The Sunday Summary [2012-36]

This week was a fairly busy one, socially speaking…

Monday night at Growth Group, we continued on our So Many Questions studies, looking at the question of You can’t trust what the Bible says – it’s been changed too much over the years!… The question generated some good discussion amongst the group, but as the chatter kept on, it seemed to get to be a little on the hostile and argumentative side, because the question itself is a fairly weak one with a strong answer. I think we seemed to have lost sight of the fact that we are looking to win the person rather than win the argument. In the end we had to remind ourselves that this question and the appropriate answer needs to lead to the gospel and an investigation of that for the person asking the question, or arguing against the Bible.

Tuesday night, I had planned to catch up for dinner with Michael, Christina and Luke Dodd, but Tina and Luke were sick, so Michael and I made alternate plans to head out to the movies with dinner beforehand. We met up at Castle Towers for dinner, followed by The Bourne Legacy. It was good to catch up with Dodo; to talk about life and ministry – it’s joys and it’s struggles, knowing that it’s tough and hard. The movie was pretty average; storyline lacked an interesting story and the action wasn’t great, but it got there towards the end…

Wednesday during the day I, along with a few others, received a text message from Lairdy saying that he’d submitted his PhD, so that was a bit of excitement. After work I went for a run, the first run I’ve been on for a long time… It didn’t feel particularly comfortable, but it wasn’t too horrible or painful. In the evening Geoff came around for dinner, Diablo 3 and devotions. We ate steak with hot chips and gravy, read some James 3 and played some Diablo 3; both reaching level 60, and then getting to play with Marcus and Diren for a little while as well. When Lairdy came home, we had a small surprise party for him, even I was surprised….

Thursday night after work I went back to my folks place for family dinner, which was just them and me this time, but tasty nonetheless..

Friday night’s touch game was good, we seem to be getting more of the non-Christian guys coming along, and a diminishing number of Christians, which is both good and bad… SALT had a spring formal where most people got dressed up, with plenty of photos and stuff. Tech for the night was a bit full on, and I’m progressively getting things later and later…

Saturday Morning was pretty relaxed before I headed out to Castle Hill for Nathan & Serena‘s Engagement Party. I arrived shortly after 1pm to find a pretty empty party… As more and more guests started arriving, they said that they had to fight heavy traffic to get there; luckily I was able to avoid all of that through back roads. The party setup was absolutely gorgeous!! I was on official photo duties and managed to capture quite a bit of the party. Here are a few of my favourite shots:

Being photographer for the day did mean that it was harder to engage in conversation. The few that I did manage were pleasant. It was easy to see the great divide between groups of people, and even more the divide between males and females… I find this funny and frustrating and wonder how much it is a product of our Church…
At night I headed out to Goldfish in Kings Cross to see yet another one of my DJ heroes Dave Seaman. I hadn’t yet been to Goldfish, but it was a nice little setup. The dancefloor is rather small, and has a giant pole in the middle of it, but the floor is nice and smooth, and quite nice to dance on, especially when it is dry…
There were quite a lot of pretty girls out and about in the club, and plenty of guys trying to cash in on that and pick them up.. Seaman played quite a strong set, darker than I was expecting or keen for, but still fun. Towards the end of the night I stayed towards the back of the floor to ensure enough room to dance. There was a couple who decided to make out on the couch just to my right, but one of the guys mates dragged him away, leaving the girl, who wandered off to the bathroom, but left her belt behind… I promptly chased after her and returned it.

Sunday morning after about four hours of sleep, I got up and made my way out to Naremburn to visit NCA Church. Upon wandering in the door I was warmly greeted by Tony who shook my hand and introduced me to the ushers, and then passed me on to Simon and Annabel Nixey. It was good to hang out with them for the morning. The service itself was very similar to what we have at graceat6, except with the addition of a kids spot and a formal communion. The talk was given by Matt Lemsing, who is one of the ministers there and who also led the service, from Romans 3:21-31. It was an enjoyable talk, one of great news and hope. Matt guided us through righteousness, grace, faith, propitiation (or a sacrifice of atonement), and The Just and The Justifier. After the service I got introduced to a bunch of people, got to speak to Rick Smith and Pete Tong, and even prayed with some.
For Father’s day lunch, we were meeting at Anna and Arthur‘s place in Pymble, but I got a message to bring a can opener, a strange request I know, so on my way from Naremburn I dropped in at David Jones at Chatswood Chase to pick one up. Lunch was corn soup and steak sandwiches, which was pretty tasty. At graceat6 tonight we had Gary preach from 1 Kings 19; a difficult to understand chapter. The takeaway from the talk was that God is in control. There may be times when we want to give up, when we feel like all hope is lost, that people don’t understand our message, but we mustn’t give up because what God has promised, He has fulfilled because He is faithful.