We are to be as stars in the sky

Each month on Salvos Online, Rosy, the Territorial Secretary for Spiritual Life Development, shares her thoughts and reflections on the spiritual issues that shape our lives as Christians, exploring how our faith intersects with our everyday experiences and how we can deepen our relationship with God. Today she reflects on a meaningful young adults’ retreat she was part of and how it has impacted her for the Kingdom

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Around 27 young adults and a few leaders recently gathered in the Melbourne CBD for a three-day retreat.

On the first night of the young adults’ retreat, we went on a city tour with Nick White, a teacher of Indigenous history, who took us to specific sites of significance to the Kulin nation.

At one of the sites, he told us about a young man who had met the soon-to-be colonists at what would become the casino waterfront of the Birrarung River. Back then, the natural dip in the river made it easy for European colonist ships to dock.

The first family was a handful of people, and their cat (can’t forget the cat!), and this young man chose to host them and show them around. When mob further up north heard that the colonists had landed in Melbourne, they sought to come down to remove them, as settlers further up the coast had wrought havoc on local mob, women, and land. The young man decided to protect his hosts and gathered a few men so that, when the confrontation occurred, there would be no loss of life.

Nick went on to say that decades later, this young man was isolated and alone as an old man, because, as we know, the colonists continued to come and come and come, and eventually eradicated most of his family and took the surrounding landscapes for themselves. Nick asked us, did he do the right thing, knowing what we know now?

And yet, it is the exceptionally generous culture of welcome that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are known for, and it made me think of Jesus, and how Jesus’ radical welcome, even to a people who were hostile and killed him, was never redacted.

There is a parable Jesus told in Matthew 21:33-39 about a vineyard and its owner, and the people in the vineyard who continued to kill the owner’s servants he sent, so he finally sent his only son. They killed him, too. This parable was a direct reference to God’s love and loss as God sought to reach people.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved” (John 3:16–17).

I believe that in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture, we can see the exceptional value of hosting the stranger and the foreigner, making a place among ourselves and not turning away those in need, loving even unto death.

“When a foreigner lives with you in your land, don’t take advantage of him. Treat the foreigner the same as a native. Love him like one of your own. Remember that you were once foreigners in Egypt. I am God, your God” (Leviticus 19:33–34, MSG).

At the end of this tour, the young people stood together as we learned that the Australian flag has the British Union Jack and the Southern Cross on it, and that mob around Australia have seen in the Southern Cross the representation of their five ways of living: law, language, ceremony, place and kinship.

There, on the Australian flag, we actually see the coming together of the law of the British colony and the law of the First Nations people of Australia.

As we were reflecting, I saw a picture in this of how God continues to call us to be disciples and to disciple others.

A fresh image of this came from reflecting on the Southern Cross:

• The smallest star in the middle could represent ourselves. (Luke 9:23)

• The star above, the person we are following and imitating as we imitate Christ. (1 Corinthians 11:1; Hebrews 13:7)

• The star below, the person we are feeding into and raising up in the gospel of Christ. (2 Timothy 2:2; Matthew 28:19–20)

• The stars either side, our peers or friends who can bear our hearts and encourage one another in Christ. (Hebrews 10:24–25; Galatians 6:2)

  
  

We had an exercise at the end of the retreat where we drew, on one huge continuous piece of paper, the Southern Cross and put our name in the centre, the person we are discipled by above, the person we are discipling below, and our friends either side, encouraging that if we didn’t have one of those stars, we would commit to finding or building that relationship in the days to come.

On the same huge continuous piece of paper, each young person and leader drew a part of a river, and in the middle of the river we wrote two or three words of what we hoped for the body of Christ, for ourselves, for God to give us. Things like connection, unity, justice, courage, and love were in the middle of each river, and then we drew the cross. At the end of it, we folded the paper so that every single river connected, and we saw this river of life flowing through the middle. In te reo Māori, the word is Wairua Tapu, which means Holy Spirit, the deep, sacred, spiritual river. It was really beautiful as we all stood in the middle of the river and prayed.

So, what does that look like for you? What resonates about the Southern Cross, a uniquely Australian discipleship model? Do you have someone who feeds into your life? Are you feeding somebody else? Do you have friends who see and know you on a deep and spiritual level? (John 7:38; Ezekiel 47:9)

The Salvation Army Australia’s focus for this year is around The Way: prayer, discipleship, spiritual warfare, evangelism, all Salvos on mission. How can we do this alone? We cannot. And we are to be as stars in the sky. (Daniel 12:3; Philippians 2:15)

Another thing that has been a part of this last couple of weeks, alongside these amazing gatherings, has been that my health has been really hard, getting my wisdom teeth out, and the slow healing process because of my chronic illness and recurring chronic pain. Here we have the contrast between feeling very useful and connected with many people, and the isolation of a bedroom, and the stress on your body from trying to heal and recover after intense times.

People sometimes ask me how I continue to do what I do when I am so unwell. When talking with a friend of mine who came to help for the day, we both agreed that in times of mourning, loss, pain and sickness, a unique grace comes to those who experience them, for Jesus says, “Blessed are they …”.

The Beatitudes – Matthew 5:3–10

Blessed are the poor in spirit

Blessed are those who mourn

Blessed are the meek

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness

Blessed are the merciful

Blessed are the pure in heart

Blessed are the peacemakers

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness

Here is a poem I wrote to reflect my experience:

I wonder if seeds

Chatter

Radiate

Glitter

In the hands of the master

Knowing they must be cast

Buried

Pushed by the finger

That drew words in the dirt

Covered in sod

That made human in Genesis

The same that God

Says all humans

Will return to

And as the seed sits in

Its darkest chamber

I wonder if it

Reminds itself

That Jesus

Too was buried

Darkness

Under earth

Three days

Sadness and temple curtains tearing and eclipses and weeping and herbs cast aside

He had no knowledge of this

Of care for this

Dead to the world

He had bigger fish to fry

(Maybe Jonah and he will laugh about this

Cast me into the deep

For it’s me the Lord wants!)

To come to people

Who have no faith

And offer them the word

Repent

Jonah’s tree grew

And as the seed

Feels itself

Disintegrate

A degrading

Instead it sees itself

As giving

Offering what was

To become what is

Welcoming the unknown

The end

As the beginning.

A new sprout

Tender and reaching

Unseen

Unseen

Unseen

Forgotten by those who planted it

But it hummed along industriously

The flesh of its old life

Becoming the food for the new

Jesus rose in secret

Blasting into locked rooms

Sneaking up on beloved disciples as she grilled the angels by the tomb

He made aware all

That was is planted

Where no eye may comprehend

Has roots

In the

Unsmiteable

And seeds bear trees bear fruit

And as the Holy Sprout makes me plentiful

The seed I shed is sensible

Knowing she gave all she had

And it was enough

And it was

Seen by him

Seen by him

All for him

And it’s sweet