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Record Live is a conversation about life, spirituality and following Jesus in the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
The Bunnings church mentality_ with Dr Brendan Pratt
Jarrod Stackelroth: [00:00:00] Zita, can you believe that? It is December already. The year has just flown by and I can't believe we're sitting here having a conversation on record live, and it's December. We are very privileged today to have, , a special guest, Dr. Brendan Pratt, the Australian Union Conference President, fairly newly elected, so I guess he's still getting used to that role.
And Brendan, we are very happy to have you today.
Brendan Pratt: It's a pleasure. Thank you for inviting me
Jarrod Stackelroth: now. Before we get into the meat of today's topic, 'cause we are leading up to Christmas, it is a time of materialism, of consumerism and you have quite an interest and even some research and some study in this area.
So we're very excited to talk to you about that today. I just be curious to know, as the new president at a UC, how you've been settling into the job. How are you tracking, getting your head around everything? , I imagine it's quite different to what you were doing before. , How [00:01:00] you, how are you going?
Yeah,
Brendan Pratt: no, thanks for asking Jared. Yes, it is different. , My previous job was working largely, , with the post-Christian Center at the gc. , And that was its own challenges, working on areas of consumerism and what that means for churches and what that means for culture. But. What is the same is my last job was all about how to create Christian community, and what I am passionate about is what does community look like in Australia in an increasingly isolated culture?
What's that community look like? What's it look like if our whole system refocus its mission? Around being a non-anxious community in an anxious culture. And so, so I get to have those conversations. Yeah, new job, new challenges, sessions. Interesting. We had what, three sessions in a row during September, the appointments committees, and that's its own interesting thing.
, But we've got a wonderful bunch of leaders in Australia working with the conference presidents and, , working with each of our conferences on what it looks like for them to go about mission refocus and looking what it looks like across Australia. To embrace Mission Refocus. . Getting the [00:02:00] heart of, we had our church next conference where we talked about the fact 84% of Australians don't connect with the faith community.
That's its own challenge. And so we've been having lots of conversations about what's it look like if we get some of that right. What's it look like for an outward focus with Australia for Christ? Coming up in 2028, we had our year end meetings last week with president's council executive, so lots of first offs.
Jaron Zita. Lots of firsts. , So, so jumping lots of new hurdles, learning lots, lots of new things. But , yeah, we've got wonderful leaders across Australia. I get to work with some wonderful, wonderful people.
Zanita Fletcher: Hmm. That's awesome. Now, today we are, like Jared said, talking about, , consumerism, which being Christmas is a very, , relevant kind of topic.
But this actually came up in terms of like having you on, because you wrote, , an article for , a new youth magazine that is coming out. I don't know if it's been launched. I'm not really gonna. It shed light on that, but your article was titled Bunnings Church and it really intrigued me and yeah, it just gave me some food for thought.
So can you tell us why you titled your article that, and I guess what parallels you're drawing [00:03:00] between Bunnings and allies of church and our faith today?
Brendan Pratt: Well, reality is there's things that don't change about humans. And while we talk about consumerism, and as Jared mentioned, that's the area I've done my research in on a Sunday morning.
People still look for meaning. People still look for transformation. They still look to the object of the desire. We are told that transformation is in how you redo your house, how you redo your room, how do you reset. So, so there's a place where you gather for community, they, you can buy a sausage there and support a charity if you want.
You can put your kids into an activity if you want. . And it's just looking how Bunnings has in incredibly well captured idea of community captured ideas of being part of community, community groups. , So it's, it's not a, it's not a, an attack on Bunnings. It's actually Bunnings have captured something that once upon a time in our culture, a Sunday morning was.
Church. Now it's cafe, now it's Bunnings. , There's reasons for [00:04:00] that, but at the same time it does point us to what we can look towards as far as community goes. , Brands, commodify community or try to commodify community extremely well. But underneath all that, and Zigman Bauman points that out., A Polish a sociologist, he says the.
The effort to commodify community just points us to the deep human longing for real, genuine meaning making community. And so I think the Bunnings Church idea, the idea that, hey, I can get a better life by doing a better room or doing a better renovation, or , the DIY kind of approach with a focus on community.
, I think clever marketers have managed to capture some of what it is to be human. And can market that for commodified ends not a bad thing because we do want to, , pursue those kind of things. But at the same time, I think it does point us to the genuine desire for meaning making [00:05:00] community and community being the opposite to consumerism.
Jarrod Stackelroth: Is that. Is that what people are looking for in church? The DIY self-help make yourself better? Is that what church should be like? Go in there on a Saturday morning and improve your life, make it work for you, as well as having some nice music , and,, some community or some fellowship as you've shared.
Brendan Pratt: Yeah, excellent question, Jared. And this is the challenge because the challenge is we do inherently pick up the messages of our culture and we do turn church into commodity. , Sky Han's written a wonderful book called The Divine Commodity, where he analyzes how we relate to the church. And when we use that as a consumable, we treat it like we would a Bunning store where we take something off the shelf.
This is gonna make my life better. If I don't like it, I put it back on the shelf. Or if it doesn't suit me. And so we do end up treating church like commodity. And in so doing, we actually miss the beauty [00:06:00] of deeper community. And so, and we call it church shopping. , , you hear people talk about church shopping.
I'll try this church, I'll try that. Church, you hear people analyze styles of church, that one's not for me, or styles of music that didn't work for me. Forgetting that. It is about God's community. And so unfortunately, and I do the same, we take on the commodified life that we've grown up in. , Tim Casser, American psychologist says, just from the age of seven, we just know how to commodify and experience and people Sky Jahani says.
And mark Sayers in his book, , trouble with Paris, he says, we just take on these concepts. And apply the very commodified life we've grown up in to the church and we treat the church the same as we would a movie. , It can move us to tears even. We can get emotional about it, but then we walk outside and return to the same hopes and dreams we always have.
Which if, Tim Cass is correct, then [00:07:00] even as Christians, . Without even thinking. We're swimming in the swimming pool of a commodification. Nothing wrong with commodities because we do need to consume, but when that becomes the end point in itself, when I commodify people, when I commodify fellow church members, when I commodify the worship service, when I commodify God, then the same mentality I take the Bunning store I take to.
My church faith community, then that's where we do end up, skimming life rather than living in the depths of community.
Zanita Fletcher: What should the right approach be? Because, I think about my current location. I'm on the Gold Coast here, and there are a million churches, and I'm sure it's the same in Sydney and like Brisbane and the major cities.
Like you've got a lot of options these days as to like what church you wanna go to. And, you're right. Like you say, you do hear people often say like, I'm church shopping, , I'm looking for the right church for me, but realistically, should we just be going to the church that is closest to us or that has the most needs?
Or how do you kind of approach that? Because it, it kind of feels [00:08:00] wise in some ways to look for the right church or to look for a good church.
Brendan Pratt: And there's nothing wrong with going, this is a faith community where I can see myself being part of and growing, , but the challenge is sometimes we want it all our way and we forget that the real depth in community.
Is investing your life into that. And when you invest your life into community, sometimes that has warts on it because we are all human when we're investing in relationships. , What's it look like to invest into community in a world that commodifies and skims community? Can we end up skimming and miss the one another's of community?
Do we So is. Is the worship service something that I attend in our case on a Sabbath morning to consume. And as Jared in his last question, talk about the self-help thing, um, the problem with self-help, it ends up pointing back to yourself. And that was the problem to start with, but. [00:09:00] Is the church experience something that I commodify and consume to my ends, or is it something where I'm doing the one another's where I give my life away, where it's not about me, where it's about us?
The challenge is you and I live in a culture that's, well, Zigman Bauman says we've moved from solid to liquid to gas. There's upsides and downsides in that, but in that gas, it's become so individualized that I find my entire identity in self. And so everything is measured on what? I think of what I design, what I like and don't like.
, And therefore we turn our whole church experience into a product we lose when we turn into a product in the end, we lose the depth of relationship. We lose the people caring about us and us caring about other people. . The reality is genuine community can be frustrating, but genuine community is where Christian discipleship happens.
It's where life happens. It's where you are going to find the [00:10:00] beauty of being truly human. And if, if it's always I'll try this church, that church, that church, then that's great. Apart from you miss the depths and beauty of being truly human.
Jarrod Stackelroth: All of this is bringing up a massive question for me. What is church?
I'm gonna break that down a little bit just because , that's huge. , We are the church, right? The community of believers. I think we'd all be on that page, but for some people, I think to avoid the consumer mindset, , they are playing with , the structures and the functions of church and as.
You know, part of the church institution yourself. You are now the president of the Australian Church, so you are looking at the church broadly across Australia and going, well, how does this work? So, so for some people it's like church planting or small house groups. Like we'll just have an organic community, but we'll avoid any [00:11:00] trappings of structure or whatever.
We'll just sort of feel it , and. Commune with the spirit, and then others are like, well, no, we need certain other things, or We need to meet this demographic or that demographic. And so they'll set up , their church services in such a way. So what is church or what's the best way? What, how should we be the church?
Brendan Pratt: Excellent. Excellent question, Jared. One thing I really like about my new job is I get to see lots of ways of going about being the church. And we do have Adventist house churches that are absolutely wonderful organic places, and we do have larger institutional churches and we've got country churches and city churches and all kinds of different expressions of church, and that's a good thing.
Now the other reality is sometimes we go, Hey, as you mentioned, here's the organic side. And we get scared of structure. Like our pioneers. Our pioneers, were bothered by that. We get overstructured at the same time. [00:12:00] Anytime we get two or three people together, we start forming structures that work. So we've gotta make sure our structure doesn't clog out organic.
But what is church? A church is simply the community of believers, and that can happen in all kinds of ways. If we look at what Paul describes church as, , he talks about being a bride and a body, and he talks about it being a family, and he talks it in relational terms, and he talks in all kinds of, in Ephesians, there's all these descriptions of what the church is, but he's always saying the church is a body of believers where they're growing and serve, growing in faith, serving, connecting, sharing, worshiping.
If we lose those aspects, we can be a really good event. But if it's not a place, if it's not community that's growing, serving, connecting, sharing, worshiping, as an Adventist movement, we talk about, , the emphasis on our time in history where prophecy talks about being this, we see this anxious world and I say, Hey, sure, we're about discipleship, growing, serving, think, and sharing, worshiping.
But it's also about what that community of faith looks like [00:13:00] as we invite other people into. This community as well as this non-anxious community in an anxious world. And so, can that be expressed In lots of ways, yes. but it does come back to community where it's the one another's where I give my life away in a world that tells us to focus on me.
Church is about. To one another's, and I'm part of something bigger. I've actually given my life away to be part of a community, part of Christ's body. but there's lots of ways that looks and lots of ways to get it right. And, this morning I spent time with, aged care CEOs and they're doing wonderful things in aged care.
And you know, you look at Adventist schools and there's wonderful things. There's lots of ways of being. Church, rather than simply, this is the building I turn up in. I I think now for the first few centuries, and you're aware of this, the, the term going to church, you wouldn't have heard it in the, in the early church.
' cause they didn't go to, they were it, you don't go to community. You are community. And so it's that whole connection and fabric. And that's not to say that buildings aren't important because buildings don't change lives, but what happens in them does. [00:14:00] It's that fabric of relationships that really is church.
And I think as we've commodified church, as we've turned it into, I go to get my needs met, get a service done, show up, pay up, and go home. We've lost that whole interconnectedness of the beauty of what it is to be genuine Christian community.
Jarrod Stackelroth: Can I just clarify something that you said? You said, , a non-anxious community in an anxious world.
Can you just unpack that? 'cause you've said it a couple of times in this conversation, and I think there's a richness in that term that would help our viewers and our listeners to, to understand what you mean by that.
Brendan Pratt: Yeah. I think, , well, let's go with the three angels, , just to jump into a another part, and we say we're the church of the three angels.
What is that? It's messages that talk about our current world. Talk about God is gonna sort it out. Creation does matter. Systems that. Combined spiritual authority and power are problematic and they do crush people. [00:15:00] But as an Adventist church, we're saying what we look and see around us in the world. It's not a shock and it's not a surprise.
And as we see anxiety lifting in our culture, and you don't have to look too far now to see headlines at once Upon a time we might have, , thought with sensationalism. Now it's, Hey, this is gonna happen. That's gonna happen. But there's always this. Community that is non-anxious because , as a faith community, we know where this is going and that God is in control.
Even to quote the old hymn, even though the wrong seems off so strong, , there is a community that does life different. I guess it's a different way to be human. , The three angels call us to a different way to be human, that it's not about power and control. That it is about following Jesus wherever he goes, which is growing and serving and sharing, connecting, worshiping, there's in a commodified, individualized world, there is a different way to be human that is about the one another's scriptures that's not about us versus them, which [00:16:00] is what our world wants to turn us into.
It is about, this is us, we're all God's children, and some of us are called to serve all of us. And. , Without going all idealistic. , I really believe. That the Adventist Church in Australia as Australians increasingly look for meaning making community, which is increasingly more research saying this, , Philip Hughes, he's doing this whole big research on, we've become so individualized now that we are realizing our society's not delivering on the promises.
That said it was going to. We've got a generation growing up who are saying, Hey. For the first time in Australia's history, we've got young people growing up saying, realizing that they're not going to be materially as well off as their parents. That's changing our society. Growing up in a world that made online promises and they're realizing that online world isn't delivering for them.
They, there's this active search for meaning making community, which amongst our younger generations is becoming increasingly evident. The search for meaning making community, there's [00:17:00] increasingly openness to spirituality. , It's individualized spirituality. It's commodified spirituality 'cause that's what we've taught people, but there's an openness that wasn't there previously.
And so I'm incredibly optimistic about what the church can look like. As we embrace this, meaning making community as we're a different way of being human, as we show Australia that, is there a different way to go about being who we are? There's a different way of being people. There's a different way of being community and the parts, the aspects of Australian culture that we see the point to community like Bunnings.
I think it's actually pointing to something even deeper that I think as meaning making communities in those one anothers, in the loving and lovable Christian you might wanna call it. with the Sabbath, we've got a whole day where we say, take a break from commodification. Take a break from those things that demand your attention during the week.
Take a break from being just. Production machines take a break for if you go to Egyptian ideas, making bricks for the empire, making bricks for the Pharaoh take a break because the Sabbath [00:18:00] is freedom from slavery to consumerism, freedom to explore humanity. Its best freedom to explore relationship with God and one another.
And I think if the Sabbath was ever gonna make sense, I think it's now a community that embraces the whole idea of Sabbath. A different way of being human that embraces a celebration of creation and relationships with God one another. , in a culture that, as Philip Hughe says, is looking for a different way of being human.
Realizing that the promises of consumer culture, while it's delivered excellent things, it's delivered excellent healthcare and all kinds of things, I'm not, I'm not a beat up on, on, on capitalism, consumerism. There's good things, but at the same time. It's delivered dysfunctions that we are waking up to and saying, Hey, is there a better way of being human amongst all this?
I think there is, and I think our church communities can model that better way of being human, and that's what I get excited about. I get excited about what's it look like [00:19:00] for the Adventist faith community to be transformative in Australian culture and especially as our younger Australians. A seeking meaning making community, , what's that look like for us to be meaning making community that says there's a better way of doing this.
Zanita Fletcher: That's awesome. Yeah. I think a lot of people. Long for community, right? Like we, most of us have that deep longing to be a part of a group of people or to be a part of a community. But I think one thing that often inhibits that from happening is conflict. As soon as there's a little conflict, many people will just run out.
They'll go find another church. And I think in line with that, we've also got, , cancel culture has kind of spread into our modern day. , The conversation of boundaries has come in, which in some ways is amazing, but in some ways. People kind of use that as an excuse to put walls up and then not repair things.
So when we talk about like those kind of conflicts and realities of things that come up in relationships, how do we push past that, , and kind of like have that [00:20:00] relational grit where we are not just backing off as soon as something goes wrong, like, because I think that's really important when it comes to building community.
Like how do we repair. Conflict because it's inevitable.
Brendan Pratt: Yeah. Zita, you're so right. I think your question, you started to answer it already. Reality is the world we live in does it divides us. And politically, whether that be in spiritual communities, political philosophy, the middle gets pushed further and further a pass.
, , and you've got groups that, they exist to, to divide because that's where they find their identity reasons for existence, whether it be left or right, they exist to push us further apart. And so we do end up looking at each other as the problem. Rather than realizing there's bigger problems.
Well, as Paul says, our big problems in the spiritual realm, not each other, but we do it in churches. We look at each other as the problem, rather than saying, Hey, together we form something beautiful, we are gonna be different. We are gonna have different perspectives, and that's one of the beauties of it.
If we could model that community in a [00:21:00] world that is increasingly seeking to push people apart. If we can model what it is to actually, no Jew, no Greek, no free, no slave, no male, no female. Those things, what's it look like to be community that's not divided? I think that would be the incredible beauty, because you're right, Our world is increasingly individualized. We're increasingly that gas that's pulling apart rather than that coming together. And imagine if there was a group in society that was able to be genuine community despite of ethnic background, spite of social class. If the new community of scripture. It was the new community.
Now then as Jesus says, they'll see their love and they'll be drawn to you because of that. And I think you and I live in a world that is in remarkably similar to the New Testament world. And if in a world that's become increasingly divided, if there was a model of community, Imagine what that would look like.
Imagine. Can we be that? I think so. I think we can be that. I think this model of a new community, it's not just a political philosophy. It is about [00:22:00] relationship with Christ where the fruits of the spirit, the one another's come through. and this is what I get excited about. I know we've covered a lot of stuff today.
and it can get complex, but it's. It's actually simple. Uh, what's it look like for me to be a loving and lovable person? To be outward focused, to love despite the differences. And sometimes I've gotta just get better at walking past the things I don't agree with sometimes. And loving the person rather than getting involved in the argument.
Social media, oversimplifies. And creates oversimplified argument rather than what it is to be in community. And we're gonna have differences. How we go about those differences is where the real test of what community looks like. , So I think, I think in a world that keeps talking about community, we talk about sporting communities and branded communities, there's this longing for community if anyone's gonna get it right.
I think it's a group of people who celebrate a whole day for community. When we say take a break from it all, celebrate community. I think if we celebrated that [00:23:00] community well, I think that's a beautiful thing that as Jesus says, people will be drawn to that because they'll see him reflected in it.
Jarrod Stackelroth: your brother Darren has commented here. . Our young people immersed in deep community are less anxious and less depressed according to Jonathan Haight. , I wanna reflect as a parent, how do we pass our faith on and how do we avoid some of the traps of commodifying? Church of consuming church rather than creating community.
How do we do that for our children? How do we do that for our children at church and at home so that we are not passing on? You've said that not everything about commodification is bad , and you know, it's just the, it's the water that we swim in, right? Mm-hmm. So , to some extent it's unavoidable.
I hear what you're saying in that space, but also. If we're saying, we've got sometimes the answer or the anecdote to that, how do we give that to our children?
Brendan Pratt: Yeah, [00:24:00] that's an excellent question. And I'm not pretending I get this right, , because you can educate. I've educated my three boys on consumerism.
We analyze advertising, what it does to us. Remember, one time my boy came up and said, I really do need the latest Nintendo ds. And I'm like, he goes, consumerisms got to me, but I need it. At least he was able to identify what got to him. But educate is one thing. Experience is the big reality. And so it is creating time for community, creating time for relationship modeling more than teaching.
, I think churches that model community well, where as Paul describes the enthusiasm of youth, the wisdom of years where you see. Older people investing into younger people. , Children don't walk away from the places they belong to. Children walk away from the churches they never belong to. If they belong.
If there's a sense of I belong here, then it's a different, different experience of that. And sometimes [00:25:00] we try to commodify our young people into staying by saying. And there's nothing wrong with that. I think memory event's excellent, but if we are trying to turn church into a commodity to keep young people, that's one thing.
But what's it look like to create a place of belonging where young people go, I belong here. Even if there's stuff that I'm in a community where I'm not gonna get my needs met entirely. But nor are you gonna get your needs met entirely. But together we are gonna go to a deeper need, which is the need for relationship and community.
And so for my boys, we try and make sure there's people around them. That they can explore that community, be part of that community. , It's something you feel rather than something you teach. , And so I think, what's it look like to create that unhurried space? . What's it look like on Friday nights just to have an unhurried space where you're a family?
What's it look like to do some of those Sabbath rituals really well so that there's spaces that connect , to community. What's it look like in part of, a faith community where you've got other people [00:26:00] investing into the life , of your children? , What's it look like to have your children see that life is about existing beyond themselves, to get them involved in serving?
And as I say, I don't pretend I've got this right. And the longer I parent, the less likely I'm to write a parenting book. but I do think that young people who experience the church's community see it as a very different thing than it simply being an event I go to on Sabbath.
Zanita Fletcher: Do you think some of our, , I guess our ways of doing church are a bit.
, Misprioritized in the sense that often when people are organizing a church service, they'll focus on, , having a really good preacher. , These days you often see really fancy PowerPoints, , really charismatic, like people at the front, great songs. And then you go to other churches where that's not happening.
And typically they're the churches with fewer people or like fewer visitors. So like, are we kind of contributing to this consumerism mindset in a way? Go about that. Like how, or should we just be ditching the whole [00:27:00] service and,, hanging out in the park? Like,, are we doing it wrong or is there a place for having pride in us?
I
Brendan Pratt: think, I think this often zita, , partly because, and I, I won't go into a whole sermon on this, but. I, I grew up in the church growth era, which was, which was a big emphasis on some big churches in America, , Willow Creek. And,, we got obsessed by this is what we do to be, seek a sensitive and wasn't a bad thing.
'cause it did focus us outward. But our focus became on meeting needs. And I grew up in that era where I passed it in a church in New Zealand. A wonderful church by the way. But it, we were incredibly zealous about serving better and better and better and better products. And so now whether it be the music product, whether it be, how we went about the sermon product, the experience product.
I'm not saying don't do church with excellence. I'm all for excellence. But if that's the end point, then we've got someone to buy our product. But church isn't the product church's relationship, and so that's the [00:28:00] outside of the bucket. The substance of the bucket is relationship with God and others. If I had my life again, if I had my first 10 years of ministry again, I would be less obsessed with the product church and more obsessed with relational connectedness of church.
, The church I pastor, we did really well on measurements of a product. I think we made an excellent spiritual product and people engaged in that spiritual product. I look back now though, and see the long-term outcomes of that, and there was good things happened, there was excellent things happened, but a lot of people then moved on to the next product when the next product was shinier and newer and more fashionable because we engage people without connecting.
As much into relationship I had my time. Again, I would put a lot more of the focus and energy into relational connectedness, not just the quality of the product. So I'm not saying don't do the quality of the product because there is good things and people are attracted to excellence, and excellence does on a God.
But if that's the end point, I think that's the danger that sometimes that becomes the end point. Then we [00:29:00] miss the relational part. And sometimes you'll see churches that have that relational part sorted out really well, and you get frustrated by the lack of intensity everywhere else, but the relational part.
Is the big deal, relationship with God, relationship with people. , So, so I, as I say, I think there's lots of ways to get church, right. , But that rightness is about relational connectedness. And I think if I had my time again, I would be, the first 10 years of my ministry particularly would be less church growth oriented.
Not losing some of that stuff I learned. Less consumer develop the products and more what's it look like for a person to connect into community rather than just turning up to experience the product?
Jarrod Stackelroth: Hmm. As we wrap up, Brendan, I. We'd like to get practical here on record live, and you've given us some practical things.
We've heard a lot of theory, a lot of interesting, things we've heard, some practical, but here's my question [00:30:00] for us today. Is it just. Like being more like Jesus, getting more of the Holy Spirit. Is he the only one that can actually build this community, or are there things we can do? And, and if it's him, like, 'cause I heard you say that in, in part of your answers, you were like, we need the fruits of the spirit to be able to solve conflict.
We need to be loving and we need Jesus to help us to do that. If we need that, how do we get that? In your experience as a person, as a pastor, and. Now in your, in your current role, what would you love to see everyday church members do to really become the church that you're talking about?
Brendan Pratt: Okay, so if there's one thing I could do, I would say read Romans 12 every day because Romans 12 finishes Romans 11, all about the glory of God.
It exists for God's glory, but then it says, therefore, offer yourselves as a living sacrifice. That's the opposite of consumerism. Consumerism is about accumulating to me. Living sacrifice is giving life away off yourselves, a living sacrifice. This is your spiritual act of worship. So in consumerism, it's about worship of [00:31:00] self.
A church community is about worship of God. Then Paul starts talking about, he talks about serving in the body of Christ, using your spiritual gifts, getting involved, serving in ways that grow the church and in the community. So get involved in serving. If there's something that really does address consumerism, it's actually serving.
Serving, giving your life away. Then Paul talks about keep your spiritual fervor be face faithful in prayer. Patient reflections. He's saying, do those things. Allow Christ to dwell in you. He then talks about brotherly love. , I like the paraphrase from, , the message where it says, practice playing second fiddle.
Don't be full of self-importance. Practice being humble. Consumerism doesn't practice being humble or practice playing second fiddle. It's about my needs being met where Paul's saying, Hey, brotherly love matters. Honor others above yourself. , He's saying in as much as possible, live at peace with everybody.
He's saying, build bridges. If you can build bridges as much as possible, live at [00:32:00] peace. But then he's talking about. Sharing. Sharing what you have, sharing who you are sharing in the body of Christ. You're saying live generously. , So if you were to look at Romans 12, which is about the worship, serve, grow, connect, share, and I think the very practical part is what's it look like?
For me to, who am I bringing to the church when I, and even that's a commodified state and saying, bringing the church, who am I being as part of my church family? Is it about what I get? Or would people say this person serves, this person lives beyond themselves. This person invests their lives into others.
This person lives humbly. And as Paul points out, we only get to there if it's a living sacrifice. , If we've already seen the relationship with Christ as something the gospel is so compelling. That I do give my life away because there's a totally different way of being human. And as I do that, I do then serve, I do live deeply [00:33:00] with others in community.
, So, so yeah. I know , I'm not , going back into preaching mode, Jared, but I think, I think Romans 12 EnCap encapsulates the new community, where it is about honoring others above yourself, where it is about truly being humble and not, I, I think the living sacrifice. And that Living Sacrifice community is the community that is the opposite to consumer community.
And to go back to the start, Zita, when we talked about Bunnings Church. , Bunnings Church is about experiencing. This idea of community and connection and transformation, but I think that points to an even bigger idea of community and transformation and connectedness. So I think a bunning Sunday morning points to something deeper, and I think that deeper is something that we can be, and in doing that we point people to Jesus and transform Australia.
Zanita Fletcher: Hmm. Beautiful. I like how you ended your article. You said, as Christians we are called to give [00:34:00] our lives to a different story we will consume, but with different glasses on. , So I think that's a good place to end. But thank you Brendan. You've given us a lot of good food for thought with a lot of enthusiasm.
It's been great to have you on again. And thank you everyone for engaging in the comments. It's always good, , to know that other people are watching and enjoying the conversation. , We'll see you all again next week for another week of record live. Until then, keep safe.
Brendan Pratt: Thanks. Thanks.