Length of service

5 hymns at 5 minuets a piece = 20 min

1 sermon = 15 min

1 all age address 7 min

4 prayers - 12 min (that 3 min a prayer)

Lords prayer + Collection  2 min (depending on size)

= 56 minuets

so if you have communion you better do it quick 

Naked truth

This blog is based on  Genesis 3 – Verses 3-11: 

I was recently preaching about being children of God

I was sharing the preaching of the word with a worship leader who said, if your troubles by not feeling like a child of God talk to the lay preacher in the congregation

Or today's preacher

Me?

ME!

What do I know about this – I don’t feel like a child of God I merely preaching about it

I did not pick the topic it was simply there in the chosen readings

I just speak on a given topic. I have no special knowledge or insight

I suddenly felt ashamed

I felt naked

I wanted to hide

So who are we to answer these questions – to not only eat but serve the fruit of knowledge?

In the passage we’ve heard God forbids the eating of the fruit of knowledge

But why?

Well God knew the fruit of knowledge was dangerous – once you know about your place in creation you cannot simple exist within it

The fruit make give you knowledge of good and evil (like God) but does not make you a fit judge

Once you have judged you are good you will judge others as evil

Once you know about the world that separates you from the innocent

Once Adman and Eve had eaten the fruit they were as distant from Eden as an adult is distance to a baby.

Separated not geographically but by knowledge – the knowledge of there dominion, the knowledge of good and evil and the knowledge that they were not innocent.

So is this the answer to reject knowledge?

To be a Christ said like little children

Well no of course not

The fruit has been eaten – the great fall has been endured

We are no longer innocents, frolicking in the Garden of Eden

So what can we do?

We could hide like Adman and eve but what good will we do?

People will seek us out, they will find us. Preacher our pretty easy to spot

We could answer with the theological answers that come almost off the shelf 

Though we would simply be hiding our nakedness because we were ashamed of it

We would simply be separating ourselves once more – leaving the asker to wonder alone

Or we could like Adman and Eve and answer honestly, come what may

If we do not know then we do not know

We should be unashamed of our intellectual nakedness

If we are troubled by something then let us be troubled

If we are puzzled then we are puzzled

If we do not accept the store brought theology, why will the seeker accept are repetitions of it?

No we must accept that though we eat the fruit we are not equal with God

We are intellectually and emotionally naked and only he can cloth us

We seek absolutes and reassurance – when absolutes bring only temporary reassurance  

We are merely people called by God

We do not know Gods meaning or purpose

 Only God can provide that

We are allowed to wonder and search and doubt and not know

We are called to be honest to people, so they may know what truth looks like

we are simply asked to be tellers of truth

Rejoice in our nakedness for this is God work