Thorburn-Sutherland's River Pastoral Charge

O Lord, by the power of your Spirit, open our hearts and our minds to your Word. Teach us your ways and give us the grace to follow them. Give us understanding to see the world as you do. Give us hearts to love others as you do. And give us the wisdom to discern how to best live as followers of Jesus, your Living Word. Amen

I think we can be forgiven if we are feeling a little uncertain these days. We’ve just come through a pandemic that has changed the way we look at and experience the world. We’ve been through three years of isolation and uncertainty and the anxiety, grief and anger that accompanied it.

And we’re facing changing economic times. Costs are rising faster than wages and the news is full of warnings of recession. Groceries have risen in price and it’s much more expensive to try and feed your family.

And even our weather has changed, there seems to be more extremes of hot and cold, wet and dry, as our climate becomes more and more unpredictable and catastrophic weather events hit communities around the world. Last summer we had three weeks without rain, this year it seemed like we had three weeks where it rained every day.

As communities and individuals, we are stressed. Some of us are struggling with finances. Some are stuck in painful relationships. Some struggle with mental health. Some are struggling with physical health. With many different stories and circumstances, we have come through, and are going through difficult times.

In hard times, it can be difficult to see where God is. Peace, hope, and faith seem a long way off. The number of people who come together to worship and follow Christ in communities and congregations across Canada has declined and those of us who remain often wonder how we can continue to be faithful followers of Christ in a world we don’t understand.

But this is also a common theme in the Bible. The people of God go through tumultuous times again and again and again. They doubt. They fear. They question God. And they are scared to do anything. Today, in our Old Testament reading from the book of Jeremiah, we heard their lament.

The prophet Jeremiah lived a little over five hundred years before the birth of Jesus. The Israelites are in exile in Babylon, an alien land, and a hostile environment.  Jeremiah has told them that their exile will last for 70 years, more than a lifetime for most of them. And yet, in the same breath, he tells them that God has plans for their welfare. This is what God had said to Jeremiah, “Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. …For thus says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfil to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For surely, I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”   (Jeremiah 29:5-6, 10-11)

Think of what Jeremiah’s words must have meant to the people of Israel – a people who have given up and don’t know what to do. Jeremiah has given them instructions on how they should live through this time of exile: build houses, plant gardens, marry, and have children. Continue to pray, seek God and work for the welfare of the place they find themselves in. In other words, get on with living.  Don’t stop being the people of God because you are in exile, because times are uncertain, because you are afraid – and better things will come.

Jeremiah told them to choose faith over fear. This wasn’t easy for the people. Jeremiah was asking them to choose hope over despair, faith over fear.

And it’s not easy for us. Fear is a natural reaction to uncertainty. We face big, overwhelming challenges. We wonder how our actions can make a difference. We think we aren’t good enough, that we aren’t enough to make a difference. It can be easier to allow fear to envelop us and do nothing at all.

But fear doesn’t have to motivate the way we act. We can choose to act out of faith instead of fear, even when we are afraid. Instead of inaction, we can let hope motivate our actions. When I hear this reading from Jeremiah, I hear God saying: “Live as I have taught you, and I promise you a future of hope.”

Even in hard times, even in uncertain and chaotic times, we can build houses, plant gardens, find spouses, and have children. We can find ways to stop and see the joy around us: smell the flowers, savour the sweetness of the fruit that is in season, hold hands as we watch the sunset. We can stop and listen to people’s joys and sorrow and help those in need. We can work together on projects that will help each other. We can participate in rites of passage: graduations, weddings, funerals – and take note of the milestones of life. We can plant trees for the future and work for the welfare of others and the place we call home.

And with each action, we can pray, seek God.  We don’t always know where God is leading or how we will get there, but we know that God is faithful. Choosing faith is part of building a church community.

Strength and energy come when we stand together, work together, share together, commune together, laugh together, cry together. God reminds us again and again that we need one another. In community, there is strength.

Congregations across Canada sharing the gospel in word and action are vibrant expressions of God’s love. Together we live out our faith, in our communities and around the world. In times of crisis and chaos and uncertainty, the message of the gospel—hope, peace, joy, and love—is needed so much. It is needed now. So, we mustn’t stand still, paralyzed by fear.

And, as you can see by the insert in the bulletin, today is Presbyterians Sharing Sunday. Presbyterians Sharing is a fund of our national church which helps finance mission and ministry in Canada and around the world. Here in Thorburn part of our weekly offering goes to support this fund. On our envelopes, on the right side, there is a place to write in your donations for missions. If you were to look in our annual report, you’d see there is a page which outlines how much was donated for the year and where the funds went.

Supporting and equipping congregations, both in Canada and abroad, is at the core of Presbyterians Sharing. When we give to Presbyterians Sharing, we provide materials and resources to help congregations in faithful ministry even through these challenging times.

Our donations also equip leaders through theological colleges, conferences and learning opportunities. We are helping congregations live out new dreams by providing coaches and mentors who share their experiences and perspectives. We are providing grants that help start new faith communities, launch new congregations, and renew established ones. And thanks to the generosity of our congregation, we are also able to support local missions, such as sending children to Camp Geddie.

Together we face difficult questions: Where is God calling us? What is the Holy Spirit equipping us to do today? How do we reach people who are skeptical of institutions and, even more, of organized religion?

It takes courage to see and address the pressing needs in our communities. With smaller numbers, we can no longer do things the way we have always done things. It takes physical, mental, and spiritual energy to change and learn new things. We find ourselves changing our routines, sharing our spaces, and redirecting our resources.

Sometimes it is helpful to remember that our church history is steeped in the tradition of being reformed and always reforming.  It is our history and culture to step out of our comfort zones, try new things and witness to the resurrection of Christ in fresh new ways.

This is why we come together in our churches. This is why our churches come together in our denomination. Gifts to Presbyterians Sharing help us navigate these uncertain times. When we put our gifts into God’s hands, God does incredible things; things that we can’t do on our own.

Gifts to Presbyterians Sharing help congregations reshape and redefine their ministries. Together, we share experiences from across the country as we discover new ways of ministry into the future. We are discovering the courage and language to start conversations about difficult issues like mental and spiritual well-being. We are learning how to care for one another better. We are leading our communities in caring for creation and responding to injustice. God is calling us to be God’s people in this challenging world in which we live, here and now.

And on a further note, I think it’s important to mention that our gifts are not just about money, but also time. So many of you do volunteer work, and not just helping our church, but also in the community at large. Whether it’s reading in church, greeting at the door, taking collection, or helping with receptions and church suppers, it all takes up your time. And as the saying goes, “time is money.”

And in closing, we go back to the story of the Israelites in exile in Babylon during the time of Jeremiah. God said to them, “For thus says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfil to you my promise and bring you back to this place.” And seventy years is a long time to wait, pretty well three generations. And during that time things weren’t going to get any easier. The feelings of brokenness, loss and abandonment continue as the Israelites experience the trauma of exile and having to rebuild their lives. However, those feelings were held in the hands of a loving God who never let go.

Maybe, like the people in the time of Jeremiah, we recognize that we are also waiting. Not a listless, despondent, sitting on our hands doing nothing kind of waiting, but an expectant kind of waiting, where we pause, reflect, and listen.  Where we don’t assume we have all the answers, leaping into action. The coming of God’s realm takes time, God’s time. God promises renewal for God’s people. God has reaffirmed God’s love and purpose in our lives.

So, we wait expectantly on the God who promised new life for Jeremiah’s people. We wait expectantly on deep, rooted, strong, unshakable promises, on a an ever-faithful God, who often surprises and sometimes overwhelms us. And we do it together.

And as we wait, living lives filled with faithful action, walking on this journey together, we can feel fear and excited expectation, we can experience joys and sorrows, we can pray and share our hopes and fears and joys and sorrows with God. And we can be patient and see where God is leading us – as individuals, congregations, and denominations.

And through our support of Presbyterians Sharing, we put God’s gifts in God’s hands, God will do remarkable things.  We’ve been promised so. As Winston Church said, “We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.”

Let us Pray:

Loving God, through our gifts, we proclaim how much you have done for us and allow your work to be done. Let our giving reflect our choice to live as Christ taught us, sharing love, faith, and hope with people in our community and around the world. In Jesus name we pray. Amen