Lent2023caz

  Straight Paths. Prov 3 v 5 - "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight". Earlier in the week I bumped into a friend in Tesco, that I hadn't seen for a long time. We had a long chat catching up on lots of news and hearing about what all our kids were currently up to. As she has five, this took considerable time! Since I last saw her, one of her sons has moved away to study in Aberdeen. I was encouraged to hear this as he has Aspergers and has always needed quite a lot of support. We agreed what a wonderful thing it was that he was managing to live away and experience greater independence. However, she was quick to clarify that his need of her is still strong. Her summary of how life pans out is that he is fine "if the road is straight, BUT if there is a bend in the road....."  Without any need for more to be said, I knew the sort of things that a 'bend...

  The Spirit of  God , the Master, is on me because  God  anointed me. He sent me to preach good news to the poor, heal the heartbroken, announce freedom to all captives, pardon all prisoners.  God  sent me to announce the year of his grace— a celebration of God’s destruction of our enemies— and to comfort all who mourn, To care for the needs of all who mourn in Zion, give them bouquets of roses instead of ashes, Messages of joy instead of news of doom, a praising heart instead of a languid spirit. Rename them “Oaks of Righteousness” planted by  God  to display his glory. They’ll rebuild the old ruins, raise a new city out of the wreckage. They’ll start over on the ruined cities, take the rubble left behind and make it new.  (Isaiah 61 Message)   A couple of weeks ago the toddlers in church creche planted cress seeds because our topic was God Makes Me Grow. When you are three you dont really have the patience to wait for things to g...

  You all know how I love words.  And I also love listening to the radio - mostly because radio is a great source of words.😀  So you can imagine my delight when I heard on some radio programme or other that the word 'thesaurus'  comes from a Greek word meaning 'storehouse or treasure trove.'   I almost crashed the car I was so excited!   I hope your mind is taking you where mine took me ...... to lots of Biblical references to treasure and storehouses coupled with the notion that a thesaurus as we now know it is a treasure storehouse of words and synonyms.   I love the idea that someone once considered words to be riches.  To be currency. So valuable that they need to be protected in a big dictionary. Amen to that!  The storehouse in the Bible has different meanings depending on the context . It can refer to   a place where food, goods, or riches are kept , God's power over the natural world and His goodness , His threshi...

  Last night I watched Bear Grylls interviewing President Zelensky in Ukraine.  He also spoke to various civilians and newly signed up soldiers - ordinary citizens whose lives have been utterly shattered by the war. Something struck me as I was watching.  Everyone Bear spoke to talked about ' when we have won this war'.  Most talked about the thing they were going to do when the war was won; a soldier gave Bear a box of  'victory'  tea and told him not to drink it until Ukraine is victorious.  If you want to know what faith is, that's it.  It's a factory which in the middle of wartime sets its machines to print 'victory' labels to put on tea bags. It's people who are buying those teabags and keeping them ,or sending them to friends like bottles of champagne to be opened to celebrate a win.  There is such a belief in the Ukrainian people that Putin will be defeated and that they will get their lives and country back.  It is humbling to wa...

 Heres a question for you - answers on a postcard, or in the comments please 😀  What's the difference between being considerate, mannerly, thoughtful and being a people-pleaser? I'm asking because I'm not sure that sometimes, in my desire not to offend and to be respectful, I don't occasionally tolerate the intolerable, defend the indefensible and generally go out of my way to absolutely NEVER upset anyone  ( except my spouse and kids of course- they don't count 😂😂)  Now I do acknowledge that my main motivation is to be an exhorter.  And we exhorters avoid offending people like the plague.  We get our kicks out of encouraging people and therefore can tend towards people-pleasing more than most.  Nevertheless, I do think that in the UK in particular and perhaps in church more than anywhere we are conditioned to be 'nice' above all else, There's nothing wrong with being nice of course.  And here's the problem. When you look at the state the ...

 Ive been lying in my bed over the past several months looking at the glass lampshade hanging from the ceiling and thinking that it could probably do with a clean. I could see cobwebs forming and dust accumulating.  Yesterday evening I finally got round to taking it down.  To say it was dusty was an understatement!  The glass shade was covered in a thick film of grime.  The lightbulbs themselves were dusty and cobwebs were strung between them.  Ten minutes of spit and polish later and everything was all clean and back in place. And it was only then that I wished Id taken a photo -before and after!  Im sure you have already worked out by now that the result of cleaning the light shade and bulbs is that now my bedroom light is throwing out a whole heap more .....light 😀. The thing is that the dust settles evenly and imperceptibly so that the light is dimmed little by little.  It takes ages before it is noticeable ( well to me anyway.  Other pe...

Harmony The other weekend I was at a memorial service where the legendary Shirley Gatt was playing bass guitar in the worship band.  I cannot describe to you the way my heart leaped for joy when I heard her riffing away in the background with some effortless fingerwork and brilliant musicianship.   The bass is one of those underpinning instruments which you dont really notice much when you are listening to a piece of music but if it isnt there the song is so much less rich.  Most people most often wont even be able to discern a bass line, but when Shirley is playing I hear her and what she plays brings me real joy.  I usually actually chuckle out loud as Im listening.  Yesterday evening I was in a really small worship service.  At one point there was a four part harmony going on in the congregation.  It was really great to hear voices underpinning the tune and making the song sound three dimensional and rich. Accompaniments and harmonies arent the...