, however, prove to be a terrific playground. There are hidden staircases in the towers, and we once played a game of cricket on top of the ceiling, under the roof of the northern transept.

My brother and I were therefore bemused when teacher Tim (the nerd) read from a pocket Bible each morning. You can’t exactly miss it when three of you are living on a dinghy.

Things came to a head when we sailed into the Cornish fishing port of St Ives early one morning after sailing all night.

We ate breakfast on dry land and pushed back out to sea. We rounded the headland and sailed slap-bang into heavy weather. The boat got swamped, the granite cliffs got closer, and some of the gear broke. Eventually, we managed to limp back to port … but it had been a close-run thing.

Perhaps it was this brush with death – plus Tim’s Bible-reading habit – that prompted my brother and me to ask Tim what the big deal was about God. With very few words, Tim shared the love story of a God who took the blame for our sins on a cross – sins which would otherwise disbar us from God’s presence. It was a story that reached my heart and warmed my soul, but I was not yet ready to become a Christian.

After the voyage ended at Lymington, my brother

and I stayed on as sailing instructors at a Christian schools camp. There, we both learned more about the gospel – and I had to make a decision. I found it extraordinary meeting Christians who were excited about their faith. This was palpably not the boring, irrelevant Christianity I’d grown up with.

So, I went for a quiet walk in England’s ancient New Forest and committed my life to God. I was then faced with my next challenge – to tell my twin brother.

When I did, he told me that he’d made the same decision three days earlier.

The Walled City My parents moved to Hong Kong with the army and lived in a unit with fabulous views over the beach and the Pacific. Tim (the brother) and I joined them one long, summer holiday. We’d been Christians for one year, and we both knew that something was missing in our faith. We weren’t seeing those things that we read about in the New Testament. So we both prayed.

A stranger on the train taking Tim to Heathrow Airport gave him the name of a missionary in Hong Kong’s “Walled City,” Jackie Pullinger. When we arrived in Hong Kong, one of the British officers attending Dad’s church said he knew Jackie and told us how to find her. So we did.

We met her at a prayer and worship night being held in the house of a deputy headmaster. Jackie met us at the door and startled us by saying that she’d been praying for us. Evidently, she needed two physically fit Christians to accompany her, a few other Christians, and some “brothers” to a summer camp on the top of Lamma Island a few miles offshore.

We agreed straight away.

It turned out that the “brothers” were members of the 14K triad society and that most were heroin addicts. They had come on the camp to plan an ambush of a rival triad gang. Fortunately, their plans came unstuck when the key leaders committed their lives to Christ. Tim and I were baptised with them off a beach.

From scientist to pastor I returned to England to do a biology degree at Portsmouth Polytechnic. During the first term, I shared the gospel with a girl on my course, Mary … and married her four years later.

Whilst at Portsmouth, I flew planes with Southampton University Air Squadron, sailed a few boats, and became president of the Christian Union. The CU was exploding in size at the time because of the charismatic renewal. It was a wild ride!

Somehow, I got a degree and went on to become an agricultural research scientist – working mostly in East Anglia. I then secured a similar job with the same company in Australia.

After a brief sojourn in the mid-Murray Mallee, I was moved to Adelaide.

Mary and I attended a Uniting Church and were almost immediately asked to start a youth group.

We hadn’t a clue what we were doing, but we did.

We began with seven people … and it grew to 110.

God dumped a mini-revival on us!

So I decided to stop being a scientist and train as a pastor. Sadly, this brought me face to face with the deadening hand of liberal revisionism that is killing the mainline churches in the West.

Growing a church in such a spiritually destitute culture was both hard and heartbreaking so, after 13 years, we resigned from the Uniting Church and planted a new church, Rivergate Christian Community, which was affiliated with the Crosslink Network.

The dyslexic writer God picks the most unlikely people to do his work. I am slightly dyslexic and have always struggled with spelling. This made life difficult at school. But after I left school, I managed to get two degrees in science and two in theology. My spelling, however, was still not great. The relevance of this is that God has called me to be a writer. It wasn’t an easy path to tread, largely because I didn’t particularly want to be one. I wanted to grow churches. It was what I was used to doing.

But Rivergate didn’t grow. What was wrong?

I took to walking the tracks around Morialta Conservation Park in Adelaide, in tears. I would pour my heart out to God. Was I the problem? I was just days away from resigning as pastor when a prophet picked me out of a crowd of 200 church leaders and told me that my ministry would be making complex academic things simple for people to understand.

It turned out that I was actually already starting to do the ministry God was calling me into. I was writing and recording for Christian radio (about 800 “Thoughts for the Day”). And some of my books were being translated into Hindi to resource church planters in India.

Being a scientist, I also wrote books about the scientific credibility of Christianity.

Just for good measure, I wrote novels. I wanted to write the sort of books I love to read; books that feed the heart, mind and soul (adventure, romance and mystery, with a garnish of spirituality). And so the Stone Collection of novels was born.

Now here’s the thing: If God can do such things for me, he most certainly can do them for you.

Cancer – the best years

I have cancer. It is throughout my body. There is nothing special about that. Almost half of us will die of the disease.

What is special is that I can say this: the last five years I have battled the disease have been the most joyful, peaceful, miraculous and productive of my life.

As a result of cancer, I love God more deeply, cry more readily, think more deeply, empathise more profoundly and am focussed more intently on God’s mission – on the need to finish my mission.

And ridiculous things happen. As I write this, my energy is not great. I tend to do things in one-hour bursts. But, somehow, this year I’ve written three books and a bunch of daily devotions for the Bible Society now published as Soar Above the Storm: Hope in Suffering (A 40-day Devotional) That’s the difference the Holy Spirit makes.

I’ve shared my story, and I look forward to hearing your story … when we are finally home.

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Going deeper A devotion from Nick Hawkes’ book Soar Above the Storm: Hope in Suffering (A 40-day Devotional)

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night.

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither – whatever they do prospers. (Psalm 1:1-3) I loved God before I got cancer, and I continue to love God now I have cancer.

Having cancer didn’t cause me to suddenly become “more spiritual.” It did, however, test my faith ... and I have grown a deeper relationship with God as a result. I find myself increasingly guilty of acts of spontaneous worship, and I “cat nap” pray throughout the day.

It’s good to be able to meet suffering with a robust faith born of a lifetime’s heritage of knowing God. Why? Because it has grown my roots.

Suffering and grief will test you. So, let’s agree to grow our roots down deep into God and drink deeply of the source of life, so that when the searing heat of suffering comes, we flourish. Let’s be the tree that is planted by the water.

Dear Lord Jesus, Thank you for allowing the circumstances that have caused me to walk in a deeper relationship with you.

I love being with you.

Celebrate Messiah has been sharing the love of Messiah with Jewish people in Australia since it was founded in 1995.

Celebrate Messiah is an interdenominational, evangelistic society dedicated to raising the banner of Messiah amongst God’s ancient people in Australia and abroad through our partnership with Chosen People Global Ministries.

celebratemessiah.com.au

BIBLE SOCIETY AUSTRALIA

Helping Bible martyrs’ families Providing homes safe from Boko Haram

A

year after Boko Haram terrorised a village in northern Cameroon and killed two Bible Society literacy teachers, their families are in new homes in a safer village thanks to assistance from Bible Society Australia (BSA).

The Islamic terrorist group killed Jonas*, 42, last August and his friend Joseph*, 43, in September and took all both families’ possessions, leaving both wives and a combined 16 children with nothing.

BSA was able to step in straightaway and provide funding for both families for food, clothing and other essentials. It soon became apparent, though, that the wives were very reluctant to accept replacements of their household goods as that would make them a target for further attacks by Boko Haram. They weren’t safe and were at high risk, especially the school-aged children who moved between villages to attend school.

Bible Society Cameroon approached BSA with a request to fund moving both families away from danger to a much safer village and even help to pay for new houses for them.

Soon after this, one of the women gave birth to another child, a little boy she named Innocent, who sadly would never meet his father.

After BSA readily agreed to this plan, the Cameroon team got busy, moving the families into homes in their new village and buying all new furniture and household goods as well as clothing

Jonas, 42, and Joseph, 43, two Bible Society literacy facilitators who have been helping to prepare their community for the arrival of the Bible in their language – Parkwa – were killed by Boko Haram in an attack on their village in the Far North Region of Cameroon in 2020.

and new school uniforms for the children.

They then arranged the purchase of land plots and the building of two homes side-by-side.

Recently, the families were able to move into their new homes, filled with everything they need and in a place where they are safe and secure.

Bible Society Cameroon has committed to support these families for at least five years, providing food and clothing and paying for the education of all of the children. BSA has committed to contribute to this, along with a couple of other generous Bible Societies that were also moved by this story.

In addition to such practical assistance, traumahealing programs are being provided to both families and also to the village where the men were killed and where the literacy project still runs.

After the attacks, Cameroon’s General Secretary, Luc, commented: “It is this Bible that will bring hope and heal the wounds of the Parkwa-speaking people. The translation of the Bible into the Parkwa language is truly taking place under the most painful conditions. Even at the official ceremony to launch the translation project, we had to leave the village in a hurry because we were warned of a possible attack by Boko Haram.

“You know, when God sends you on a mission, he doesn’t say what conditions you will face when you go. He says, ‘Go, I’m sending you.’ He sent us to this people and we must accomplish our mission.

His Word For Every Generation.

Help Christians of all ages, in every generation, tell the wonders and word of God. Your gift will help to distribute Bibles and Scripture portions, run life-changing literacy classes, and transform lives through trauma support courses. biblesociety.org.au/allgenerations

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We are convinced that, with him, we will complete our mission, despite the actions of the enemy.”

Please pray for people traumatised by terrorist violence in Cameroon. And thank God for the generosity of our donors who give to “where needed most,” which enabled BSA to help provide for these precious women and their children in their time of great need.

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world” James 1:27. *Names changed for security reasons.

You can support Bible Society literacy programs in a range of countries at biblesociety.org.au

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OVERSEAS COUNCIL AUSTRALIA SPONSORED PAGE

How to train 10,000 new leaders for the growing church “This is a once in a generation opportunity!”

That’s how Rev Dr Stuart Brooking, head of Overseas Council Australia (OCA), sees the global pandemic.

COVID-19 has brought disruption, loss and trauma to every community around the globe, but a lesser-known impact is the massive change it has brought to theological education in the developing world.

“We are amazed at how God is working through this pandemic for good, amidst all of the difficulty and pain,” he said.

OCA is part of a global network of leading mission organisations (Overseas Council Network) facilitating the training of church leaders in the developing world.

Over the last few years, the OC Network has been discussing the advantages of online education with partner seminaries and church leaders.

Distance education has huge potential for training pastors and church planters, but Stuart had no expectation that seminaries and Bible colleges would be positioned to roll out online education quickly.

“If you had asked me before the pandemic how long it would be until the majority of evangelical colleges would have the capacity to do online education, I would have said, 15 or 20 years,” Stuart explained.

PANDEMIC CRISIS

Sherif Fahim recording a lecture at Alexandria School of Theology, Egypt.

Rev. Peterson from St Andrews College of Theology and Development Kabare, Kenya.

“There wasn’t the motivation, funding, or training to move faster.”

But then the pandemic hit and with it came the lockdowns.

And when the choice was to go online or stop teaching students, Stuart said, “15 to 20 years became 15 to 20 days!”

“The emergency online teaching wasn’t fulsome, creative online education. It was mostly ‘clunky zoom’!” he said.

But it allowed hundreds of thousands of trainee-pastors and local evangelists to keep learning.

“The pandemic gave everyone an impetus for growth—and the tools to do it better!” Stuart explained.

Overseas Council Australia has just launched Local Online: A Global Strategy.

Focusing on developing local capacity, local competence and local content, the strategy can massively increase the number of students studying theology

ONLINE OPPORTUNITY

Hundreds of thousands of pastors and church planters trained Over 200 key evangelical Bible colleges involved Pacific, Asia, Middle East, Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe

online and the quality of their training.

With the goal of equipping 10,000 new students over three years, Local Online will work with over 200 seminaries, key organisations and dozens of experts in education and theology from the developing world.

During the launch of the strategy, Stuart interviewed Dr Joanna Feliciano-Soberano, OC Network Director for South-East Asia. She said that in the past few months, seminaries in her region have seen that returning to ‘normal’ isn’t possible, but they have been unsure about the way forward.

“When I heard about Local Online, it was like a breath of fresh air,” she said. “We wished to move forward, and this is the way to do it.”

Learn more about Local Online: A Global Strategy by heading to overseascouncil.com.au and donate to help increase global theological education through online learning.

For more information and to donate, visit www.overseascouncil.com.au office@overseascouncil.com.au 02 9635 4409

OVERSEAS COUNCIL AUSTRALIA

CENTRE FOR PUBLIC CHRISTIANITY

Christmas and the life-changing magic of messy relationships Natasha Moore wishes you a happy Kondo.

Or maybe not.

‘And being a classic introvert, relational decluttering – streamlining my social life – has its appeal as well.’

Sometimes you come across a term you’ve never heard before but that makes instant, intuitive sense. That’s what happened to me recently when I stumbled on the phrase relationship minimalism.

We’re pretty familiar these days with minimalist movements. It’s a word we apply to art and music and architecture; but mostly now, what we talk about when we talk about minimalism is lifestyle.

The most visible icon of this streamlining trend is Marie Kondo, the Queen of Clean herself, author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up and currently to be found on Netflix. Marie Kondo is all about looking around at the stuff in your life, in your home, and asking: Does it spark joy? If you hold that pair of jeans close to your heart and feel … nothing, time to banish that sucker from your life.

It’s clutter. Life is too short to harbour things that do not spark joy.

Relationship minimalism seems to follow more or less this principle, but applied to people instead of t-shirts. A Guardian article earlier this year told the stories of a number of young people “who are not only eschewing excess material items, but also meaningless relationships and excess “emotional clutter”: “If their friendships are non-satisfactory, they declutter, opting for fewer but more quality relationships. If the city they live in no longer sparks joy, they move.”

At the same time, researchers and health professionals are over and over sounding the alarm about the “loneliness epidemic.” The Talking Loneliness report, a survey of Australians commissioned by Telstra, conducted by YouGov, and released just a few months ago, found that 9 out of 10 Australians experience loneliness, with 44 per cent of us saying we regularly feel lonely.

Twenty-four per cent of Aussies say they don’t feel they have anyone to talk to; 35 per cent rarely or never feel like they are part of a group of friends.

And of course, COVID only made things worse.

Twenty-seven per cent of those surveyed reported experiencing loneliness for the first time during the pandemic; unsurprisingly, 38 per cent said they have never felt lonelier than they did in lockdown.

Crises have a way of bringing to the surface things that have been bubbling away underneath for a while. I wonder how the experience of lockdown may sway the fortunes of relationship minimalism: has it clarified for us who the core people are in our lives, or convinced us of the importance of a wider, thicker web of relationships?

And being a classic introvert, relational decluttering – streamlining my social life – has its appeal. Long before COVID, I embraced the motto of the thirty-something introvert: the best plans are cancelled plans. Recently someone who knows me very well bought me a pin that reads: “Sorry I’m late, I didn’t want to come.”

But every now and then, I get the desire of my heart, and my busy schedule dies down a bit, and I love it … for about a day. I have reason to think I am not uniquely weird on this front – that others grapple with the same tension. Sally Rooney, the young Irish writer who has been called “the voice of a generation,” in her most recent novel Beautiful World, Where Are You, has a successful young novelist called Alice write to her oldest (and at this point, almost her only) friend Eileen about her own commitment allergy and her dissatisfaction, at the end of her 20s, with the life she finds herself leading: In public I’m always talking about care ethics and the value of human community, but in my real life I don’t take on the work of caring for anyone except myself. Who in the world relies on me for anything? No one. I can blame myself, and I do, but I also think the failure is general.

The voice of a generation … yet Rooney’s Alice could be riffing on a warning penned 60 years ago

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by C.S. Lewis, in his book The Four Loves: To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken.

If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.

Friendship is messy because people are messy.

It is a human instinct to want to withdraw from mess and entanglement – from the pain, and awkwardness, and frustration, and scary vulnerability that comes with relationship.

The story of Christmas – of the incarnation – is the story of how God looked at the mess that is his creation, the mess that is us, and instead of withdrawing (decluttering, shedding excess emotional baggage …), he moved towards the mess. He leaned into the mess so far as actually to become human himself! He chose entanglement.

He accepted the pain and suffering that come along with it; he accepted vulnerability. What more perfect picture of vulnerability, than a helpless newborn?

It’s the Christmas story, really, that clinches for me the case that optimising my friendships – relationship minimalism, extreme introverting – is not going to make my life smooth and sunny and fulfilling. It compels me to recognise the truth: that it’s out of the mess and entanglement, the being tied down and burdened by others, and being a burden to them, that something beautiful emerges.

I’ve got nothing against the life-changing magic of tidying up. But the gospel, and the experience of learning to live it out in a wonderfully messy church community, demonstrates to me daily the lifechanging magic of messy relationships.

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Think on these things: Michael Jensen on minding your mind

S

o, what do you think about? What fills your mind?

I don’t know about you, but so many things have filled my mind in these past few months. In the midst of a global catastrophe, it’s been impossible not to play out all the worst possible scenarios for the future. Turning on the news certainly doesn’t help; neither does my socialmedia feed.

In Philippians 4:8, Paul writes these memorable words: “Whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things …”

That’s a strong word “think about” – it means “contemplate” or “consider,” invest in and meditate upon. Fill your thoughts with.

Paul is not talking about abstract concepts here. It’s not as though he’s telling us to consider “honour” or “truth” or “justice” or “purity,” as ideas that float somewhere in the sky. He’s drawing our attention to “whatever” is, actually and really, these things; tangible and concrete instances of truth, honour, justice, purity, and so on.

We’re to find these things in the world in which we live – whatever is excellent or praiseworthy – and to give our minds to them.

Why is that? It’s because whenever we think about these things we will necessarily think of God and hope in Christ. When we contemplate those things that are true and honourable, just and pure, pleasing and commendable, we are reminded of (as my podcast partner Megan Powell du Toit put it) “our created intention and our future destiny.”

The world was created by God and he declared it to be very good. And although much of what we see now is hellish, we can also see that the goodness of the one who made it is still there.

And we are also reminded that we are expecting this world to be redeemed and transformed. And this is a key point: our salvation itself is not an escape from this world, but a transformation of it and us. Our heavenly citizenship is not a promise that we will we go to heaven, but rather that heaven will come to us. Jesus will not take us to another home after he has demolished this one, but transform this world – including us and our bodies – to be like his glorious, resurrected body.

And so: when we contemplate what is true and honourable and just and pure, we are looking at the things that anticipate the way everything will be. Just as the first buds of spring herald the full glory of summer, so the goodness of heaven is poking through and coming to life all around us.

All is not lost; however dark the night, the rays of the dawn announce the coming of the day!

The brilliant colours and the happy chatter of the rainbow lorikeets; the majesty of the Moreton Bay figs; the tingle of the cool surf on your skin;

the taste of truffles and cheese and wine and blueberries and rye bread and chilli and rare steak; the glint of the sun on the harbour; the power and drama of the Southerly Buster; the smell of a newborn baby; the beauty and resilience of the human body; the Sydney Symphony in full flight; the genius of Joern Utzon’s Opera House; the gifts of true friendship and human love; the extraordinary miracle of civic order that we enjoy: all of these are but a foretaste of what is to come.

They are still there from the creation, and they are messages from the future to us: this is the reign of Jesus breaking through. This is what’s coming, says Paul. And so, he says: notice them, think about them, concentrate upon them, cultivate them, invest in them. Understand them for what they are.

So, what do you think about? What fills your mind? Do you give your mind a chance to free itself from the shock and horror of the news, the way in which advertising infects you with envy, and the banality of much of modern culture? As never before in human history, our minds are under assault. We learn about sex from pornography and our ethics from reality TV. But what is pleasing and commendable, true and just? How can we tell? These categories do seem open wide. Paul doesn’t particularly give us any shape to them – though he is confident that these things are not just a matter of individual taste.

I do think he’s got something here. We too easily fall for the nonsense that there’s no objective truth, or that morality is only subjective.

What we learn from the Bible ought to be our reference point here to learn what is true and honourable and just and pure. The character of God as we learn it from Jesus, our humble Lord, is the measure. He is, after all, the truth; in him we see divine justice; we see and we receive true purity and holiness; we see the example of what is honourable and excellent and pleasing to God. Not only should those things that we think of remind us of Jesus, but it is thinking about Jesus that should give us the measure to know that what we are thinking on is truly beautiful, true and good.

He heals the woman with the flow of blood, the paralytic and the man born blind; he raises the widow’s son; he casts out the demons; he eats with tax collectors and sinners; he welcomes the little children; he teaches love for your enemies, and then loves his enemies by dying on the cross for our sins. He is the living model of whatever is true, honourable, just, pure, pleasing and commendable: think on him.

But don’t just sit there in contemplation! Not only are we to recognise the traces of the kingdom of heaven in the world; we’re called to underline them when we see them and to sketch new ones in. God is building a great new city; we are to start building it now – to find the pure and the just and the true and to make more of it.

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Michael Jensen is rector of St Mark’s Anglican Church Darling Point and the co-host of With All Due Respect.

Announcing the 2022 Season of Lectures

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Progressive Christian Communities (18 Jan) Economics and the Prosperity Gospel in Australia (27 Feb) Global Diversity of the Anglican Communion (27 Mar) Domestic Violence in the Church (31 Mar) Pastoral Dimensions of End-of-Life Care (3 May) Post-Holocaust Theology (15 May) Religion and Law (25 May) Ageing and Spirituality (19 June) Christian Women in Leadership (24 July) A Muslim’s View of Jesus & A Christian’s View of Muhammad (7 Aug) Poetry is Essential to the Human Spirit (28 Aug) Cancer and Divine Creation (4 Oct) Afterlives of Jesus (16 Oct) Islamophobia and the Christian Response (8 Nov)

ACT FOR PEACE SPONSORED PAGE

Share the joy of Christmas this year Once again, COVID-19 has disrupted the lives of most of us here in Australia this year. As is often the case, the impact was not felt evenly, with the poorest among us hit the hardest. As Christmas approaches, you can join with Christians across Australia to share God’s love with those who need it most through this year’s Christmas Bowl appeal.

“Through the Christmas Bowl we can come together as Christians and reach out to help people uprooted by conflict and disaster who are in urgent need of food, shelter, and lifesaving support, ” said Janet Cousens, CEO of Act for Peace, the international aid agency of the National Council of Churches in Australia.

In 2021, the pandemic has continued to have a devastating effect on so many communities around the world, especially the 82 million people uprooted from their homes by conflict or disaster, and the people caught up in the humanitarian crises caused by this year’s conflicts in Ethiopia, Myanmar, Gaza and the fall of Afghanistan.

The contrast between the relative abundance we enjoy here in Australia and the needs of uprooted people is even more obvious at this time of year, and the Christmas Bowl was born of the desire to redress the balance.

One of the longest standing Christmas appeals

More than 15 Christian denominations and 1200 churches across Australia are coming together this Christmas to share God’s love through the Christmas Bowl.

in Australia, the Christmas Bowl was established in 1949 by Rev Frank Byatt to raise money for refugees post World War Two. On Christmas Day that year, Frank put a Bowl of Remembrance on the dinner table and asked his family to place a gift inside to help those less fortunate than themselves.

The Christmas Bowl was born.

“The Christmas Bowl is needed as much now as ever. It enables us to actively express our unity in Christ, to share our faith through positive action and shine a light of hope into the darkness, ” Janet added.

At a time when the pandemic continues to have a devastating effect on so many communities

around the world, your generosity through the Christmas Bowl is a powerful demonstration of our support for uprooted people. In a world that often feels divided, Australian Christians can stand alongside those forced from their homes by conflict and disaster. Together, we can share the joy of Christmas and help build a world where all people have a safe place to belong,” said Janet.

Share God’s love this Christmas by giving through the Christmas Bowl and help provide people uprooted by conflict and disaster with the food, shelter, and lifesaving support they so urgently need: afp.org.au/christmasbowl

Esther and her children fled violent conflict in their home country. They walked for three days, without sleep, before arriving in Ethiopia. Esther has to care for her young daughter who is very ill, so is unable to work and earn an income.

“She can’t sit, can’t talk, can’t walk, just laying down, she can’t eat by her own hand.”

Martha Tadesse/Act for Peace

This year, conflict and COVID-19 have created a refugee crisis in Ethiopia, with more refugees and fewer resources available.

Martha Tadesse/Act for Peace

Esther* prays that one day her children will have a better life

Esther * was fo rced from her home country by violent co nflict.

Your gift will help our local partner, Development and Inter-Church Aid Commission, to support families like Esther’s with food, shelter and life-saving support.

Share God’s love this Christmas

Share Christmas

Share food, shelter and life-saving support with a refugee in Ethiopia this Christmas.

Visit afp.org.au/christmasbowl, call us on 1800 025 101 or scan the code. *Esther’s name has been changed for safety reasons.

The Christmas Bowl is the Christmas appeal of Act for Peace, the international aid agency of the National Council of Churches in Australia. ABN 86 619 970 188

Pl e a se give toda y