Kia Ora
How has the week gone for you?? How are your bubbles holding up? With the sun out today, I hope you’ve had some time to get out and soak in some vitamin D – good for the soul and the mind 🙂
Just a couple of things to make you aware of church before we hear from Den below.
Our services will continue being Hope from Home over level 3 and our staff will continue to work from home as best they can. We will continue to adhere to the government’s recommendations and will do everything we can for the health and safety of us all 🙂 Service times this weekend are:
9am with Hornby
10am with West Melton
11am with Rolleston
6pm with the Evening Team
As usual, head along to www.hopechurch.net.nz/live to access the content.
We also wanted to give you an update of Andrew and Karen who we partner with as a church in Laos. They are currently are here in NZ, but are looking to head back as soon as they are able in the next couple of months.
Also as a church let’s continue to pray for John and Elaine McLardy as they make their way back from PNG. It’s a difficult time to travel at the moment, so let’s keep praying for them.
Thanks, be sure to read the below from Dennis and we’ll see you all on Sunday
God bless
Marty
I want to give this a twist with ANZAC day upon us. I remember watching the inauguration of the tomb (2004) of the unknown soldier in Wellington, on TV. It was a solemn event with parliamentary dignitaries, public notables, old soldiers, and a large crowd in attendance. The Unknown New Zealand Warrior was originally buried at Caterpillar Valley Cemetery near Longueval, the site of the Battle of the Somme, France. Why is the tomb of a dead soldier so important? Even not knowing his name has significance. His anonymity means he could represent one of us. The tomb looks to the past, but it also looks to the future. How many more conflicts will New Zealanders be involved where those that fall will not be identified? Representation is important, we understand the gravity of this memorial. Likewise, the analogy applies to Jesus as a representative for all people. His representative consciousness is seen when he refers to himself as the son of man. The Greek word for man is anthropos, it is the generic word for mankind, in pc lingo, humanity. Jesus could have called himself the son of humanity. As a representative, when he died, humanity died. When he was raised from death, humanity rose from death. In Jesus the resurrection has begun. That is why John describes Jesus as “the first to rise from dead” (Rev 1:5). If a first there must be a second, and a third, and a … While Paul writes, Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first of a great harvest of all who have died (1 Cor 15:20). We live with the consequences of the first man’s disobedience; Adam. Adam gave death legitimacy to reign in humans, and we live with the consequences and our physical bodies die. The first representative man blew it for us. Jesus is the second man, he never abandons his humanity to become God again. He is inherently God, he cannot not be God, but he is human. his humanity gives us hope, … you see, just as death came into the world through a man, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another man. 22 Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life (1 Cor 15:21-22). Our bodies are dying but at the same time new life grows in our inner beings, and even though our physical bodies die that life God has begun in us will continue. One day, the life of God will culminate in a resurrection body with the same attributes as Jesus’ body. Resurrection means I/we have a purpose beyond physical death. Christians thus die with hope. Resurrection means the future is good, even in the face of death. Death does not have the last say. Jesus became human to be forever human. Once he left heaven, he would never be the same again; that’s eternity. A huge cost but humanity was worth it. Just think you and I were worth it. We don’t even think that highly of ourselves. A human representing us, now occupies the highest place in the universe. A representation of greater significance than the tomb of a nameless soldier. Past present and future Jesus represents you. More, he’s personally connected with you; he loves you. It’s mind boggling!
Den