FOR HE IS OUR PEACE
EPHESIANS 2:14
LUTHERAN CHURCH OF AUSTRALIA
EDITORIAL
Editor Lisa McIntosh
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e lisa.mcintosh@lca.org.au
Executive Editor Linda Macqueen
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LUTHERAN CHURCH OF AUSTRALIA
The Lutheran informs the members of the LCANZ 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 and New Zealand.
There’s no place like Frome!
On his way to volunteering as part of the livestream team at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Adelaide, Peter Wong stopped at an office building around the corner for a quick look. The building at 139 Frome Street will become the LCANZ’s new Church House when the Churchwide Office and Australian Lutheran College staff relocate from North Adelaide sometime in 2025. It will also be the place for members of the church to visit, attend meetings, get information and resources – and perhaps even renew your subscription to The Lutheran!
Send us a photograph featuring a recent copy of The Lutheran and it may appear on page 2 of a future issue and on our website at www.thelutheran.com.au
People like YOU bring love to life
Judith-Anne Kleinschmidt (Hensel)
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Toowoomba Qld
Nurse, visitor to General Synod
Most treasured Bible text: Romans 8:38,39
‘For I am convinced that neither death nor life … nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.’
Neil Huth
Peace Lutheran Church Gatton Qld
Research scientist, lay delegate to General Synod, chairperson at Gatton
Most treasured Bible text: Micah 6:8
‘He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.’
Glenis Kupke
Tanunda Lutheran Home Congregation SA
Retired aged-care hostel supervisor; enjoys helping with music and PowerPoint during weekly services
Most treasured Bible text: Psalm 46:10a
‘Be still and know that I am God.’
Let the light of someone you know shine through their photo being featured in The Lutheran and LCA Facebook. With their permission, send us a good quality photo, their name and details (congregation, occupation and most treasured text) and your contact details.
‘Life is a puzzle. Find the missing peace.’ So said the signboard outside a church I drove past the other day. Clever, I thought. A timely prompt as life seems to become increasingly hectic in the lead-up to Christmas. That’s what we’re all longing for, isn’t it? A bit of peace?
Maybe peace is lacking in our family, in our relationships with friends, at work, or even in our congregation. Perhaps there is no peace in our heads or souls, due to things we’ve said or done or things that have been said or done to us.
Or perhaps it’s all the noise – literal and figurative – that is the peace-killer in our world right now. The blaring announcements from our TVs, social media feeds and emails about ‘Black Friday’ sales (we don’t even have Thanksgiving here – how on earth did we get Black Friday sales?). Children stacking on a turn in the shops when Mum or Dad dares to say ‘No!’ to buying the toy every kid ‘needs’. Rage on the roads and in carparks. Too much work with too little time and too few resources to get it done ...
Oh, for some peace and quiet.
If we can find that missing peace, everything else will fall into place. The pieces will fit together, and we’ll see the big picture.
The signboard outside that church didn’t say where we’d find that ‘missing peace’, but we know, don’t we, even if we need reminding? We can find it in the word of God and in the Word of God. Jesus is the missing piece and the missing peace in our lives. And he’s ready to perfectly fill the hole in our hearts, making us whole again.
Yes, the quest for real peace all comes back to that baby born in Bethlehem. The true meaning of Christmas, the greatest gift: real joy, real grace, real love and real peace, all wrapped up in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger. Contrast that with the world’s view of peace, as depicted by the universal symbols on our cover. Real peace is far more powerful than the laying down of weapons or warheads.
In this edition, we are privileged to share stories from across our church about the power of this real peace in our lives, in our churches and even as we face death. I hope you will be blessed by reading them. You’ll also notice a new-look resources section, now called Congregational Life, which is designed to share with you some of the vast array of helps found on the new web hub of the same name (www.lca.org.au/clh).
As this is the last edition for 2024, I would like to thank you, our readers, subscribers and group collectors for your support. My gratitude goes, too, to our wonderful team – Linda Macqueen (executive editor), Elysia McEwen (graphic designer), columnists Helen Brinkman and Bishop Paul Smith; proofreaders Lyall Kupke and Kathy Gaff; LCA Communications colleagues Elise Mattiske and Beth Marsh; Lyndal Fuller and Harry Phan for their help with subscription administration; and Trevor Bailey and all at Openbook Howden.
Have a safe, blessed and peace-filled Christmas,
What is real peace?
The path of peace –an Advent reflection
Restoring peace in our churches
Reconciling through shared stories
Peace beyond reason
80 years of sharing hope
Out of the mouths of babes …
Because we bear your name: Bishop Paul’s letter
in God’s word
Go and Grow)
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that the following pages may contain images of people who have died. Our cover: iStock.com. Montage artwork by Elysia McEwen
BISHOP PAUL’S LETTER Because we bear your name
‘Joy, O joy, beyond all gladness!’ These are astounding and inspiring words from the rarely sung chorus of the Christmas hymn in our Lutheran Hymnal and Supplement (LHS) 32, written by 17th-century hymnwriter Christian Keymann.
The good news of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ is deeper and lasting beyond simply happy feelings. The angel told the Bethlehem shepherds, ‘I bring you good news of great joy!’ The telling of the nativity story is great joy. God has become enfleshed and dwelt among us out of great love for all humankind.
This story began with God’s promise at the dawn of time, to send a saviour to ‘strike the head’ of the serpent. At Christmastime, we remind each other that the promise unfolds in the story of the manger and the cross. God will bring about that exchange of our sin for the righteousness of the sinless Son of God so that we would have peace with God. This is the good news of great joy!
The chorus of Keymann’s hymn continues, ‘Christ has done away with sadness. Hence, all sorrow and repining, for the sun of grace is shining’.
rising ‘with healing in its wings’. This image is also sung in the well-loved carol, ‘Hark! The herald angels sing’ (LHS 33).
As people of grace, the people of our Lutheran Church have been walking as sisters and brothers in Christ in the light of the ‘sun of grace’. We have travelled through 2024, during which our General Pastors’ Conference and Convention of General Synod met, and we resolved to remove our prohibition that required the ordination of only men as pastors in our church. We also resolved to continue as one church in which both the ordination of men only and the ordination of both women and men are received as faithful understandings of the word of God.
THE TELLING OF THE NATIVITY STORY IS GREAT JOY.
This does not mean Christians are free from feelings of sadness, sorrow or struggle. Rather, this ‘good news of great joy’ of the coming of Christ means that, whatever we experience or whatever comes our way, we walk as people of grace in the light of the gospel. Because of the manger and the cross, we know God is with us. Because of Christ Jesus, we know God is for us.
With this sure promise of grace over us, before us and within us, we come to God with complete confidence with all our weariness and heaviness. We join with the psalmist, praying: ‘Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.’
The hymn’s image of the ‘sun of grace shining’ draws on another biblical promise spoken by the prophet Malachi where, in chapter 4, we read of the ‘sun of righteousness’
As we work through these things together as sisters and brothers in Christ, the words of Keymann remind us of the sure promises of God in all circumstances. We are people of the gospel who are given hope in what our Lord Christ Jesus has done for us: ‘Joy, O Joy beyond all gladness, Christ has done away with sadness.’
As we prepare for Christmas festivities, we know that around us are people who do not know or have forgotten the joy of salvation.
As the shepherds left their flocks to ‘make known’ what had been ‘told them about the child’, may the Lord give us the opportunity to give a good account to family, friends and neighbours of the Christmas hope and joy within us.
Keymann’s hymn ends with a beautiful and hopeful prayer:
Praise the Lord!
In Christ, ‘Jesus, guard and guide Thy members, Fill Thy brethren with Thy grace, Hear their prayers in every place Quicken now life’s faintest embers; Grant all Christians, far and near, Holy peace, a glad new year. Joy, O joy, beyond all gladness! Christ has done away with sadness. Hence, all sorrow and repining, For the sun of grace is shining.’
REV PAUL SMITH Bishop, Lutheran Church of Australia and New Zealand
