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The NSW Council of Churches comprises representatives of seven evangelical Christian denominations. For more than 80 years we have proclaimed the good news of Jesus Christ and advanced a Christian perspective on public issues. Click here to learn more.
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2CH Messages
Generosity
Michael Jensen - Sunday 22 January 2012
In 1990 scientist Richard Dawkins wrote a book called The Selfish Gene. His book was about genes and evolution - but I think the title is catchy for another reason: it pretty much sums up how deeply embedded in the human soul stinginess is. Self-interest is the only kind of interest we pay. Greed springs eternal in the human breast. There is a meanness within. Generosity is profoundly unnatural...
The genius of capitalism is that of course it understands this. Whenever communism has been tried - the idea being that you had to share everything with everybody - it has never worked. We humans much prefer the possibility of having more than others. And we hate to think of people getting things when they haven’t earned them. Make the dole bludgers work, we say. Australia can be a very ungenerous place. We hate to think of sharing Australia too widely with others, unless they pay for it of course. We don’t want people to think they can get something for nothing, do we?
Dare we trust God?
Steve Cooper - Sunday 22 January 2012
Good morning! Here’s an interesting question: Do we dare to trust God? It takes a while before we can fully trust someone. First we want to observe them over a period of time to find out if they’re trustworthy. We watch whether they keep their promises and truly care about us. But do we dare to trust God when we can’t see him? How do we know if he’s reliable? What do we do if we obey what God commands, and believe his promises, but then it seems that God’s not keeping those promises? What if we follow God’s ways then find that life seems to be falling apart? Can we still trust God? Let’s explore that question this morning by considering a fascinating story from the Bible. It’s the story of an unnamed woman – she’s simply called the widow of Zarephath. She had to wrestle with this very question: ‘Dare we trust God?’