by Charles Bertelsmeier
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Read Ecclesiastes 1:1–11
Although I can remember the names and a little about the lives of my grandparents, I would struggle to tell you the names of all my great-grandparents or anything about their lives.
Then I think about my grandchildren and realise they know virtually nothing about my parents and previous generations. I’m sure we could all agree with the sentiment expressed in today’s verse.
We will spend today and the next four days looking at the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes. Before you open your calendar app and set a reminder to resume reading LCA devotions next Saturday and skip these five days, let me encourage you to persevere. God has put every book of the Bible there for a reason and has a message for us. I pray that God has a message for you in what he gives me to write. You may also like to read the whole book before we proceed with these devotions.
The first verse of this book indicates that the author is King Solomon. God blessed King Solomon to be one of the wisest people in history. He is also believed to be the author of the biblical book Song of Songs and to have collected many proverbs.
In Ecclesiastes, the author conducts a series of scientific experiments to find the meaning of life. In reflecting on this, I think we are all doing the same, but probably not as scientifically as Solomon. As young children, we are absorbed in play. As teenagers, we are trying to discover who we are. As young adults, we seek acceptance through our friendship circles and employment. Then, we aim to perpetuate our identity through our children, moving on to get ourselves financially secure and finally retiring to contemplate what we have achieved with our lives. Maybe we will even write up our life stories to perpetuate our legacies.
Solomon tries a range of activities to find meaning and fulfilment but comes up empty each time. Most of these things are things we also do to try to discover meaning and purpose. Spoiler alert: The conclusion Solomon comes to is that we only find that meaning and purpose through our relationship with God and by surrendering our lives to the plans he has for us.
Most of us, me included, didn’t want to hear that when we were younger and tried looking elsewhere. I thank God he didn’t give up on me and gently led me to accept Solomon’s conclusion.
Heavenly Father, I accept that life without you is meaningless. Please help me to listen to your Spirit as we dive into the Book of Ecclesiastes and to find meaning and purpose in your plans for us. Amen.
Charles is a retired engineer who has worked on communications projects for the air force, army and navy. He lives in a retirement village in the outer north-western suburbs of Sydney with his wife, Diane. Together, they have four children and eight grandchildren, all of whom they love spending time with. Charles keeps busy caring for their pot plants and a community vegetable garden, researching his family history and volunteering at LifeWay Lutheran Church.
Once and for all
by Linda Macqueen
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… he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption (Hebrews 9:12a).
Read Hebrews 9:11–15
Today’s text stands at the centre of a long, careful argument (read all of chapter 9 if you have time): Christ is the High Priest who enters not an earthly sanctuary but the very presence of God, offering not the blood of animals but his own life. He has done something no earthly priest could ever do: he has opened the way into God’s presence once and for all. He has secured eternal redemption.
The original hearers – Jewish Christians – knew the staggering weight of this claim. They had grown up with the temple, the priests, the Day of Atonement, the panicked bleating and bellowing of animals aligned for slaughter, and the stomach-churning smell of blood. They also knew about the heavy curtain in the temple that marked the boundary between God’s holiness and human frailty.
For modern readers, the temple system isn’t part of our cultural memory. We don’t feel the awe of a priest stepping behind the curtain, or the solemnity of sacrifice. But we do know what it is to feel unworthy, distant or unsure of our status before God. We know the inner rituals we perform to try to make ourselves ‘clean enough’ or ‘good enough’ – and even then, sometimes, we are still not sure if it’s been enough.
Into our world, the writer of Hebrews still speaks with astonishing clarity: Christ has already crossed the distance. He has already carried the cost. He has already opened the way to God.
Matthew 27:51 gives us the image that makes this truth unforgettable: ‘The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.’ Not from bottom to top – as if we humans had clawed our way toward God – but from top to bottom, God’s own act of opening the way. The barrier rips apart, once and for all. Access is given, once and for all. The Holy of Holies is no longer a place of fear but a place of loving welcome.
We are safe with God. We are home.
Dear Jesus, my High Priest, thank you that your very own blood opened the way to the Father once and for all. Sometimes, I still feel as though I’m standing outside the curtain, trying to be worthy. Help me to step into the astonishing truth that my access to the Holy of Holies has already been given, and that I stand before my God, redeemed, once and for all. Amen.
Linda Macqueen retired in September last year, having served 26 years as editor of The Lutheran and communications manager for the LCANZ. She has rapidly adapted to retirement, happily and energetically bringing her long-neglected home and garden back to life. She lives in the beautiful Adelaide Hills with her husband Mark.
New clothes
by Linda Macqueen
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Put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness (Ephesians 4:24).
Read Ephesians 4:17–24
Paul’s words in today’s text (addressed to the Ephesians) replay the same melody we heard in yesterday’s text (addressed to the Corinthians). If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation – and now Paul sketches what that new creation looks like in everyday life. He contrasts it with the old patterns of the Gentile world: darkened understanding, hardened hearts, restless desires that never satisfy. These aren’t merely moral failings; they are symptoms of life lived apart from the One who is Life.
But Paul does not say, ‘Try harder to be different.’ He says, ‘You learnt … Christ.’ You were taught to take off the old self and to put on the new – language that sounds remarkably like baptismal clothing. This is not self-improvement; it is participation in Christ’s own life. The new humanity is something God has already begun in us.
We don’t wake up each morning needing to earn God’s favour by being good. We wake up already claimed, already beloved, already joined to Christ. And because we belong to him, his life begins to reshape ours – often quietly, often gradually. It’s like a slow, steady ripening, a growing up day by day into maturity.
In Ephesians 4, Paul’s long list of examples of Christian living is not a checklist for righteousness but a description of what Christ’s life looks like when it takes root in ordinary people: truthfulness, gentleness, forgiveness, generosity and patience. These are not conditions for salvation; they are the fruit of it.
After dwelling on all this, I’m thinking about our neighbour Warren again, and his ‘What’s new?’ question every Thursday night. Maybe I should pay more attention to that question. Maybe I should ask myself that question every day of my new life in Christ. What’s new today, Linda? What did you and the Holy Spirit drown together yesterday so that something new, something that looks like Jesus, can take root and grow?
Dear Heavenly Father, take me again into the waters of my baptism. Let my old self be drowned. Let Christ clothe me again in my new life. Help me to stay alert to how your Holy Spirit is forming me into the very life of Jesus. Amen.
Linda Macqueen retired in September last year, having served 26 years as editor of The Lutheran and communications manager for the LCANZ. She has rapidly adapted to retirement, happily and energetically bringing her long-neglected home and garden back to life. She lives in the beautiful Adelaide Hills with her husband Mark.
What’s new?
by Linda Macqueen
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: the old has gone, the new is here! (2 Corinthians 5:17)
Read 2 Corinthians 5:16–21
- Every Thursday night, our neighbour Warren pops over for a coffee and a chat. Invariably, as he drops a Coles cake on the kitchen bench, he’ll ask, ‘What’s new?’ Rarely do my husband Mark and I have anything to offer. ‘Nothing much,’ we mutter. ‘Same old, same old.’ (Which, in truth, is exactly how we like it, now that we’ve retired.)
In today’s text, Paul is not asking the fledgling Christians in Corinth, ‘What’s new?’ He’s declaring, ‘You are new.’ For them, being a ‘new creation’ was a radical reorientation against the background noise of a pagan city. It meant stepping out of a world built on social status, rivalry and self‑promotion, and into a community where identity rested in Christ’s reconciling and all-embracing love. This was a seismic shift in thinking and living. This was a ‘born again’ sort of new.
By comparison, for lifelong Christians today, the drama of our ‘new creation’ can feel muted – boring, even. Some of us don’t have a compelling ‘coming to Christ’ testimony, or a life of two distinct chapters: before and after Jesus. Yet baptism tells us that our new creation is not measured by the intensity of our conversion story but by the daily rhythm of dying and rising with Christ. Martin Luther captured this beautifully: baptism is not only a past event but also a present, ongoing reality, binding us inseparably to Christ’s death and resurrection. Each day, the old self is drowned, and each day Christ raises us into his life.
Our ‘new creation’ experience probably looks more like a slow, faithful reshaping: a softening heart, a deeper compassion, a willingness to forgive, a readiness to serve without being noticed. But the source of this new creation is the same for us today as it was for the Corinthians. Christ’s love compels us, draws us, remakes us – again and again – until his life becomes our life.
Father God, you have declared that I am a new creation in Christ. I can’t argue with that, even though I don’t always feel new. Forgive me for dragging into my new life some things that belonged to my old life. Please drown these things and raise me up once again to live into the new creation you have made me. Amen.
Linda Macqueen retired in September last year, having served 26 years as editor of The Lutheran and communications manager for the LCANZ. She has rapidly adapted to retirement, happily and energetically bringing her long-neglected home and garden back to life. She lives in the beautiful Adelaide Hills with her husband Mark.