Scotch College

We are sailing

The first books I remember loving were 'Little Golden Books'. The Taxi that Hurried and Tootle the Train. They were part of my early travel reading and bring back memories of railway stations, particularly of the enclosed kind. Queen St. and Glasgow Central, Princes Street, King's Cross,

St Pancras. But the great journeys of my childhood were on ships. Weeks at sea with the sun beating down, the wake straight to infinity and the ocean to the horizon with the rhythmic throb of huge engines somewhere deep below. The names of the ships still enchant me: the Akaroa, the Monowai, the Largs Bay. When I stepped from the P&O Liner Otranto onto Station Pier in 1955, I was a seasoned traveller.

By contrast the Bayswater Primary School grade five trip to Yallourn was miniscule. In fact, however, it managed to be quite exciting. There was the build up in class, learning about brown coal and the SEC. In the main street there was the excitement of the Mother's Club stall to raise the money for the bus. Of course, the trip meant a whole day out of school. You can learn lots, even on a little trip. The next year I went with my Grade 6 class to the Olympic Games. We saw Betty Cuthbert win the 100 metres at the MCG. It was a gold medal for Australia. Even a short trip can be memorable and profoundly formative. The next time I went to the MCG I heard Billy Graham, I remember that too. My next ocean voyage was on the Orsova. By then I was reading the Bible.

Jesus only made short trips. Israel is a small country. You can drive across it in your lunch-hour. Jesus' big trip was the journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. The temple there was the centre of Jewish life, social and commercial as well as religious. Jews as far away as Alexandria and Babylon paid a 'temple tax' to have a share in the temple worship. The temple's empty inner room was 'home' to the unseen eternal One who had formed Israel. The temple routines were all about Israel's creation, liberation and her unique place as God's serving people. As a boy Jesus called the temple 'my father's house' (Luke 2:49). To be with God was to be 'home'.

There is a sense of destiny in the way Luke presents Jesus' final journey to Jerusalem (9:52, 17:11, 18:31, 19:11). After Jesus arrived there was a showdown at the temple (Luke 19:45) which precipitated the final solution. He was executed outside the city. However, journey's end proved to be the beginning. After Passover came Easter. A new and transforming message echoed from the holy city.

The message of God's reconciling grace and friendship radiated from Jerusalem like ripples in a pond. From the very temple, God's place, journeying people carried the message to surrounding Judah, Samaria and 'the ends of the earth' (Acts 1:8). This transforming message penetrated the imperial capital. God's love reaches to Gentile as well as Jew. In Christ Jesus they were one, there is no distinction. This love can reach into all our stories. Jesus' journey has the power to transform all our journeys. Recently I revisited Station Pier. On the newly erected monument at the end of the pier are inscribed the names of the ships on which countless travellers journeyed to Australia. We have found a home here. Yet, in a way, we still travel that other kind of journey. It is God's grace that has the power to bring us home. I think this is the yearning that Rod Stewart sings about 'I am sailing.. I am flying... Can you hear me...' Oh, Lord to be with you to be free...