7 Teachings, 7 Animals, 7 Words to Live By

 

I first learned about the 7 Sacred Teachings when one of the teachers at North Star School (who was also a part of the congregation of Riverview United) in Atikokan was doing the illustrations for this book. Kristy was actually Sarah’s teacher for Senior Kindergarten and she was really excited to come home on the first day of school and say that her teacher “is an illustrator!” because Kristy was just finishing up the pictures for this book. The book has text in both English and Ojibwe. When it came out every student in the school got a copy of the book – so we should have two copies but at present I have only located one. (you can see Kristy's illustrations here)

To be honest in fact pretty much all I know of what is meant by the 7 Sacred Teachings in indigenous culture comes from flipping through this book. To really learn about how they are understood in any of the Indigenous communities across the country one would best be served by talking to an Elder, or more importantly listening to an Elder.

The teachings themselves are words common to our culture as well: humility, honesty, respect, courage, wisdom, truth, and love. These are qualities that many cultures would find important, even sacred, as we learn how to live together. In Indigenous tradition the teachings are each tied to an animal: Wolf, Kitchi-Sabe or Raven (the book names both), Buffalo, Bear, Beaver, Turtle, and Eagle. You can find these in posters hanging in the sanctuary or the Friendship Room.

As I said, these teachings are common to multiple cultures. It is always, I believe, helpful to learn what meaning they have to different cultures. The same words can have different connotations in different places. As named in the preface, this book addresses the teachings using “many of the beliefs of the Ojibwe/Chippewa/Anishnaabe”. The peoples of this part of Turtle Island might have slightly different understanding even though the teachings have great universality.

Over the next several newsletters we will be invited to reflect on these seven words, seven teachings, seven qualities that build a healthy life. What do they mean to you? What do they mean to our neighbours? How do we live them out? How do they shape who we are?

I will have the book in my office for any who want to take a closer look – or listen as it comes with a DVD as well.

--Gord

Sing Toward Christmas

 There is an Advent hymn written by Shirley Erena Murray that has these words to begin the first 2 verses:

Look toward Christmas! Advent is here:

welcome December changing the year,... (verse 1)
Set the world singing, make the world glad!
Now is good reason not to feel sad,... (verse 2)

As we come to the end of November Advent has arrived once again. Time to ramp up our preparations for Christmas. How do we prepare for this, one of the central festivals of the church year?

There are, of course, many ways to answer that question. We decorate. Some people engage in a frenzy of baking. Some spend hours buying that perfect gift. Some make travel plans to see family. And probably a whole lot of other things I can’t think of right now.

What about in the church? How do we prepare ourselves for Christmas?

We light candles and remind ourselves of Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. Choirs practice special music. Plans are made for the Christmas Eve celebration. Some places still plan for the Christmas Pageant. Personally as a worship planner I like to find some unifying theme to carry through the season, just to focus myself. So what about Advent 2026?

As long as I can remember a big part of the Christmas season has been music. Being the child of a choir member might have something to do with that but I am pretty sure I am not alone. So this fall I had the thought that maybe we could use songs of the season as our touchstone as we march through Advent. I got Alison on board and came up with the theme Sing Toward Christmas.

So each week we will have a song whose story will be told at Children’s time and will probably get worked into the service in some other way. Here is what is planned thus far:

• November 29, Advent 1: Sing Toward Christmas: The Melody of Hope with the song being “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear”
• December 6, Advent 2: Sing Toward Christmas: The Pealing Bell of Peace with the song being “I heard the Bells on Christmas Day”
• December 13, Advent 4: Sing Toward Christmas: The Trumpet Call of Joy with the song being “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”
• December 20, Advent 4: Sing Toward Christmas: Love’s Soothing Lullaby with the song being “O Little Town of Bethlehem”

Come join as as together we sing our way to Christmas!

Looking Ahead to November 1, 2026 -- All Saints' Day

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Hebrews 11:1-3, 39-12:2
• 1 Thessalonians 2:8-13
• Luke 22:24-30

The Sermon title is And We Come After...

Early Thoughts: Who makes up the cloud of witnesses that led us to become the congregation we are today?

I have always loved that image from the letter to the Hebrews, the great cloud of witnesses. The writer spends all of chapter 11 reminding the readers of the great heroes of faith who have come before them  and then uses that image of the cloud. They seem to suggest that all those who have gone before us, preparing the way, leading us to where we are now, continue to surround us, giving us hope and courage, urging us forward.

We have inherited (for better or worse) the work of many many who have gone before us. As our congregational history book reminds us, they got it started and we come after to continue the work. How do we best honor those who have gone before while living in a different world than they knew? That is a hard question for the church, an organization so deeply bound by tradition.

Re-reading those verses from 1 Thessalonians this morning I found myself asking: "what would those who founded and led this church before us say to us today?" Would they, like Paul does with the Thessalonians, commend us for how we continue to live out the faith they passed on? Would they fret about some of the choices we have made? A bit of both?

I think that to honor the saints who have gone before us, the cloud of witnesses is to think seriously about what they have passed down to us. Then we seriously ask what we do with it. Some things we pass on unchanged. some things we let rest. Some things we adapt to a changing world or changing understandings. Honoring and thanks those who built the path does not need to mean we are handcuffed by what they built. Historian Jaroslav Pelikan once said: Tradition is the living faith of the dead, traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. We mark All Saints' Day, we celebrate the cloud of witnesses with the former not the latter. Maybe the best way to handle the tradition is a bit like jazz -- we take the base theme and add new interpretation, new modifications as best suit our current need.

SO who are the saints of McQueen Presbyterian/St. Paul's United over the last 115 years? Who are in our congregational cloud of witnesses? How do we carry on the work they started?

One of the answers, for me, lies in the Luke reading this week. We are the heirs of those who chose to serve. They followed the One who self described as "I am among you as one that serves" and chose to serve their community in turn. However we live out our faith in 2026 and in the years to come we need to continue to worry about serving our community. It will look and sound different than it did when people like Alexander and Agnes Forbes or I.V. Macklin first started building this place. It will look and sound different than when the 'White Church' opened in 1926, or when the current sanctuary was built in 1956-57, or when the West Wing was built in 1986-87. It will build on the work of those who were here before us, but it will be our work. We will help shape what gets passed on to those who come after us.

--Gord

Looking Forward to October 25, 2026

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• 1 Corinthians 3:5-9
• Matthew 9:35-38

For Children's Time I am adapting "Canoe Vespers", an idea I learned at camp this summer.

The Sermon title is Teamwork Makes...

Early Thoughts: What Team(s) are you a part of?  Why be part of a team at all?

Paul understands it. Paul knows that it is not all about him (in this instance at least--there are other times when I wonder about that). Paul knows that it takes a team to grow the Beloved Community. 

Writing to a church that, it appears, has deep divisions within it Paul wants them to get past their divisions and soak into the unity of Christ. There had been another teacher, Apollos, in Corinth besides Paul, apparently after Paul had been there. Now some members of the community are claiming allegiance to Paul while others to Apollos. In and of itself this is a relatively normal thing in human communities -- people are more bound to one leader or another for a variety of reasons. But it gets to be a problem when it becomes a source of competition or division. Especially when in the end, they are all on the same team.

Then we have the Matthew passage. Jesus sees the need and responds. Immediately after these verses, at the beginning of chapter 10, Jesus commissions the inner circle of 12 to go out and proclaim that the Kingdom of heaven has come near. The task is too much for one person (Jesus) alone, it takes a team to get it done.

To be in community means to, well, be in community. The life of faith is not something we do alone. No one person is responsible for keeping the community going. It is a team endeavor. Only when we work together, sometimes with disagreement to be sure, but together we make the community function. Together we make things possible.

I wonder.... how many of you automatically finished the saying begun in the sermon title? What is the dream we are trying to make work in the faith community we call St. Paul's? In the wider communities of Grande Prairie, or Alberta, or Canada? In the wider church of the United Church of Canada? In the wider community called Christianity? What is the dream? Who makes up the team?

One of my favoured readings for weddings comes from the book of Ecclesiastes chapter 4:

9 Two are better than one because they have a good reward for their toil. 10 For if they fall, one will lift up the other, but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help. 11 Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? 12 And though one might prevail against another, two will withstand one. A threefold cord is not quickly broken.

Over and over Scripture reminds us of the importance of not trying to go it out alone. As a team we support each other, we pick each other up, we share laughter and tears. We are stronger when we recognize that, as Paul says, "[one] plants and [another] waters but God gives the growth".

I believe this is a stewardship question. I believe that it is the best use of our resources, our energy, our gifts to pull together as a team, with God as team leader/coach.

SO who is on your team?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to October 18, 2026 -- 21st Sunday After Pentecost

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• 2 Corinthians 9:6-15
• Matthew 22:15-22

Source

The Sermon title is How Shall We Give?

Early Thoughts:  Cheerfully or begrudgingly? To chase a dream or to fulfil an obligation? Building a  hope for the future or maintaining what was before?

How do we give? How could we give? How should we give?

In this week's reading from 2 Corinthians Paul is talking Stewardship, a topic that began at the beginning of chapter 8). The Christian community in Jerusalem is struggling and Paul is asking his friends in Corinth to take up a collection to support them. You can read more about this collection here (among other places, Google about Paul's collection for Jerusalem to learn more). It is possible this is the first written account of a stewardship drive within the Christian church. He also makes mention of this collection, with some concrete ideas of how to build it up, in 1 Corinthians 16.

It is interesting to see how Paul motivates the people to support this cause. At the beginning of chapter 8 he seems to be playing one community against another, telling them how wonderfully generous the churches in Macedonia have been, and encouraging the Corinthians to meet that output. It sort of reminds me of a number of telethons I watched when I was younger where there were constant challenges to "meet or beat" a pledge. But here in chapter 9 Paul speaks to the Corinthians differently. Here he reminds them of abundance, he encourages them to give out of gratitude and giftedness. He reminds them that God provides with abundance. Even more important he tells them to give cheerfully, as they have decided not to give out of a sense of compulsion. Earlier in 8:8 he has already told them that he is not commanding them to give. Paul assumes the people want to do something and provides a way for them to respond to that desire.

I can think of many church stewardship campaigns in my lifetime that could have learned a thing or two from Paul. Paul does not use guilt as n incentive. Paul does not say "if you don't give this terrible thing will happen". Paul invites and encourages gratitude and generosity. Paul speaks about abundance rather than scarcity. He does use language like "testing of this ministry" in both chapters but one does not get the sense that it is a test with a risk of failure.

Then we have Matthew and "render unto Caesar". To be honest I find this a less helpful teaching for building stewardship. Where Paul encourages generosity and not giving under compulsion Matthew's Jesus could easily be seen, in this passage, as commanding giving whether one is cheerful or not. More of a tax (and the question he is asked is all about taxation) than an act of generosity. At the same time, however, Jesus' answer does push us to ask what belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar. That in and of itself might challenge our assumptions of "whose is this" and "who gets to use this". That could be a Stewardship question in and of itself.

Source

SO... how shall we give?

On one level that is a question of process. If someone wants to give a gift but doesn't know how to do so the gift might be wasted. So we could answer the question by talking about offering plates, or PAR, or e-transfers, or our Tithely giving portal, or simply by directing folk to the Donations page on our congregational website. We could talk about opportunities to volunteer. WE could offer to connect folk with partner agencies who are looking for volunteers with specific skills. All of that could be one way to answer the "how do we give" question.  And there is certainly a place for all of that.

Paul, I think, pushes the question in a different direction. Paul pushes us to look at motivation, at the emotional side of giving. We can make really good logical arguments about why giving is needed and still miss the mark. We need to ask ourselves, and ask each other, in what spirit we give. We who are asking for gifts need to take seriously how we ask. Are we building cheerful generous givers or are we (possibly inadvertently) using guilt or fear to encourage giving? Are we spouting budget numbers or are we inviting people into the vision, the hope, the dream of what the gifts can accomplish?

How shall we give after all?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to October 11, 2026 -- Thanksgiving Sunday

The Thanksgiving Scripture Readings this year are:

• Psalm 65 (we will read the Responsive version from VU782)
• Deuteronomy 8:7-18

The Sermon title is Hey God! Thanks!

2025 Tree of Thanks

Early Thoughts: How do we say thank you? What are we thankful for?

The flow of the Scripture story often reminds us to be thankful. There are whole passages in Jewish Scripture where the author reminds the reader of those things that God has done for God's people [it is worth pondering why those reminders might be needed]. Within the book of Psalms we find a category of praise and thanksgiving psalms.

To be the people of God is to be a thankful people.

So what are you thankful for this year? In our sanctuary stands our Tree of Thanks, a place where we can hang a leaf with a few words written on it, a place where we name what we are thankful for. In a prayer this week the young at heart, and everybody else, will be invited to say thank you for something. 

Thanksgiving is not, in the big picture, something we do one Sunday a year. Thanksgiving is meant to be a part of our daily practice. If we are honest, we might not quite meet the daily piece but we can make an effort to say thanks more often.

So what are you thankful for this year?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to October 4, 2026 -- World Communion Sunday

As this is the first Sunday of a new month it is our regular Communion Sunday. However the first Sunday in October is also marked out as World (or Worldwide) Communion Sunday. This is an idea that grew out of a Presbyterian congregation in the US in the 1930's as a way of fostering Christian Unity.

As always, on the first Sunday of the month we also like to highlight our Local Outreach fund and the tradition of a "Second Offering" where dedicated gifts are given to that fund. This fund is used to work with our partner agencies here in Grande Prairie to support our neighbours in times of need.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Exodus 12:3-4
• 1 Corinthians 11:17-26, 33

The Sermon title is A Banquet for All

A Place at The Table

Early Thoughts: From the beginning one of the markers of Christian worship was to gather at the table. We are told about it in the early chapters of Acts. We are told about it by Paul in 1 Corinthians. They gathered at tables, often a full meal that included what we now call Communion/Eucharist/Lord's Supper weekly. You would think with that sort of history this would be a unifying practice for the church.

Well maybe not. In the end the history of the church consists of many many arguments about communion. Who can receive? Who can serve? What gets served? What does the liturgy look and sound like? How often is the meal celebrated? How should it be served?

Sometimes these arguments take place between different denominations. Sometimes they take place within the same denomination. Sometimes they take place within the same congregation.

Still it is the meal to which Jesus invites us. It is the table where God is the host. I firmly believe that when we gather at the table we are getting a foretaste of the "eschatological banquet", the banquet at the changing of the world when the Reign of God comes to full flower. If that is true then surely it must be a place where all can gather?

Indeed, my preferred words of welcome and invitation to the table is the "all who seek to follow the Way of Jesus Christ are welcome to eat and drink".

One of the things that many of us are proud of in the United Church is that we offer an open table. This wasn't always so. There was a time when only confirmed members in good standing were expected to partake of communion. In my last year of seminary I interviewed a man who had been a visiting elder and remembered making those pre-communion visits to the members in his district. In the early 1980's I remember being at church during communion (I think the Jr. Choir had sung earlier in the service and we had not been taken over to the school where Sunday School was meeting) and my sister and I just automatically going up to be served with the rest of the crowd. Later my father made it clear that this was not proper as we we not yet confirmed.

Times change. In the later 80's many United Church congregations had conversations about children being welcome at the table. There were objections about "they are too young to understand" and counters like "how will they ever understand if they don't take part" or "I don't fully understand but I still take part".

I believe that God is constantly calling us to broaden our understandings, to find a way to make this a banquet for all. the challenge is how do we do that? How do we balance the traditions and traditional understandings that bring people comfort with new ideas, new understandings that open the door a bit wider? How do we mix "the way we always done it"  with "this is how we did it in my last church"? 

There is no one simple way to answer those questions.

This Sunday we will sing "For everyone born, a place at the table". In song we will remind ourselves of a call to "build a longer table...feasting together stranger turns to friend".  As we gather on this World Communion Sunday I invite us all to consider how this meal can become an even better symbol of the whole Body of Christ gathered together. As it happens, in my searching this morning I found some thoughts on the United Church website on that very topic. 

I believe we need to celebrate how we welcome all and how our welcome has broadened over time. I maintain we also need to ask what limits we may have placed (intentionally or not) on who gets to participate fully. When are those limits good to maintain, when do they need to be pushed, when do they need to be dropped? Again the answers are not always clear, and not everyone will answer the same way on any of them.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to September 27, 2026 -- Creation 3

 This week we continue passing through Creation Time. As a reminder our theme verse for Creation Time this year comes from Romans: We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Romans 8:22
• Exodus 17:1-7 
• Matthew 6: 25-34

The Sermon title is God Will Provide

Source

Early Thoughts: Do we have that kind of trust? Over and over Scripture advises or encourages us to trust that God will provide. Jesus almost makes it sound like a commandment or instruction. Do you have that level of trust? I don't think I do. What might life look like if we did? What happens when we don't have it?

In my reading last week I was reminded that people who are starving tend to develop an fixation on food. They will not be sure that there will be food tomorrow. They are more apt to save or even hoard it. I strongly suspect that the same thing happens when we starve, feel the deep lack of, for other things in our lives.

Is that a side effect of a lack of trust?

What would it look like if we lived life trusting that we would get what we need? Would we indeed get it or would we be trodden under the wheel of economics?

To be honest, when I read the Matthew passage for this week is get a bit of a "don't be such a pollyanna" response in my core. Now admittedly I lean more to Murphy's Law, or pessimism or even catastrophism (by which I mean expecting the worst possible outcome) in my philosophy of life so I may not always be the best judge of such things. Still it appears that Jesus is not being altogether realistic, particularly in a 21st Century context. Lots of people are consumed by those worries for the simple reason that they do not have these things.

Source

The people in the desert are justified, I think, in at least some of their grumbling and complaining. They were hungry and thirsty in a setting where food and water were not easily found. I think they have valid concerns. But God answers those specific concerns. Last week we heard of the provision of quail and manna, this week we have the provision of water. The same God who heard the wailing of the people in slavery hears them in the desert and God responds.

How does God respond to our worry and complaining today?

I note that Scripture doesn't mean "sit back and do nothing" when telling us to trust in God. Jesus does not tell his friends to do nothing, he tells them not to worry. God provides for God's people as the people need and meets them where they are. God also tells the people that once they are out of the wilderness they need to build in practices to care for their neighbours. That is part of how God provides for God's people. Some years after Jesus preaches the Sermon in the Mount Paul will take up a collection for the Jerusalem church in a time of hardship. Trusting in God to provide may take many different faces.

Trusting in God allows us to not worry. I think that trusting in God's providence allows us to  be more comfortable with a smaller safety cushion. It helps us think differently about how much we need to save "just in case". I think that this might make us healthier as individuals and as a society. It might help us respond in different ways to the many different reasons all Creation is groaning.

This does not mean it is easy to have that level of trust. Some of us find it so much easier to worry.
--Gord

A Pastoral Letter as Alberta Approaches Referendum Day

September 19, 2026

Friends in Christ,

Peace and Grace to all of you in the name of the God who is made known as Creator, Christ and Spirit.

As I sit down to write today the words of Jeremiah 29:7-8 come to mind “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let the prophets and the diviners who are among you deceive you...”. In chapter 29 Jeremiah is speaking to people in exile who have a faint hope that they will go home immediately. He is telling them what to do while they wait (and it will be a long wait). But it is an instruction that holds true wherever and whenever we find ourselves. We are to work for the welfare, the best possibility, of the place where we find ourselves living, we are to pray on behalf of the people and community around us.

Exactly one month from today (as I write these words) the people of Alberta will be going to the polls. We will be voting on a series of 10 referendum questions [you can read them here: https://www.elections.ab.ca/elections/referendum/]. Questions 1-5 have to do with immigration-related issues, Questions 5-10 are constitutional in in nature (10 being the question related to separation). As we prepare to vote on October 19^th (or earlier by mail, or at the advance polls as I intend to do) what does it mean to work for the welfare of the community, what prayers do we raise up in the community’s behalf?

All summer I have been pondering how I, as a leader of a faith community, should respond to this referendum. Not so much how I will vote, I decided that months ago, but believing strongly that the church needs to speak to how we live together as a society what is the appropriate response in this situation. Most certainly it is not appropriate to say “vote this way” but it is also not appropriate to say nothing. Some of these questions, the ones dealing with immigration, touch on some very theological issues in my opinion. So I think the best route is to name what I see as the theological questions and ask all of you to weigh those considerations into your decision making.

I begin with the proposition that as Christians our first loyalty lies with the Reign of God, not to Canada, not to Alberta, but to something bigger and different. That colours how I interpret what it means to follow the instructions Jeremiah gives to the exiles in Babylon. After all, as followers of Christ, followers of The Way of Jesus we are called to love our neighbours, friends, families, enemies and strangers. How do we live out that love when we answer those 5 questions about immigration?

Over and over again in Scripture, both Jewish and Christian, we are told to care for the stranger and newcomer in our midst. Over and over again we are called to ensure that the most vulnerable among us is protected, fed, housed, and clothed. Arguably our society has, at best, a mixed record when it comes to living into that calling. Sometimes we have been insular, worrying about ourselves first and ‘them’ later. If we take seriously my proposition that our first loyalty is to the Reign of God I think that changes the math, it means we worry about what is good for all of us at the same time. As I said last Sunday, we are all in this together. We need to vote as if that is true.

There are a lot of voices out there claiming to have a claim to the truth. Some of them we will agree with, some of them we will think are out of touch with reality. And that door really swings both ways. I think we need to pay attention to what they say but not stop there. God has given each and every one of us the ability to listen, to reason, and discern for ourselves where we hear God calling us to go. We listen to our neighbours but also tot he words of Scripture. We look for the path that lives out love for all of God’s Beloved Children. We seek and pray for the welfare of the community in which we find ourselves both in the present and in the future.

I know how and why I am voting on these referendum questions. I am open to talking about them, but I can’t, won’t, and shouldn’t tell you how to vote. I trust all of you to vote with your hearts and minds and hopes on all 10 questions. Every time we help shape the way our society works, both in our faith lives and in our civic lives, we have a chance to move the world toward God’ vision of God’s Reign. May God give us the wisdom to listen, to pray, and to act accordingly.

I close this letter with one more request. In the lead up to this referendum many harsh words have been said. Many people have felt attacked, injured, threatened, and dismissed by those words. That will still be a reality on the days following October 20^th, no matter what the results of the referendum is. My hope is that we can choose to be voices of healing, not doing more damage. My hope is that those of us who feel overwhelmed or scared by all this will find ways to regain our footing. My expectation is that as a community of faith we will help that to happen. After all, in the big picture, we are all in this together and there are lots of other issues we need to work on as we live into the Reign of God.

May God be with us as we head into October 19^th. May we find wisdom and hope and love as we lean into God’s presence in our midst.

Shalom/Salaam/Peace/Paix,

Looking Ahead to September 20, 2026 -- Creation 2

This week we continue passing through Creation Time. As a reminder our theme verse for Creation Time this year comes from Romans: We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Romans 8:22
• Exodus 16:4-21

The Sermon title is Take What You Need

Early Thoughts:  What do you need? What do you want? Are we always aware of the difference?

Because taking what you need is a bit different from taking what you want.  One is much healthier than the other.

Image Source

Exodus 16 tells a fairly well-known story of God's miraculous providence. The people are in the desert, there is no food. The people are getting antsy. So God tells them to wait and watch. At evening a flock of birds descend on the camp and the people have meat. Then in the morning the ground is covered with a flaky substance. They collect this stuff, (manna is related to the question "what is this stuff") and have bread. As it happens everyone gathers as much as they need for their family, no more and no less. Nobody goes without. Nobody has too much. The manna that is not collected melts away with the morning sun. The story will tell us that the people live on this bread from heaven until they cross the Jordan.

It is a great story for talking about trust in God. It is one of many in Scripture that reminds us that God will provide what we need (there are others from he wandering in the desert, Jesus counsels his followers not to worry in the Sermon on the Mount). That is a great lesson for the faithful to remember. We will talk more about it next week. But there is a bit in the story of manna that almost gets missed.

Moses tells the people to only take what they need for the day. He specifically tells them not to keep any for tomorrow. But people are people. Some decide to keep some in storage. It rots. Once a week they can take more than they need for one day. The day before Sabbath they gather two days worth of manna since they can not gather any on Sabbath. Then it does not rot, but stays fresh for the Sabbath day. But excess, hoarding, taking more than you need simply does not work with manna.

Maybe there is a message for us there as well.

Why did some try to keep manna past the best before date? were they hedging their bets, wondering "what if it doesn't come tomorrow?"? Were they hoping to sell it to their neighbour when they got hungry in the middle of the night? Did they just want to look important because they had more than anyone else? The story doesn't tell us. It is one of the gaps we can let our imagination fill in. All we are told is that the kept back food rots overnight and the Moses is not pleased.

I think that the story reminds us that taking what we need means only taking what we need.

I remember more than once as I was growing up my mother reminding me that want and need are different things. We live, I believe, in a world where we have forgotten the difference. That is not surprising since there is a multi-billion dollar industry committed to making us forget the difference. We are routinely told that we need something that we really don't -- some of it stuff we didn't even want until somebody decided to convince us it was a necessity.

What would happen if all the stuff we got because we wanted but didn't need it rotted or broke or ceased to work overnight?

Paul tells us in our theme verse for this season that all creation is groaning. I have a very strong belief that part of Creation's groaning, part of Creation's pain, comes from the fact that we have mistaken wants for needs. I believe that a large part of why we have such incredible discrepancy between the haves and the have-nots in the world is that we have forgotten the difference between wants and needs. I believe that many issues would take a big step toward resolution if we re-learned the difference between wants and needs.

Years ago a friend of mine who was a recovering alcoholic told me how lucky I was to learn the difference. They said that the first thing they were told went they went into rehab was that they were confusing wants with needs. Obviously addiction is more complicated than that one piece. Still, as I look at the world around us I have to wonder what addictions have been allowed (or even encouraged) to run amuck and thus led to the fracturing of society and the degradation of Creation?

LEt's be honest, we will always fulfill some of our wants. WE don't have to limit ourselves to only what we need. Wants are part of what gives life joy. But we have to find the right balance as we hear creation groaning.
--Gord