Winter Series starts this week

Dear friends,

This week we start a three-week Winter series on some of the weighty words of Jesus. See, in term 3 we’ll be racing through Mark 9-16 one chapter at a time, and that’s fitting: Mark is kind of an ‘express gospel’. But the thing is, there are some very weighty words Jesus utters on subjects like hell and divorce and we’re just not going to have enough time in term 3 to slow down for them. So we thought it would be worth dedicating an entire week to each of these subjects during the winter break.

On the 5th of July Tom will teach on Jesus’ command to love God and love our neighbour. It’s not weighty in the sense of controversy like the other two weeks, but it is weighty in that it pretty much covers all of life. We’re to love God and love our neighbour. That’s basically every decision we make.

On the 12th of July I’ll be taking us through the subject of hell, which Jesus raises at the end of Mark 9.

And then on the 19th of July Nigel will guide us through Jesus’ teaching on divorce from the start of chapter 10. I did message him to check he’ll be OK covering such a big topic for his first sermon back from long service leave and he said he’s been thinking a lot about it on the Camino as he meets so many people there who are recovering or reorienting after a divorce.

So these are some weighty words from Jesus we’ll be covering in the winter break. For some of us, they will be hard to hear. But we know Jesus to be a good and loving saviour and a truthful teacher. We can be thankful he taught plainly about these deep issues of life, and we can trust his wisdom for our lives today. I’m praying it’s a time of great depth and practical teaching for us.

In Christ,
Gerard