Salvogesis

God is mad at Israel. He is like a parent or a boss here who is fed up. He says, Verse 1, 'declare to MY people, THEIR REBELLION and…sins', God is upset with these people, HIS people who, Verse 2: Ø        Seek him out, Ø        Seem eager to know His ways Ø        Ask Him for just, right decisions Ø        And seem eager for Him to come near them   God is upset with these people, HIS people and, like children or a husband sometimes… they really don't know why. They know that they do all of the above and they wonder why God is upset with them. [1]  Verse 3: 3 ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?’… God does not really believe that they are trying to fast all. He replies. Verses 3b and 4: “Yet on the day of your 'fasting', you do as you please and exploit all your workers. 4 Your fas...

Today is the third Sunday in Advent and in Advent we have the Advent wreath, of course. I don’t know if you know some of the significance of the Advent wreath. One key point is that it is traditionally made from evergreens. We’ll talk a little more about the evergreen  in a little bit. First we will talk specifically about Psalm 122, a psalm of David. Psalm 122 is the psalm associated with the first week of advent this year and this is the Psalm that we will be looking at today. Psalm 122:1 records- I rejoiced with those who said to me, “Let us go up to the house of the LORD.” Let us go up to the house of the LORD: It is always exciting when people wish to go up to the house of the LORD, to go to church, to come to the corps - either new friends from out-of-town visiting with their family at Christmastime or when we have visitors from other churches to do Advent Reader Exchanges and that sort of thing. It is good too when people haven’t been in church for a while decide to come...

Tomorrow we begin hamper registration at the corps. Hamper registration and hamper distribution are always an interesting time in any Salvation Army. We just came from Toronto where Christmas was quite a bit different than it is here. But the other day as I was readying application forms, appointment cards and Angels for the Angel Tree I was reminded of one hamper distribution day we had in Swift Current, Saskatchewan. Our building there is a former elementary school - like it was here for a bit. It is big and at Christmas time it is full of people; so it’s Hamper Day 2010 and everything is going well – we have so many volunteers helping from the community, it is great. In the morning I receive a phone call: someone is asking if he can register for a hamper that day. I explain to him that not only do we not register people for hampers on hamper pick-up day but that the deadline for registering was three weeks ago. He is way too late. He is persistent though. He is bound and det...

On this day in 2014 there were 888 246 ceramic poppies encircling the famous Tower of London in England; they create a powerful visual image to commemorate the centennial of the commencement of the First World War. The 888 246 poppies filled the Tower’s moat. Each poppy represents a military fatality during the war. We Canadians fought as part of the empire; our family members and our countrymen lived, served, and died in the ‘Great War’, the ‘war to end all wars’, the First World War. . When World War One broke out Canada was a very small and sparsely populated country of just over 7 million people. Most were farmers or involved in other primary industries. Many boys and young men left their family farms and businesses here to serve in the war there. I have read stories of bankers and teachers and minors and scientists and athletes and farmers and very young men from across this country and Newfoundland who put their jobs, their careers, their parents, their girlfriends, their ne...

Of this passage of scripture Moffet S. Churn writes, “Commentaries often call it the Sermon on the Plain. You may prefer to think of it as ‘the sermon I don’t want to preach.’…Jesus tells them plainly, pointedly, repeatedly, ‘Love your enemies and do good to those who hate you.”[1] This is most certainly an interesting passage to look at in the days leading up to Remembrance Day. It is definitely an interesting one for the Lord to put on my heart as I am at the same time preparing a message on a very different text for our community’s Remembrance Day ceremonies as the local Royal Canadian Legion chaplain.[2] That all being said, I think this passage is as important to our world and our community today as much as it ever has been in the history of civilization. I also think that it is incredibly poignant to examine this on the day prior to the eve of our country rightfully mourning those who were killed by our country’s enemies. I was born during the Cold War. I grew up in an era where ...

On November 11th we remember our friends and families who served in the World Wars, Korea, peacekeeping missions and subsequent conflicts in the 20th and 21st centuries. My own grandfather returned home to Saskatchewan from California, where he was working when the Second World War broke out, to join the Canadian Army. He eagerly grabbed some friends from Cut Knife and they all signed up for our armed forces. Of the men that enlisted that day with my grandfather, I believe, only he lived to see the end of the war. John 15:17, in the Bible, records: ‘Greater love has no man than to lay down his life for his friends’ The Salvation Army was also present in both these wars – actually in the trenches -offering material and emotional support and the love of God to the soldiers. I am humbled and honoured to share with you today some of what the Lord has done through the Canadian Salvation Army in the conflicts of 20th Century. During both World Wars and throughout the Cold War, The Salvat...