NTC - Nazarene Theological College: Australia and New Zealand

17/10/2026

JOIN US for the final community chapel service of 2026.

13/10/2026

13/10/2026

Dear Friends,

We hope this week's devotional will encourage you in your spiritual walk. We give thanks to Michael Lund for writing this devotional.

You are welcome to share this and include it in your church newsletters if you wish; we just ask that you please give credit to NTC and the author. Thank you!

SCRIPTURE READING: Exodus 33:12-33 (NRSVUE, emphasis added)

12 Moses said to the Lord, “See, you have said to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favour in my sight.’ 13 Now if I have found favour in your sight, please show me your ways, so that I may know you and find favour in your sight. Consider, too, that this nation is your people.” 14 He said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” 15 And he said to him, “If your presence will not go, do not bring us up from here. 16 For how shall it be known that I have found favour in your sight, I and your people, unless you go with us? In this way, we shall be distinct, I and your people, from every people on the face of the earth.”

17 The Lord said to Moses, “I will also do this thing that you have asked, for you have found favour in my sight, and I know you by name.” 18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you the name, ‘The Lord,’ and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one shall see me and live.” 21 And the Lord continued, “See, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; 23 then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Before today’s passage, we have Israel’s sin with the golden calf (Exodus32), Moses’s repeated intercessions for the people (32:7-14, 30-34), God’s promise of an angel to accompany them (33:2), and Moses meeting with God in the tent of meeting, where the Lord speaks to him “face to face, as one speaks to a friend” (33:7-11).

Throughout chapters 32-33, Moses’s intercession for Israel remains a focus. When God refers to the Israelites as Moses’s people whom Moses brought up out of Egypt (32:7), Moses insists that they are God’s people, whom He brought out (32:11). This intercession carries into today’s passage, with Moses again reminding God, “Consider, too, that this nation is your people” (33:13). God’s promise in the next verse is “My presence will go with you”, using the singular “you” which possibly refers only to Moses (Pokrifka, NBBC: Exodus, 402). But Moses’s response prioritises Israel rather than himself, “If your presence will not go, do not bring us up from here.” Again in verse 16, Moses emphasises “I and your people” and “us”.His concern is not simply for his own relationship with God, but for God’s presence with all his chosen people.

Moses also understands that if God’s presence — and therefore relationship with him — is tied to a geographical place, then it’s better to live in the desert where God dwells than to go up(literally “exodus”) rather than enter the prosperous promised land without Him. God’s presence matters more than the blessings of the promised land.

The second major point of this passage is Moses wanting to experience God more. Amidst the aforementioned chaos, sin, intercession, repentance, violence, death, and plague, Moses presses deeper into God. And God honours Moses’s boldness. Despite his face-to-face intimacy with God, Moses wants to confirm favour in God’s sight (vv. 12, 13 (twice), 16). God affirms it once again (v. 17). Moses doesn’t stop there. He wants to know God’s plans and know God (vv. 12, 13), and God reveals his plans to Moses and assures him he is known by name (v. 17).

You think this would be enough for Moses. God has agreed to accompany Israel (not just Moses) to the promised land. But it’s still not enough for Moses. He wants to be shown/experience God’s ways and his glory (vv. 13, 18). Not just in some distant land, but here and now. Again, God rewards Moses’s boldness, and so Moses witnesses God’s goodness, the revelation of God’s name, and God’s grace and mercy.

As Brueggemann notes, this is “daring, insistent prayer… Moses refuses to let God determine the limits of asking. This model of Jewish prayer offers much to learn for Christians, whose piety is characteristically too deferential.” (Brueggemann, NIB: Exodus, 942). Moses has already spoken to God, interceded for his people, assuaged God’s anger and helped change his mind, is affirmed of God’s favour, learned God’s plans, and is known by God, but that’s not enough. He wants more from God, and more of God.

Are we really wishing to see and experience God? How much are we wanting to know him more? How willing are we to pray dangerous prayers, even amidst our sin and repentance, hoping to experience God, his glory, his goodness, his mercy?

PRAYER

LORD, we thank you for who you are, for revealing your very self to us. We thank you for journeying with us in your goodness, grace and mercy. Give us boldness to pray dangerous prayers. Grow in us the desire to know you and be known by you, to see and experience you afresh, to have a foretaste of your glory. Amen.

04/10/2026

The NTC Office is closed to observe the public holiday. We will reopen tomorrow at 8.30am.

01/10/2026

It was great to have our Principal and his family participate in the Australia Southern District Youth Camp last weekend. Read more about this in our upcoming newsletter!

16/09/2026

Save the date! We would love to see you there 🎓🎉

16/09/2026

Dear Friends,

We hope this week's devotional will encourage you in your spiritual walk. We give thanks to Rev Dr Linda Stargel for writing this.

You are welcome to share this and include it in your church newsletters if you wish; we just ask that you please give credit to NTC and the author. Thank you!

MATTHEW 20: 1-16
20 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ 16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
The Parable of the Vineyard Owner (20:1-16) has two main parts: the hiring of the workers (vv.1-7) and the paying of the workers in reverse order (8-16). In the end, all receive the same wages. But the message is not about God’s unfairness, as some would think, but about his generosity. The surrounding context of this parable is very important for understanding it. Just before it, there are three other teachings about entrance into the Kingdom:

1. The Rich Young Man Seeking Eternal Life(19:16-22)
2. The Difficulty of the Rich Entering the Kingdom of Heaven (19:23-26)
3. The Reward for Those Who Have Left Possessions to Follow Jesus (19:27-30)

This parable continues with the same theme of entrance into the Kingdom. God welcomes those who come to faith in the last hour, on their deathbed. They receive the full reward of a place in God’s kingdom, just as those who have journeyed a lifetime with God. But maybe final destiny should not be considered of primary importance. How much better is it to come to faith earlier in life, to have the extra blessings of being made Christlike, of serving, of being productive, and of enjoying God’s presence on the journey. Grant Osborne comments on this passage: “Life in the already/not yet is less about what we get when‘yet’ arrives and more about the blessing of living toward the ‘yet’ in the‘already.’” (Exegetical Commentary on the NT: Matthew, 202).

PRAYER:
Merciful and generous God, we are truly grateful for all who find eternal life in Christ. Thank you for never giving up on us. May we, who journey with you now, be encouraged by your peace, your presence, and your work in us and through us.
May we be faithful in this journey so that others are drawn to you. AMEN.

14/09/2026

You are invited to join us for our community chapel service tomorrow, 1-2pm AEST, followed by afternoon tea. We hope to see you there.

12/09/2026

Our penultimate chapel service of this academic year is this coming Tuesday. Rev. Dr Linda Stargel will be our speaker. We would love to see you there either in-person or online.

10/09/2026

We would love to see you either in-person or online for our penultimate chapel service of this academic year. Rev. Dr Linda Stargel will be our speaker.