Details, details, details...

Today, we welcomed back to St Andrews Rev. Fred Demaray, and the topic of his sermon was "Found in the details". We could not have sang a better song to bring home the message. "Open our eyes, illumine me - Sprit divine". Indeed we are all beckoned to open our hearts, our minds, our eyes, our ears and our beings, to see God all around, and celebrate him not just in the spectacular moments of our lives, but in those tiny details where he stacks things up to line with the bigger picture he's set out for us. 

As I listened, I was reminded of a saying that I am fond of: details, details, details. That's my go to sentence for curtailing a long winded and convoluted story ( or maybe I am just inherently impatient). In my mind, who said what to whom and what ensured is not really crucial. Its all about the outcome. I was reminded today though that details do matter. Consider this,  there's a reason you go through a home inspection or hire an architect when building or buying a home. For if we overlook the details such as the design, the materials, the number of rooms and bathrooms, etc surely we might wind up with  a design that doesn't make sense or doesn't work for you and your family. Similarly as Christians, our end goal is to see Christ someday, and to live with him - but if we don't pay attention to the details of our life and feed our souls the spiritual food we need to grow,how are we preparing for this meeting?

Reverend Demaray reminded me today, that details, details, details are important. Our God (like every good parent) is interested in the details of our life. It's a balancing act you see. You don't want to get so tied up in the details that you miss the big picture or focus too much on the broad picture that you overlook key details. This sermon left me reflecting on the details of my faith and walk with Christ. It was a reminder to look for and celebrate God in the details  while enjoying the journey of life which He has afforded me.

Silently now I wait for thee, Ready my God - thy will to see, Open my heart, illumine me, Spirit Divine"

-Clara H. Scott

Koko A.

Sunday Lunch Blog - June 29

We welcomed back The Rev. Bob Hill today, June 29. His sermon was ‘What makes a nation great?’ As I was spending some time with the Church School before the sermon I thought I had the answer – our children and youth! We have an exceptional group at St. Andrew’s and I feel confident in the future.

Rev. Hill reminded us that a great nation must be moral and compassionate. A great nation must be a moral nation – respect for people. How we treat others is how we treat God. Humorously, he spoke about how morality would reduce our country’s debt! Debt costs us so imagine what life would be without crime and the associated costs!

Morality is character being exercised. We end up with a sense of value of ourself. Character is what you do when no one is looking….Worth thinking about.

We must ‘walk the walk’ and experience the reality. If we move away from God we will turn to other means in our lives. It was fascinating to learn that one of the earliest signs of civilization was a healed broken limb – it showed someone cared. Evidence of compassion is a first sign of civilization.

God wants us to be great and to endure…not to be disposable like a paper cup.
Jeanie H.

Sunday Lunch Blog - June 22

This week’s service was, for me, encapsulated by two thematically linked ideas: gardening and faithfulness – about how God is like a gardener, how we are agents of God when we do garden, and, with the lovely singing and spoken word presentation by the choir, the young voice of our psalm reader today, and the Grade Four Bible presentations, how God’s people too are the fruits and blossoms of the earth. Last year, I was watching online news sources intently for updates about the flood in my home city of Calgary and news of my evacuated relatives: I greet today with delight and gratitude the knowledge that it was those same relatives who were in turn intently watching this morning’s video simulcast of the children’s choir and our daughters reading. With the wonderfully silly and traditional picnic games: the tug of war, the three legged race and the egg and spoon, I am again heartened that these games have been played for hundreds of years. Continuity and spring are beautiful marks of God’s faithfulness to us.

Rebecca B.

Sunday Lunch Blog: Open Doors, Open Hearts

This Sunday I was ushering at the North door, and I opted to sit out in the narthex. On occasion, I really love doing that. Especially in the summer. I love sitting there, looking in on the service while all the doors around me are open – the doors leading from the street into the church, and the doors leading into the sanctuary. I love what it says about our community. That one small gesture of opening our doors suddenly makes our service and our community permeable.

Tourists enter, glance in at the sanctuary and see our community gathered to practice our faith. Perhaps they take an order of service and join us, perhaps they continue on. Either way, it is so important that they see us there, much more than the beautiful architecture of our building.

And even if they don’t come inside, they hear us! Our prayers and hymns float out onto the sidewalk, mingling with the noise of traffic on Wellington. And the outside comes in to us – we hear that traffic, and feel the cool breeze as it comes through our doors.

All this noise – traffic, prayers, hymns – resonated for me in the words of our reading today: speaking in tongues, cymbals clashing. We were reminded, in one of the most beautiful passages of the Bible, that love is the basis of Christian life.

And what a beautiful reading to hear, if you happened to be wandering through our doors today. So often read at weddings, it is easy to forget that the type of love that St. Paul was writing about was not romantic love, but the everyday love that we should practice towards everyone – patience, kindness, humility, forgiveness, honesty, and hope.

And what lovely words for us to send out through our open doors, into the din of traffic, hopefully to find the ear of someone who will hear it, and be better for it.

We gather at church today and every Sunday to learn how to live those words, to be reminded how important it is that they become more than mere poetry for us, but a way of living and being with each other. It is easy to open our doors, much harder to open our hearts. But we strive, with Christ, to do that and send his word out into the world.

Jessica C.

Sunday, June 8

I really liked the moment in worship this morning when we all said the Lord's Prayer together, but each of us in our own languages. We also did this at the World Council of Churches 10th Assembly that I attended in Busan, South Korea last year.
 With thousands of people in worship, I can only imagine the number of languages that were spoken there that day. It really was just a hum of noise rising up. An amazing, diverse, unified chorus. (You can hear the leaders in Korean and Spanish (I think?) at 1:30:51 of this video... and watch to the end for a good shot of how many people were there.) I remember even doing it in our smaller Bible study groups - I had German on one side of me, Arabic on the other. We were all coming from very different places, but praying the same words. As Huda said during her sermon, that is what it means when we say "the holy catholic church" in the Apostles' Creed - the church is universal, inclusive and diverse.

And that ties in so well with the other scripture reading we heard this morning about the parts of the body. We all have gifts, given to us by the Spirit, that we bring. And it is good to reflect on this every once in a while, I think. What are my gifts? How is the Spirit blowing through me so that I can live and serve? And what about St. Andrew's - what are our gifts as a church? Are we allowing ourselves to be filled with the Spirit as we worship, make decisions, go out and serve?

It is actually kind of reassuring to me. Sometimes I can get very discouraged - we are a long way from realizing the kingdom of God here on earth. But knowing that the Spirit is supporting us, blowing through us as we try to create that kingdom, knowing that we are not alone - that fills me with hope and possibility. Indeed, we couldn't do it alone. As we concluded the Prayers of Thanksgiving and Intercession today:

We pray as the people of the Spirit, who lights our fires, who fills our lungs with air, who blows us out into the world to live and serve.

Sunday, May 18

At today’s service, the topic of discussion was the reconciliation and healing within Canada with our aboriginal people. Today was indeed the 20th anniversary of the Presbyterian Church in Canada’s confession of its role in residential schools. I learned what an important step this was for aboriginals and for the church, in coming to terms with the wrongs that were committed, so that all could move forward with confidence in a future where such injustices won’t take hold again.

Much attention was focused today on the legacy of residential schools, a dark and sad chapter in our country’s history. This was also part of the church school lesson for the children. I joined my kids to hear a story, told through the eyes of a modern aboriginal child. The story was of his older relative’s experience with residential schools. I walked away with the strong feeling that telling such stories is important, not to assign blame or guilt, but to promote understanding, and ensure all of us understand the impacts this era had.

Reconciliation is a building block. It will help the next generations – both aboriginal and non-aboriginal – to have an understanding of our shared history and a mutual respect for culture, language and tradition. And it will help our young people to recognize the potential each one of them has, regardless of their background or upbringing, to not only succeed for themselves, but to pass that success on to the generations that come after.

Mike S.

Sunday, May 11

I wasn’t in the sanctuary today, yet I felt my morning was full of grace.

In preparing for church school, I found a quiet place to cut out little cards, each indicating either a material good or an intangible blessing. So, for example, while one indicated “a car”, another indicated “peace”. The idea was to engage my class of early teens in an interactive activity, while having them cast their minds back to how the early Christians shared. As I cut the little cards, I couldn’t help but think about how I could share. That, of course, is the constant miracle of teaching – the teacher learns as much as the students.

With my preparatory task completed, I stepped into Grant Hall to find children of all ages, including members of my class, involved in a pre-class interactive activity. There they were, helping each other, sharing of their time, and of their skills. There they were in community. The theme of my lesson had been brought to life, even before I could place the cards before my class members. I would soon learn that my assignment today was not to teach, but instead to act.

Within minutes, I was confronted with my own opportunity to share. A church member believed she had left her stove on before heading to church, and was now quite worried about the risk of fire. She lived about six blocks away, but she did not have a car, and walking home would certainly waste precious time with so much hanging in the balance. So it was that with my class safely in the hands of another teacher, I offered a ride to the member. Sharing of my time, and of the benefit of a car, might well have averted a disaster. The stove, she reported, was on, the pot had become mangled, and the element was a write-off!

So it was that I learned about sharing, and about community, steps from the sanctuary, on a Sunday morning that gave words on little cards – car, and peace – meaning within the span of an hour.

Jide A.