Christianity

Enigma and the Body

Posted on October 2, 2012 by Pieter Stok

Yesterday I commented on the amazing work done during WW2 by the people at Bletchley Park as they worked on deciphering German Enigma messages.

The brilliance of the work at Bletchley was the fact that a team of people with a range of different skills were brought together in one place for one task. There were maths geniuses, people who had an eye for patterns and how they repeated, there were engineering and scientific experts who knew their fields as well as stenographers and radio operators. Further afield there were brave men who boarded enemy submarines and ships as they were sinking to retrieve code books and enigma machines and there  were spies in enemy territory risking their lives by the minute.

It is not unlike the picture that Paul gives us in Romans and 1 Corinthians as to how the body of Christ is called to work with its gifts and talents in order to  further the Kingdom of God. At the risk of repeating myself, if this can be done in wartime for the common good, the body of Christ has an even greater good to promote by using its many gifts in a unified effort.

Categories: christian, Christianity, Faith, Reflections | Tags: , , , | 1 Comment

We Find It Everywhere

Posted on September 21, 2012 by Pieter Stok

The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 1 Corinthians 15:26

A Cemetery in Alesund Norway

One of my more macabre pastimes is to visit cemeteries. They are a fount of history and stories. We can learn much about places and people from headstones.

But the point is, they are everywhere. There is no escaping them. Towns, villages, cities and rural areas all have them. They can be found on the outskirts of town, next to churches, in churches and even in prisons. I have found these sober reminders of our mortality in all sorts of places. Simply put, millions have gone before us.

Why is it that so many of us live as though death doesn’t exist, or that it doesn’t matter?

A Pilgrims’ Cemetery on the Camino to Santiago

1 Corinthians 15 is the Apostle Paul’s wonderful exploration and apologetic for the reality of the resurrection. He declares that for the believer “death has lost its sting”. Sadly, for many, the sting hasn’t been removed from death because they refuse to rely on Christ – the sting remover.

Cemeteries are a constant reminder for me of what Christ has done but also a challenge to seek and find the lost before it is too late.

Burial Mounds at Gamla Uppsala Sweden

Categories: Cemetery, christian, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | 2 Comments

The Already and Not Yet

Posted on September 18, 2012 by Pieter Stok

And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus … Ephesians 2:6

Image courtesy: Nadeau’s Auctions. 

When I was five years old we lived in a small country town where phone numbers were between one and one hundred and everybody knew everybody. There was a General Store that supplied all our needs from cereal to rakes.

As we were recent immigrants, money was scarce and every penny (pre-decimal days) had to be turned over twice. On a high shelf of the General Store was the “toy department”. It had cars, dolls and games. But there was also one big red Tonka tow truck. It was every young boy’s dream. I left my mother in no doubt that I liked this truck. However the answer was always the same. We can’t afford it.

So each time we went shopping, as my mother stood at the counter I would wander off and stare wistfully at the red truck. Then horror! One day it was gone. I was shattered. All my dreams had disappeared in one cruel blow. That was it!

A few days later I was trawling through a cupboard looking for something when I noticed a brown paper parcel. On closer inspection the contents had torn one small corner open and I noticed the hook end of a red tow truck.

Mum had bought the truck! I knew it was mine. My brother had not been born and my dad was too old. It was mine! Oh the joy!. There was one problem. My birthday was not for another few months. So I had to wait to receive the present. But the truck was mine!

In some ways our place in heaven is like that. As Ephesians tells us, we are already seated with Christ in heavenly realms. Because Jesus is there, we are there. That is a reality. On the other hand we have not seen it or received it clearly yet. We are still waiting for God’s call. In the meantime we can rejoice at the reality and the anticipation.

Categories: christian, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | 3 Comments

Use By Date

Posted on September 17, 2012 by Pieter Stok
On jar lids

See how the flowers of the field grow

packet edges,
in neat computer printing
are dates:
“Use by …”
“Best Before …”
 
A sign of finite life,
Limited use,
and inevitable corruption.
 
The average life span for men
in Australia is.
79.7 years.
 
Is that a “best before”
or “use by” date?
 
Or is every second
a gift
to be cherished
and lived,
whether many or few?
 
 
For there is no 
“Use By” date”
in the Kingdom of God.
Categories: christian, Christianity, Faith, Poem, poetry | Tags: , , , , , | 3 Comments

Humility

Posted on September 16, 2012 by Pieter Stok

The following is a quote from Teresa of Avila in a piece that she writes for her fellow nuns:

I was once considering what the reason was why our Lord loved humility in us so much, when I suddenly remembered that He is essentially the Supreme Truth, and that humility is just our walking in the truth.  For it is a very great truth that we have no good in us, but only misery and nothingness, and he who does not understand this walks in lies: but he who understands this the best is the most pleasing to the Supreme Truth.  May God grant us this favour, sisters, never to be without the humbling knowledge of ourselves.

Teresa of Avila. Santa Teresa an Appreciation: with some of the best passages of the Saint’s Writings. Kindle Edition.
Categories: christian, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, Teresa of Avila | Tags: , , , | 2 Comments

The Providence of God

Posted on September 13, 2012 by Pieter Stok

De Hezenberg near Zwolle in the Netherlands

The Building  in the photo above looks like a pleasant country manor house. It is or was. For our family it is a picture of the providence of God.

In the early 1950s a man in his forties who had recently become a Christian was sent by his pastor to the pastoral care home – “De Hezenberg” because he suffered from depression. Due to a series of dramatic incidents in his life he needed “time out” in a caring environment. This need had been recognised by his pastor.  A short while later a young lady in her mid twenties, also sent by her pastor, came because of health issues. She too needed time to recoup   in a loving environment away from the “rat race”.

These two people fell in love, but the man had already made plans to emigrate to Australia. He left and the young lady promised to follow him. Which she did a year later. They were married in Melbourne and over the next 8 years grew a family of three young daughters.

These two people were my wife’s mum and dad. Her dad passed on in 1963 and her mum just a few years ago.

Why do I call this providence? Well, at the lowest point in their lives God enabled them to find each other, happiness and start a family. Even though my wife’s dad died early on (after 11 years of marriage) he left behind three girls who have all continued in the faith that he had found later in life.

There is much more to this story. But which ever way you look at at it, God’s hand is firmly in it!

Categories: christian, Christianity, Devotional, Faith | Tags: , , | 8 Comments

The New Intolerance

Posted on September 11, 2012 by Pieter Stok

In western societies we are to be tolerant of everything and everyone … except Christians and Christianity – in particular those of the conservative/evangelical variety.

Will Our faith Survive The Onslaught?

This was brought home to me in last night’s edition of Q&A on the ABC. The archbishop of Sydney spoke graciously and reflectively on a host of issues including homosexuality, same sex marriage, asylum seekers, marriage vows and the like. However, when he put forward, what I would call, conservative evangelical values he was howled done by a number of the panelists.

Even when Peter Jensen simply posed a question along the lines of the life expectancy of gay versus straight men, he was told in a variety of ways that this was not an appropriate question. Questions for considered reflection have been found offensive. The issue isn’t whether we agree with archbishop Jensen or not but whether Christians are permitted to put forward views and ask questions that do not reflect the ethos of the majority.

This is just a taste of the intolerance that people of the Christian faith will increasingly encounter in times to come. We had better get used to it.

But it hides a bigger question: if we, adults, find the going increasingly tough, how well are our children prepared to stand up for their faith and to withstand the scorn of many around them?

Last night’s discussion reminded me that home, church and Christian school have a monumental task in training and preparing our children. That is, we need to give them strong Biblical foundations but also the where-with-all to defend the faith and articulate clearly, in a sceptical world, a Christian vision for humanity.

On many occasions in the Old Testament we are reminded that we are not just training our children but also preparing the groundwork for our children’s children. This is a serious task we are all called to put our faith, hearts and minds toward.

It is comforting to be reminded  by the Apostle Paul:“For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.” 1 Cor 1:25

Categories: christian, Christianity, Faith | Tags: , , , | 2 Comments

Obituary of Gabriel Antoine Vahanian

Posted on September 11, 2012 by Pieter Stok

The name in the title may not ring a bell but for those who are my age and older the debate he and his colleagues started will. In 1961 he wrote The Death of God: The Culture of Our Post-Christian Era. This started, the poorly named, “God is dead debate”. We may not have always liked the answers but many of the questions he and his colleagues raised are still important and in a real sense were a portent of the era in which we now live.

The following is his obituary from the NY Times (via The Age):

Gabriel Antoine Vahanian 1927-2012.

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Orthodoxy … In Conclusion

Posted on September 6, 2012 by Pieter Stok

The following is the conclusion to G.K. Chesterton’s head spinning ramble “Orthodoxy”. It is a passionate and articulate demonstration of the veracity of the Christian faith. He finishes with the following:

Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something.

Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.

Chesterton, G. K. (Gilbert Keith) . Orthodoxy (pp. 163-164). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.
Categories: christian, Christianity, Devotional, Faith, G K Chesterton, Reflections | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

The Un World

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Pieter Stok
Disparate souls
wandering.
Hearts seeking
relationship.
Beings made
to relate and join and
celebrate community,
un-warmed,
un-connected,
un- celebrated
 
Connections bound
by rigid rules,
by unconsidered traditions,
and lifeless patterns.
“Insanity” it is said,
“Is doing the same thing
Over and over again.
Expecting different results.”
 
The spark of God,
the frisson of Spirit
and life enhancing
bonds
ached for
so that soul meets soul,
spirit, spirit
and being, being.
 
Hence the Divine
may shine
brighter
clearer
and eternally
for the un- generation.
Categories: christian, Christianity, Church, Faith, Poem, poetry, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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