I wonder how many times you have heard these words? How many times you have heard sermons on them? They certainly are favourites for preachers. How many fairs you have been to? or working bees? or weddings? or baptisms? - or funerals? How many times you have been to church? How many times you have been through this whole process of Lent, with Lenten studies etc, etc?

You see there is nothing wrong with any of these things, but we can be trapped into them by repetition - by the very fact that we are so familiar with them. We can become very good at doing the church things, but at the same time, become disconnected with God.

Our problems as a church; as a diocese, stem I believe, from the fact that we have become better and better at doing the church things, and less and less connected with God.

This is no more strongly demonstrated than in the public brawl that surrounded the Illawarra church recently. In the quest to become an efficient organisation, the decision was made to close or keep open churches based on some fair and equitable criteria. All churches had to reach a certain performance standard or else they would be closed. This sounds fair and reasonable. We all want to know that we are efficiently using God's gifts. That we are not wasting the resources that God provides. That is, until you ask the question who is setting the performance standard? Or more to the point what is the performance standard measuring?

To take the quantitative view of the church is the most dangerous thing that we can do. To develop a bottom's on seats mentality, places the emphasis on the action - of gathering - and the correct course is to run the church on the basis of attracting people. I am sure that if we gave away free money, we could improve our attendance, but would it improve our church?

Being God's people is not about this at all.

When Jesus said that discipleship meant to take up a cross and deny yourself, and follow him, he was not just stringing up a nice slogan, but rather laying down the pattern of expectation. It was Peter who was looking for the soft option. What Jesus was asking was hard and these things are all personal qualities. Although I will often talk of the church in collective terms, there is nevertheless the personal or individual responsibility as well. Your faith and mine as individuals is what is important, and not some sort of global average. Unless there is the reality of a personal relationship with Jesus in your own life, then there is nothing that is of any benefit in our corporate life. As individuals we are challenged to love God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength and to love our neighbours as ourselves. There is the inference of a personal responsibility here.

Our collectiveness is about working these things out together. You know the way to prevent sibling rivalry? ………..Have only one child.

It is the same with faith. It is in the pressures of living and working together that our faith will be tested and strengthened. In addition, we can teach and strengthen each other in this way. As we observe the faith of others at close quarters, then we can be challenged to grow in our own faith. So our corporate nature is about mutual growth and support and even the difficult people are God's gifts to us to help us stretch our faith.

So how will we measure our church? Will we count the people? Or will we draw close enough to each other to know one another and the strength of our individual faith? Close enough to see one another taking up our own crosses, denying ourselves and following Jesus.

In our first reading, Abram was ninety-nine years old and God appeared to him a third time and told him that he was to be the Father of a Nation. So sure was God that he changed his name from Father of one (Abram) to Abraham which means Father of many. And this would happen through Sarah (age of ninety).

And why do we remember this? Because in faith Abraham acted. Faith is the key to all we do. Faith is what makes us different to the Football club and to Rotary. Faith is our very currency. We may run out of money and this would be a problem, but if we run out of faith, we will need to close for there is no point in continuing. So then our success or failure as a church is in our own individual hands. It is to be measured by our faith not our works.

Perhaps it is the long way to get to this, but it will be faith that will keep the flame alive. Our Lenten observance and indeed all that is part of our Christian life comes down to this. So

• let us engage in this our calling.
• Let us expect that God will be active in our lives and our community of faith.
• Let us avoid the dangers of complacency and the feeling that we have done this all before.
• Let us expect God to engage us in our daily life and look for him in everything that we are doing.

Together, we must expect to grow and develop, and to see God in action. Together, the future is ours if we have faith. Our challenge is to trust God and like Abraham leave the rest up to him. This will not be easy for you or I, but if we work together it will happen,

As we continue on our journey towards Easter, may God strengthen our faith and fulfil our hopes.

AMEN.