October 2022 - LPNI

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October 2022

LPNI Devotion

Ancient Grace Still Lived

I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people – for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Saviour, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all people. (1 Timothy 2:1-7)

I have been learning about the long history of the Christian Church with all its very good behaviour and its very bad behaviour. I have been reading Bullies and Saints by an Australian historian, John Dickson. John tries to be dead honest about the Christian church with all its magnificent contribution to the very foundations of our Western democratic way of life, and the terrible corruption and violence perpetrated in the name of God. The church has engaged in both – and usually at the same time!

John asks other world class historians how they would describe the over-arching character of the Christian community around the known world in those first 300 years before the Church became the legalized religion of the Roman Empire under Constantine. The experts said one word would be ‘charity’. It was Christians who brought a completely different way of dealing with life with all its loss and pain and suffering, more than its surrounding pagan culture. It was Christians who looked after the incomeless widows, the diseased, the forgotten people who needed a civil burial. It was Christian communities who, when on the margins of society with no special favours or place or name, were at their finest as they simple ‘did the good news’ as they saw fit, thereby revealing the gracious heart of God to a culture that lacked all grace.

The same thing happened in those “Dark Ages’, which we find were not so dark! It was the small Christian communities that began thousands of communities based on prayer and Scripture and this character of ‘charity’ in the thousands of monasteries throughout Europe. It was those communities that began small hospices to tend the sick, schools to educate children, and grew food to feed the poor.

The seeds of this very different way of living were in the New Testament Gospels and letters. The short direction from Paul to Timothy (above) is one of those seeds with timeless impact. Paul says gospel-transformed people do not try to distort or destroy governments or those in power. Instead they pray to God for them and for their and other people’s needs. As we do this, it is more likely that everyone can live a peace-filled life, which is what ‘pleases the Lord’.

Parish Nurses are one more sign of this uniquely Christian response to people’s need. Our Parish Nurses at St Petri in Nutriootpa, in South Australia, are part of our Pastoral Care Team. They live out this ancient gospel-hearted life, full of prayer, care and sharing people’s need. We are thankful for them and for the God who serves us in all our needs every day.

Jesus, we thank you for all Christian people who live out your grace in their family, their work, their community and their church. We thank you for all Parish Nurses, too. Help all of us to continue to live out your transforming grace as we care for people, share their suffering and speak your words of love to them as we are able, so your peace reigns. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.

Pastor Adrian Kitson, adrian.kitson@lca.org.au

St Petri Lutheran Church, Nuriootpa, Barossa Valley, South Australia.