Easter Letter

Dear Friends

These last six months have been full of activity for me. I have visited fourteen of the nineteen Presbyteries, having a meal with the Moderators and Clerks, talking about the life and work of each of these Presbyteries. There have been moments of celebration: Berea (125 years), Auld Memorial (85 years), Midrand (25 years) and in September, Durbanville (50 years).

I toured the Presbytery of Lekoa in the first two weeks of March, driving from home to Carletonville and Westonaria to Klerksdorp and Stillfontein to Vryburg and then Kuruman, Mafikeng. The second week was spent in Vereeniging, going out to Sebokeng, Sharpville, Denysville, Boipatong, Vanderbijlpark etc. It was a wonderful time and I was warmly welcomed wherever I went.

There have been meetings, oh, so many meetings! All important, most considered by their members as urgent but so many meetings. I have tried to take my place around these meeting tables and to play my part.

There have been funerals – 4 of our ministers have died since I took office: Jimmy Stevenson, Brian Woods, Leslie Dawson and Moshe Rajuili. The first three had grown old (Genesis calls this ‘full of years’) and passed on peacefully but Moshe was tragically killed in a road accident. In one way or another, I was able to express the sympathy of the UPCSA to these families.

I am grateful to God for all these and many other opportunities to serve you.

Yesterday, in a meeting, one of our elders reflected on the state of the church. She singled out ‘unforgiveness’ as one of the great challenges facing the UPCSA. She spoke about this unforgiveness as a feature of the Church, in her observation, over the last 10 years.

Forgiveness is such a complex thing – do we forgive each other our debts? Do we forgive each other for hurts caused unintentionally or for hurts caused by others who are now ‘associated’ to the person standing before us?

Easter is all about forgiveness. Easter is about God’s intervention in human history to restore the relationship with humankind. Easter is a grand display of how love can transform even the most heinous evil. 

A few years ago, Sascha and I were in London and went to see the West End stage play, “Whistle down the wind.” In this story a convict escapes and hides out in the barn belonging to a recently bereaved family. The children meet the stowaway and as a result of their naiveté and a misunderstanding, they mistake the man for Jesus – Jesus, they believe, is hiding out in their barn!

And so they begin to treat him differently – with lavish love and deep respect. Slowly, before the eyes of the audience, this convict begins to change. His whole character changes! Perhaps Andrew Lloyd Webber was right when he wrote: “Love, love changes everything.”

The UPCSA has huge challenges – not least the Church Association issue and the increasing inability of middle sized congregations to pay assessments. But the UPCSA has much to celebrate also – dynamic personnel, growth, massive social engagement (in the community) through congregations. How will we face our challenges? Surely by relying on the God who intervened in Christ.

I pray that your journey through Easter will be meaningful and that you will know again the wonder of the resurrection. May you know the forgiveness that was realized on Good Friday and the transformation of death that Easter Sunday displays.

Much love,

A Friend...

Dear Friends

My friend Dal Woodward died this week.  He was very dear to me. 

The first time we met was on Easter Sunday in 2000 or 2001. I was minister of the Margate congregation on the Natal South coast.  I was walking in to Church when the elder proceeding me reached over to his right and said to this man I had never met, “You are a man of your word”.  Needless to say, I was perplexed. After the service, I asked the elder what this was all about. He looked rather sheepish and went on to explain that Dal was the local pub owner and that on the previous Thursday night, after our Maundy Thursday service, he and his wife and two of our “old dears” had popped in to the pub after the service for a “night cap”. There they met Dal who wanted to know where they had come from “all dressed up”. They said “church”. Dal said: ”Church meets on Sundays”. They said: “Its Easter. We have services Thursday, Friday and Sunday”. Then they asked Dal whether he was a Christian. He told them he was a ‘pedestrian’ and defined this as a person walking around looking for a Church. On Easter Sunday, Dal came to Church and he was there every Sunday after that.

I made a pastoral visit to the pub. When I asked Dal for his version of the story, he told me that on Maundy Thursday, four angels arrived at his pub and ordered drinks. And that the angels led him back to Church. He always called those four his angels and even although they were a naughty bunch of angels, I began to see them as angels too. Its a strange thing but even although I did not know about Dal’s death yesterday morning, when we sang the song “We are standing on holy ground”, it was Dal who I was thinking about.

In recent years, Dal has been living up here in Johannesburg. He reached a turning point in his life some years back and admitted himself to a rehabilitation facility where he found freedom from alcoholism. After that, he found Sandra and they were married in October.  It was my joy to officiate at their wedding.  Every now and then, I saw him and Sandra sitting in the congregation. On other Sundays, they would attend St Columba’s in Parkview.  Sascha and I visited Dal last Tuesday in the Donald Gordon.  He looked frail. I prayed with him. He said I should look out for his ‘ugly face’ in the congregation. He died yesterday at home with Sandra.  I will miss my friend – someone whom God sent to me, a real sign of God’s grace to me.

There is a line from one of our new songs (sung yesterday) that becomes real to me in times like this: “We are a moment. You are forever”.

My prayer this week is about waiting and longing – a prayer for Dal (by Walter Brueggemann)

God of the Seasons,

God of the years,

God of the eons,

Alpha and Omega,

before us and after us.

You promise and we wait:

                we wait with eager longing,

                we wait with doubt and anxiety,

                we wait with patience thin

                and then doubt,

                and then we take life into our own hands.

We wait because you are the one and the only one.

We wait for your peace and your mercy,

     for your justice and your good rule.

Give us your spirit that we may wait

                obedient and with discernment,

caringly and without passivity,

trustingly and without cynicism,

honestly and without utopianism.

Grant that our wait may be appropriate to your coming

                soon and very soon,

                soon and not late,

late but not too late.

We wait while the world groans in eager longing.

Lots of love, dear friends,