A personal reflection by Paul Holdway

I stand before you wondering whether this is a good idea. It is 24 years since I first preached, but 20 years since I last preached.

I did study for a Bachelor of Theology alongside the esteemed Garry Deverell and Nathan Nettleton, but I did not follow them into ordained ministry to become Rev Paul and practice preaching on a regular basis.

I must admit that I have heard few sermons over the past 7 years on account of my young children and when I speak I often do so from a few scribbled notes, but the practice of this Church is to have it all typed out beforehand.

Because we follow the Lectionary, I can’t preach on a passage I want to, like the parable of the talents in Luke, Isaiah 61, or a verse which has always attracted my attention like 2 Thessalonians 3:17 – “I Paul, write this greeting with my own hand.”

So I feel it is somewhat arrogant of me to stand here tonight and purport to bring you God’s word - so I will tell you a bit of the faith story of my life rather than seek to unpack and proclaim a pastoral point from the paraphrase.

As I prepared, I thought I could try trivia - the first passage shows evidence of inflation in the Bible, did you pick that up? – Joseph’s betrayers were paid 20 pieces of silver, but as a regular attender to God’s word you will realise that some 2000 years later, Judas got 30 pieces of silver for betraying Jesus. Or I thought I could try some black humour and point out that selling Joseph off meant one less person to be filled in on the Census form this Tuesday night!

Anyway, it is not often I get to reflect upon my life in such a public way and to put some of my thoughts about life out there...so...

Let’s start with the Gospel. Well, I learnt at Whitley College that the boat symbolises the Church but beyond that I do not profess to have the faith to get out of the boat and interpret that passage for you tonight.

How about Romans? As the Apostle Paul refers to, I seek to obey the law and uphold the law, but as a Christian I realise it won’t get me salvation and as a Baptist I reserve the right to civilly disobey it or seek its repeal or reform if it causes injustice. That’s more like it.

Hang On! After all, I see it is Joseph I want to reflect upon.

In tonight’s Hebrew Bible story we see the course of the rest of young Joseph’s life set. Likewise, I consider that a lot of the direction of my life was set very early.

I have never been given a very classy coat or an amazing technicolour dreamcoat, and, although I do not believe I was favoured over my 2 younger brothers and I did not dream of lording it over them - I was a dobber and I was born with 2 silver spoons in my mouth!Apart from the spoons, which I still have, I was given 40 tins of babyfood, which presumably I ate up before I was one. Within that first year I developed my sweet tooth as my Maternal & Child Health record shows I was fed tea with condensed milk! By the age of 2, I met Royce Hart, a star Richmond footballer and have followed the Tigers ever since.

As I look back, I attribute significance to being enrolled on the North Carlton Baptist Sunday School Cradle Roll by the time I was 2 days old! My beloved Grandmother was the Cradle Roll Secretary at the time – she was also Crockery Stewardess – both positions annual appointments of the Church meeting.

My Grandmother, affectionately known as Nana, and my Mother went to Church but their husbands did not. They played a pivotal role in my faith journey through their faithful delivery of me to Sunday School each week and their example of Christian hospitality and care, their strong sense of justice, watching out for the downtrodden, and faithful hard work for the local Church and their families.

I grew up attending Sunday School at North Carlton and later at Heathmont Baptist Church where I joined The Boys’ Brigade, was a foundation member of the Cricket and Soccer clubs, put up my hand to say I wanted to give my life to Jesus at the age of 11, joined the youth group, and was Baptised at the age of 16, which for me was a very conscious and very serious decision to commit the direction of my life to following Jesus.

I completed my HSC, as it then was, at Yarra Valley Grammar and went on to Melbourne University to study law and arts - eventually graduating with honours in Criminology.

Around this time I took on leadership roles in Youth Group, Scripture Union Beach Mission, Boys’ Brigade – local, State and National, Cricket club – both on the committee as well as coaching, Christian Union at University, and I joined the Christian Lawyers Society. I must have fitted study in somewhere.

I took a gap year off from University and went to work for a Baptist Church as a Youth Worker – in Wellington, New Zealand, which was a wonderful experience.

Upon my return to Melbourne, I moved full time to live with my Grandparents in North Carlton and founded a Student Chapter of the Christian Lawyers Society at University.

I look back and see this as significant as after my Baptism I really wanted to follow Jesus in my whole life, and therefore my field of study, and consequently in my work, as well as in my personal and family life.

I see my work as ministry, my calling, I see no difference in a call to the workplace and a call to the Church. I believe firmly in the priesthood of all believers and the different gifting of everyone in the kingdom of God.

So let me tell you a bit about my work and link it vaguely to the texts by claiming that I can identify a bit with Joseph.

I have not been sold into slavery to go on to lead Egypt and save Israel, but I see in Joseph that he was called to serve a foreign power faithfully, and I strongly sense a call to serve God faithfully in our secular society.

I serve our formal legal and governmental society in that I am a Barrister and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Victoria, an Officer of the Court, an Australian Lawyer and am bound by all the affirmations of allegiance and duty that go with obtaining those roles and titles.

As a Christian, however, I see our formal Society as a foreign power as it seems to encourage a nation where individuals come first in decision making, where popular opinion not action that leads to just outcomes prevails, where the earth is to be used up rather than cared for and renewed as stewardship demands, where reality has left the body and ended up on television, and where relationships and self-identity are shaped more through social media than human interaction.

Using this comparison, our law firm maintains an intention of being in the world, but not of the world. Rather than seeking to work only for Christians and Christian Organisations, we aim to be an excellent commercial law firm engaged with the formal Institutions of our society and caring for all people regardless of background.

In the Psalm, we read that Pharaoh gave Joseph authority over all other officials to tell them what to do and how to do it. Well, I do not have this level of authority but at work I am the Managing Director of40 people and have a lot of authority in that role – interestingly it is not the sense of power or authority that occupies my thoughts in performing that role but rather the responsibility I feel that I have for good stewardship of the organisation, pastoral leadership of the staff, and the provision of a job and salary for them and their families as well as encouraging them to find their vocation .

In the Psalm we also read that God had sent someone ahead to provide help. Well, let me stretch the analogy and say although I was not sent to Egypt, 12 years after I met someone at University, they would come to me and I would be able to help them with a serious issue.

Let me explain by telling the story of a major part of my call - my work with victims of sexual abuse, mainly by Catholic clergy.

I started a theology degree part time during my last year of law and then studied one subject a semester for 9 years. Little did I know when I started that I would end up with a major in Pastoral Care with a focus around responding to victims of sexual abuse.

The intervening event came in 1995 when I was a young lawyer and someone was looking for a Lawyer to act for victims of clergy sexual abuse. They were referred to the then President of the Christian Lawyers Society who was one of my bosses at the time, and who is a direct descendent of the founders of this Church, Joseph & Caroline Wilson.

I got involved in the first case and then another and another until now I have seen over 300 victims. We developed a non-Court response model known as Pastoral Advocacy, where we seek to assist a victim with their claim against the relevant Church authority in an holistic way, seeking to respond pastorally and therapeutically, not just legally to the people who come to

see us. We have done so much pro bono work in this area that in November 2010 I was honoured with the Law Institute of Victoria President’s award for Access to Justice.

One of the victims we helped was the person from University who I did not know was a victim of sexual abuse but when we met up years later I had been sent on ahead to provide help.

Today, I remain committed to my baptismal vows and seek to live them out in all that I do - parenting my children, husbanding my wife, leading a law firm, as well as in the board roles I have in 5 other companies, as well as School Council, the Christian Legal Society and Whitley College, where I am about to finish 13 years on the Council.

After all that, this year I have sensed my faith in God growing, my confidence in God and who I am in relationship with God increasing, a growing willingness to be known as a Christian in all parts of my life and a consequent reduction in fear of what others might think of me because I live as a Christian.

In this, I see in Joseph as an example of faith to aspire to, faithfully serving a foreign power for decades, remaining faithful to his call from God and I imagine growing closer to God throughout his life as he saw God’s faithfulness and purposes working themselves out despite being acutely aware that he was different to most of those around him and the powers that be.

I aspire to such faith, I believe in the essential goodness of each person as a creature of God and in their innate ability to be instruments of God in the world without becoming part of it.

Nelson Mandela is for me a modern day example of Joseph, a Lawyer of course, who kept his faith through decades of turbulence.

Tonight, it is my prayer for all of us, for me, for Alison, for my children, for each of you here, for all Christians and ultimately for all people in our beleaguered yet hopeful world that we might grow in our faith like Joseph did.

Amen.