Poems, Sermons and Writings

      2 Corinthians 8:7-15 How many letters did Paul write to the Corinthians? - 2? 3? 4? >4? - we don’t know? What we find in the New Testament are glimpses into the relationship between Paul and some churches and glimpses into the life of the church in the first century. To understand the Corinthian correspondence, one needs to read Acts and both of the letters that we have to the Corinthians. Paul’s relationship with this community straddles several years of visits and letters, and it is a two-way conversation. The first letter refers to a previous letter - suggesting that our “1st Corinthians” is actually “2nd Corinthians”. Paul also refers to questions they had asked him in a letter so we know they also wrote to him. His initial relationship with this church started during an 18-month visit to the city. Later in the relationship there is a “painful visit” and also a “painful letter” which we no longer have (possibly 3rd Corinthians) and the letter which we ...

Personal story Just under 15 years ago I was on my short drive into work and the tears started welling up. I pulled into my carpark and walked past my office door and across to the door of my own GP, a friend and colleague and said “sorry Sue, I just can’t cope today - you and the boys will need to see my patients” and I had a cry on her shoulder and turned around and went home. Home was the problem - my 15 year old son was going through a psychotic breakdown. That was hands-down the most awful time in my life.  I’m sharing this story not looking for sympathy but as an example to discuss. This was not an experience of burnout but an acute stress reaction. As I lived through this there were times when work was a balm - time out to stop my mind going around in crazy anxious circles. There were other times not many, when I was too overwhelmed to work. Some of the things that helped me get through this were the supportive work environment I was fortunate to have. My colleagues stumpe...

  “The waters are agitated” - these are the first words of a well-known love song - you may know it better as   " Pōkarekare Ana ". The story of Peter and Cornelius certainly agitated the waters. The story proper begins at the beginning of Acts chapter 10,  it’s a love story but it’s not a comfortable one. Cornelius has a scary vision of an angel and is told to send for Peter. Then Peter has this confusing vision of food that he had always thought of as unclean and the message of inclusion was so shocking it had to be repeated 3 times.  It was when the messengers of Cornelius arrived that he began to realise what his odd vision might mean. Peter had to overcome his life-long prejudices to go and visit Cornelius and then while he was preaching the Holy Spirit was there and made obvious to all by the miraculous speaking in tongues event. This showed Peter (who had lived through the events at Pentecost) that there was no difference between him and these Gentiles....