Can we say I was there?
Today has been a day of death with multiple visits to plan funerals, comfort the bereaved and to make real the desire that the last opportunity for someone to be in the same physical place (until the Lord's return) is as good as can possibly be.
Our days are numbered and the journey through life is marked with many triumphs and tinged with the sadness of separation and acts of selfishness. But I am called to bring the light of Christ into the world and the lives of those I meet.
A church member once said of a cleric I knew, "The man could bring joy to a gathering by leaving the room! May I never become such a curse :-(. May I be an influence for good and make the party no worse even if I cannot make it any better.
Lord for those who have wished me harm - I pray that your light and peace might touch them and that you would lead them into places where their hearts are made whole and their lives know the joy of your presence.
For those who stand with me as family, I can but give you thanks. For it is never right for us to walk alone.
For those who seek to serve you, may I be the means by which this is made real.
For those whose bodies and minds are broken - bring your healing and wholeness.
I thank you for the opportunities ministry brings and the joy of Communion with you. For the new clergy who have come to our patch, may they be blessed and be a blessing. For those who have been here for so long, may they not grow stale but rejoice at the opportunities we share and all that is before them. For the people of God in this place - may they be one, active in their love, faithful in their lives.
What a great day - let's do this again tomorrow.
You play the tune and I'll dance.
You show me your face and I will be healed.
Sola fide
1 comment:
It is interesting in how we respond to the different aspects of a day. On a Tuesday, I attend a Coffee morning in a Chrisitan Cafe, locally, which is organized by Ann, our Community Deacon. The group who meet are a disparate lot. Many are committed Christians of one flavour or another, but others are poor, deprived, unwell, umemplyed and or subjected to benefits sanctions. As a group we often disagree, but are united in caring for one another.
Yesterday, one among our number T, who is ex-Army, so we have things in common, but who is so severely disabled that he is reliant on a wheel chair to get about. Despite his disability, he is an active evangelist and Church Warden in his place, who also copes with a wife with a mobility disability. But he thinks of others, by volunteering at the local food bank and doing pastoral stuff where appropriate.
Yesterday he introduced us to an initiative in support of local refugee's and those in need - we as a group, would subscribe what we could afford to a small emergency fund, managed by the Book Shop manager (A Baptist Pastor) to give small cash grants to those in genuine need.
To a person, everyone there, without exception declared that they would support the fund, and we gave what we could afford that moment. We raised over £50 from our twenty people, and we will contribute weekly from now on.
Those among us, who subscribed, might well be future beneficiaries - but more to the point, we as a group, will be reliant on the local knowledge of the Cafe Manager and Terry to distribute the funds justly and to the most vulnerable and needy.
It's a small thing in the scale of giving, but to me, it's a sign of God' action among a group of people, vastly different in position and outlook, but united by God's love.
There is hope out there, day in, day out.
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