Belgrave South Baptist Church

Living and Sharing Jesus' Love

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15 into 4

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At last Sunday’s members meeting, I announced that I would be finishing at BSBC in the middle of January to take up a position at the Baptist Union of Victoria in the Church Health team. I greatly enjoyed worked in exactly the same role earlier this year on a 10-week contract not dreaming that the position would become available permanently! It is perfect for my family giving them the stability and presence that they would love.

I must say however that I am saddened that what I expected to be for 15 months will only be for 4 months as I have really enjoyed working with you. A number of people said on Sunday that “we need to trust God in this” and they are correct. When Jesus builds his church, there are always many apprentices who serve for different seasons; some longer and some shorter. I firmly believe God has great things ahead for BSBC.

Blessings
Mark Wilkinson
Interim Pastor

As was his custom

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There is a little phrase in Luke 4:16 which is slipped in by Luke amidst the episode where Jesus is returning to Nazareth on the Sabbath. As a good Jewish man he was expected at the synagogue on a weekly basis for worship. Now we know that Jesus felt totally free to break the standard interpretation of the old covenant laws that he felt was onerous or against the greater good – think of the number of times he actually challenged the Sabbath law interpretations in his healing ministry!

However, Luke tells us that when it came to Sabbath attendance at the synagogue that it was customary for Jesus to participate. “…and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom.”

Whilst we surely don’t need to be legalistic about it; what would it be like if we, too, made weekly attendance at worship a priority such that people would say of us, “They be at church today; as is their custom”?

Blessings
Mark Wilkinson
Interim Pastor

500 Years

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On Tuesday when many people we celebrating Halloween, God’s People were remembering the 500th anniversary of the recognised beginning of the Reformation. Martin Luther a German monk was reading his Bible and some things that the church of his day was saying didn’t make sense.

For instance, when he read the Greek text of Mark 1:15, he believed that the text meant, “Repent and believe the good news” when the standard translation of the day was “Do penance and believe the good news.” Since ‘do penance’ had become a major fund-raiser of the church, this was not popular and he was ex-communicated from the church. His desire was to ‘reform’ the church; the outcome was he was outcast but God used him to begin the Reformation.

About 100 years later some English Christians thought the Reformation didn’t go far enough when it came to the issue of baptism and our denomination was formed. We’ll have a look at Jesus’ baptism (and temptation) today.

Blessings
Mark Wilkinson
Interim Pastor