Holy Adventures

(Micah 6:1–8, Luke 2:22–40)

My Facebook memories popped up this week to remind me that sixteen years ago I preached this passage from Luke’s gospel for the first time. It is now eleven Februarys since I was ordained, and this reading crops up every first Sunday in February, which means Mary and Joseph, the baby, Simeon and Anna have returned again and again across the years. There’s something about Candlemas that keeps drawing us back, asking us to look again.

Candlemas began as something very ordinary. Before it was a feast of light or symbolism or poetry, it was simply a moment of religious obligation. Mary and Joseph bring their child to the Temple forty days after his birth, because that is what the law requires. They come to present him, to offer what they can afford, to do what faithful people do. They bring the simplest gift permitted, because they are poor, living without security, yet they fulfil their religious duties nonetheless.

For the first centuries of the Church, this day was known simply as the Presentation or the Purification. There was no drama to it. Just a poor family, four birds, and a child brought into the life of faith. Only later did the Church notice what Simeon says — that this child is salvation, revelation, light — and to realise that this quiet moment was actually a turning point. Candlemas sits at a threshold: between birth and ministry, gift and consequence. It is the moment when the baby stories end, and the long road toward the cross begins. One of our liturgical resources defines it as the moment we turn from the cradle to the cross, inviting worshippers to face the crib and then turn a full 180 degrees toward the cross. It’s a powerful image.

But despite the years of repeating this festival and hearing these passages over and over, this year, with Luke alongside those words from Micah, something landed for me in a new way. Micah gives us a courtroom scene. God calls the people to account and asks a devastatingly intimate question: What have I done to you? God reminds them of liberation, faithfulness, and rescue — and then we hear the people’s response. They start bargaining. Justifying. Proving their worth somehow. They bring burnt offerings, calves, thousands of rams, rivers of oil, even their firstborn children. It’s as if they are saying, tell us what you want, God. Tell us how to get this right.

And God’s answer is almost weary in its simplicity. It’s as if this holy judge in the courtroom is holding their head in their hands and saying, I don’t want any of that. I just want you to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly. That’s it.

Standing between Micah and Luke, I realised something that feels obvious now, but somehow had escaped me before. This week I have seen the Bible in a new overarching way (for me) that I hadn’t quite seen before.

The Old Testament is a long, faithful, painful story of people trying to work out what God wants — and repeatedly not quite managing it. Not always out of rebellion or refusal, but simply missing the mark. In Genesis, people grasp at blessing instead of trusting relationship. In Exodus, they build a golden calf, not because they reject God, but because they want a God they can see and manage. In Samuel, Saul offers sacrifice out of fear and urgency, only to be told that listening matters more. And in the prophets — especially here in Micah — God finally says it plainly: stop bringing what you think will impress me. I want justice, kindness, humility.

And then there is silence. Four hundred years of waiting. And I imagine — reverently — God saying, They’re still not getting it. I’ve told them again and again what I want. Now I’m going to have to show them. And so God does. Not with a new list. Not with better instructions. But by coming in person.  Luke doesn’t give us an argument. He gives us a baby.

Here is the astonishing reversal Micah could never have imagined. Micah asks in fear, Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression? Will God require everything? Luke answers: God does not take our firstborn. God brings God’s own. Not in response to a demand, or to placate a vengeful dictator, but as an offering of love.And what does God bring to the Temple? Not power or purity. God brings vulnerability. Dependence. Trust. Mary and Joseph, in their quiet steps into the Temple, reveal something bigger than a baby. They show us how to live that command, that way of being, laid out in Micah 6:8.

Their justice is shown in faithful obedience while living under empire.
Their kindness is seen in the way they carry and protect this child.
And their humility is revealed as they offer poverty without shame, because they know their true offering is not the birds they carry, but their lives: all they have and all they are, all they have been and all they will become. And in doing so, they offer God’s own child — God’s own self — as they will be asked to do again and again, right to the end.

Simeon sees it. Anna sees it. Not because the offering is impressive, but because it is true. This is what God has always wanted. Not more. Not better. Not harder.

But our full selves. Our ordinary faithfulness. Our imperfect obedience.
Our willingness to show up with all we have.

Candlemas does not ask what we can bring to impress God. It asks whether we are willing to place our fear, our love, our uncertainty, our hope — our good bits, and even the parts of ourselves we carry with deep shame — into God’s hands. It asks us to bring our past, our present, and our future, and hand it all over. And the quiet, astonishing promise of this feast is that when we do, God receives it and calls it enough.

So here you are, in this temple. Lay it all down. You are enough. Amen.

Isaiah 9:1-4               Psalm 27:1-10           1 Corinthians 1:10-18                      Matthew 4:12-25

Without having been to the Sea of Galilee it is pretty difficult to imagine exactly what it’s like; the view, the sounds, the scents. Sometimes the gospel feels like it happens in a place far away; some kind of holy shoreline, with ancient boats and men in robes. But Matthew locates his writing in a specific time and place. He tells us Jesus doesn’t begin his ministry in Jerusalem. He wasn’t born in a place of polish, and he doesn’t begin his work in a place of wealth, power, or control. Matthew tells us that, after John’s arrest, Jesus withdraws to Galilee and goes to live in Capernaum, by the sea.

Capernaum was a working port town. A place of tides and trade. A bustling place of fishing, not the centre. Sound familiar? If we let the Gospel come close — Capernaum is Fremantle. Jesus doesn’t arrive in Perth. He arrives here, on the edge, at the waterside, along Derbarl Yerrigan. So, let’s imagine how it matters if Jesus came to begin his work here in the 1^st century, because this place had a story long before colonisation.

Walyalup was — and is — Whadjuk Noongar Country. The river wasn’t scenery. It was a living system of food, law, and kinship; a place of deep listening. Colonisation did not discover this place in 1829; It took it. Land was seized. Fishing was criminalised, and sacred sites were damaged or erased. Without treaty, or consent. And when Noongar people resisted — simply by moving through their own Country, fishing and surviving — they were punished and imprisoned.

We don’t have to imagine that history. We know the water’s edge. We know the stone walls of Fremantle Prison, where Aboriginal men were locked up for being on their own land, where control was enforced, where the cost of colonisation was made brutally concrete. Fremantle’s prosperity — its port, its trade, its growth — was built alongside this violence, and it is not ancient history.

And this is where Matthew places Jesus. Not above the harm. Not after the story is cleaned up. But inside it. Isn’t that always the scandal of where we find God? Inside darkness, oppression, injustice, mess? Not looking over, but looking upwards and outwards from within?

Matthew tells us that Jesus walks along the sea and sees fishermen at work —
Simon and Andrew, James and John — these young people, teenage labourers, working with their bodies, risky and exhausted. And if we imagine this is here in Fremantle, then widen the picture. Jesus walks past boats and nets — and past prison walls and holding cells. Past the people labelled trouble, criminal, disposable. And from here — not the religious centre, not among the respectable — Jesus says: “Follow me.”

This is where the scandal sharpens. Because Jesus does not assemble a tidy group. He calls fisher kids — poor, expendable. And later, he will later call a tax collector who collaborates with the empire. He will call them both, young and old, manual workers and professionals, criminals and judges, and they will both respond, together, immediately, follow me. No forwarding address, no job description, no idea of who it is doing the calling, or what they are following for. And the call will be so compelling, so compulsive that they will leave everything – family, business, background, debt, crimes, reputation – good and bad – and follow. That is wild. That is the scandal of the gospel.

People who should not stand side by side. People whose histories do not align. People whose presence together is already offensive. All together in one melding pot.

If we’re honest, it’s not a comfortable picture of the church. Fishers alongside tax collectors, like homeless people alongside rich homeowners, landowners, professionals, or like First Nations people, alongside colonisers. The poorest, alongside those who benefit from the system. The rejected, alongside those who enforce rejection. Together. Not because the harm is erased. Not because the past is resolved. But because Christ is walks here — and calls from the margins.

Matthew’s Jesus proclaims: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” Repentance here is not private guilt, or performative regret. It is a total turning around, a change of direction.

For a place like Fremantle — and for the church on this land — repentance means truth-telling, refusing silence, allowing those long pushed aside to be centred again, being in the mess together, not ignoring it or sanitising it, or despising it for being messy. The kingdom comes near not when the story is tidy, but when we turn toward the wound instead of away from it.

Matthew quotes Isaiah: “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.”

That darkness was not spiritual metaphor. Isaiah was speaking of occupation, violence and dispossession. And still, this is where Jesus begins. And when colonisers rock up to steal and destroy and whitewash and dominate, God shows up too and says – on you, you who sit in the region and shadow of death light has dawned. No wonder the disciples leave everything to follow! Not because the world no longer matters, but because it matters more.

Following Jesus doesn’t mean escaping this place. It means learning to be a church that doesn’t hover above history, rushing to reconciliation without truth telling. But being a church that is willing to walk where Christ walked — alongside the water, by the prison, with the wounded, towards the poor and dirty, offering a promise of life, light, healing, forgiveness. And who doesn’t need that?

And as he called then, so he calls us now, together — not knowing exactly where we are going, but knowing who we are walking with. Sometimes we need the light, sometimes we are called to be the light. Sometimes we need healing, sometimes we are the ones to bring healing. We are both the called and the one calling. That is the church in its glory.

So if this is Fremantle, and if Capernaum is here, then Christ still walks Derbarl Yerrigan. Christ still calls fisher kids and tax collectors and First Nations peoples and settlers, those healed and those broken, alike, into a way of life that refuses domination, names harm, and dares to believe that the kingdom can take root even here.

The light doesn’t wait until the damage is undone. It arrives now. And the question left hanging in the salt air, blowing in on the Doctor, is not whether the call is scandalous, it is whether we will follow. Amen.

Isaiah 42:1–9  Psalm 29                   Acts 10:34–43          Matthew 3:13–17

One of the most terrifying things I’ve heard about the Australian education system is this concept of Beach Safe. From what I can work out, a whole year group of children arrives at their local beach with a couple of teachers, learns how to be safe … and then they go into the water on their own, while those teachers watch from the sand.

It reminds me of every child who learned to swim in my hometown in the 1970s or 80s. We would don our swimming caps — crying, if you were me — and make our way down to the overly chlorinated, freezing-cold pool. We would get in, while this ageless woman named Mrs Lee barked instructions from the poolside. The intention was to teach every child to swim. Some swam. Some sank. I was firmly in the latter category.

It wasn’t until my favourite auntie got right into the pool with me — supporting my stomach, placing a hand under my chin, making all the encouraging noises — that I ever learned to swim.

And that’s what came back to me as I read the Bible readings this week.

I learned to swim because someone got into the water with me — not because someone shouted instructions from a distance, no matter how skilled a swimmer they might have been.

And isn’t that what our Old Testament reading and our gospel are telling us too?

God isn’t found standing safely on the shore calling out advice — be braver, have more faith, try harder, don’t be afraid — while we flail in deep, unfamiliar water. God gets right into the water with us. That, surely, is the heart of the incarnation. The God who could have remained distant, or silent, or safely above it all, chose instead to put on humanity and come close — right beside us — doing life the way the rest of humanity does.

Isaiah speaks to a people who are exhausted, displaced, traumatised by loss. They are not coping well. And God does not say, You should have known better. God says instead — in the very next chapter — When you pass through the waters, I will be with you.

Not if. When.

And not I will tell you what to do, but I will be with you — in the fear, in the crossing, in the unknown. And in this extraordinary moment from Matthew’s gospel, we see that promise take flesh and bones.

Jesus comes to the Jordan not because he needs repentance, but because this is what God is like. God does not ask us to go anywhere God is unwilling to go. Jesus steps into the same water as everyone else. He lines up with sinners, with the confused, with the weary, with those who don’t quite know how to stay afloat. He doesn’t hover above it. He doesn’t exempt himself. He wades right in.

And it is there — not on the shore, not in the temple, not after some great achievement — but there, in the water, that the voice comes:

You are my beloved. With you I am well pleased.

Before he heals anyone. Before he preaches a sermon. Before he does anything impressive at all. Beloved first. Affirmed first. Held first.

And I don’t know how that makes you feel, but I find it a bit unsettling — because most of life works the other way. We belong once we’ve proven ourselves. We are loved once we’ve achieved something. We are accepted once we’ve shown we can cope. Why wouldn’t we project that onto God?

But baptism tells the truth:

You are not loved because you are strong.
You are loved while you are still learning to float.

And baptism doesn’t only tell us God gets into the water with us — it also trains us, calls us, and requires us to stay there. At school we didn’t just learn to keep ourselves afloat. We learned life-saving skills. We swam in our pyjamas, heavy and awkward. We dived down to retrieve bricks from the bottom. We learned what it feels like to move against resistance, to stay calm when everything feels wrong. It was training for emergencies. For the moment when someone else is in trouble.

And the world we are living in now is not a calm, supervised pool. It’s open water. It’s rough. People are tired. Many are sinking quietly, right alongside us.

In Christ’s baptism we are given a comfort and a calling. God in Christ gets into the water with us, and in doing so, shows us that we must be willing to get wet for the sake of others.

To move toward the struggling person rather than away. To resist the instinct to stay dry, safe, and distant.

And so the questions write themselves: Where are we needed right now?
Who are we pretending not to see?
And where, if we’re honest, are we avoiding the water altogether?

It’s one thing to admire Jesus standing in the Jordan. It’s another thing to wade in ourselves — into grief that unsettles us, into injustice that costs us something, into relationships that don’t come with neat boundaries.

Baptism names us as beloved — yes. But it also names us as participants in God’s life-saving work. Not as heroes or experts. But as people who know what it is to be held — and therefore dare to hold others.

Sometimes that will look dramatic. More often it will look small, costly, and unseen: staying longer than is convenient, standing with someone others step away from, refusing to look away when someone is struggling. And the grace in all of this is that the same God who got into the water with us is already ahead of us, beside us, between us and the deep.

We don’t save the world by our strength. But we do show up and get wet. We do stay present. And as we finish today, the water is still here. The font is still full of last week’s baptism. As you come forward for communion, or as you leave today, you’re invited to dip your fingers into the water — simply to remember you are held.

You are not alone in life’s waters. God has already gone into the water with you.

And you are sent — gently, bravely — to stay in the water with and for others.

Because the gospel is not shouted from the shore.
It is lived, again and again, alongside one another, in the water.

Amen.

Isaiah 63:7-9   Psalm 148                  Hebrews 2:10-18              Matthew 2:13-23

On Christmas Day I was asleep in bed soon after 7pm. When I woke up around 1am, I took the dog outside, looked up at the starry sky, and found myself thinking about people celebrating Christmas all around the world.

I thought about those who may have had the best day of their lives — the marriage proposal, the gift they never imagined receiving, the birth of a long-awaited child.

And I thought about those who had the worst day imaginable — people who lost someone they loved on Christmas Day, particularly suddenly or unexpectedly; people whose darkest truths were exposed; people who were frightened, alone, displaced, or far from home.

Standing under that vast sky that stretches over us all, thinking of them felt like prayer.

Because even here — even in this parish — some people had an unspeakably hard day, right alongside others whose day was almost perfect. And most of us, thankfully, found ourselves somewhere in between.

Life, as it turns out, does not separate joy and grief neatly.
They live side by side. Strange neighbours. Sharing the same sky.

And that is why this morning’s gospel feels so confronting.

There is barely time to take in the birth before fear arrives. A child is born — and almost immediately that child is hunted. In Matthew’s telling, there is no gentle fade-out after the angels sing. He does not protect Christmas from the world. He lets the mess rush straight in.

And behind it all, Isaiah has already been whispering for centuries:
“In all their distress, God was distressed.”

That line will not allow us a distant God. Whatever is happening here, God is not watching from a safe height.

Warned in a dream, the holy family flees to Egypt. And that detail matters.

Matthew is writing for a mostly Jewish audience, and Egypt is not neutral ground in Israel’s memory. Egypt is the land of slavery. Of crushed bodies. Of children killed by a fearful ruler. Egypt is where empire once showed its teeth. Some escaped. Many did not.

And yet here — Egypt becomes refuge.

That should unsettle us. Because it makes it abundantly clear that salvation history is not tidy or linear. The same place can wound and shelter. Fear and hope can occupy the same night. In the horrific account of the slaughter of the holy innocents, Matthew deliberately echoes Moses. A tyrant orders the killing of children. A child is spared. But the story twists.

Moses is saved from Egypt. Jesus is saved by Egypt. Saved in Egypt.

Oppression and refuge collapse into the same geography.

And this is not symbolic.

This is a real journey — hundreds of kilometres, weeks on foot, with a newborn and a young mother. A baby who feels the cold at night and the dusty heat in the middle of the day. A mother navigating fear, exhaustion, and breastfeeding without her own mother to help her. And an anxious dad, desperate to protect those in his care. Three people moving through danger and borderlands, their lives suddenly unrecognisable.

God does not wait for the world to become safe.
God does not tidy the mess first.

God goes straight into it.

The gospel is explicit: Jesus’ first journey as a refugee takes him along the Gaza road — a place where empire, fear, and displacement collide. Where people travel, longing for safety, and only some survive the journey. Sound familiar? Achingly familiar…

And suddenly it makes new sense of God laying in the straw and the feeding trough.

The King of Kings is born not into safety, but into exposure. Into vulnerability. Into danger. Glory and gore are not opposites in this kingdom — they belong together.

Not because the story has failed, but because this is how God chooses to be present.

So what we have, in this confronting co-existence is not a God above the rubble.
Not a God who arrives after the mess is cleaned up.
Not a God who rushes to fix and gloss over reality.

But a God found inside it — right in the middle of it, where the most vulnerable of God’s people are; the Word made flesh, dwelling among us right here;
walking dangerous roads, sharing fear and fragility, and resolutely choosing to remain.

And perhaps faith is this: trusting that God’s refusal to leave, determination to remain, means there is no place — in this world or in us — where God has not already gone. And God knows.

So tonight, step outside. Look up at the stars.

Remember that the same sky arches over joy and grief, birth and burial, celebration and terror — over refugee camps and safe homes alike.

Allow that looking up to become prayer.

Because the God we meet at Christmas is not far away.

God is with us. Within us. Under the same sky. In the same night.

Walking dangerous roads with the weary, the frightened, and the fleeing — in the first century and the twenty-first.

As you look up, remember: the sky is wide enough for joy and grief — and God is in it all.

Christmas Morning 2025 – John’s Prologue

A couple of weeks ago I came across a poem that is nearly five hundred years old, and it is among the most beautiful things I have ever read about Christmas. It was written by St John of the Cross, a poet and theologian of the sixteenth century, and I wanted to share it with you this morning. He writes:

If you want
the Virgin will come walking down the road
pregnant with the holy, and say,
“I need shelter for the night, please take me inside your heart, my time is so close.”

Then, under the roof of your soul, you will witness the sublime intimacy,
the divine, the Christ
taking birth forever,
as she grasps your hand for help,
for each of us is the midwife of God, each of us.

Yet there, under the dome of your being does creation come into existence eternally, through your womb, dear pilgrim—
the sacred womb in your soul,
as God grasps our arms for help;
for each of us is His beloved servant
never far.

If you want,

the Virgin will come walking
down the street

pregnant with Light
and sing.

It almost brought me to tears. I read it over and over, and I found myself wondering why it moved me so deeply. I think what I love most about it is the invitation.

If you want, he writes. If you want.

Everything in this poem turns on that phrase.

Mary is never assured of comfort. She is never promised safety or ease.
She is not given a clear explanation or a guaranteed outcome. She is asked only if she will make space. And she does.

God asks her, in effect, if you want, and she replies, yes — I want.

And because she does, everything changes. And what this poem dares to suggest is that we are offered the same choice.

I love that we have a choice.

Jesus does not arrive by force, overwhelming us with divine presence.
He does not break in, dominate, or demand. He waits to be welcomed.

He asks for room — in a body, in a home, in a heart, in a life that is already complicated and unfinished.

Which means Christmas is not about getting everything right. It is not about spiritual readiness or emotional tidiness. It is about letting God be born into what is already real. Into tired bodies. Into anxious minds. Into homes that feel too full or too empty.
Into lives that carry joy and grief side by side.

God comes anyway.

Not loudly or triumphantly.
But quietly. Vulnerably.
Trusting us with something precious.

And that changes what holiness looks like.

Holiness today will probably not feel dramatic.
It may not feel radiant or impressive.

It may look like patience when you are exhausted.
Kindness when you would rather withdraw.
Forgiveness that comes slowly.
Hope that is stubborn rather than certain.

Christmas happens wherever someone says — even without words — that divine and eternal invitation, you can come in. IF YOU WANT.

So if this morning you feel joyful, God is there. If you feel numb, God is there.
If you feel worn thin, unsure, or holding things together by grace alone — God is especially there.

Because God is not looking for the perfect place.

Only a place that is open.

And if you want —
God will make God’s home with and in you.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.

Amen.

Christmas eve midnight – 2025

St Luke’s Nativity

One of the greatest joys this past month has been sharing – again – the Christmas story with the elderly, in residential care homes. Since the beginning of December we have visited several homes and read these exact words from Luke’s gospel that we heard again, just now. It is quite remarkable to watch the careful, occasional recognition flit across faces often blank with dementia and to see smiles appear. It is beautiful to hear often silent voices singing the familiar words of deeply entrenched Christmas carols.

On each visit, after retelling this beautiful account of the birth of Jesus, with the angels and shepherds, the stable and manger and the precious holy family, I asked each group who their favourite character was in the Christmas story and it turned into a fascinating piece of market research.

The first time I asked, Godfrey made the rare confession that he liked Caesar Augustus best because he was a man of great order and structure, and he loved the roman empire. Completely unexpected.

At another home every resident said they liked Jesus best – always a solid answer. One relented slightly with the caveat, ‘closely followed by Mary’ and another – almost certainly peer pressured into answering ‘Jesus’ by every other resident doing so – came out with the classic, kind of understated, line, ‘I’m pretty fond of Jesus…but I really like the donkey’. Priceless. (I hope I didn’t ruin what might be her last Christmas by telling her the donkey doesn’t feature in the bible story anywhere…).

And then, the best moment came when I asked David who he liked best and he replied ‘the wise men’. His wife was sleeping in her chair next to him and when I said, ‘are you a wise man David?’ she didn’t miss a beat. Her eyes opened. She sat bolt upright for one moment and then said, ‘he is NOT!’  and then she was gone again.

A little while later she had woken up and I asked her, ‘Hazel, who is your favourite person in the Christmas story?’ she paused, and I wondered if it was too difficult a question for her to grasp. How foolish I was. She was thinking. And then she said ‘I think that depends on what I need at the time’. I think that depends on what I need at the time…and she went through many of the characters explaining why, or when, they might be her favourite.  And it’s so true, isn’t it?

This fabulous story, this amazing gift to humankind – where God came near, in Christ, to live and walk among us as a reminder and example of how to live and love fully – it really does contain everything we need.

Mary said yes, without truly knowing what she was agreeing to; wildly and boldly saying yes to whatever it was God was asking, because she knew God was trustworthy and true.

Those kings – the three wise men – who we meet in a few weeks time – gave up everything, left everything behind, to follow after what they believed would be worth losing it all for. Such determination. Such diligence. Such singlemindedness.

The shepherds – those lowly outcast dirty guys, shunned to edge of society, kept out of sight. They show that God does not forget those people. In fact, they see the glory first. They hear the good news first. They get a front row seat at the dawn of the brand new world.

Joseph was measured and gentle and wise and kind. He was caught up in Mary’s yes and he backed her and supported her and protected her and gave the son of God an earthly dad.

The angels proclaimed glory – glory to God in the highest – and promised peace – peace to all the earth. Glory and peace.

And Jesus came to earth to bring love – to shine brightly, dispel darkness, destroy hate and to create change that would last forever.

So whatever you are facing this Christmas time, whatever it is you need, I think Hazel is right; whatever you need can be found in these words from the bible – can be found in the people and events of this moment in history that changed everything.

Whose story, whose strength, whose character, whose example?

Who is it you need to focus on this Christmas. They are all available to all of you.

Who will be your Christmas companion this year? Amen.