E NEWS 5TH JANUARY 2024
Talofa lava ma ia manuia le Tausaga Fou. Happy New Year. Well here we are in 2024, I hope it has been a good start for you all. I have heard that Sunday’s church service led by Ian Harris was a great way to end 2023 and welcome in 2024. I wonder what this year has in store for you and your family, for us as a St Andrew’s Community?
My niece is getting married on February 28th next month and her favourite aunty (me) offered to pay for her wedding dress. Hmmm, I told her I had a budget of up to $1k which I thought was a reasonable budget. She bought the dress yesterday and she chose a $3k dress, OMG. Thankfully, she was happy to pay the balance with her savings. $3k on a dress for one day!!! Is that normal? But hey, that’s her choice. She face-timed me with her wearing it and she looked beautiful.
Did you watch the news yesterday where a fisherman had fallen overboard while attempting to haul in a marlin on Wednesday. He was a lone fisherman and he drifted miles out to sea away from his boat. He was in the water for 23 hours and had all but given up hope. He had his watch on and used it to reflect the sun so that someone might see it flashing in the distance. That was a brilliant idea, in fact it was all that he could do. Two men in their boat saw the light flashing in the distance and at first thought nothing of it until the other one thought that perhaps they should go and investigate what the light was. They were in total disbelief when they discovered it was a person who was alive hoping to be found. That was a miraculous find, the reality is if it was not for his watch he may have never been found.
I wonder, how we have made most of a bad or negative situation in the past and used whatever resources we have left in us to turn it into a positive situation like the fisherman and his watch?
I’ve been invited out to Te Kakano o te Aroha here in Lower Hutt at Moera on Tuesday 16th January to do a one hour lecture on the Pacific Island Presbyterian church in Aotearoa NZ. It’s part of the curriculum for the degree in Theology at Otago University. Rev Dr Wayne Te Kaawa is using his reciprocal invitation after he availed himself to lead our Parihaka Sunday service here at SAOTT. I was given the option of an upfront lecture or sitting around a table. Guess which one I chose, sitting around the table. I wonder whether there will be food on it during or after the lecture?
Next week we start our Cuppa and Chat again on Wednesday at 10.30am. If you have never attended one and have been curious, come along and try it out, the coffee is good and so is the company.
This Sunday is the first Sunday of Epiphany. The theme for my reflection is “A change of direction”. The Magi were told in a dream to take another route home to avoid King Herod. Often in our lives we too may have experienced a time or times when we have had to make a change in the direction we were heading in for whatever reason. Would you call it an epiphany? It’s still a work in progress and I look forward to sharing it with you on Sunday.
Easter is early this year, Good Friday on the 29th of March and Easter Sunday on 31st March. By that time I would have been here at SAOTT for two years. Has time flown for you? It certainly has for me and SAOTT continues to be a place where I have been called to as it says in the Book of Esther “For such a time as this”. Looking forward to another year of being your minister. Faafetai, Fei
You can read the full E-news here: https://mailchi.mp/bff07d512fb8/this-weeks-newsletter-from-st-andrews-on-the-terrace-9418652
