I have decided to look at the Book of Ephesians on Mondays in the year 2026. I have traveled to the ancient site of Ephesus six times. The archaeologists are uncovering things there all the time. I was on six tours with Tom Yoder Neufeld, a retired New Testament scholar from Conrad Gregel. One of his areas of study was Ephesians. I have gathered much from him over the many years when we traveled there together. For a thousand years, the letter was thought to have been written by the great Apostle Paul. But recent findings and research has given another opinion. The earliest copies of the letter do not have Paul’s name in the first verses. In Greek ( The New Testament was written in Greek ), its grammar and words are not in the same order. The issues of community, theology and salvation are similar. It doesn’t really matter because the church agreed ( around 370 AD )that it should be part of the New Testament along with the other letters of Paul.
Paul,
an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,
To God’s holy people in Ephesus,
the faithful in Christ Jesus:
Grace and peace to you
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Ephesians 2:1-2
The beginning is like a form letter. Paul began many of his letters like this. He is writing to one of the first Christian communities in the world. He was the great church planter, almost always going to the synagogue in the city to offer them life in the Lord Jesus Christ. We do not know how big the church community was in Ephesus. Ephesus was on the edge of the Empire. It was a large outpost city. They had a large theatre, with an athletic stadium and the great Temple to Athena. It was one of the great wonders of the ancient world. Only one column remains from the Temple. The Romans were interested in the mind, body and soul. The city has many statues to the Gods, and three of four markets for the people to shop.
If you were Paul, how would you go about talking about Jesus ?
Continue to pray for Gaza. People are still hungry and without adequate housing. AMEN
I was born in St. Catharines, Ontario, the sixth child of David and Annie Redekop. The house was just off the downtown, and I think it was a poor street and area of the city. I was hospitalized with rheumatic fever before 1965. I am not sure of the year, but I remember my parents visiting me in hospital. Also sometime before 1965, my father had an accident with his milk truck. He broke some ribs and was off work for months. On Christmas Eve, Santa came to our house bearing gifts. There was a gift for everyone in the house, and I remember the canned goods rattling against each other. That sound has stayed with me. I do not know who told someone about our family… the church, the dairy or social services, but I believe in Santa Claus because of this event.
363 Simcoe Street. Niagara-on-the-Lake
We moved here in the summer of 1965. The house was old, and it had survived the War of 1812, The US burned most of the town, after the British had burned down the White House. It was called the Creen House, and was one of three houses designed by the same architect in a square block in Niagara-on-the-Lake. My dad bought it for 9,000 dollars. He sold it in 1968 for 17,000 and change. After we sold it the new owners stripped it down to the chimneys and the frame, and rebuilt it. The last time it was on the market it was for the asking price of over 2 million. I started second grade when we moved, and we attended Parliament Oak public school. I met Mark Graham here, and he became my best friend.
220 Mary Street. NOTL ( Two and half blocks from Simcoe Street )
This was a much smaller house. All eight of the children were still at home. My brother John and I slept in the TV room, just off the kitchen. There didn’t seem anything abnormal about it. Before my parents moved into St.Catharines, all of us had left the house, moving to other places and going to school. I graduated from Parliament Oak and Niagara District Secondary School. Trent University, Peterborough I attended Trent from 1977-1980. I had grown up in a conservative household and church, so it was a big move. At the time, Trent was considered the most gay friendly university in Canada. I lived in residence at Lady Eaton College for three years. I majored in English and History, and I considered myself an average student. I participated in student government and played on the university basketball team. I really enjoyed my time there, and I made major steps in thinking for myself.
Ferme Liehouse, Biederthal FRANCE
I signed up for the MCC InterMenno program in January 1980. We were to live with European Mennonite families for a year. I was accepted, and went to the orientation time in Akron. PA. This is where I first met Shirley Stauffer. We flew Icelandair to Luxembourg, my first airplane ride. My first placement was with the Goldschmidt family in Alsace, France. They lived on a farm, where they raised beef cattle and hogs. The couple I lived with were Pierre and Mary-Jane and his parents lived upstairs. At that time they had two girls. They would have a boy a few months after I left. The family still lives in this 500 year old house.
Altersheim Weyergut. Bern, Switzerland
In the second six months of the program, I worked and lived at a seniors’ home. I was a custodian there. The directors, the Andenmattens, of the place had lived in the US under the same program, in Oklahoma. I explored the city of Bern in my time off, and went with the train all over Switzerland.
AMBS 3003 Benham Avenue, Elkhart Indiana, USA
After I returned to North America, I started my Seminary education at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminaries, Since grade 4, I thought I wanted to be a minister. My first courses were challenging, and it was not what I thought preparation to be a minister would be like. I had assumed the Bible was dropped out of heaven for the church. I learned that it was written by real people, in real time, and about real issues. It was a human book with divine realities and teachings. One experience sits with me today. I asked a question about a theological issue, and the theology professor said, ” if you had asked that question in the Reformation you would have been killed.” No other comment. I was devastated.
Box, 9 Phanat Nikhom, THAILAND ( two different houses )
Shirley and I got engaged in April 1982, and married in July. After I did an internship at my home church in Virgil, Ontario in the summer, we left for a three year assignment serving with MCC in Thailand. We listened to the suffering and pain of thousands of refugees from Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. The camp was surrounded by barbed wire, and the refugees were not allowed to leave, unless they got accepted by a Western country to resettle there. It was a difficult experience for us, but our understandings of the world and faith were helped by everything we saw and heard. Our oldest, Lucas was born in Bangkok in June 1984.
AMBS 3003 Benham Avenue
We returned from Thailand in October 1985, and I began my studies again at AMBS. I was more settled there in my faith and life. We left there in May 1987 to take a position as a pastor in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Our second, Jared, was born while we were there, in Goshen Indiana in May 1986.
443 Hawthorne Drive, Lancaster PA, USA
I started as pastor of Bethel Mennonite Church in July 1987, and served there for four years. I did not know anything about the traditions of the church there, and so I learned a lot. I preached almost every Sunday. I was helped by the former pastor, Paul Wikerd, and my cousin, Judith Rempel Smucker, who were members at the church. At some point, we decided that we wanted to raise our children in Ontario, so made application in early 1991. Our two youngest, Hannah and Caleb, were born at home in February 1989 and July 1991. We had the help of a midwife, Rosena Howard. I accepted a call to be pastor of Floradale Mennonite in August 1991.
27 Main St ( or 2356 Floradale Road ) Floradale, Ontario
I stayed 25 years. We were fortunate to be able to raise our children in such a stable environment. I accepted five five year covenants with the church. They offered me three sabbaticals, 1996, 2003 and 2011. They were generous with time and money. In 2007, I suffered a heart attack, but returned in April 2008, and served eight more years, finishing 2016. There are thousands of other stories to tell from 1991-2026. Till later.
4 Ernst St. Elmira , Ontario
We moved here in 2015. I took a job with MCC telling the MCC story on Sunday mornings, and to community groups. I worked there from 2016-2020. In 2017, Poole Mennonite asked me to come on as interim supply for six months, and then in 2019 I returned half-time. In March 2020, the Sunday that the pandemic hit, I started full-time. I served there until March 2025. I retired then.As you might think or imagine, there is more to my story. I could shape it with anxiety attacks, worry, health challenges, my marriage, my children, my faith or the over forty years of wilderness, cheering for the Maple Leafs and Cleveland Browns. Sorry for the length, Any questions or comments ?
Fred
black and white shadows
crush humanity’s freedom
am I complicit ? MPL 2025
8
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Sunday October 25, 2025
Good morning,
Here is one more plug for our Camino Tour. Please consider it. Send the link to others who you might think are interested.
As of today, I will be taking a time away from Ponder Anew writing. It might be the First Sunday of Advent. November 30, 2025 when I will return to the blog.
Thank you for listening and responding to my ponderings. It has been a privilege to write. I began a month after my heart attack in January 2008. It started as a weekly update on my health but it morphed into a devotional on Jesus through the eyes of creation, politics, sports, weather or anything. I wrote weekly until March 2020, but then COVID hit. Since then I have written most days, at first to the Poole Church and then following my retirement , to the wide open spaces of the universe.
Thanks again for listening . I will see you in the future through my words.
Be blessed by God, so you are a blessing to others. Love conquers all.
Prayers
Dear God,
Guard all of these people with your love and compassion.
Keep them safe and in your will.
Keep them watching , listening and caring.
Thank you for their friendship.
Lia nd Dirk
Rick and Nancy
Bernie and Martha Susan and James
Barb and Roy
Eileen and Willis
Dale and Sharon
Wendy and Rob
Shirley and Fred
Rick and Donna
Wanda
Steve and Donna
Pearl
Marcia and Akii
Agnes
Lucas, Alison, Levi, Emmett,Jared, Hannah, Alaa and Caleb
Susan and Ed
Johane
Maria and Alf
Linda and Art
Monika
Esther
Doug
Mike and Carolyn
Brendan
Judith
Mark and Rachel
AMEN
Please, bring peace to Gaza and the world AMEN.
Fred
Lines of life in a cabbage.
October 23,
Good afternoon/evening/morning,
We may word things differently, but this perpetual search to know the unknowable is a familiar feeling for many contemplatives. We have an almost ravenous hunger, or some might say a palpable thirst, or a seemingly aimless dull ache that thrums through us. The ache reminds us we are in touch with the suffering of the whole world. All contemplatives, no matter their religion or spirituality, seem to have this in common, and recognizing this makes me feel less alone.
The contemplative life is not a way of knowing. It is not the path of certitude. In fact, that’s what makes it so alive, so necessarily active. Our glimpses of “arrival” along the way are places we can catch our breath and recall we are moving in the right direction, even if it’s only because it’s exactly where we are. Those times, we remember that the way is not meant to be easy, simple, or comfortable. But these moments only last for a flash in the midst of life because, as the Rev. Dr. Walter Fluker reminds us, “Life will keep going because life itself is alive.” … from Richard Rohr’s website
I think this describes me. And I am now okay with it ? Believe in the grace of the great Counselor.
I will never arrive at the destination of total communion with the Great One, the Everlasting One, the Holy One, here on earth.
Jesus said that the Kingdom of God has arrived, in his first sermon in his home synagogue in Nazareth. But I have rarely seen it. Am I only faithful a little bit in my life? I do not think so.
I think this means that I am human, and I am on the way to the Spirit of God. I just do not arrive today or next week.
Unfortunately . I have to wait for my death to become a new sense of the Divine. Not quite yet, though.
God, help us to bring peace to Gaza, with children, parents, grandpas, moms, single women, singers whales and trees. AMEN
I wrote a few months ago that I do not believe I have any or very few new ideas. I say things in a different way in my blogs or my sermons.I don’t know where my thoughts or ideas or beliefs have evolved from. But, I know they have come from others, maybe even the readers of my blog. Many of my thoughts come directly or indirectly from Jesus of Nazareth. But I get other ideas that come from many different sources. I subscribe to a ‘ substack ‘ ( a new word for blogs ) from Kristin Du Mez. She is a church historian from Calvin University in Michigan. She is fearful that she will get fired as her interpretations go up against the Trump Empire, and evangelical Chrsitians. I am afraid for her safety. In this week’s blog she quotes her pastor’s( Len Vander Zee ) sermon. The pastor in his sermon quotes from a book by Deb Rienstra. Here is his quote from the book:
” This week I read Deb Rienstra’s wonderful book “Refugia Faith.” In the book she gives us a wonderful analogy of what we are called to be in this time of climate crisis. In 1980 Mt St. Hellens blew its top, leaving a swath of utter devastation. Today if you go there you will find a lush mountainside or flowers, grasses, growing trees, and all kinds of critters.
How did this happen? There were pockets of life and seed and fungi hidden in the mountainside. And the volcano ripped them open, and eventually spilled their life into the rich volcanic soil. Scientists call these pockets of life refugia.
Deb suggests that this is a good model of the church. A small, often hidden and overlooked community rich with God’s life and a different story to tell the world.
“They[ the early church ] served Christ as Lord and King, and refused to give that status and authority to any earthly emperor, and they paid for it. They practiced the radical hospitality of Christ’s kingdom, welcoming slaves to share the table with their owners, and in a few years, calling the owners to free them. Calling people to share the wealth rather than horde it. Picking up thrown away babies, mostly unwanted girls, and taking them into their homes. They said a clear no to any kind of violence.”
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. I John 4:7-9
My faith, ideas, thoughts come from everywhere in creation and beyond. The threads are there.
Hoping that the ceasefire will hold, and a peace might come to Gaza and the West Bank. AMEN
As a Mennonite, you might have celebrated Communion this past weekend. For most of Mennonite history we celebrated the Lord’s Supper twice a year, Good Friday and around early October. World Communion Sunday is the first Sunday in October. As we understand, the Catholic Church celebrated the Mass everyday. Two very different understandings of the bread and the cup. The early church celebrated the Supper every time they ate together ( according to Acts ). After the early baptisms in Zurich in 1525, the Anabaptists were having communion all the time. In John 15, returning to the last meal, Jesus describes who he is. He says, ” I am the true vine “. This is the final of seven ‘ I am ‘ statements that Jesus calls himself as recorded by John. For John, these are words that define who Jesus is. He states, ‘ I am the bread of life… I am the light of the world … I am the door of the sheep… I am the good shepherd… I am the resurrection and life… I am the way the truth and the life… ‘. John’s Gospel is framed around these ‘ I am ” statements. The other Gospel writers do not shape the life of Jesus this way. This is connected to the God of the Old Testament. When Moses sees the burning bush, God says, ” I am who I am “. I think, believe, that Jesus is connecting to God in this way.This wraps up this teaching here at the dinner table. I wonder who told the writer that Jesus said all these things ?
As you probably know, I am not a literalist in my understanding of the Bible. I think we are always interpreting the word of God for our lives as a group of believers. I am a volunteer interpretative guide at The Mennonite Story, and I am telling the people who come to the cabin/museum that one of the beliefs that Mennonites broke with the Catholic church was about the bread and the cup. Catholics believe that the bread and cup turn into the flesh and blood of Jesus during the Mass. Mennonites thought that was not right. But in John 6:
Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. ( verses 53-56 )
Most churches celebrate the last meal that Jesus has with his friends. Catholics can have bread and cup everyday. Most Mennonites do the meal twice or three times a year. The Quakers remember, but do not do the drinking and eating of the meal. How important is taking the bread and cup for your faith ? What happens to you when you take the sip and eat a small piece of bread ? Catholics believe that the cup becomes the actual blood of our Lord, and then the bread is transformed into the actual flesh of Jesus. There is great mystery in this, and by taking the communion elements the grace of God comes down upon you and in you. Mennonites are supposed to be in the right relationship with our sister and brothers before we can come to the table. John in his Gospel does not say that.
At the end of chapter 14 of the last meal, Jesus continues to confuse his friends. He is going away, but he will come back. I wonder if there was a harsh argument here with Peter, John and James and the others. ” Jesus, you said that you have brought the Kingdom of God to the world, and now you are saying you are going to leave… but then come back. ” ( and by the way, from a present-day disciple, you have not come back ). Teh Gospel does say that the disciples soemtimes get frustrated with Jesus,a nd that is just fine for a faithful person to say such a thing. Jesus tells them he will not leave them alone . He will give them the ‘ Holy Spirit ‘. It is not a flesh and blood person, but a nebulous being that floats around the new community that is left without its leader. The Spirit is hard to describe. How does the Spirit play a role in your life ? Have you ever seen the Spirit move around, when you have not been able to hold it. ?
” I have told you now before it happens,
so that when it does happen you will believe.
I will not say much more to you, for the prince of this world is coming.
He has no hold over me,
but he comes so that the world may learn that I love the Father and do exactly what my Father has commanded me. ” John 14:29-31
The Holy Spirit will help us in this world where the prince of this world is winning ? Oh no !!
A few months ago I picked the footwashing scene from the Gospel of John as my text going forward in my life. It is such an intimate event for Jesus and his disciples. but then there’s a problem. Peter does not want to have Jesus wash his feet. It upsets the fine evening. The dinner has all kinds of tension in it. Jesus wants to teach them humility with this act of service, but I am not sure it works.
As the evening continues in John 13:18-30 , Jesus says that someone in the room is the betrayer. This must have been a shock to the group except for Judas. He says it is not all of them in the room. Peter asks another disciple to ask Jesus who it is ? Jesus says it is the one whom I give the bread dipped in the wine. But there seems to be confusion about what it happening in the room. Judas was the treasurer of the group, so some thought Jesus was telling him to go buy the food for the evening.
“But no one at the meal understood why Jesus said this to him. Since Judas had charge of the money, some thought Jesus was telling him to buy what was needed for the festival, or to give something to the poor. As soon as Judas had taken the bread, he went out. And it was night.” verses 28-30
Often I am like the disciples and am unclear what is going on in the church and in life. How can Israel continue to kill children, and the world community cannot stop them ? How can the war in Ukraine continue on the same pieces of land for so many years ? How can we ( and I am very guilty here ) continue to fly places knowing that fossil fuels make more pollution ? Are we stuck, or hope that someone else will fix the problems of war and climate. ? We must continue to advocate for change. It is our task.
The disciples did not always perceive Jesus’ teaching. Here at the beginning of the supper, they are fighting, and one of their own is now accused of conspiring to kill their saviour, their teacher and their rabbi. What next ?? Praying for all the leaders of all nations to work for a better peace . AMEN
My friend has dementia. It is not rare, and probably all of you know someone, or have a family member who has the disease. My father-in-law suffered from it for seven years. We lost a part of him every day. Every time we saw him he was always a little worse. I am not the only person who is asking the unanswerable questions about disease, life and death.
But, of course, it is personal this time, as well at other times too. My friend is in the hospital now. I sat with him for a few hours last evening. There is nothing to say, or I cannot find anything meaningful to say. Maybe if I could sing 1970’s rock and roll music that would be good. But my friend is not in the room anymore. He is there physically, but where has his mind gone ? He looked into my eyes, I think, and nothing came out of his mouth. When the words came they were mumbled and so quiet. How should I pray ? I had hours to think about it. With disease, we can pray, ” Dear Lord, please take my loved one, or heal them now .” I know prayer does not work this way, but I would like this to come about. With disease, we are often at a loss of what to do. We do not like to see someone who is hurting and/or in pain. I do not like to see my friend, and his family, suffering. Vietnamese culture says that ‘ life is hard, there will be suffering ‘ . Our culture, I think, believes that suffering should not happen to us. and if it does, there should be some treatment to fix it today or at least tomorrow. Two very different cultural attitudes towards life and suffering. So, how do you react to the role of suffering in the human condition ? Is there an answer at all ?
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me,
so far from my cries of anguish? Psalm 22:1 ( Jesus said these words on the crosss as well. )
I am not good with administration. We delayed receiving our CPP and OAS until this year. This is fine, but when I did get to it, it took a long time because forms stress me out. You could do it on-line, but that was a mess for me. So, I went to the office on Frederick Street, and I found out that they moved it to the south end of Kitchener, near the 401 highway. I went into the office, and they said I needed our marriage certificate. The form did not say I needed it for OAS or CPP. I went back three more times, and although the Service Canada employees were polite, they all said slightly different things. Finally, for the fourth time I went last week to bring the final documents. Now I will wait for the secondary persons to tell me what I did not give to them on the forms. Fortunately, we will get money back retroactive to when we applied, I think.
Last week, I sat down in the waiting area ( for the last time ? ) to wait for the Service Canada representative to call my name. A man sits down next to me, and says ” I am a miracle “. Last week I was in tremendous pain, and I could not do anything. It was going on for six months. The doc finally diagnosed me with polymyalgia (?) , and three days ago I started meds, and it is a miracle. Look at me . ” . He stood up, and raised his arms above his head, and he jumped up and down. He couldn’t do it three days ago. ” It is a miracle, ” he said over and over again. I asked him if there were any side effects. He began laughing and could hardly get the words out, ” The doctor said I will have, ‘ chronic happiness , no, no, manic happiness’. Can you believe it ? He kept laughing and smiling. ” Manic happiness “. Wow eh !! My number was called, and I gave the man a fist bump, and I left him smiling. When I came out, he was gone. I think I was visited by an angel.
As Jesus and his disciples were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed him. Two blind men were sitting by the roadside, and when they heard that Jesus was going by, they shouted, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”
The crowd rebuked them and told them to be quiet, but they shouted all the louder, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”
Jesus stopped and called them. “What do you want me to do for you?” he asked.
“Lord,” they answered, “we want our sight.”
Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.
Ponder Anew 