{"id":2164,"date":"2020-05-25T19:46:30","date_gmt":"2020-05-25T09:46:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/?p=2164"},"modified":"2020-06-24T11:02:17","modified_gmt":"2020-06-24T01:02:17","slug":"why-you-werent-born-a-koala","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/2020\/05\/25\/why-you-werent-born-a-koala\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Let me begin with the assumption that you weren\u2019t born a koala.<\/p>\n<p>If you were, these are some of the things that you might notice, and others might notice about you&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>You would spend about 20 hours a day either asleep or resting;<\/p>\n<p>You would spend between 1 to 3 hours a day feeding;<\/p>\n<p>You would spend between 1 to 3 hours a day grooming, moving from one place to another, and searching for a mate.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>And something that you may not want to raise with a koala \u2013 you would have very little brain, about the size of a shriveled walnut (in two separate halves).<\/p>\n<p>But in case there is still any doubt, here is something that definitively sets you apart from being a koala. The koala lives a solitary life.<\/p>\n<p>Obviously not totally solitary or we would have run out of koalas.<\/p>\n<p>And there may be a territory of eucalyptus and a loose-knit society of koalas, but koalas are not communal.<\/p>\n<p>They are not \u2018one another\u2019 creatures.<\/p>\n<p>They are not made to be mutually supportive, to be welcoming, to work cooperatively as a team, to respect and value one another, to be protective of one another (apart probably from their own offspring).<\/p>\n<p>But if you are a child of God, and if we are Christ followers, we are all these things \u2013 we are made to be.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Who are we?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Ephesians 3:15 &#8211; Family members, born of our Heavenly Father, carrying the family name.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>This passage affirms that we are a people chosen, redeemed, a people among whom, with whom, God is building His home.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What do we have?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Ephesians 3:16-19 &#8211; The Spirit of the risen Christ and all that he brings.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>We have, by the living Spirit of the risen Christ, \u2018every spiritual blessing in Christ\u2019.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Why are we here?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Ephesians 3:21 &#8211; To bring glory to His name.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>We are for the praise of His glory.<\/p>\n<p>Also we are here to&#8230;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Know Him better<\/li>\n<li>Know the hope to which we are called<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But above all to be to the praise of His glory.<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8230;to him be glory in the church&#8230;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>So thank God for koalas, enjoy them, delight in them, protect them, just don\u2019t expect them to be interested in building a caring community \u2013 we are made for different ends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Let me begin with the assumption that you weren\u2019t born a koala. If you were, these are some of the things that you might notice, and others might notice about you&#8230; You would spend about 20 hours a day either asleep or resting; You would spend between 1 to 3 hours a day feeding; You [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":2165,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2164"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2164\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2562,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2164\/revisions\/2562"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashfieldbaptist.org.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}