I’m very conscious of demands that Christmas brings on ministers and their families in this festive season. I’m currently preparing for Christmas #29 as a minister. It should have been #30 but I skived off one time making the most of the opportunity that a shift between parish ministries gave me!
I know we all like to be creative and fresh each Christmas but the simple reality is that we are coming to the year’s end and most of us are catching a sniff of holidays looming close… so we box on, stagger, or limp towards 11am on Christmas Day, and often present ourselves to our families as tired wrecks… Every now and then I wish Jesus was born in September! Continue reading
Author: mart the rev
Advent Resources
Hi there
Candour is hoping to provide some creative resources for you curators of Advent worship out there. Please forward anything sparkly that you have drawn up or drawn on to me at martin(at)villagechurch.nz and I can load it onto the Candour blog.
Martin [Ed]
Prayer for All Saints Day – Robert Simpson
Robert is a retired minister in Christchurch
LORD,
we thank you that we not only have You surrounding us,
enveloping us in Your love and enabling power,
but that we also have a great cloud of witnesses
packed into the heavenly stadium,
encouraging us by our remembrance of their lives
here on earth. Continue reading
Out of Retirement – Ray Coster
Ray is a former Moderator of the PCANZ and is back from a year away as he embarks on his retirement from full-time church ministry
Recently I returned to New Zealand after a year ministering in a Methodist Circuit in London. Consideration of further parish ministry was never on my bucket list when I turned 65. When I retired after nearly 40 years of serving the PCANZ in parish ministry I did have a plan for my retirement years. A friend and I had a dream of working for a third of our time, serving humanity for a third, and ‘playing’ for a third. Continue reading
Prayers for praying
Hey there!
Who writes prayers for worship?
Would you be willing to submit some for Candour?
Contact me: martin(at)villagechurch.nz with your contributions!!
Robert Simpson, a retired minister in Christchurch has prepared these prayers to start us off:
LORD,
Triune God,
You are magnificent,
marvellous and almighty One.
You are creator.
You are holy.
Your love is constant.
Your words are true.
Your works are dependable.
Your plans are enduring.
Your purposes last eternally.
You are mysterious.
You protect me.
You save me.
I offer obedience, trust and praise,
and worship only You.
LORD,
I have so much to celebrate!
My world echoes to Your beauty.
Your great love surrounds me.
The friendship You offer me is returned.
The open-door hope that You bring,
shows me the outstanding future.
Thank You!
LORD,
rest our minds in thinking,
touch our lips in speaking,
hold our hands while working,
guide our feet in moving,
watch our bed while sleeping,
and shield our faith in serving.
LORD,
the horrors of war, famine,
death, injury or starvation
confront millions of people.
We don’t know how to pray for them,
or even what to pray about.
You said, “Pray for the least of my people,
and you have prayed for the world”.
That should be enough to go on!
LORD,
we hear from Your Word
loud and clear –
Forgiven! – Forgiven! – Forgiven!
May we act to others in the same way.
An offering to the powers that be – Martin Stewart
Martin is the editor of Candour and a minister in the team at The Village Church, Christchurch.
A few weeks in Wellington I photographed Finn, my seven-month old grandson, revelling in the wonder of a Wellington gale. I was about to head to the airport to fly home. I was dreading the flight because of the intensity of the gale, and I was eventually held up on the tarmac for almost two hours because of that wind! But there was Finn, throwing his head back in laughter as he delighted in the wonder of wind! Continue reading
Time for a woman Moderator? – Marg Schrader
Marg is a retired minister living in Waikanae
I woke with a sense of call last Tuesday. The context was my concern that in the 117 years since our first moderator, there have been only four women moderators in a church that has far more women than men. Continue reading
May the road rise to meet you – Martin Stewart
An Easter reflection on Andrew Norton’s photograph Home Hills Rd in Central Otago. The Village Church in Christchurch hosted a collection of Andrew’s images and poems.
May the road rise to meet you.
That, of course, is the opening line of the well-known Irish blessing. May the road rise to meet you. It’s an interesting idea – the road rising. Our usual take on things is that we do all the moving – the lowering of a foot as we lift the other in order to propel ourselves forward. And the road is there for a purpose – to walk or drive on – functional. Continue reading
Can the church be more like what Jesus said? – Martin Stewart
Martin is one of the ministers in The Village Church in Christchurch. He is also the editor of Candour.
I’m planning some study leave next year and have been wondering about why any reference to the parables of Jesus seem to be absent in the New Testament witness, other than in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Continue reading
God whispers a secret about telling secrets – Geoff New
Rev Dr Geoff New is Dean of Studies at the Knox Centre for Ministry & Leadership and is based in Dunedin.
I was ambivalent about accepting the invitation to write this blog. I found myself with something to say but unsure if I could say it; unsure if I had the vocabulary. I’ll try.
When I was young, too young, I became aware of the Holocaust. I was too young to appreciate the enormity of it and that expressed itself in a morbid fascination with it. Yet over the years that morbid fascination matured into raw realisation. Continue reading
