Sermon: We are never left alone

Posted on May 23, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Sermon for Williamstown

Pentecost, 24th of May, 2015

Ezekiel 37:1-14
Acts 2:1-21
John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15

Today we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit to Jesus’ disciples at Pentecost, the event that we remember as the birth-day of the church. Today is a day of loud and joyful celebration, coloured red for the Spirit in the liturgical calendar, as we envisage a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and divided tongues, as of fire. We have balloons, streamers and candles here in the nave; the children, I believe, are currently decorating cupcakes for after the service; and we will have deeply unhealthy fizzy raspberry soft drink to accompany them. Today is a happy day. Continue reading →

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Sermon: Friendship

Posted on May 7, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

I’m cheating! Most of this was written and preached in the Macedon Ranges, last time this reading came up in the lectionary. But looking back at it I find that I still agree with everything I said then, and I quite like the sermon, so I’m going to preach it again. 

Sermon for Williamstown

May 10th, 2015

John 15:9-17

I’ve been thinking about marriage this week. On Tuesday I received the first mailing of papers for the national Assembly that will be held in Perth in July. Among the few proposals that came with them the papers were two about marriage, one from the Standing Committee and one from the Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress. (Neither suggested any change in our current understanding of marriage, but both suggest that we have a lot more discussion about it.) On Wednesday, at a meeting with members of the Burmese congregation, Natalie, Bev and I heard that Pastor True has been recognised by the government as a marriage celebrant, and we rejoiced with him that he’ll be able to celebrate the marriages of members of his congregation. Most people in Australia see marriage as something churches are particularly concerned with, which is why ministers are able to be authorised by the Attorney-General to act as marriage agents for the state. Churches agree, marriage is important to us, which is why the coming Assembly will spend a fair bit of time discussing marriage. In comparison, friendship isn’t a topic that gets mentioned a lot in the church. And yet if any form of relationship can be described as particularly Christian, as the specific way that Christians live out our lives, it’s not marriage. It’s friendship. Continue reading →

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Sermon: The sons and daughters of the eunuch

Posted on May 3, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Sermon for Williamstown

3rd of May 2015

Acts 8:26-40

The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose”. (Romans 8:28) God is able to take things that may not in themselves be good and create good out of them. Today’s reading from the Acts of the Apostles, the story of Phillip and the Ethiopian eunuch, comes from a time when the early church was being persecuted in Jerusalem and the Christian community (not yet called by that name) was scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Interestingly, among those most zealous in persecuting the church was Saul, the man who would later become the Apostle Paul. All things work together for good, and the author of Acts tells us that “those who were scattered went from place to place, proclaiming the word”. Phillip was one of the scattered, and while exiled from Jerusalem he preached the good news in Samaria extremely successfully. Then, as we heard today, an angel of the Lord told him to leave Samaria and head south to the wilderness road that ran from Jerusalem to Gaza. There Phillip encountered an Ethiopian eunuch. Continue reading →

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Reflection: Killing people is wrong

Posted on April 29, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Killing people is wrong. That seems to me to be a simple truth. We can have long and detailed ethical discussions about circumstances in which killing someone may be the lesser of two evils, if someone kills in self-defence or defence of others, but it remains an evil. Killing people is never a good thing to do.  Continue reading →

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Sermon: Love in truth and action, not word or speech

Posted on April 26, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Sermon for Williamstown
26th of April 2015

John 10:11-18; 1 John 3:16-24

Earlier this week, on the ABC program Q&A, Australia’s Trade Minister, Andrew Robb, argued that Muslim clerics weren’t doing enough to prevent the radicalisation of Muslim youth. He said: “The leadership of the Muslim community, the imams in particular, I think should be doing a lot more to look after their community in Australia … You’ve got to show the leadership and we’ve got to do whatever we can to help you in that regard.” Since then there’s been discussion in the media about how much authority Muslim clerics actually have, and whether they’re making enough use of that authority to prevent Muslims turning to violence.

As a ‘Christian cleric’ I’ve been pondering this idea of religious responsibility. How responsible are people like me for the actions of Christians? If Christians turn to violence, as some have, is that at least partly the responsibility of their ministers and priests? Last week, at the ANZAC service, I quoted some of the sermons and articles delivered by clergy during the First World War, and in that case I think church leaders absolutely had some responsibility for the vast number of soldiers who went to war, to kill and to die. But what about today? Continue reading →

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Reflection: Saying good-bye to Nanna

Posted on April 26, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

On Tuesday I attended the funeral of the last of my grandparents, my paternal grandmother, Nancy Evelyn Jones (known as Evelyn, never Nancy). She was 95 years old and we had a conversation last year in which she told me that she was ready to die, so her death was the opposite of untimely. It was expected; wanted, even. So I’ve been surprised at how much it has affected me.

Nanna and Pop

Continue reading →

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“We know love by this, that Christ laid down his life for us” (Easter 4B / 100th Anniversary of ANZAC Day, 26 April 2015)

Posted on April 26, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Paul Walton has preached a wonderful ANZAC sermon. So many of us struggle with honouring those who fought and those who lost loved ones without in any way glorifying wars.

PaulW's avatarGetting There... 2 steps forward, 1 back

Readings
1 John 3.16–24
John 10.11–18

I hate militarism. I loathe nationalism. But I honour those who serve.

Sam Neill

How do we speak on a day like this? At this very time one hundred years ago, the Anzac forces—and, let’s face it, the Turkish soldiers too—were going through hell.

Soon we’ll sing the 23rd Psalm; some of the Anzacs will have been reminding themselves of the words of that psalm. Later we’ll say the Lord’s Prayer; many will have been saying that prayer too. They must have been praying above all for it to stop, so they could go home to their sweethearts and wives. After all it was General Douglas MacArthur who said:

The soldier above all others prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.

We know of course that these scars are not just  obvious…

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A very short reflection for an ANZAC Day service

Posted on April 22, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Williamstown Uniting Church – Electra St

April 18, 2015 – ANZAC Day Service

You’ll notice on the Order of Service for today that this is a ‘reflection’, rather than a ‘sermon’. And it’s going to be a very short reflection, because in this centenary year of the landing at Gallipoli I think that ministers like me have to be very, very careful about what we say. Continue reading →

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Reflection: Help me, great and powerful internet community

Posted on April 17, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

I have twelve bookcases in my two-bedroom flat. I live surrounded by several thousand books – and as long I don’t leave a lighted candle too close to any of them this isn’t a problem.

But I also live surrounded by piles of books that haven’t made it into bookcases – because I’ve bought them or been given them, and haven’t yet read them. And that’s more of a problem.

Books on the DVD stand

Wonderful, fabulous books, that I want to read, but never get round to, because I am constantly adding to their number. There are over 100 of them at most recent count.

This must stop! Continue reading →

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Sermon: Mark the meta-narrator and the hope of resurrection

Posted on April 4, 2015 by Avril Hannah-Jones

Sermon for Williamstown

Easter Sunday, 5th of April, 2015

Mark 16:1-8

Did you feel there was something missing in today’s gospel reading? Were you expecting the reader to read a little further on? Surely the story can’t end with: “So the women went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” It’s no great shout of joy and triumph. The other gospels all end with tales of meetings between the risen Jesus and the disciples: the great commissioning on the mountain in the gospel according to Matthew; the meeting on the road to Emmaus in the gospel according to Luke; the miraculous catch of fish and breakfast on the beach in the gospel according to John. I imagine that in the back of all our minds we think of Jesus’ resurrection as including all those things, in the same way that we imagine both shepherds and magi at his birth. The Gospel according to Mark, however, doesn’t tell us of any such meetings. This abrupt conclusion has been such a problem for the church that scribes later added two further endings to the gospel: and they’re in most versions of the Bible: called the shorter ending and the longer ending of Mark. But they aren’t the way Mark originally ended his gospel, and we need to ask why. Why does the gospel according to Mark end with a whimper rather than a bang? Continue reading →

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