Warmest greetings
to you there for the New Year from Martha and myself. We trust and pray that
you had a very blessed Christmas time with family and friends.
Talking of
Christmas, I was just reflecting on the difference between the Christmas
seasons here in Australia and the one in the CIS countries where the Slavic Gospel Association
ministers. Here, we will have been complaining about the heat, but over there,
many will have been struggling with the snow and intense cold. Something most
of us here in Australia have no real understanding of the difficulties and
dangers such extreme cold conditions can wreak, because we have never
personally experienced it as an “insider”.
This
insider understanding reminded me a little of one occasion in South Africa,
(whose climate was not that dissimilar to Australia’s), when we were in this
remote rocky, hilly but otherwise very beautiful, valley, and I remarked to
one of the locals on how beautiful it was, only to have him remark that it may
be beautiful to visit, but it was not so beautiful if you had to live there
and to try and grow crops and graze livestock for a living.
So here he was,
seeing things as a resident and Insider, while I was seeing things as an
outsider and visitor: Both of us were seeing the same thing, but from
different perspectives. In truth, what we were both seeing, was only a part of
the wider picture and neither of us saw, or even cared about, the perspective
of anyone else. With both views being equally one-sided and
incorrect!
What about you when
you see this world in which we all live today? Do you see it as a resident and
are simply trying to make a living and not worrying about anyone else?
Or perhaps, you see it just as a visitor and just seeing
the beauty and ignoring the hardships of others? Again: Both ways of viewing
things is not how God would have us as His Children behave. So, as we enter
into this New Year, let us again be thankful for all that the Lord has given
us and share our blessings with others, wherever and whenever God shows us
how.
Practically,
there are many ways that you can do that and only you can know how to do that
best, so I will leave that decision with you, but one way all of us can do
something worthy for God, is to Pray. So again I would like to humbly
encourage you to again spend time in prayer for those less fortunate than
yourself, whether in other countries, or just here in Australia and in your
own community.
Thank
you and have a blessed New Year: Walter
