Kaikorai Presbyterian Church

‘See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.’

Have you ever been in utter despair seeing something you put your hope in come crashing down around your ears – where a tree was growing, a smouldering stump is all that remains? Such was my teaching career, the first time round. Fresh out of teachers college, I went to teach juniors in a rural primary school, only to finish after two years vowing never to return to the classroom. In my second year we got a new Principal who made a ‘special project’ of my professional development, calling into question many aspects of my work and character. This was a difficult thing, I was young, impressionable and far away from family support, and I resigned at the end of year two. That principal was fired the following year, but even that gave me little comfort at the time. Read the rest of this entry »

from a sermon by Martin Fey, 21st November.

As I began to prepare for this sermon on Gen 22:1-18, I couldn’t help thinking of the Roald Dahl book Tales of the Unexpected, an anthology of short stories, many of which were sinister black comedy with a twisted ending, and which inspired a TV series in the 70s and 80s of the same name. Read the rest of this entry »

Mercy: The Unmerciful Servant Matthew 18:21-35.

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It’s always interesting to be close enough to a newspaper story to be able to evaluate its accuracy based on your own experience. I know of the few occasions I’ve made it into the paper, more than half of those appearances have contained inaccuracies or mistakes.

In 2002, we were all dismayed to read about the case of Bailey junior Kurariki, at 12 years old, New Zealand’s youngest convicted killer, involved in the death of pizza delivery man Michael Choy. Kurariki’s mother, Lorraine West, said at the time she felt she had failed her son. She had never beaten him – “maybe I should have done”. Asked if she was a good mother, she said: “I wouldn’t say excellent – but I did the best I could.” Read the rest of this entry »

A sermon on 2 Peter 1: 1 – 15

The last thoughts and desires of a  matriarch or patriarch, a leader of the people, carry great weight, and in the times of the early church, possibly more so than now. What we have in the letter we call 2^nd Peter, are the last wishes and a testament to the teaching of an apostle, imprisoned, condemned, waiting for death.

In this case the last thoughts and desires are communicated by means of a letter. You only write a letter if you want your thoughts to be known in other places than where you are, and also in this case, if you want your message to continue to be read and heard after your death.

Well he got his wish didn’t he?

The apostle though, isn’t writing a last letter to his family, or to those close to him, with fond words of love and comfort, he is writing to the church; Read the rest of this entry »