Category: Musing

Why die, why rise?

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This is my take on connecting with our community this Easter.

‘Christian tradition, pagan festival, money-making exercise… what exactly is Easter?

If it is about someone dying on a cross, and rising from the dead, why?

If it is supposed to have something to do with me, why? If it is supposed to change the world, why?

Easter 2010 at Eternity Christian Church is an opportunity for asking and answering questions; for reflecting, belonging and celebrating.

You may leave with as many questions as you came with or you might just feel you found something…’

The painting is by Canberra artist Ben Sherwood who did this pastel on cardboard piece in about 30 minutes during an Easter service at Newtown Neighbourhood Centre quite a few years ago (if your out there somewhere Ben, drop me a line!) It now hangs in our church and is one of our favourite works of art.

We borrowed the Good Friday Candlelight Service idea from a church in Port Macquarie (saw their posters one year) and it works nicely with the quieter, reflective feel of Good Friday.

Anyway, beyond all the ideas, the spin, the occasion – we really do long to see the mystery of His cross and resurrection undone in our own hearts and for others too.  PH

Easter symbolism ‘abounds’ in Sydney

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As we approach Easter Holy Week it is no surprise that even secular Sydney is abounding in religious symbolism.

Taking pride of place in Martin Place, resplendent in gold and several metres high, is the well-known pagan symbol for fertility, the rabbit.

Alongside this touching symbol, I’m sure I caught a glimpse of the post-modern symbol for significance, the $. Of course we are well accustomed to finding this crafty, curly symbol lurking somewhere around ancient Christian festivals.

Mmm… Must be time for a hot cross bun. I wonder what this cross business is all about? PH

Utterance 2000 times and not counting

Peter Hallett3 Comments

Utterance, an attempt to encourage reflective pauses and thoughtful communication, has just recorded 2000 visits – not including my own!

This may be a result of family and friends visiting the site 20 times a day, but hopefully it is an indication that an invisible community of people have been connecting and finding something here that enriches their day.

Utterance is a conglomeration of creative expression, timely information, spiritual devotional, critical comment and reflective observation and half the time, I don’t know which is going to come next.

And then there is the side-bar… glowing with widgets, I wonder if you noticed, that among all the ways you can search or subscribe,  it feeds news from Christianity Today and shows Utterance on Twitter – Twutterance – although I’m yet to find time to get this moving regularly.

As to where this is heading, the best part is not knowing. PH

Growing through serving

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Often our greatest growth comes in the act of serving because the act of serving exposes our greatest vulnerabilities.

Whether these are fear, frustration, impatience, weariness, anger, pride or apathy – once exposed, we have a powerful moment of clarity in which to give our weakness to God and allow him to teach and counsel us.

If we hadn’t served – forcing ourselves to be stretched by circumstance, sandpapered by people and sifted by our own emotions – we might have never realised our need, and remained unchanged.

As we approach Easter we recall two friends of Jesus whose vulnerabilities were shockingly exposed as they served and followed their Master. One acknowledged his grief and drew close to his companions, putting himself in reach of resurrected restoration. The other hated himself and withdrew in shame, positioning himself for self-destruction.

Whether sitting in a conference or working on the streets, both moments present an opportunity to take in and give out. If we make it either/or, we have already stalled our growth. PH

No growth without change

Peter Hallett1 Comment

Growth is change
              in a positive direction
                         towards Christlikeness
                                we won’t grow if we won’t change.

Change involves continuing to let go of wrongdoing (repentance).
Change involves continuing to let go of hurt and blame (forgiveness).
Change involves continuing to renew our mind with God’s word (learning).
Change involves continuing to enlarge capacity through the Spirit (experiencing).
Change involves continuing to surrender all to the will of God (Lordship).
Change involves continuing to take responsibility for life (self-control).

Obstacles to growth/change include:

  • Failure to decide and commit – we must be intentional about growth
  • Ongoing criticism and judgement – our critical spirit locks us into forced superiority
  • Low self-esteem and pride –   they both say, ‘I can’t be better’ but for different reasons
  • Laziness – we want the benefit but won’t pay the price; we won’t it now or not at all
  • Depression – a loss of the any sense of possibilities. Begin with the small things
  • Being ruled by our emotions – our desire to grow may waiver but the need remains

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life. Gal 6:4-5 TMB

The unspiritual self, just as it is by nature, can’t receive the gifts of God’s Spirit. There’s no capacity for them. They seem like so much silliness. Spirit can be known only by spirit—God’s Spirit and our spirits in open communion. 1 Corinthians 2:14 TMB

Possessed by our possesions

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‘Anything you cannot relinquish when it has outlived its usefulness possesses you. And in this materialistic age, a great many of us are possessed by our possessions’. Mildred Lisette Norman courtesy of Criminal Minds.

‘You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor…then come follow me.’ Jesus courtesy of Mark’s Gospel, Ch 10:vs 21

Confronting comfort

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Comfort: – verb 1. to soothe, console, or reassure; bring cheer to. 2. to make physically comfortable. 3. to aid; support or encourage.

To truly bring comfort to the discomforted, we are almost certain to be rendered uncomfortable. No wonder the Holy Spirit is called the Comforter. Rather than comfort ourselves, we comfort others making room for the Spirit to comfort us with an everlasting comfort. PH

The only way out is…

Peter Hallett5 Comments

See the long-haired, drug dealing/using skinny man with the bad teeth and flared jeans? That’s the one. With the plate of food covered in pepper. You have his measure and feel confident that your approach to life is superior.

As you share a few of your own struggles, though, he smiles, and kindly says: “The only way out is up.” And you realise that you don’t have a mortgage on faith and goodness.

See the neatly dressed older man who sits alone? The one who keeps to himself but is quick to lend a practical hand and quietly admits to you that he is a [reformed – that is, constantly battling] alcoholic.

Overhearing some of your challenges he too offers comfort: “I’ve learned over the years that whenever you attempt something for God, he looks after it.” And you wonder how you, with so much, have chosen to ignore this gracious truth.

“Now there lived in that city a man poor but wise, and he saved the city by his wisdom. But nobody remembered that  poor man.” Ecclesiastes 9:15

Red castanets and other amazing things

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Yesterday my father lay in intensive care having come through a long and delicate operation to remove a tumour on his spine and to repair the damaged vertebrae. With wires and tubes protruding everywhere, and a neck brace surrounding his head, he raised his eyes and in his post-surgery  voice said, “He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities… and by His stripes we are healed. Thank you, Father. You know its amazing that this God of ours is called Father.” And tears came to his eyes as he contemplated the love of God. Faith well in tact I’d say…

Today as I walked through Leichhardt I came across an old man, grey hair and beard, skinny legs protruding from crumpled shorts, walking with stilted step. He gazed around with a slightly bewildered look and with each step he shook a bright red castanet. As I continued down Leichhardt St, I could hear the regular shake of the castanet as he slowly followed my path. Strange? Perhaps. But give me a red castanet over the hammer and knife wielded on the same streets just days before.

On King St south Newtown we followed a golden Honda Jazz with its back windscreen covered by an intriguing web address – www.yumchaatyourplace.com.au Now there’s a thought….

And the most unbelievable thing of the week – I took my father’s car to the Kmart Auto in Annandale to investigate possible problems with the brakes and some strange noises. After a thorough inspection, Peter told me the car was perfectly safe and although some work was required in the future, “it would be a waste of money to do it now”. Bring it back in a couple of months was his suggestion, “And, there’ s no charge today. I hope your old man is ok.” A mechanic choosing not to do some work now but send you home with no charge. That’s mighty unusual… but beautiful! PH

Do Unto Others and to Yourself

Peter Hallett1 Comment

‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ This is a powerful call to kindness and mutual respect. By gaining insight into the value of others, relative to our own, we act more justly.

‘Do unto you what you have been expecting others to do for you.’ This is a powerful call to take responsibility for our own well-being rather than demanding others to fill our needs, which they never can. By choosing not to blame or bargain, we mature as people and allow others the freedom to give kindness, unhindered by demand.

Neither statement can be fulfilled by humankind without the grace of God abounding in our hearts, restoring true humanity. PH

The naked face of human emotion

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“The face is not a secondary billboard for our internal feelings. It is an equal partner in the emotional process” writes Malcolm Gladwell in Blink.

He is referring to the discovery by researchers that not only does our face spontaneously express our emotions, but that our emotions are impacted by the expressions on our face.

Scientists working to collate the full range of human facial expressions spent hours perfecting facial muscle movements, including those that would usually express, sadness, anger and other negative feelings. They began to realise that on those days, they began to feel terrible emotionally.Read More »

No knee caps

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“How are you going today, George?” I ask while standing in line for a meal at the Lambert St Lunch, Camperdown.

George is 60ish with long gray hair and unshaven face; is wearing a t-shirt, too-small shorts and joggers and carries his walking stick.

“Oh, not that good. I nearly fell over on the way here.”

“That’s no good,” I reply. “What happened?”

“Have you ever had your leg just slide out, like this, while your walking,” he says while demonstrating a strange sideward leg movement, precariously. A lunch volunteer, plate of food in hand, is watching as our conversation unfolds.

“Maybe George, but have you had that happen?”

“All the time,” he says seriously. “It’s probably because I’ve got no knee caps, so I’ve got to be careful.”Read More »

How are those resolutions going?

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This is my 21st blog post for 2010 having boldly resolved to post every day of the year. So I’ve already broken my New Year’s resolution eight times and January is not even over! I may attempt multiple posts to catch up. Do you think that counts?

 It’s an interesting phrase when you think about it:

  • Resolution is a firm resolve to do something;
  • Re can mean “again and again” while solution means “answer” so a resolution might be coming back to the answer again and again (which sounds very much like a new year’s resolution!)
  • Tracing back to its origin, the word resolution comes from the Latin resolutionem (nom. resolutio) meaning “process of reducing things into simpler forms,” which in turn comes the stem of resolvere – “loosen”. The solution, it would seem, is in finding the simplest way forward, free of restraints.
  • Resolution in our age also refers to the fineness of detail in an image which could mean a new year’s resolution is a sharper view of life. Or a blurrier one…
  • And as for being a new year, if the only thing that changes is the date – and not your decision, your thinking, your spirit – then is it new at all?

How are you going with your New Year resolutions? PH

Sun strikes horizon, beautifully

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Kuta Beach may not be the cleanest in the world, but the sunsets remain untainted by tourism, pollution and souvenir sellers. It is at the junction of things that we often experience the most beauty. As the ocean beats the shore or the sun strikes the horizon we find the richest images. In life too, it is the collisions, the surprises, the challenges, the beginngings and endings that so often throw up the most strident beauty.

Action interrupted, truth stumbled

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The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it. Chinese proverb.

What have you stopped doing because of a voice, internally or externally, saying  it can’t be done, you can’t do it or you can’t do it well? Avoid these interruptions.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry on as if nothing had happened. Winston Churchill

As opposed to the interruption of doubters, truth is worth taking note of. What truth have you stumbled over, even and embarrassing or inconvenient one, that you have done your best to ignore but keeps tapping on your shoulder. Stumble back to truth, it always set you free.

Incidentally, I came across these quotes while reading Organic Church by Frank Viola. Still trying to decide if this book is interruption or stumbling truth. Probably a bit of both… PH

The Maltese Falcon still the stuff of dreams

Peter Hallett1 Comment

Just watched film noir classic The Maltese Falcon with Josiah. Still an excellent, face paced movie that keeps you in despite the lack of Avatar-like effects.

When Humphrey Bogart grimaces the line, “The stuff that dreams are made of” and stares longingly into the distance at the close of the movie, there is just a moment when we all look with him, and wonder.

Anyway, I’m still a sucker for a 1930s gangster movie. Must have been all that time watching movies while doing a Film Study major at UTS a million years ago…

Bogart’s line is a paraphrase of Shakespeare’s:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp’d tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on; and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
The Tempest Act 4, scene 1, 148-158

I wonder if Prospero grimaced?

Speaking of grimacing, The Sydney Festival  has created a few (grimaces that is) with its inclusion of Hamlet in German this month. Many are wondering what good is an English classic in a foreign language?

Given that this most quoted of plays is set in Denmark, perhaps German is closer to reality. In any case the amazing set, mesmerising acting of lead actor Lars Eidinger and direction of Thomas Ostermeier has led to these exuberant reviews:

‘Hamlet rages and blows across the stage, a Gollum on ecstasy, a mama’s boy, spoiled brat, an exploding nerd, who takes his feigned madness so far that it becomes his undoing.’ – Süddeutsche Zeitung

‘Startlingly and shockingly replete with the issues of the here and now… It is a tour de force.’ – British Theatre Guide

And if all else fails, according to the Sydney Festival website, there are subtitles…

If that all is all too much, settle for 12 seconds of Bogart and sit back and contemplate, what are dreams made of?

PH

PS What is the collective noun for grimaces?

What are you growing this year?

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We grow what we feed. We feed what we see. We see what we choose.

Rediscovered roseI have a miniature rose in a pot in the front courtyard of our home. I had paid it little attention in the past 12 months until late October when I decided to move my tomato planting efforts to this same courtyard (inner city vegetable growing is a ‘particular’ art).

Each day as I watered, fertilised and generally yearned over my tomatoes, I would give a similar treatment to the random plants that happened to be in the same location.

The tomatoes plants duly bore fruit but what really surprised me was the literal revival in the other plants, especially the long neglected rose. It grew bushy and is now covered in about a dozen flowers.

Which illustrates well: we grow what we feed; we feed what we see; we see what we choose.

What will you see in 2010? Your choice. You may have something in the courtyard of your life waiting to flourish, but unnoticed.

Having seen it, how will you feed it? Your words, your prayers, your faith, your time, your action.

Having fed it, there is no question – it will grow. So make sure what you focus on and feed is the very will of God.

Strangely, my rose is flowering because I focused on the fruitfulness of my tomatoes and there was enough focus and feeding left over for something beautiful.

Follow the fruitful callings of God in your life and something beautiful will spring up in the midst. PH

Check out my full message on this theme titled “12”.

Eyes of Fire focus on 2010

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New Year 2010

It’s 2010 and after seeing another year in from two different locations around Sydney Harbour, one of my new year’s resolutions is to post everyday to Utterance.

breath | speak | breath – a good rhythm for life and communication. Feel free to join me this year as I search for meaning, significance, laughter, the absurd, wonder, beauty, horror, warmth, hope, life and God in each and every day. I hope my search inspires yours. PH

Before a word…

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The world has never had so many words. When we consider how few words it took to create the universe, and how many words we produce to get much less done, the efficacy of our speaking becomes questionable. How rare is it in our emails, texts, letters, conversations, sermons, speeches, and dare I say, blogs, are we truly understood. What comfort then in these ancient words of Psalm 139: ‘Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, oh Lord’. There is Someone who always knows the full intent of our words, before we speak and better even than we know ourselves.

Newtown south eats bacon

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Past Camden St where my second cousin Roy, blind, died after a fall. Park somewhere down Holt St because it’s before 10am and a clearway on King. Judy rings, “I’ve been given four tickets to the Swans.” Cool. Walk with one eye on passersby, other eye on shops, cafes. Leaking water at a building site with workmen and mobiles. Coffee store ‘Once-was-Allegro-now-is-Sacks’ is open. Purchase many Marogagype beans. Sales women smells the beans before sealing the coffee. “It’s a beautiful tasting coffee”. Cappuccino to go, one sugar.

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