Newsletters - Keppel Anglican

Keppel Anglican
6 months ago

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Hi Church! Here is a picture of a congregation I was part of in Tasmania. I have fond memories of the people in this photo. However, it was different to church in CQ. Church seems to change according to where it is. Church this week will be very different, and you might even ask, “What is church?” as we watch the Diocesan Synod Communion Service live from the Anglican Cathedral at 8:30am from our Emu Park and Yeppoon churches.

It has been a challenging time as we have prepared for this special service. Some issues have brought me to the point of needing to ask “what is important” and what is not. In one case, I even said to others, “I think we need to do it this way, because I’m a bit stuck in my ways, and I’m not ready to give it up quite yet.” We can all have trouble deciding what is important in this life. It can be a difficult question to answer.

But there are some things that do not change. This year at Synod I am seconding a motion about things that do not change. It is about what it means to be a Christian, and what it means to be Anglican. I won’t be speaking about what I think, but what the founding documents of our Diocese tell us members of the Anglican Diocese of Rockhampton believe. We weren’t founded last century, but the century before that, and we haven’t changed what we believe in that time. Actually, we couldn’t, because they are in our founding principles.

We founded ourselves on the Prayer Book, which includes our Articles of Religion (The 39 Articles) and our Creeds. Still today, clergy, ministers and even our new Bishop, need to commit to these beliefs and truths. Truth is real. It exists. Foundational to them all is the truth of Jesus Christ. We believe there is only one way to find salvation, only one way to know God, and only one way to receive eternal life. We read Jesus saying it like this, in John 14:6,

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

I expect you know this verse well, because the Anglican Prayer Book recommends we use it for funerals. Jesus’ words are our words. Our founding principles as a Diocese agree with Jesus. Apart from Jesus, there is no other way to be saved, there is no other way to know God, and there is no other way to have eternal life. Only Jesus.

My hope today is that you are glad that your Anglican Diocese understands the Gospel of Jesus. My hope is that you thank God that our Diocese stands firmly with us as we wave the flag for Jesus. My hope is that you share in this hope of eternal life that Jesus speaks of, and that you put your trust in Jesus. This is our truth. This is our hope. This is what it means to be Christian in the Anglican tradition.

Grace and peace.

Rob

We will only have one service at each of our churches this week.

Sunday 25/10/2020 at 8:30am from Emu Park and Yeppoon.

All other services have been cancelled for the week.

We expect this service may last up to 2 hours. So, feel free to take a break or leave if you need to before the service concludes.