There’s a Christian song that we love to sing to kids which goes like this:

I’m H-A-P-P-Y, I’m H-A-P-P-Y, I know I am, I’m sure I am, I’m H-A-P-P-Y.

I’m H-A-P-P-Y, I’m H-A-P-P-Y, because I know God loves me so, I’m H-A-P-P-Y.

It’s a great little song, especially for young kids who really understand only two emotions: sad and happy.

And so with this simple message is a simple truth: joy, satisfaction, happiness is found in the love of God.

Yet, we get much older, we realise that even as people who know Jesus and are loved by him, there will be times when we will experience great sadness.

I was reminded of this as I recently read Psalm 6 as part of my daily Bible reading. It says:

I am worn out from sobbing. All night I flood my bed with weeping, drenching it with my tears. My vision is blurred by grief; my eyes are worn out because of all my enemies. (Psalm 6:6-7).

It’s a lot different to the “H-A-P-P-Y” experience of the kids’ song, but it shows that sorrow is an authentic experience of the Christian.

Yet, Christian sadness is not without hope. The Psalm continues in this way:

Go away, all you who do evil, for the LORD has heard my weeping. The LORD has heard my plea; the LORD will answer my prayer. (Psalm 6:8-9)

As we experience sadness, we can know that God hears us in our grief, and he answers our prayers.

And our hope is future-focused: we look forward to him answering our prayer for deliverance from our enemies and the rescue that we are promised because of Jesus.

Whether you’re H-A-P-P-Y or S-A-D, you can look forward to being restored and rescued by our saviour Jesus Christ, as we await his return or our going to be with him.

JODIE McNEILL

One of the great treasures of the Christian faith is the collection of prayers found in ‘The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions’.

It contains two hundred or so prayers written nearly five hundred years ago, and their timeless words capture some deep reflections on the Bible’s teaching.

I first became aware of these prayers when an album was released by Sovereign Grace called ‘The Valley of Vision’, where several of these prayers were put to song, including ‘Let Your Kingdom Come’ and ‘O Great God’.

Yet it is the first song of the album, which is based on the first prayer of the book, that has been a great blessing to me in my Christian walk.

Here are the first two stanzas:

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly,
Thou hast brought me to the valley of vision,
where I live in the depths but see thee in the heights;
hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold thy glory.

Let me learn by paradox
that the way down is the way up,
that to be low is to be high,
that the broken heart is the healed heart,
that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,
that the repenting soul is the victorious soul,
that to have nothing is to possess all,
that to bear the cross is to wear the crown,
that to give is to receive,
that the valley is the place of vision.

Let us pray that we will find God’s glory in our valley.

JODIE McNEILL

Walk about Zion, go around her,
 count her towers…
that you may tell of them
 to the next generation. Psalm 48:13,14

Psalm 48 is an invitation to behold with eyes of faith Zion, the city of God, and for us to not to rejoice in the number of towers, but to rejoice that this is where God dwells.

He is secure forever, and so therefore are his people.

But the purpose of this knowledge is not just for you; it’s so you will tell the next generation.

Christians are those who now see not the walls of an earthly city, but with eyes of faith see the heavenly Jerusalem, where we are gathered around Mt Zion.

And the same command comes to us to tell the next generation, and the generation after that.

Each generation must take the mantle of sharing the news of the gospel that we see by faith.

We live in a society that by and large have rejected this vision, and so have left their children adrift. We as the Church have the opportunity to fill that spiritual void and hold out the good news of salvation.

We are privileged to have a terrific relationship with Jamberoo Public School, and we enjoy the privilege of teaching the school students every week about the Christian faith through Special Religious Education (SRE).

Over the next few weeks our Jamba Kids team plan to get together to see how we can further strengthen the connections between our Saturday night ministry and the Scripture classes at the school, as we plan to re-launch our weekend kids’ ministry.

And, as I (Jodie) begin to teach and coordinate our Primary School SRE from next year, we’re praying that we’ll have even stronger ties between our church and the school.

SIMON CHAPLIN (with JODIE McNEILL)

Last weekend Mandy and I attended the ‘Anglican Future Conference’ in Melbourne.

One of the keynote speakers, Wes Hill, encouraged us to think about the challenge of having our churches open to including people who experience unwanted, same-sex attraction.

He encouraged us to be ‘welcoming, not affirming.’

We are to be welcoming to people with all sorts of backgrounds and experiences, but do so in such a way that we do not affirm behaviour that is against God’s will.

As a basis for his encouragement, he led us through a Bible study on Romans 9 to 11, where he outlined the remarkable way in which God’s gospel makes believers go from spiritual death to life.

And when God acts to save his people, his salvation is unifying.

We who were excluded as non-Jews have been included into the nation of Israel, and it had nothing to do with how faithful we were to his law.

In fact, he included us in order that we might be dependent on God’s grace, not on our own merits.

The result is that “we must forsake our looking down on others.”

For this reason, our church welcomes LGBTQI+ people.

God’s saving message of his love and mercy is for everyone: we are all welcomed, but our sin is not affirmed.

For as we read in the Bible:

Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 9b-11)

JODIE McNEILL

In the midst of a very messy few weeks in Federal Politics, our nation has ended up with a Prime Minister who trusts in Jesus as his Lord and Saviour.

In his maiden speech, Scott Morrison spoke of his “personal faith in Jesus”, noting his commitment to his faith at an early age.

We can be thankful to God that he has given us a man to lead our nation who himself follows Jesus as his own leader.

Nonetheless, it is a challenge for any Christian in public office to faithfully follow his own beliefs whilst serving a nation full of diverse faith positions.

Whilst he must not divorce his own heartfelt commitment to the teachings of Jesus, he must also lead politicians who represent a wide range of constituents.

Morrison has said “My personal faith in Jesus Christ is not a political agenda.”

Furthermore, he said that for him, “faith is personal, but the implications are social—as personal and social responsibility are at the heart of the Christian message.”

This will be a real challenge for our new Prime Minister.

We must pray for him that he will have great wisdom as he seeks to be a faithful Christian man in a very public office.

For, as he observed a decade ago, “it has become fashionable to negatively stereotype those who profess their Christian faith in public life as ‘extreme’ and to suggest that such faith has no place in the political debate of this country.”

We must pray that Mr Morrison would continue to profess his Christian faith in public life, and that he would have many opportunities to commend the truth of Jesus to those he speaks to privately and also in the public sphere.

JODIE McNEILL