The wedding banquet
This morning our Gospel reading is Jesus’ parable about the king who organised a wedding banquet for his son. In summary, in the Parable of the Wedding Feast, God sent his Son into the world, and the very people who should have celebrated his coming rejected him, bringing judgment upon themselves. Remember in last week’s parable, the owner of the vineyard even sent his son, but the tenants killed him too.
As a result, the kingdom of heaven was opened up to anyone who will set aside their own righteousness and by faith accept the righteousness God provides in Christ. Those who spurn the gift of salvation and cling instead to their own "good" works will spend eternity separated from God.
The self-righteous Pharisees who heard this parable did not miss Jesus' point. In the very next verse, "the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words". The Parable of the Wedding Feast is also a warning to us, to make sure we are relying on God's provision of salvation, not on our own good works or religious service alone. Like the king, God provides the wedding garment, but we have to put it on.
Those who believe, but do not act on that belief by showing charity, are at the wedding banquet, but they are not adorned with the wedding garment. They are Christians in name only, and are vulnerable to being cast out like that unfortunate guest into exterior darkness unable to explain their lack of charity.
Those beautiful sunny days of last week has turned into some rainy weather of late but I trust the sun will come out for those hoping to do their daily permitted exercise. Many people are out in the parish grounds and we have noticed that one of the chairs in the Memorial Garden has finally given up after 40 years of weathering.
We are hoping to replace it with another chair to match the most popular one in the garden, seen below:
If perchance you have a matching one which you no longer use, it would be great to have it for the garden as you can see from the footprints below it, it is popular in both terms of seating and position. We are hoping, over time, that the chairs will all match. Please let me know if you have one. A second-hand seat is less likely to be stolen and would not need affixing to the ground.
Given the Premier’s view of the likelihood that Melbourne will make the target for next stage reduction of restrictions by next Sunday, I am not anticipating that there will be a change affecting us for some time yet, but we are proceeding on the basis that Melbourne will meet its target for the resumption of services at the end of November.
This week at St Andrew’s:
Sunday
10am - : Mattins : (in English) [join here]
11am – Bi-lingual service [join here]
Anytime – Video Eucharist [watch]
Wednesday
10am – Morning Prayer (in Chinese) [join here]
10.30am – Chat with the Vicar and friends [join here]
Thursday
10am – Bible study (in English) ‘The ‘I AM’ statements in St John’s Gospel’ [join here]
Friday
7.30pm – Chinese bible study [join here]
To simplify entry to the Zoom meetings, the following links will apply:
For all Ian’s activities – Wednesday chat, Thursday bible study & Sunday @ 10am:
https://stab.pub/3bGMD2h
For all Michelle’s activities – Wednesday morning prayer, Friday bible study & Sunday @ 11:
https://stab.pub/3ipDYUe
Trusting that you all have a safe week.
主任牧师寄语 11/10/2020
婚礼宴会
今天早上我们读的福音是耶稣的寓言，关于君王为他的儿子举办婚宴。总而言之，在婚筵的比喻中，神差他的儿子到世上来，那本该知道他来的人却拒绝了他，自己去做审判的事。记得在上个星期的寓言中，葡萄园的主人甚至打发他的儿子去，但园户也杀了他。
这样做的结果就是，天国就给那些舍去自己的义、并且因信得接受神在基督里所赐的义的人而打开。那些弃绝救恩而执著于自己的“善”工的人，将永远与神隔绝。
那些自以为是的法利赛人听到了这个比喻，并没有放过耶稣的意思。在接下来的一节中，“法利赛人出去计划，要用他的话陷害他”。婚筵的比喻也是对我们的一个警告，要我们确信我们所倚靠的是神所预备的救恩，而不是单靠我们自己的善行或宗教的事奉。像寓言里的君王一样，上帝提供了结婚礼服，但我们必须穿上它。
信而不去行善的，就是在席上，却不穿结婚的礼服。他们只是名义上的基督徒，而且很容易像那个不幸的客人一样被驱逐到外面的黑暗中去，无法解释他们为何缺乏爱心
上周那些美丽的阳光天已经变成了最近的雨天，但我相信，对于那些希望日常锻炼的人来说，太阳会出来的。很多人都在教会的操场上活动，我们注意到纪念花园中的一把长椅在经历了40年的风雨后，终于不能继续使用了。
我们希望用另一把椅子来取代它，它会成为花园中最受欢迎的一把椅子，如下图所示:
如果你有一把你不再使用的 合适的长椅，你可以把它放在这个美丽的花园里。你可以从它下面的脚印看到，它是位于一个受欢迎的位置上。我们希望，随着时间的推移，椅子会完全和花园合而为一。如果你有的话，请告诉我。二手的长椅不太可能被偷，也不需要把它固定在地面上。
考虑到总理对墨尔本在下周日之前制定下一阶段减少限制的可能性的看法，我预计一段时间内不会有影响到我们的变化，但我们会在墨尔本实现在11月底恢复崇拜的目标的基础上继续推进。
StAndrews@home
本周StAndrews@home:
周日
10am: 晨祷 (英文)[点击进入]
上午11时-双语崇拜[点击进入]
随时-线上圣餐[观看]
周三
上午10:30 -与牧师和朋友聊天[点击进入]
周四
上午10点-圣经学习(英文) 关于约翰福音经文中“我是”( 点击进入)
星期五
晚上7:30 -中文圣经研习[点击进入]
进入Zoom会议，可用通过以下链接:
所有Ian牧师的活动-周三聊天，周四圣经学习和周日上午10点的晨祷:
https://stab.pub/3bGMD2h
Michelle的活动——星期三晨祷，星期五查经班和星期日@ 11:的双语崇拜
https://stab.pub/3ipDYUe
我希望大家可以继续享受这温暖的天气。