Sunday, December 5

 
“God with us” – Emmanuel
 
This morning we celebrated the second week of Advent, in preparation of the coming of Christ to the world two thousand years ago, as well as the second coming, and took part in the Lord’s Supper.  I love the combination of these two.  It feels like we are celebrating and committing ourselves to the birth, death, and then the second coming of Jesus all at once.  These two events, I think, depict God’s complete commitment and steadfast love for us, now and forever.  (Even so, I caught myself busy thinking about things-to-do for the fast approaching Christmas season.  That would be some kind of advent activity on a personal level, wouldn’t it?)
 
When Andrew spoke of “our” song, Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel, I felt that it could easily be “our” song for everyone who believes in God, whose presence is in us for every moment of our life, hence, Emmanuel, “God with us.”  It was not us who came up with that name, or title, for Christ, but it was God himself who gave that name to His only son.  Perhaps, this was God’s way of saying that He wants to be with us, among us.  I just hope that my thoughts, words, or actions would not muck up His desire to be with us, or hinder anyone else wanting to get closer to God.
 
Jonathan K.

First Sunday in Advent

I love the Advent Season - and perhaps the first Sunday is my favourite of all. The lighting of the candle of hope is always very moving for me. It is a time to focus forward, to feel and to know the promise of Advent. By looking toward the future, perhaps we are able to slough off the fetters of the past, and the anxieties of the present.

Reverend Johnston's sermon was entitled "Preparation!" The exclamation point is his, not mine, and I believe to emphasize that the preparing to be ready is as important as the being ready. This is surely comforting - knowing that for all our faults and shortcomings, the work of preparation is our supreme task as Christians.

Following the text of Matthew 24, Reverend Johnston challenged us to change our perspective - to be future-centred, not past-focused. The future described in this passage in Matthew is the Rapture - the Second Coming of Lord Jesus Christ on Earth. It is this future event for which we light the candle of hope, and toward which we look.

The troubling part of this passage for me is the 50% of the people who are not taken. "Are they unworthy?", I think. "Am I unworthy?", I selfishly think. Of course, there is no certain answer to these questions, but there is hope. And there is the work of preparation which may make us more ready to be taken into the glory of the Rapture. This work, clearly, is more difficult than the promise in buying an "R4R" mousepad or t-shirt! But it is the work of preparing our hearts and lives to be acceptable and pleasing to God, and in living out the promise and the hope of the Advent Season that we come to be closer to Christ.

Sunday, November 21

As a confirmed goer to the 9:30 service, it's always a pleasure to experience the fuller service of 11:00. the choir, the children, the fuller congregation - everything! This morning was particularly moving as it was a time for the whole congregation to come together to profess publicly to each other our commitment to Christian life together and to St. Andrew's Ottawa in particular.

I enjoyed the choir being closer to the congregation and I especially enjoyed the Moses story as depicted by the children. I never imagined Moses saying "Holy Smoke", but I'm sure but it was certainly fitting to describe the voice of God coming out of a burning yet not consumed burning bush.

Reverend Johnston pointed out that we identify with the bush, the bush who was going about its earthly business doing whatever a bush does, until one day God needed that bush and acted through it. Apparently, we too are going about our business always at hand to be the conduit for God. It made me wonder if this is really the case. Are we, or at least, am I open enough to be of use to God. Would I be be watching TV when God came? Would I be working? Would I be answering email, texting, playing a video game, even asleep? perhaps God used the bush because, as a bush, it didn't have the luxury of distractions. perhaps i ouht to take some time to be more open, more attuned and more aware, less distracted, less busy, for God to work through me. And this, I think is one lesson of Covenant Sunday - being aware that we as a congregation need to make some time, devote some talent, divert some treasure for His work, through St. Andrews and the Presbyterian ministry.

On a practical note, I've been doing the PAR contributions for 2 years now, and it is so easy. It also makes the option of sleeping in on a Sunday morning less guilt-inducing knowing that the contribution goes to work, even if I don't go to church!

Geoffrey

Sunday, November 14

Music in the worship service is a powerful force. The excellent singing by the choir in the opening and closing hymns, Praise, my soul, the King of heaven and Great is thy faithness, rose and touched me. What is it in the hymn God of the sparrow, God of the whale that is so moving? The simplicity of the words and music? It brought tears to my eyes.

It was wonderful to have The St Andrew’s Hand Bell choir perform. Beyond all Praising was very respectfully played.
Faithfulness was the theme of the sermon. Faithfulness in marriage is our greatest good; it is of the essence.

Margaret M.

Sunday, November 7

Every Sunday at St Andrews is a special Sunday however today was extra special as everyone there heard through the children’s story the importance of saying thank you to the countless men and women who have fought and in many cases even gave their life that we might have a free country in which to live. How moving to hear those young voice in unison thanking our veterans and service people of today.

There were 2 lines from the sermon that caught my attention more than the others.

“Every human life is a creation of God”.

“War for a Christian is never good, it is even considered failure”.

How much value do we as Christians, place on human kind? Do we look at War as failure of God’s will? If we were true to each and every commandment, how do we justify the atrocities of war? Love your neighbour, Thou Shalt not Kill and on it goes

O day of Peace that dimly shines!

Let each of us take time on this Remembrance Day to not only pause to give thanks but also to pray to God and ask him for strength and wisdom to honour this commandment, “Thou Shalt not murder/kill. As the lament of the bagpipes calls us to a place of remembrance, so may our time of prayer draw us to a time of closeness with God that he may guide us in the way he would have us go.

- Grant P.

Sunday, October 31

Something happened this Sunday morning that made us think of Abass Hassan Mohammed. James met Abass in a refugee camp in Kenya in 2004. Abass had fled Somalia with his family in 1992 and had survived in one of the poorest and most violent refugee camps in Africa for more than a decade. But Abass had accomplished something even more remarkable: his final high school exam results ranked him first in his province and eighth in Kenya. With the help and encouragement of strangers and friends, he won a scholarship to study at Princeton University.

Abass’s incredible journey was made possible, in large part, by light. Recognizing the importance of education, his parents spent what little money they had on kerosene, so that Abass could study after sunset. Providing light for their son was a significant sacrifice for them to make in a camp where refugees barely receive enough food to survive.

How often do we take light for granted?

Light was the central theme of Reformation Sunday at St. Andrew’s this morning. In our reading of Matthew 5:14-16, Jesus tells us that we are “the light of the world.” In the message from the Rev. Dr. Emidio Campi, we learned that a central image of the early Reformation was uncovering the light, which is the word of God. We were challenged to let this light be free and to shine in the world through our actions. As we sang in the children’s hymn:

Jesus bids us shine, then for all around;
Many kinds of darkness in this world abound:
Sin and want and sorrow; so we must shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.

We heard of one opportunity to let our light shine at the start of the service when we learned more about the decision by St. Andrew’s to sponsor the S* family for resettlement to Canada. The S* are an Iraqi Christian family. They have lived as refugees in Syria for many years due to the violence and persecution of Christians in their homeland.

When introducing us to this ministry of our congregation, Peter L. reminded us of Matthew 25:31-46, where we hear that God calls us to feed the hungry, refresh the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, care for the sick and show solidarity with the imprisoned.

This call for action is as important today as it was 500 years ago at the start of the Reformation. Indeed, a central message of this morning’s sermon was what God did through Reformation. “We don’t remember Reformation to celebrate tradition but to celebrate God’s action,” said Rev. Dr. Campi. “The Reformers were illuminated by God’s living word.”

If God accomplished all this through the Reformers so long ago, what can God accomplish through us today if we let our light shine?

– Laurie Mackenzie and James Milner

Sunday, October 24

Thou Shalt Share: Honouring God, Respecting Others

The focus of today’s service was justice and forming a just society.

The lesson for the children really resounded with us. Andrew talked about an ice cream factory that made his favourite flavour: mint chocolate chip. He explained to the children that, to make this delicious ice cream, you need a large vat of milk, a bucket of sugar, a small bowl of chocolate chips, an even smaller dish of green food colouring, and, lastly, a very tiny container of mint flavouring.

One day, however, the ice cream factory made the ice cream but forgot to include that tiny container of mint flavouring. Nobody liked the taste of the ice cream, and nobody wanted it. They learned that, in this case, the smallest ingredient was the most important – the one that completed the recipe and gave the ice cream its distinctive and appealing flavour.

Andrew asked us to think about how this story might apply to society. He asked us to think about people in our city and in our lives: those who are poor, those who struggle with school, those who are old, those who are ill. Jesus said that it is, in fact, these people who are the most important. If we can’t take care of them, if we can’t love them, then nothing in the world is right. In other words, we’ll be missing an essential ingredient, just like the mint in the ice-cream.

Andrew also encouraged us to look at the commandment “Thou shalt not steal” in a new light. He put forth the idea that, instead of thinking only of the prohibition contained in these three words, we might want to consider them as a positive exhortation, something more like, “Thou shalt share.”

Stephen Allen, Associate Secretary, Justice Ministries of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, expanded on this idea in his sermon, called “Signposts to Freedom.” Drawing on the experiences of diverse groups of people who struggled – and still struggle – for justice and freedom, he suggested that we think about the commandments not just as rules that tell us what not to do, but as constructive starting points that could help frame the way we live.

Quoting Leviticus 25, Stephen spoke about the year of jubilee: Every 7 years, fields are to lie fallow; every 50 years, land is to be returned to its owner and debts are to be cancelled. He spoke of how this concept applies today, a time in which many people – the Global South in particular – struggle with crippling debt. Stephen also mentioned the active role St. Andrew’s played in working to cancel these debts during the Ecumenical Jubilee Campaign (1999-2001), reminding us not to underestimate the role that the church can play in public life and how it can contribute as a forum for moral deliberation.

What we took from this morning’s service: In a world plagued by suffering, injustice and inequality, we should think more about those in need and find new ways to act on the lesson of sharing behind the four words “Thou shalt not steal.”

After all, we all need a little mint in our ice cream.

-Katherine and Jeremy Boyes

UPDATE: Listen to Rev. Johnston's children's story here. (8minutes, 7.8MB)