My Adventures with God Ch 41: A Prophecy Fulfilled

Ch 41 A Prophecy Fulfilled

After I was offered a few months work as locum at Vermont I had this prophetic vision that I would become vicar at Vermont and have to do battle with the choir. We had still tried to find accommodation back where we were in Caulfield but to no avail. God who had provided so abundantly a year and a bit before now seemed to have closed off every option.

So we moved the other side of town to Vermont, and rented the now vacant vicarage. Our eldest was now at Melbourne Grammar Senior School which is relatively easy - that is to say bus then train then tram – to get to from Vermont The other three were at Melbourne Grammar's Junior school at Caulfield (Co-educational for those who are wondering) This was not possible by public transport so Sue drove them on her way to and from work at hospital, which being part time she could coordinate.

My first impressions of St' Luke's Anglican Church Vermont were not good.

Before I had a chance to do anything good or bad I met a man at the vicarage beck fence (which bordered the church) who had idolised Jack. My “hello” triggered a torrent of angry abuse in return. The churchwardens explained it away – he was just angry to see anybody in “Jack’s” house. This man continued this violently hostile attitude all the time I was there.

Then there were the Parish Staff. I had built up a team ministry at Lang Lang, so I was looking forward to working with staff, I fondly thought that the weekly staff meeting would be times when we would encourage and build each other up, as it had been with the team at Lang Lang. I could not have been more wrong!

The staff consisted of a “one-quarter time” youth worker, a “half-time” pastoral worker and a “half-time” secretary. There had been a full time curate but he had left at the same time as Jack and parish finances no longer ran to getting another curate (the decline was already showing).

The youth worker, Nick, was an engineer about my age. His thing was explosives and he travelled all over the world consulting. His parish work had to be fitted around this schedule. He was all “alpha male”: lean, muscled, in jeans and T shirt, his already grizzled hair cut short. It was only later that I would learn that he only tolerated one or two males whom he considered no threat in the senior youth group he led. Over the years all other males he pushed out. The resultant group, largely 20’s and 30’s single women I heard referred to as “Nick’s heifers” Nick was married to Jane who was music leader; they had three thoroughly delightful young boys.

The pastoral worker Pam was a single lady in her late twenties. She had been hired a couple of years back on Nick’s recommendation. Together they belonged to a select “community” within the church which was led by Nick. This community seemed an attempt to at least partially re-create the early Jerusalem church model of believers sharing their lives and their possessions. It was a very tightly bonded community.

The secretary Judy was a middle aged mum with semi-grown up children and married to Barrie who lead the “4 wheel drive club” which was very big at the church. Barrie from the start showed his great regret that because no one expected Jack to resign, he had not stood for election as either Churchwarden or Incumbency Committee member. This meant that his “party” in the church was not represented in the selection of a new vicar.

As only a locum I was “under their radar” so to speak. Judy was sweet and efficient. To Nick and Pam, I was just someone who had to be there because of inconvenient church practices which required a priest to celebrate communion - both Sunday morning services were communion. They soon put me in my place. Nick produced the roster he had compiled : I was to preach here and here, lead services here, here, and here. Pam then chipped in, she had planned a preaching theme, they were preaching through a book (not of the bible, a devotional book by someone) and I was to preach on this chapter and that chapter. The evening service was a charismatic “youth” service – which was, as is ironically often the case, attended by people of all ages. And I was down to lead here and here. Nick’s body language made it clear that any questions I had I could keep to myself!

I did have a question. If the evening service was charismatic why did they not ask me what my spiritual gifts were rather than just putting me down on the roster for a bit of everything? At our charismatic service at Bayles I had always preached – that was my particular gift. Ross had always lead the worship – that was his. And having seen someone who really did have a spiritual gift leading worship I knew I could not do it! (well not in any more than in purely human strength.)

My question was answered at the first evening service. For fully ten minutes at one point Nick, who was leading kept the congregation on their knees in silent prayer while he coaxed “I sense one of you has a word from the Lord, come forward”. For ten minutes!

I had read very widely and this behaviour corresponded to something I had read described by Watchman Nee the famous Chinese Pentecostal. Nee termed this behaviour “Soul-ish” - ie it is what happens when the Holy Spirit is not acting and humans are trying to fake it! I had also seen real “words from the Lord” – they didn’t have to be coaxed like that! Some of the “Caring Christians” girls at Lang Lang had found God used them to mutually counsel each other. Frequently one would say later “I just opened my mouth and all these words came out” Typically the person being counselled would on hearing the words burst into tears and say “yes that is true, but you couldn’t possibly have known that about me” and there would be real healing.

What I saw at this first evening service was so fake that it made me angry! Next evening I went to see Nick and said in a more diplomatic way what I have outlined above. Wow! He really did not take criticism kindly! In fact he did not take criticism at all! I was sent packing in short order. His attitude is best explained by something he said to me much later – when I was the vicar of the parish. He said to me: “You were only appointed by the human Church; I was appointed to lead this congregation by God!” That was indeed his attitude right through!

Otherwise the locum months were uneventful. After a while the Parish incumbency committee unanimously agreed they had found their man: me. The bishop did not. He had someone else in mind. The Incumbency committee were all men who pre-dated Nick and the others who had arrived once the church was successful. one was “crispy” evangelical, one moderately Charismatic and one very Charismatic. They had prayed together been convinced together and now faced off against the diocese together. They prevailed and I was appointed.

When it was announced in church there were cheers – except for Nick’s supporters some of whom openly wept.

As a “PS” the incumbency members told me Jack had planned to get rid of both Nick and Pam, and advised me to take the archbishop’s offer of the parish on the condition that they were moved to positions in other churches. I didn’t. Would it have made any difference in the end? I think not, but you may judge for yourself.

My Adventures with God: 41: God Changes my Plans

Chapter 41 ... God Changes my Plans

Towards the end of 1990 it was obvious that our finances were not going to hold out for me to do a Ph.D.

To cut a long story short I came to that sad conclusion that the “Ph.D.” bit of it had been more in the line of my take on what God wanted. His plan seemed to more along the lines of a one year sabbatical. And just to make sure I got the message there was our bank balance slowly but surely dwindling away. I got the message and I eventually even gave in!

So I went to see a Melbourne bishop (one did not easily get to see the archbishop!). He was sympathetic but pointed out that right now they had a glut of priests, and what jobs there were had to go to Melbourne men (I was from the 'foreign' diocese of Gippsland!). He did however think he might be able to put a locum or two my way.

He did. And I was hired to fill in a vacant parish for a few months until the new vicar arrived. All right, I had forgotten: parish ministry was fun!

After that he offered a locum at the recently vacated parish of St. Luke’s Vermont. Now comes the scary bit. I had a revelation. I cannot recall, if indeed I ever understood, its exact mechanism. I think it was a sort of a vision. Anyway the content was that a) it was God’s purpose, which he would carry out, that I would become vicar of Vermont and b) I would have a fight with the choir or musicians (I’m not sure which it was).

What could I say? That did not sound exactly enticing, but God had a gun (or rather a bank balance) at my head – and besides I was by now mostly in the habit of doing what he asked, after the usual amount of “kicking and screaming” of course.

We were still living at Caulfield. If I had doubts that God was serious, the owners managed to sell their house, and we were, understandably, given notice. I thought we should move into the vicarage “while I was locum”. Sue thought differently. Well the vicarage was new, and in many ways an ideal vicarage, but aesthetically it was – well “barren” is the word that comes to mind! We tried hard to find another house to rent in Caulfield. (Perhaps Jonah had similar, though of course much stronger, feelings) Eventually even Sue had to accept that “a house in Caulfield” (wasn’t going to happen.

When you are in the habit of obeying God he is tremendously kind and considerate if you occasionally dig in your heels and try to go the wrong way. He just shuts the gate until you have thought better of it! That is infinitely kinder than letting you go ahead and make a mess of things believe me! So eventually we gave in and asked if we could rent the vicarage while I was to be locum. The Church Wardens agreed and we moved in.

I will describe our experiences at Vermont more or less chronologically over the following chapters. But since we were presented with a baffling puzzle which seemed to change and shift every time we thought we had a handle on it, and which took all our skill and energies for four or so years, I will make life easier for readers. I will give you now, at the beginning, my “in a nutshell” analysis which is the fruits of those first years of strenuous effort constantly trying to solve the puzzle, and the further distillation of nearly two decades of hindsight.

My predecessor had been there ten years. He had done something very similar to what we had done in the first two or three years at Lang Lang, but over a slightly longer time scale.

What he had built up was better integrated and more stable as he had not had the problem of trying to mix different social strata (suburbs tend to be socially homogeneous whereas country towns are socially heterogeneous and very distinctly stratified) also the longer period allowed adjustments to be made.

His achievement was really impressive. I may have this wrong, but I think he trebled the size of the church. Anyway at its peak (which was about four years before he left) there were over three hundred people attending every Sunday. A really impressive achievement.

Vermont had understandably gained a diocese wide reputation as a leading Evangelical – Charismatic church. The late Archbishop Penman had enjoyed attending it when he could. To everyone outside this was a model church, but in fact like Lang Lang, it contained the seeds of its own destruction. It was already past its peak. Whoever followed Jack Humphries was going to be blamed for the inevitable crash. A crash that they probably could see coming let alone prevent.

Part of the problem was that just as Bayles fellowship had attracted a “wolf” when it became known as a place where things were happening, so Vermont had attracted, if not actual wolves, then at least people infected by wrong ideas and motives.

These people had come to the now big and impressive church over the past four or five years. They had come as staff and as parishioners. They were better at “office politics” and at promoting themselves than the people who had actually worked with Jack to build up the church to what it had become. So they replaced these people in key and “up front” church roles. They thought of themselves as a spiritual elite, but the were really not a patch on the people they had supplanted.

The next problem was they had introduced doctrinal error. The “original” team that had helped Jack build up the church were – at least the ones I met were absolutely sound. Some were crispy Evangelical some were very Charismatic even Pentecostal but they were tremendous people and I could not fault their Christian and moral excellence. The newbies who had supplanted them exhibited all the problems of Charismatic-theology-gone-wrong I had faced at Bayles.

As one grows to maturity as a Christian, God deals with your vices and weaknesses in the order he determines so one should not generalise too much, but worship of “self” – self centered-ness, self aggrandisement, self adulation, selfishness, being easily offended and so on – is so antithetical to the character of Jesus that it usually comes under the hammer sooner rather than later. These people were living and promoting a gospel of “self” but thought they were more “spiritual” than everyone else

I can caricature their beliefs this way:

True Christianity says:

“I know Jesus loves me because he died for me - This means he is the most wonderful Being and so I will get rid of that old selfish me and live to please him.

They said:

“I know Jesus loves me because he died for me – this means I must be the most wonderful being and so I should go on living to please me”

So close and yet so far apart!

In hindsight, the special aspect of the “mission” God had in mind for me at Vermont was this:
I was to rescue his church and as many people as possible from this false doctrine. Additionally this would have to be done whilst trying to survive and even stave off the collapse of the church which was already in progress due to its pre-existing problems.

In hindsight, this was always going to be a suicide mission!

My Adventures with God: 39: A Leap of Faith

Chapter 39 A Leap of Faith

While I was doing research on the morality of abortion and lamenting the paucity of Anglican moral thinkers a conviction was growing. I began to think that I should go back to university and study moral philosophy and try to plug this gap.

I talked to Sue about it and she supported the idea. By cashing in my superannuation we could fund ourselves for a bit. Sue was able to work some now, and doctors can always find work, so we could feasibly do it and keep the kids at private schools, which was important to us.

I talked to the Philosophy department at Melbourne University and they made encouraging noises. The first step since I had a master’s degree in engineering, not arts, would be a catch-up year – basically taking 150% of a normal undergraduate load. Obviously I would select philosophy and ethics subjects from all year levels. It was starting to sound possible.

Obviously Sue and I both prayed about it because it really was a leap in the dark. We both thought it was what God wanted us to do. So we decided to do it.

I went to see the bishop and told him my plans. Whatever he may have thought, he made positive comments. He said he would appoint a “senior clergyman” to Lang Lang. I thought by this that he realised the importance of what we has achieved there and was assuring me he would find a high calibre replacement. But no. I was mistaken. Subsequent events demonstrated that he meant he saw no future for the parish and would put in a clergyman who was approaching his “use-by date”!

After I left the bishop appointed a half time locum minister who disbanded all the youth ministry because he was not interested in young people, didn’t teach RE in the schools for the same reason, and let our hard won achievements waste away. Despite some sound, if elderly, rectors serving there, in time the parish declined and was amalgamated with a neighbouring one. I seems to me that the Diocese was simply not interested in preaching the Gospel of salvation in Jesus Christ to all people in their area! Of course they said they were, but in reality what they wanted was to continue doing things their way and have God fall into line with their plans and priorities. When God demonstrated - as he did through our efforts – a way he was prepared to back, they would not see.

But back to the story

I sent in my official resignation, which the bishop duly accepted “with regret”.

Now starts the interesting bit. We had still to get the kids into schools and find somewhere to live. We settled on Melbourne Grammar, which is one of the most prestigious schools in Melbourne. When Sue went to see the bursar he laughed and said “You have got to be joking! People put their children’s names down almost before they are born to get into this school! We cannot possibly take your children” He mentioned in passing that as they were an Anglican school they did have special arrangements for children of Anglican priests and that perhaps if the bishop gave a recommendation they could consider us further. Sue rang up the bishop who very kindly wrote to the school. The bursar rang Sue and said “We appear to be taking you children, I do hope they are at least bright!”

One problem solved.

Sue was offered a half time position as a doctor at Bethlehem Hospital in Caulfield. Another problem solved.

Since both the hospital and Melbourne Grammar’s junior school were at Caulfield, this narrowed our search for an area to live in. But we could not find a house. We searched. We called on all the estate agents. We looked at everything that was offering. We felt God was saying “no” to all of them (which was a relief because they were not nice).

We set the move date. We booked a removal team. But we still did not have a house to go to!

Sue, as I said several times is very up-front with God. This time she prayed and gave specifics of what she would like in the house! There were five things she asked God for: A nice house; a house with five bedrooms; a house on a tram line to Melbourne Grammar; it had to be near a park; it should ideally also have a tennis court.

God was incredibly kind and indulgent to us.

We did the rounds of the estate agents yet again – now only two days before our moving date! One said “Oh I have this one which is just on the market. People bought it but could not sell their old house, so the want to rent it out for a year, it is not really a rental property at all.”

The house was a really cute Californian Bungalow with a modern addition on the back so it had all the cuteness factor of an old house with a modern family area and … guess what! Five bedrooms! It was convenient to Bethlehem Hospital where Sue was to work, it was just by the tram line which ran Past the Melbourne Grammar Junior school, and which continued on past the Senior School where our eldest would go, and then on through the city centre to Melbourne University where I was to study! And the beautiful Caulfield park was just a few hundred yards away. It had all the things she asked for except one. Sue had cheekily asked God for a tennis court. No it didn’t have a tennis court. The tennis court which was over the back fence was owned and maintained by the council and could be hired – so I think that counts as even better!

So many times the sheer overflowing magnitude of Gods kindness just swamps me. There we were, we had in Sue's depression and the other attacks of the devil “passed through the valley of the shadow of death” but through God we had survived. We were still together as a family. The kids were going to be in one of the best schools. We were renting this absolutely beautiful house in a lovely garden suburb. God had just been so kind.

So February 1990 we moved to Melbourne for our next adventure with God.