” Dad! Dad!” It was the voice of my daughter calling me as she ran toward my office. My wife was just back from the photo shop and I knew Kerryn wanted to show me the developed pictures she had taken some time ago.

“Look Dad, look!” she said as we looked through the pictures together.

“Can I keep this picture?” I asked her.

“Of Course,” was the quick reply . It was a picture of “Tane Mahuta” and I had actually forgotten about the trip when the picture was taken.

In front of my writing table is a map of the northern part of Northland. Between Waimamaku and Katui on the east side of the map is the Waipoua State Forest. When com ing from Opononi in the north, driving south through Waimamaku, one enters the forest and right at the beginning of the forest can be seen in big letters on the map “BIG TREE”. The big tree is “Tane Mahuta”, a giant Kauri tree. The Kauri is a native conifer or cone-bearing tree, and oozes a valuable resin-kauri gum.

“Tane Mahuta” is the Maori name for this big tree and its meaning is “Lord of the Forest.”It is the largest tree in the Waipoua Forest and is estimated to be 1200 years old. It is 51 metres high, and has a girth of 14 metres at the height of 4,5 metres from the ground. Its trunk is clear of all lateral branches for 12 metres.

I had heard that sometimes with these giant trees the inside can be rotten. This was confirmed from information I found at the local library.

When I was reading about the rottenness of the inside of some of these trees I was reminded of some people who call themselves Christians. These are people with a good outside appearance and other people are often quite impressed with them because they appear to be the real thing.

But God knows what we are like on the inside and he is not impressed with a seemingly good outside appearance. The Bible, the Word of God, says in Romans 3:12,” All have turned away. They have together become worthless”. And in Romans 3:23 it says,” For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

The Bible says that there must be a complete change from within. Our Lord Jesus Christ said to Nicodemus in the Gospel of John,” You must be born again”. Although he was religious this man still needed to own up to his sinfulness and accept the Lord Jesus as his personal Saviour. The Bible also says in Second Corinthians 5:17.” Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone , the NEW has come”!

Do you know that you are born again? Do you know that you are a new creation in Christ? We can know. The Bible says so. You need to make sure of this while you still have the opportunity of doing so.

wd

I don’t know what kind of news you have heard today over the radio or read in the papers or seen on TV. Maybe you heard again about earthquakes, accidents on the road, cyclones, floods, hijackings, train accidents, corrupt governments , and so on. One catastrophe has not finished before we are hearing of another one.

Not long ago I saw printed on a paper shopping bag,”Global Village”. And that’s what we are. Things are happening anywhere in the global village and we not only hear about them, but we can see them happening at the same time. Our modern news technology is fantastc.

In times like these when one catastrophic thing is chasing another, we need something to hold on to. One of the best- known news reporters in our country has expressed our situation so vividly in his autobiography he wrote some time ago. I am quoting from page 295, “Sometimes I felt a floated like flotsam on the reeling sea with no one to keep me grounded.” I think that is actually true of the bulk of humanity.

“In times like these you need an anchor,” says the songwriter in an old English church hymn we used to sing long ago. Do you remember the hymn?

We do read about THE ANCHOR in the Bible , the word of God. It says in Hebrews 6,17-20 ,” God also bound himself with an oath, so that those who received the promise could be perfectly sure that he would never change his mind. So God has given both his promise and his oath. These two things are unchangable because it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we who have fled to him for refuge can have great confidence as we hold to the hope that lies before us. This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain into God’s inner sanctuary. Jesus has already gone in there before us. He has become our eternal High Priest in the order if Melchizedek.”

This is the great encouragement and anchor that believers in the Lord Jesus Christ have. He went before us into Heaven into the presence of God. We cannot see him, but He is our HOPE and the ANCHOR for our souls. In the storms of life He is keeping us safe and taking us to our eternal destination.

DO you have this hope today as an ANCHOR for your soul?

wd

This is rather a long word for someone who is learning the Maori language. Maybe it is also difficult to translate, because it is so long. But it means literally “a standing place for the feet”. We are all glad when our feet are standing on something that is firm and not slippery like ice.

Let us think about our basic emotions. One of our basic emotions is that we are longing for a place on which to put out feet. We all want a spot beyond question to call our own. And this word “Turangawaewae” refers to this place.

A place or a spot has to do with geography, but the word “Turangawaewae” means much more than just a geographic location. When we hear this word we know straight away that it is connected with land and land ownership, like the word “take” pronounced “tuck-air” which, in this case means title or ownership.

But now we want to think about this word “Turangawaewae- “a standing place for the feet”. I remember that somebody once said,”Give me a firm place to stand on and I can move the world.”

Where do we find the real firm place for our feet? The firmest place, the real foundation is talked about in the Bible, the Word of God. In the part that is called the New Testament, in one of the letters to the Christians in Corinth, the Apostle Paul said, “For no-one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid which is Jesus Christ” (First Corinthians 3:11)

The Lord Jesus is not one foundation among many; He is the ONLY foundation. Are you standing on this foundation? If you are trusting Him as your Lord and Saviour, then you are!