Malvern Uniting Church

03/06/2026

29/05/2026

Last week we went to State Youth Conference and discovered that nighttime petting zoos are a very different vibe as the animals try to hide so they can sleep, I discovered I can still beat teenagers in physical endurance challenges, and we heard from Billy Hogarth as he talked about Romans 12 to a room so packed it was standing room only.

This week we’ll be returning to a classic game we haven’t done for a couple of years now with Cut-Throat Kitchen! You’ll be competing to make the best desserts you can while also avoiding obstacles that the other teams might throw at you – such as being tied to a teammate or being required to use cauliflower!
The dessert making will be happening after dinner, so there will be reasonable non-competition food available if you are not a dessert person.

After that I will be continuing through our series on Acts and looking at how what we value influences how we act.

Also our pre-youth hangout is running from 4:30pm to 6pm, if anybody is keen to relax with some tea or hot chocolate and board games beforehand!

28/05/2026

Malvern Community,

For some, friendship is in the seeing of the other. To look and see, face to face. For myself, that has rarely been my sense of friendship. Friendship for me – the richest friendships I have had – have been found in someone who shares the horizon with me. Someone who looks out into the world, and shares in my vision of that golden light.

Who sees what I see, seeks as I seek. In the vast landscape of all that could be noticed, they stoop down and pick out the one thing that I was intensely gazing at. The thing I felt was shining brightly, but everyone else seems utterly blind to.

A friend is someone who turns to you when you are enraptured by something and they say, “you too?”

It is a splendid thing to share a vision with another, and to share the journey to that horizon. But this is a special thing, a rare thing. For much of life, it is not so easy a thing to find such seamless harmony. Because we are all so unalike, and rightly so.

Each of us is gifted with a unique perspective. Part of healthy community is not sameness, but a vibrant diversity of vision. Each person sees something another cannot. It is the virtue of our gifts, that we are the ones to go and find what hidden glories there are, and to share that vision with those who have not a natural eye to see it.

And so it is with any vocation, as with preaching. Preaching is not meant to be the act of dictating truth onto others. At its best, preaching is the sharing of vision.

Not merely the preacher sharing their vision to the congregation. But inviting the congregation to share their insights. And with the whole church body, partake in the slow process of filling in the whole picture. Seeing all the wide terrain, the vast panorama, the full landscape of what is to be, the Kingdom of God coming over that horizon.

This can be a tricky business, such collaborative work. To harmonise each perspective and align it with the whole wide world before us. Of the long church tradition, of scripture and its vast scope, and of this God who calls us into relating with Him, His vision.

This is the business of the church. It is slow, and it is clunky. It is hard enough for even two people to walk the same road together, let alone an entire church. Yet still we journey together toward that dimly lit, softly breaking dawn.

And it can at times feel very lonely. When no one seems to share in the vision as we see it. It is our passions that give us purpose. But they can also make us feel alone, as no one can ever quite match it, see as we see.

But C.S. Lewis gives an insight to this. He reflected that in his youth he loved only those like himself. But later, within the church, love compelled him toward people he would never otherwise associate with. But love bid him love them, and through the difficulty of loving across difference, he discovered how rich and beautiful these people truly were. Carrying insights, depths, and visions he himself lacked. True harmony, he found, was not merely discovered in easy likeness, but slowly formed through love.

It is a lovely thing, to find a friend who resonates easily with you. But for the most part of life, love bid me to share my hidden glories with those who may struggle to see it fully. And for me to struggle to see theirs. Love keeps us coming back. Love keeps speaking. Keeps listening. Keeps trying again to say, “Come and see.”

And above all this, God sees. He shares in our vision, and is to each of us, the closest confidant. He too sees the pieces we insist on, and shares in our feelings for how important they are. There is comfort in this. That even when no one else seems to understand what so captivates or burdens us, God does. We may share even our loneliest visions with Him.

But God does not merely affirm our insights. He also calls us beyond it. Beyond our narrow horizons and into His vast one. The Kingdom of God is larger than any one perspective, any one passion, any one church. We are each only catching fragments of the light coming off the dawn.

And so, the task of the church is to keep walking together toward that horizon. Patiently. Humbly. Lovingly. Sharing what we can see, while remaining open to what God may yet reveal through the eyes of another. We are called to share in love. To love others, and be loved, into more than ourselves. And by each other’s gifts, our gifts the richer.

God shine on you, and give you comfort this week,
Max

22/05/2026

Last week some of us were making movies in Hollywood while others answered some of life’s hardest questions such as “what is the coolest animal to ride into battle?” and “how is Claudia’s shoe so good at curing hiccups?” We then talked about what happens when your actions don’t line up with what you think you believe, and the different ways we respond to that.

This week we’ll be heading off-site to Seeds Uniting Church (Aberfoyle Park) for SYC! SYC stands for State Youth Conference, and all the Uniting Church Youth Groups are invited for a night with a Petting Zoo, Loud Music, and our guest speaker who will talk about what it means when Christians use the phrase “Set Apart”.

If you are planning to come, you can either meet us at Seeds (42 Sunnymeade Drive, Aberfoyle Park, SA, 5159) at 6pm, or we will be driving people up from Malvern, Departing at 5:15pm.

If you are wanting your child to be driven up from Malvern, please let us know so that we can make sure we have enough car seats for everyone. We will drive everybody back to Malvern for a 9:30pm pickup. Alternatively, the event itself finishes at 9pm.

If you are someone who usually joins us for Welcome Friday (4:30pm-6pm hangout pre-youth) but doesn’t want to stay for SYC, Max Kowalick (our young adults pastor) will be on-site until 6pm while the rest of us head down. However, after that you will need to have your own way home.

One Last Thing: Please register through the following link so that SYC themselves have the necessary emergency contact information. You may do this on the day but if you pre-register we can get in quicker.
https://www.eventzilla.net/e/syc-worship-night-2138673251

Chris

21/05/2026

Malvern Community,

C. S. Lewis once described democracy as to medicine, good only in so far as something else has gone wrong. Necessary for a fallen humanity, but not an ideal in itself. Because those in authority are prone to pride and corruption, we build systems that limit power, distribute responsibility, and scrutinise leaders. When I first encountered this idea, I assumed it inherent to Christianity. Fitting very well with the Christian image of a perfect king, come to restore that idyllic, natural order.

But then as I engaged with the Uniting Church, I encountered a very different notion of authority and equality. Equality was not seen as a restraint upon a fallen order of authority but was seen as part of the ideal itself. That the beatific vision of the Christian hope does not have a happy hierarchy of rightly ordered power ruling over compliant subjects. But rather, as the logic of Christianity plays out, a true and real kind of equality among all things will be part of the unfolding of creation.

This is not to say that all things shall be flattened down into a world of sameness, or that no one shall ever lead another. But that all shall share in all things, in a given way. There are different gifts, responsibilities, callings, and seasons of life. Some are entrusted to teach, others to serve, others to guide, comfort, organise, build, care. Yet none will stand above the rest in any way that diminishes another’s unique dignity, as they stand. We shall all be famous in our way.

The Kingdom of God is not a world where one perfect ruler dictates forever downward to passive subjects. God Himself needs nothing from us, yet He calls us into creation to play some part in it. Throughout scripture, He continually invites participation. He allows Abraham to argue, Jacob to wrestle, Moses to intercede, the prophets to question. God seeks a dynamic, responsive creation. Not because God has need, but because love delights in shared life. God humbles Himself and lifts humanity up, as Athanasius says.

Perhaps this is closer to the natural order of things than we often imagine. A parent stands over a child to protect and guide them yet also bends down to lift them up. And later, when age has bent that parent low, the grown child bends down in turn to help them walk. Authority, at its best, is not domination, but mutual care across time. To serve, and to be served, is different for each in their role. But to each a time is had to honour, and be honoured, in their turn.

And all this a part of the uncanny, ever surprising nuance of the God we encounter in scripture. A God who is all power and authority yet comes to us as a lowly man of compassion. Making a world of rough edges, danger and threats, a world that fights and drives back. Near misses and clinch victories. God isn’t looking for a smooth, simple order. Nor a passive people. He calls us to wrestle, to argue, to press for ourselves and intercede for others, as much as to worship and honour. And in all this to find a real, dynamic relationship with him.

C.S. Lewis also speaks of God like a lion. He is not some tame thing; He is not safe. But He is good. And I think He wants that same quality for us. Not merely obeying Him in rigid rites of worship. He wants the mettle of us, the edge of us, the weight of us, as we fully engage with Him. Perhaps the Kingdom of God is not the silencing of all other voices before His own, but the raising up of creation into conversation with Him. To meet and speak our part, and all that we are offered up to Him also.

As we continue our Mark series, it pays to think deeply on the often hidden, uncanny dynamic at play when God encounters others. To see how Jesus tests, and how He honours. What it is for one to meet another at their level and match them. How God responds to those who seek Him. How He honours the voice that speaks back.

See you Sunday,
Max