Kia ora e te whānau!
Well, we had been planning for this message to be carrying the good news of the re-introduction of Sunday gatherings as a church in February, but sadly those plans are on the back-burner again as our nation moves back to Red Light settings, and the focus shifts to a coming wave of Omicron.
With that news, we just want to say again that our priority is very much on pastoring you, our beloved church, in this pandemic context. We have already started to say a few times this year: our sense is to double-down on seeking the work of Jesus' reorder in this disordered time. Come what may, the Way of Jesus still works in the future ahead, and we continue to pray that we would become a loving, faithful and non-anxious presence in this time.
So, we have a couple of things to update you on how we're going to navigate this Red Light setting ahead. Here we go, in no particular order...
1. We’re intentionally prepping for several months of caring for people in the coming Omicron-context, and practically for those in isolation: One of the good works of the Church has always been the gift of presence and neighbouring to each other. Let's not be alone in these months ahead but commit to neighbouring those around us, and each other. Let's look out for ways to help, and also, ask for help. Practically, we are now planning the preparation of care boxes full of essentials for people isolating that can be delivered if needed, and a delivery network of helping hands to pick up things like groceries for people in isolation. More details of these will be on our website later this week.
2. Red Light means no Sunday Hall Gatherings, but we are continuing online with our Sunday Epistles format: Though we won't be gathering to hear sermons, we will continue to deliver you our Biblical teaching and encouraging messages on Sunday via the Sunday Epistle formats (a written letter to read or the video to watch or audio podcast to listen to.) We have heard from so many of you how this range of formats has been a blessing to you wherever you were at, and we hope that will be the same again for the months ahead.
3. February focus: Community: We’re going to spend February teaching on Jesus' vision for discipleship in community (no lone-wolfing allowed!) and a fresh call to sharing life in Circles. Along with a Biblical teaching series, we're also prepping a training night for new Circle leaders in February, so if you're interested in forming a Circle, there will be a fresh on-ramp for you to begin. As you feel comfortable doing so, we invite you to gather in your Circles, or perhaps you will prefer to do this online in Zoom. Maybe your Circle is large, maybe it's just a couple of close friends. But the key question is: no matter the format, are you doing your discipleship journeywithsome other people? We'll be exploring this all of February and look forward to helping you discover the rich Way of life with others this year.
4. 24/7 Prayer Room space: Our usual tradition as a church is to start the year with a week of prayer, and last year we set this up in the upstairs of Community House. This year we have decided to set up the Prayer Room not just for a week, but long term as a 24/7 Prayer Room space until further notice. We are inviting you to come to this curated and consecrated space anytime in Omicron Red to come and pray, either with others, or just for yourself. The Prayer Room will thematically sit in our disorder-to-reorder theme of our year, and help us to pray our way through this moment together. All the details for our 24/7 Prayer Room will be online shortly, so stay tuned.
5. Park Gatherings: We ran our Park Gatherings last weekend so that they would work safely under Red settings too, and this weekend it is still our intention to proceed with these gatherings for those who are comfortable doing so, while the weekends are long and the sun is shining to do so. It’s so valuable to get together outside like this during these long weekends, and it was great to see the bunches of those who gathered last weekend - we really enjoyed the connection! You'll be able to sign up to the Park Gatherings for this week in the Friday Weekly Connector.
So, that's our update. There's a bit in there, but we want to convey that we are focussed on what's ahead, we're getting what we need to ready for it, and we're deeply committed to doing this all in the Way of Jesus, together as a community seeking His presence.
In Jesus' Way of love, grace and peace,
– Team CV
We are excited to be stepping toward our good friends, Saint Augustine’s, to walk shoulder-to-shoulder through the season of Advent Together.
Advent marks a new beginning, it’s the beginning of the Christian year, and through various traditions and practices, is a chance to create space in our lives to meet with God, as he comes to us in the form of a vulnerable newborn, Jesus.
In our Advent Together special delivery pack you will find a whole variety of ways to engage this Advent season, including; some beautiful weekly devotional cards from our friends at Venn Foundation, a how-to guide on making an Advent wreath, some recipes of our favourite treats for your table, a postcard about Good Gifts 2021, plus a Christmas card of course - it is nearly Christmas after all! If you’re a family, you would of received a great Advent CV Kids pack to bring your tamariki along on the journey too!
And all of this is designed to work alongside our shared Advent teaching series as we welcome Mathew Newton (of Saint Augustine’s) to the CV Sunday formats in a couple of weeks time. Also, we’re firing up the video machine too, so you’ll be able to read, listen or watch!
This Christmas let’s play our part in blessing our community
At the end of each year we put together Good Gifts to bless the community around us – it could be your neighbour, a local shop keeper, a colleague - that’s up to you! The idea is to bless someone who wouldn’t expect it; it’s a simple but generous gesture showing them they are loved, valued and seen.
For Good Gifts 2021, we are responding to a year that has been tough on the local hospitality industry. We’ve found a way to squeeze two gifts out of one and double the goodness in this years’ Good Gifts.
For Good Gifts 2021 you have the opportunity to buy a Restaurant Association gift voucher (50% subsidised by CV) that can be used at whatever cafe or restaurant your recipient loves.
They win and the cafe wins.
Each year we hear incredible stories from this simple giving of a gift and this year will be no different. We have 100 vouchers ready to go, now we just need you to consider who in your world needs a bit of love this Christmas?
Limited to 100. First in first served. Available to order until 11:59pm Sunday 5 December or until sold out. Pick up of Good Gift will be available Monday 13, Tuesday 14, Wednesday 15 December contactless from Community Hall.
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Good Gift orders are now closed for 2021
In the absence of getting to sing together, here's a new release of music from our worship crew for you. May it be good for your soul and draw you to Jesus.
Words and music by Anthony Macleod and Donald Goodhall
Performed by Anthony Macleod
Filmed by Dylan Jones / For Good Media
Mixed by Vivek Gabriel
In this moment of history, with terms like “unprecedented” or “one-in-a-hundred-years” bandied around regularly, it’s easy to think no one has done life like this before. Or the other temptation is to think the way they did navigate it is antiquated: we have progressed and don’t need to listen to history anymore. But that would be chronological snobbery, to not look back receptively would be unwise. So then, to listen to how people have navigated history is wise; there is wisdom to be found in looking at the story of their lives lived.
The Church, while it hasn’t seen this moment of history before, has lived versions of our current challenges before, and here’s the good bit: God has done amazing things in the Church as She lived in those moments. Things that are worth us paying attention to as we navigate these times.
The Church has a lived story in all kinds of situations across the globe. Been here, done that is a mini-series that wants to turn around from here and look at what the Church did. We’ll be exploring five moments in church history that speak to our current historical moment, attentively listening to the wisdom gained that we may apply it today.
Join us each Sunday in level 3 for this series released as Sunday Epistles to your inbox and on our Podcast
Over the last three months we have journeyed through an important series exploring the idea of fruitfulness. We called this series Be with, be like; experiencing and exhibiting the Father's love and Christlike Way by the Holy Spirit.
The series started as preached sermons, but then three weeks into it, due to the Delta Outbreak, it changed form into written letters. While talks and letters are different in lots of ways, one thing they do have in common is they both work with words. So, we have gone back and collected all of the words of this sermon series together and repackaged it for you to keep as this eBook.
As we say in the dedication:
May these sermons not just be words to learn from,
but words to live by —
that they help you be with God,
that you may be like Him.
Easter is not the end of the Christian story, but the start; the origin point of a new work sprouting into the world.
We’re taking four more weeks to engage in the season of Eastertide and look at four key stories in Luke 24 of the perplexed, disappointed, and doubting disciples, and how Jesus surprised them all, created a resurrection commotion and then left them behind as the new resurrected community.
Join us for this Eastertide series at our morning gatherings every Sunday in April or follow on our podcast.
Due to the sudden move to Level 3 on Saturday night, I have decided to post this week’s sermon – which came from a lockdown letter from St Paul – as a letter to those in lockdown. Please note, these are my sermon notes quickly fleshed out a little more, this is definitely not an exemplary piece of writing!
– Dan
“Design is a way of looking at the world with an eye towards changing it.”
If I say “design” you probably think of the end result of something, for example: a new smartphone, the feel of that new coffee table book you just bought or the way a website works.
But the practice of design is a practice of change. Design changes the world by solving its problems on a case-by-case scenario. As part of this, designers require skills in dreaming, critiquing and change management in between. Healthy design teams are able to work with critique and problem solve so that something can become the best version of itself that it is meant to be.
To design is to change.
Which reminds me of a great thought from Richard Foster:
“To pray is to change”
That is to say, prayer is not the destination, but the means to the end. A reminder today: we as Christ followers are people on "The Way of Jesus". This "Way" has a destination: full maturity in Christ.
It is to this end we are being formed.
And it's not just mahi that will see us formed. It's a spiritual formation. So, because not just habit will shape the outcome, but a life in the Spirit, we are to engage in spiritual practices.
We are to pray for our formation into Christ-fullness.
We are praying to that end.
“And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.”
Here today in our text, we see Paul praying for a community to change to the end goal before them.
In v3-5: Paul is praying for his partners, his fellowship.
And then in v6 we come to the framing verse; the one that holds it all together. This is what this opening is all about. Paul is motivated by the end goal which draws them all forward together. Which tells us something really, really important.
They aren't there yet.
Now this letter to the community in Philippi isn't a letter trying to solve a problem or deal with a conflict, it's just a really happy letter actually - Paul is so joyful in it even though he is writing from his own lockdown of house arrest! - but we must not miss this point here.
Even in their incomplete nature - the not-yet-finished design - Paul is still so joyful at the work God has done.
And He is joyful at the work yet to be done.
Maybe some of us just need to pause and consider that today...
God at work is a journey to delight in.
Like a healthy design team can enjoy the processes and work of prototyping and designing change, so it can be with our discipleship to Jesus. Even if God isn't finished yet, it's still good work as he moves us closer and closer to being like Jesus.
Now, this is called "eschatological tension"
The tension of the future and the present being held together. And here Paul is illustrating us this tension: God's future work (of making all things new) is reaching back through time from his future, and drawing us to his perfect future, the completed work where we are quite literally made new again and resurrected, and he's doing this via Christ's present work in us now.
To be a person of the Kingdom means we don't design and build a future of our own making and strive our way towards it, but instead we are drawn along to God's future that He is making and graced for the journey.
So with that set as the frame here. Let's look at the actual prayer that Paul prays.
“I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding. For I want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.”
“So this is my prayer: that your love will flourish and that you will not only love much but well. Learn to love appropriately. You need to use your head and test your feelings so that your love is sincere and intelligent, not sentimental gush. Live a lover’s life, circumspect and exemplary, a life Jesus will be proud of: bountiful in fruits from the soul, making Jesus Christ attractive to all, getting everyone involved in the glory and praise of God.”
There are three pieces in this prayer. Paul prays for them to:
v9 - Be filled with love that is enacted as knowledge and understanding / wisdom
Note the link between emotion and mentality. There is NO segregation here! Paul is saying that what we experience internally must become something that is enacted into the world. Love is not just a feeling but lived as a lens to see all of reality.
The Greek language had four words for love, and the one here is agape love. Agape is otherly, charitable and sacrificial love. This love is being felt by Paul from the Philippians, and he is praying that it would continue for them.
Agape can not just be a compassionate feeling, it is the move to compassionate action. If it does not move, it is not agape at all! Agape seizes the opportunities presented to it - like philosopher Søren Kierkegaard says:
“When one has once fully entered the realm of love, the world — no matter how imperfect — becomes rich and beautiful, it consists solely of opportunities for love.”
All this to say: maturity of Christ in us will mean we do not just feel love but make the most of the opportunities around us to do so.
v10 - Live in moral discernment
Paul prays that they would live in the Spirit's discernment for them in their fuzzy world. Discernment is to search for what is best and true amongst the cultural fuzziness.
And is there anyone else who is finding culture fuzzy at the moment?
It can feel like every week there is a new thing to be against, or for, and then the next week it's either another thing or it's the thing from last week but it's now changed and morphed and you are now saying the wrong thing... We live in a culture where our world, experiences and opinions are framing reality, and often as Christians, we are then trying to figure out what to do with the teachings of Jesus within that. A mistake we are often making is that we are often starting with zeitgeist (spirit of the age) as our truth and then looking to how Jesus might bless or condone it. Rather than Jesus helping us interpret the zeitgeist itself for what it is.
We must change our methods from World > Scripture > Jesus to Jesus > Scripture > World
Paul starts with Christ, and builds out from there. This too is our best discernment.
We are in interesting and confusing times, but it’s important to remember: the church always has been. Philippi was a Romanized city. It too had a zeitgiest of sexual ethics. Of racial boundaries. Of socio economic divides. Of evil. Of misused power. Of dominion. It's all part of the world the church was birthed in and has journeyed through.
All this to say: This prayer has a discernment context and we have one too. Paul is praying for them to discern their context - the zeitgeist - through Christ first, not the other way around.
v 11- Produce fruit of right living
This verse is actually intrinsically tied to the last one. Our fruits show what we are discerning. This is a great truth of life and we cannot ignore it: Our lives are already producing fruit. The question is always; is it the right fruit?
Here, Paul is stating that righteousness is not the fruit of rightness (as in arrogance and smugness, I'm right and you are wrong...), but the fruit of the Spirit as the fruit of maturity. To Paul, he goes on to explain this further a little further in the letter, framing up righteousness as formation in Philippians 4:8-9:
“And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.”
Note how active this all is. Maturity is a verb after all. Salvation is being outworked in the Philippian church as they continue to put into practice all that Paul taught them and showed them. Salvation isn’t stagnant and a one-off occasion, it is presence and present.
So in closing:
The design of this prayer is one of change.
Paul, like Berger's quote that I began with, has one eye towards how the church of Philippi can be.
And as a pastoral leader of this community, today I too have an eye on how we could be thanks to his prayer.
May we grow towards what he has prayed.
May we grow in love that is not just an emotion but an act of wisdom and knowledge.
May we grow in discernment of Christ in our context.
May we produce the right fruit of maturity.
And...
May you see how God has begun this in you - His good work - and pray and orient your life towards the fullness of its end in you.
Join us this December as we make room for Christ as God Incarnate.
This Advent season (the four weeks leading up to Christmas) we are digging deeply into the story of Christmas that centres around the God who “took on flesh and dwelt amongst us.” (John 1:14)
Amongst the many things that come our way as we plan for our Christmas celebrations and summer holidays, let us together make preparation for catching a glorious glimpse of the God who came to dwell with us.
For the next several Sunday’s we’re exploring a book of the Bible that is a little too honest at times.
In the book of Psalms we find 150 of some of the most honest and vulnerable pieces of writing ever recorded between humanity and our understanding of who God is, how God acts and what it means to be human.
This book can be tricky to handle. The world is so different. Some of the content of the Pslams seems not very helpful anymore, while some of it is incredibly inspiring. Some of it is troubling and violent, some of it is very raw and unedited and some of it is so convinced and sure.
Come on this journey as we spend several weeks looking at this fascinating collection of poetry and prayer, words of thanksgiving and hope, words of lament and waiting, and words of wisdom.