A lovely idea - but hard to follow!

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.
 

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink …”

 

Our words today from the Gospel of Matthew.  A lovely idea but hard to follow.  How can we not worry when our own government takes away the jobs and supports that we need here in this corner of rural Canada.  First, changing the EI rules and making it harder to live in areas where most of the work is seasonal.  Second, trying to change the way fishing quotas work so that most of the fishing would be done by a few very large companies and making it almost impossible to succeed as a single-licence fisherman.  And now, privatising both the Keltic and the golf course.

How can we be thankful when our own government moves the few jobs that are here out of the community?  How can we be thankful when the only jobs for our young people are thousands of kilometers away?

Our gospel today tells us not to worry.  It tells us that God will provide what we need.  We just need to have faith.

A lovely idea, but hard to follow.

Everyone here will be affected by the loss of good jobs north of Smokey.  Whether you have one of those jobs or not, you will be affected.  So what does it mean to us to have faith?  Does not worrying mean we should just sit back and let whatever is going to happen happen?  I don’t think so.  As Christians we are called to action for ourselves and for others.  We are called to speak out against injustice.  We are called to work in response to the gifts that we have from God.

Do any of you know of the Serenity Prayer?

God, give me grace to accept with serenity
the things that cannot be changed,
Courage to change the things
which should be changed,
and the Wisdom to distinguish
the one from the other.

Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,
Taking, as Jesus did,
This sinful world as it is,
Not as I would have it,
Trusting that You will make all things right,
If I surrender to Your will,
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,
And supremely happy with You forever in the next.
Amen.

What can we change and is not possible for us to change?  We cannot change the global economy and bring more jobs to our communities that way.  At least in the short term, we cannot remove the government that is taking away those jobs that we do have.  This does not mean that we can’t do anything about losing those jobs.  There are lots of things that we can do to push the government to do the right thing for this community.  We need to let the government know that what they are doing is not okay.  There are lots of ways that we can do this.  We can write letters to the editors of our local and national papers.  We can write to our MP.  We can write directly to Stephen Harper.  As a first step, there is a petition which is to be presented to our federal government asking them to keep the Highland Links golf course public.  There is a copy of the petition at the back of the church.  If you agree with it, you can sign it here or online at www.itsourgame.ca.  You can also encourage others to sign online and write letters.  Those in government do listen to what we have to say when it is said by enough people.  This is not one of those things that we cannot change.

 

Coming to this community has been a great blessing for me and for my family.  We have made good friends.  We have been living in the most incredible place on earth.  I have learned so much since coming here.  And I pray that you have learned and grown as a result of my ministry here.  But it has not all been easy.

As you all know, my family has been directly affected by the lack of jobs in Nova Scotia.  When we moved here we hoped that Victoria would be able to work at least within this time zone.  For the past three years, she has had to travel to Saskatchewan to find work.  We had also hoped that she could limit her working time to about four months a year.  This has also not worked out.  She has had to spend six or seven months in Saskatchewan to cover the costs of living in two places and travelling back and forth.  It has been a great strain on us and on our family.

Victoria will not be able to find work in this area.  This is something that we must accept.  We cannot change it.  She cannot work here and we, as a family, need to be together.  This leaves us with only one choice.  Rosa, Paul and I need to go to her.  This has been a very difficult decision to make.  We love it here.  We love all of you.  I am very sorry to say that we will be leaving to join Victoria in Saskatchewan at the beginning of the new year.  Please know that if we could do it any other way, we would.  My prayers will be with you as you decide where you go next as a parish and I hope that your prayers will be with us as we prepare for this new journey that we are starting.

God bless you all.