THE LUTHERAN December 2014

Print Post Approved PP100003514 VOL 48 NO11

DECEMBER 2014

NATIONAL MAGAZINE OF THE LUTHERAN CHURCH OF AUSTRALIA

A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. [Isaiah 11:1]

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Front cover: Peter Voigt holds a figure of the risen Christ (story begins page 5). Photo: Rosie Schefe EDITOR/ADVERTISING phone 0427 827 441 email rosie.schefe@lca.org.au

IN THE STEPS OF PAUL

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www.thelutheran.com.au We Love The Lutheran!

Janet and Grant Kowald, members of Good Shepherd, Para Vista SA, read The Lutheran at the ancient city of Ephesus in Turkey. The theatre shown in the background (with seating for 25,000 people) was the scene of a riot by silversmiths who were angry at Paul’s preaching (Acts 19:23-41).

As the magazine of the Lutheran Church of Australia (incorporating the Lutheran Church of New Zealand), The Lutheran informs the members of the LCA about the church’s teaching, life, mission and people, helping them to grow in faith and commitment to Jesus Christ. The Lutheran also provides a forum for a range of opinions, which do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editor or the policies of the Lutheran Church of Australia. The Lutheran is a member of the Australasian Religious Press Association and as such subscribes to its journalistic and editorial codes of conduct.

Photo: Dianne Ollino Send us a photograph featuring a recent copy of The Lutheran and you might see it here on page 2.

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CONTACTS Editor Rosie Schefe 197 Archer St, North Adelaide SA 5006 phone 0427 827 441 email rosie.schefe@lca.org.au Executive Editor Linda Macqueen 3 Orvieto St, Bridgewater SA 5155 phone 08 8339 5178 email linda.macqueen@lca.org.au

People like you are salt in your world [ Matt 5:13 ]

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Denis Clarke

Rob Jaeschke

Pearl Weier

Faith College, Redlands Qld Teacher Enjoys mission work in Vanuatu and eating pavlova Fav text: Jeremiah 29:11

St Paul’s, Clare SA Farmer Enjoys the outdoors, nature and exploring local history Fav text: Romans 1:20

Grace, Clontarf Qld Retired Enjoys volunteering and indoor bowls Fav text: Psalm 37:7

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I love the subtleties of language.

So many shades of meaning can be expressed through the choice of different words or combinations of words into phrases.

The choices we make reflect our culture and mindset very powerfully. We can choose our words with care or we can babble, letting our prejudices and background assumptions tumble out of our mouths, almost without us thinking about what we’re saying.

With Christmas so near and the traditional advertising blitz ramping up, I have two words rolling around in my head as I work on this issue of the magazine. They’ve been there for a while now, since this issue began taking shape in about September. I’m thinking about the difference between the two nouns ‘present’ and ‘gift’, and the ways we use them.

I’m not about to bore you with dictionary definitions or reach for the thesaurus. I just ask you to look at those two words and think about what they mean to you.

FEATURES 05 In the steps of the Carpenter 09 The turn of the tide

05 09

‘Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows’, James 1:17 says. There’s a world contained in that verse, and substituting ‘present’ for ‘gift’ just won’t cut it—should anyone be tempted. Somehow that world disappears, then, and we are much, much poorer.

In a time when the world is busy buying and wrapping presents, stop for a while and think about the gifts we receive or share or that we ourselves give. Think about the very gift of life and a place to live it. Gifts of unique talents and self-expression that make us human.

The gift of hospitality and the importance of seeing humanity in people who seem so different from us. The gift of praise and of new beginnings. The gift of sacrifice for the blessing of others. The gift of the Christ-child. You’ll encounter all of them in these pages.

Ach! Who needs presents?

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24 The other LLL 26 The boredom busters

COLUMNS 04 Heartland 08 Reel Life 15 Inside Story

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For me, a present is very much part of the material world. We are invited to a wedding and we rack our brains for an appropriate present. Birthday party to go to? What do we have stashed away in the cupboard for last-minute present-giving emergencies? And then there’s Christmas, when (too often) the pile of pretty boxes beneath the tree becomes the measure against which love is weighed.

Gifts are different. They are much less tangible and they don’t always come dressed in wrapping paper. Gifts are often unexpected, but they are always personal, no matter who the giver might be. Gifts are given, but just as often gifts are meant to be shared. They are precious, requiring the giver to sacrifice some part of themselves or a portion of their wealth.

12 Celebrate

18 Letters 19 Directory 20 Stepping Stones 22 Notices 23 Little Church 27 Bookmarks 30 Bring Jesus 32 World in Brief

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34 Coffee Break

‘Climate change is not the earth’s problem. It’s been through worse, and it will survive. Climate change is our problem, and the question is: will we survive?’

Whatever our opinion about climate change, we constantly hear about it. To tax or not to tax? To emit or not to emit? These are the questions. The scientific, economic and political arguments go on.

Ordinary people like you and me talk nervously about the weather when we gather after church. We don’t know where all of this will end.

Christians know that the earth is a good gift from God. In the beginning, he gave it to us as a place to live, and he told us to be careful with it. ‘The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it’ (Genesis 2:15).

That was a long time ago. Since then, sin has come along. Things aren’t what they once were, but God’s command still stands. He set a high standard when he asked Adam to care for the earth. We are accountable to God for how we use its wealth. Jesus said, ‘Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?’ (Luke 16:10,11).

Over the last century, and particularly since the Great Depression of the 1930s, our society has relied on economic theory for its prosperity.

Some days it’s all we seem to hear about. Exchange rates, commodity prices and share market reports bewilder us with their complexity.

Graphs must always trend upwards in a spiral of continuous growth. In the flurry of anxiety and speculation we forget Job’s lesson: ‘Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord’ (Job 1:21). The newfound fragility of the climate and the complexity this creates reminds us how true that is.

Even if the resources pit were bottomless and we could burn fossil fuels until the cows came home, we should still want to care for and nurture the earth. It’s a test of our

faithfulness. We can use the earth’s resources for good, to grow and develop our societies. We are not free to gouge, exploit or pillage. The earth is a sacred trust, but the gift has its limits.

Even if the resources pit were bottomless and we could burn fossil fuels until the cows came home, we should still want to care for and nurture the earth The quote at the beginning of this column (which I heard recently on television) is only partly right. There is a bigger picture: ‘The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it’ (Psalm 24:1). Our moral and ethical approach to the earth comes from God’s command and the love he shows us in letting us live here and providing all we need for our enjoyment and survival.

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Photos: Rosie Schefe

Traditional materials and traditional skills point to the greatest story of all time

In the steps of the Carpenter It’s not yet mid-morning, but already a hot sun beats out of the white-blue sky, bouncing around the farmyard and making the long, bleached grass even drier.

Inside the century-old barn things are cooler, the light is diffused and the fine coat of sawdust which covers almost everything somehow blurs hard edges away. The stone walls reduce the outside wind to a gentle breeze in here, making it a pleasant place to sit and think or talk.

This is the Woodenmind workshop, on a seemingly remote farm that is not really so far from the small South Australian town of Eudunda, in the hills dividing the Barossa Valley from the Murray Plains.

Carpenter Peter Voigt, who has owned this farm for nearly 20 years—almost as long as he’s been a cabinet-maker— describes the farm itself as ‘an excuse Vol 48 No11 P335

by Rosie Schefe

not to work’. In the workshop, though, it is obvious that plenty of work is going on.

A computer-guided router and its associated dust-collector hum away at one end, occasionally changing pitch as the drill hits resistance in the piece of wood it is transforming into a series of figures. Peter himself sits on a chair, quietly talking to me, his words accompanied by the constant scratch of sandpaper over wood as he smooths the curves of the object in his fingers.

Nearby, tables and shelves are filled with similar figures in various stages of completion—from fresh off the router to partly or almost fully sanded. Each one has been lovingly sanded by hand; the curving, rounded shapes offer few opportunities for using machine-made short cuts.

Peter is making the figures for a nativity set. Each set comprises fourteen pieces: the baby Jesus and the manger;

Mary, Joseph, a shepherd, sheep, lamb and cow; a donkey, a camel and three wise men. The final—and largest—figure is the risen Christ.

No precious, high-shelf keepsake this.

These figures are made to touch, to play with, to pick up and move about.

No precious, high-shelf keepsake this.

These figures are made to touch, to play with, to pick up and move about.

They are robust and solid, finished with a skin-friendly coat of beeswax and The Lutheran December 2014

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While it appears that Peter is on his own here, reality is different. The whole Voigt family helps out in different ways.

Peter’s wife Carol is a layworker at a Barossa Lutheran church by day, but in the evenings she helps out with orders, packaging and invoicing. And with all that sanding to do, regular Voigt family movie nights always include sandpapering of figures.

Two carpenters, father and son— sharing their gift and creating a lasting treasure

It was a search for something meaningful and creative—beyond cabinets and benchtops—that put Peter and his 20-year-old son Paul on this path. A skilled carpenter himself, Paul had followed his dad into the business, but something was making him restless, making him wonder whether there was another way he could use his hands in God’s service.

The year was 2012. The Bethany-Tabor parish in Tanunda, South Australia, was awarded a $20,000 District Mission Stimulus Grant from LLL in order to develop its baptismal outreach and Godly Play ministries. Bethany-Tabor’s Godly Play coordinator Shannon Schuster was looking for someone

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The Lutheran December 2014

Photos: Rosie Schefe

It was a search for something meaningful and creative ... making him wonder whether there was another way he could use his hands in God’s service

Photo: courtesy Shannon Schuster

non-toxic oils (kind to tummies, should the figures ever be taste-tested).

Top: Paul (left) and Peter Voigt have found a way to turn their carpentry skills into a ministry pointing others towards God. Above left: Hours of sanding by hand ensure that every figure is rounded and smooth to the touch. Above right: Everyone who visits gets a job: Shannon Schuster applies a final polish of beeswax and non-toxic oils to a prayer cross. who could make the many high-quality wooden materials that she needed in order to stock her baptism boxes and— even more importantly—to use for telling Bible stories in Godly Play sessions.

The biggest problem for Shannon (and all the other Godly Play coordinators around Australia) at the time was finding locally made, appropriate wooden storytelling figures. While the figures are

available for import from overseas, this is expensive and, because of the organic nature of the product, a lengthy process.

Enter Paul—and, by extension, Peter.

Recognising Paul’s talent with wood, Shannon was keen to use the Voigts’ skills to develop materials that were easier to access, fulfilled the needs of storytellers and honoured the aims of Godly Play.

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Since then, Paul and now Peter have spent a great deal of time refining designs with Shannon. They have seen how she uses the wooden figures to tell stories and also how children react to them. Many children are able to retell the story almost immediately after hearing it for the first time.

The nativity figures Peter is working on are of his own design. The sheep and lamb clearly have Merino heritage, like those outside in the paddocks, while the camel is purely an invention. ‘He somehow belongs’, Peter says. (He recalls taking the family to see their first camel. It charged and kicked their car, and that experience is now reflected in every set he makes.)

Paul is away at the moment, serving God by working for a few months in Christian camping ministry in the United States. While he’s away, Peter sits, sanding, in the workshop and reflecting on the blessings that have flowed from this change in direction. ‘I’m blessed’, he says simply. ‘Blessed to have my own business and my family involved in it. Blessed to have a Shannon in my life as well, to tell me what to do!’

Two carpenters, father and son— sharing their gift and creating a lasting treasure that can bless the next generation and those to come with the story of love incarnate.

A GIFT FOR THE AGES

by Shannon Schuster

WHY ARE RITUALS AND TRADITIONS SO IMPORTANT TO FAMILIES? So many of our ‘favourite childhood memories’ are of family holidays and occasions repeated over and over again: good smells, good feelings, good times. Children and adults alike find comfort in knowing that something is going to happen that they will enjoy.

Traditions and rituals form the building blocks of strong, caring, happy families. Because they are planned, they help us to spend time together without the normal daily distractions. Since we are often rushed, they help us to centre family life and make sure that we do the things that we really value.

Think of birthdays and Christmas: we make the effort to honour family members on their birthdays by taking the time to celebrate them.

Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year, but we take time to plan Christmas lunch and spend time with the family. For some families this may be the one time of the year that they worship God with the people they love most, together in one place.

What Christmas rituals are you passing on to your children or grandchildren? In all the busyness, are you taking the time to slow down and focus on the greatest gift that we have been given—the incarnation of the Son of God as a human baby?

Do you need help to introduce some new Christ-focused activities into the life of your family or church? The Grow Ministries GIFT package is now available, including the Godly Play Advent story and other ideas.

Who knows which of these will become a part of your own family’s treasured Advent or Christmas tradition?

Shannon Schuster is resource coordinator for Grow Ministries (LCA Board for Child, Youth and Family Ministry). She is also a Godly Play storyteller and coordinator of this ministry in the Bethany-Tabor parish, Tanunda, SA.

Photo: courtesy Shannon Schuster

To find out more about the Advent GIFT package, contact Grow Ministries on 08 8267 7300 or email growministries@lca.org.au To find out more about Woodenmind and to purchase a nativity set, contact the Voigt family at pcvoigt@activ8.net.au or Carol on 0499 251 244.

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Which story?

Exodus: gods and kings represents a revival of the ‘Golden Age’ of Hollywood, when Bible stories were turned into action thrillers for the masses. But viewers might ask whether director Ridley Scott has resurrected these characters for a different story entirely.

EXODUS: GODS AND KINGS Rating: M Distributor: Fox Release date: December 2014

Taking a leaf from Prince of Egypt, the film discovers Christian Bale as an adopted son, a member of the Pharaoh’s royal household. Joel Edgerton plays Ramses, his headstrong stepbrother— heir to the throne, and eventual oppressor of 400,000 Hebrew slaves.

Motivated by a distaste for slavery, Moses struggles to ease their suffering.

However, in the process he discovers they are his true people and becomes a willing tool for the hand of God. But it will take a combination of divine power and the courage of this son of a slave if the Israelites are ever to go free.

Thrilling? Undoubtedly. However, the problem that arises is one of ‘Chess Games’ and ‘Life Lessons’.

Let me explain.

Scriptwriters are some of the best recyclers in the business. Even the most inventive plot lines are based on archetypes that were old when Homer was still wondering what Achilles would do next. Broadly speaking, there are only three stories: the Quest, the Chess Game and the Life Lesson. In Quest stories the hero is driven by one simple desire: to get something. Whatever the goal, the hero’s quest involves doing everything he can to reach it. But Exodus is much more concerned with the next two.

Comments on contemporary culture

by Mark Hadley

The second plot grand-daddy is the Chess Game, a story of the battle between an evenly matched or overmatched hero and his nemesis. It’s a case of move and countermove until a winner finally emerges. This is the natural home of Scott’s Moses and Ramses: Ramses: You’re listening to Hebrews!

Moses: I’m listening to God!

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Ramses: Whose god?

Moses pleads with Ramses to put aside pride, but, given his stepbrother is himself a ‘god’, that’s not very likely.

This collision course leads to a series of dramatic plays that pit armies against plagues and chariot charges against miracles. The Chess Game does more than measure the skill of each opponent; it demonstrates their characters and underlines their right to triumph. By the end of Exodus: gods and kings there’s no doubt that God was right to choose Moses as his champion. But has something far more fundamental been missed? Is Scott telling the wrong type of story?

This is where the third story archetype comes in: the Life Lesson. This is the category into which the Bible’s version of Exodus falls. God instructs his people to tell and re-tell the story of their deliverance. He even creates an annual festival for them to celebrate, so that they will remember the lesson behind the events: ‘I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians’ (Exodus 6:7).

The Exodus story is no more about Moses than it is about Ramses. Both were raised up by God, so that his glory would be displayed. This is not a Chess Game between two brothers inspired by different goals; it’s a Life Lesson about the faithfulness of God and his power to make all of his promises come true.

If Exodus: gods and kings does teach a lesson, it’s that men and women should not place themselves in God’s seat. However, that is equally as true for Scott’s Moses as it is for Pharaoh—and for us. God is not an adjunct to our own epics. Difficult times do not arise so that we can shine, but so that the glory of God can shine brighter. The sooner we realise this, the sooner we come to him for the deliverance we really need.

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‘Only God knows what will happen next …’

The turn of the tide

by Rebecka Colldunberg

In 1954 a young Vietnamese man, among thousands of others, lost his life battling for the independence of his country. His son was born soon after.

The soundtrack of this boy’s childhood and adolescence was gunshots, rocket fire and screams. Screams—blood and death accompanying them—from the enemy, from strangers and, on many occasions, from his own family and friends.

This was life for the young man, his daily reality. But although he had experienced no other way of living, he knew this way was wrong and that life should be different.

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In 1954 a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed seven-year-old boy roamed his parents’ South Australian farm. The soundtrack of his childhood and adolescence was the happy clatter and chatter of farm life, laughter and church bells. This was life for this young man, his daily reality.

But although he had experienced no other way of living, he knew he was blessed to have this life and that there were people in the world not so blessed. He wanted life to be different for them.

hopes, faith and desire for all people to live in a better, safer world.

God blesses his people with the commandment to welcome strangers

Both young men met and married amazing women, who complemented their souls and shared their dreams,

Saigon fell to the Communists in April 1975. In 1977 newlyweds Hieu and Lan

In 1977 the paths of these two families crossed in a meeting that changed their lives.

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Rarely do we risk stepping out of our comfort zone But survive they did. When, weary and battered, they entered Australian waters, the asylum seekers were met by an unlikely ‘Lady Liberty’ in Aussie form—two fishermen in a tinny, who raised their stubbies to the decrepit little boat and shouted, ‘G’day mates!

Welcome to Australia!’

When their feet finally touched the soft sand of a Darwin beach, Hieu and Lan were utterly exhausted and felt as ragged as they looked. But they were excited and filled with hope at the prospect of the new life that lay before them.

Ken and Daphne Schwarz were a young couple living on a serene citrus and wine-grape property near Bookpurnong in the Riverland region of South Australia and worshipping at the local Pilgrims of Zion Lutheran Church. They had experienced their share of life’s bumps. Ken had seen active service in Vietnam. Daphne had longed to have children, but the nest had remained empty. God works in wonderful ways, though. By 1977 Ken and Daphne were parents to a beautiful Sri Lankan orphan, a little girl called Prear. (Two more Sri Lankan orphans 10

The Lutheran December 2014

Photo: personal collection

made the most difficult decision of their lives. They fled from their home and loved ones to seek refuge in a country they had only heard about. This was not the honeymoon of dreams. They endured the squalor of refugee camps and fled from an erupting volcano.

Then, squeezed into a leaky boat on the open, unpredictable expanse of ocean with 50 other desperate souls, they weathered terrifying storms and monsoonal downpours. More often than not they accepted what they thought was the inevitable … that they would not survive.

Ken and Daphne got to know Hieu and Lan over Christmas 1977, when they hosted the two refugees in the Riverland for several weeks. later joined their brood: a little boy, Simon, and a baby girl, Malini.)

It’s now the end of November 1977.

Christmas is creeping up. Daphne puts Prear down for her afternoon rest. Seeking a little respite, she turns on the radio. An announcement begins. The voice—cool and calm, gentle—invites Australian families to welcome Vietnamese refugees into their homes over the Christmas period.

The voice implores listeners to show the Australian hospitality these people deserve after the harrowing years they had endured. The voice speaks directly to Daphne’s heart.

Tingles of excitement bubble inside the young mother. As soon as Ken returns from the orchard, she enthusiastically tells him about the program. Within minutes they agree to welcome a refugee into their family.

‘Daphne said that we could only take one person because we really only had one unfurnished room to spare’, Ken says, remembering the detail as though it were yesterday. ‘But they called us back and asked whether we could stretch to three people. They wanted to send us one young man and

a married couple. The three of them had been together on the long sea voyage and they didn’t want to have them separated.’

The program organisers had tapped the Achilles heel of the Riverland couple.

Daphne and Ken found it hard to say no to a soul in need. So they dug out a spare mattress and welcomed their three guests: Hieu and his wife Lan and another young man called Chieu.

‘Until they came to us, they had been staying at a hostel in Pennington [South Australia]’, Ken continues, his soft voice gently rising, indicating a good anecdote coming. ‘I will never forget what Hieu and Chieu did one morning when they woke up at our place. They ran out into the citrus orchard and shouted at the top of their lungs, “We’re free!”.’

What follows is a very happy Christmas for the young family and their new friends. They spend Christmas Eve at the Lutheran church in Bookpurnong and talk long into the night. ‘Hieu told me about his hopes and dreams’, Daphne says. ‘He wanted to go to university. He wanted to work hard and make a success of his life.’

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Photo: courtesy Daphne Schwarz

Above right: 2007: Ken Schwarz (left) and Daphne Schwarz (right) join Lan Le and Hieu Van Le (standing) to celebrate Hieu’s swearing in as Lieutenant-Governor of South Australia. The Schwarzes were again personal guests in September when he was sworn in as the 35th Governor of South Australia.

The three refugees stay at the orchard for several weeks, enjoying the company of Ken and Daphne and earning their first Australian pay cheques by doing some citrus harvesting and apricot cutting. Then they are gone.

You never know when you might be helping an angel And that’s the end of the story.

‘Big deal’, you might say. ‘So they had a couple of people stay for a couple of weeks. Big deal!’

On the surface it doesn’t seem like much. It seems like the most natural thing in the world to do. In Deuteronomy, God blesses his people with the commandment to welcome strangers, reminding them that they themselves had been strangers in a foreign country, Egypt.

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The reality is, though, that very few of us actually do welcome strangers. We welcome friends, we welcome family … but rarely do we risk stepping out of our comfort zone to welcome strangers.

After all, there might be that most dreaded of social occurrences—an awkward silence.

Ken and Daphne didn’t change the world, but through their love and hospitality they showed three strangers that to them they were not ‘boat people’ but people—people like everyone else, who could hope, dream and achieve.

In a world where many people, including Christians, rarely welcome the stranger, what Ken and Daphne did is a big deal.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT 1 September 2014. At the Adelaide Convention Centre, South Australia’s 35th governor is about to be sworn in. In the front row, seated with dignitaries of high office, are Ken and Daphne Schwarz, citrus farmers from Bookpurnong. They are personal guests of the governor-elect himself …

Hieu Van Le.

He had never forgotten them.

His Excellency the Honourable Hieu Van Le leads with compassion and strives to give back to the people of South Australia what they gave to him all those years ago.

Ken and Daphne continue to do what they do best: care for others. They are raising their granddaughter Mikaela and are often found carrying orphaned joeys around in pouches. They have dined at Government House as honoured guests but remain as humble as ever. They take no credit for the kindnesses they offer others.

‘God is totally involved in every part of our lives. He uses us to do his work here on earth’, Daphne says. ‘After all, you never know when you might be helping an angel.’

So, is this the end of the story?

Daphne smiles softly, ‘Only God knows what will happen next’.

Rebecka Colldunberg is mother to Tevye, Rivka and Avrum and wife to Adam. She runs a noisy Brisbane household of fun and frivolity.

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