Pilgrim

It was my pleasure to assist today for the afternoon session of our Churches youth alpha to which we had 9 youngsters attend at a local retreat centre.  Today was the Holy Spirit sessions.  One of the activities for the afternoon was to consider psalm 23 and recreate it in a very personal way.  Whilst I was with some of the youngsters in the Church, I was inspired to write on myself and to share it with the youngsters.  What transpired was an honest view of my own anxiety issues and need for God. I enclose it here for any who may be helped: The Lord is my saviour, I shall not hide he saves me from my nightmares, my self doubt, my anxiety. From demons in the night, from destruction of anger, mistrust and fear. He is the restorer of my soul He guides me through the darkness of my mind. Even though I still get scared, even though I sometimes find it hard to pray. He provides me with all I need. He sends Angels to walk by my side and fills me with his Sp...

We live in a world that appears to be suffering.   There is a tendency to look at the widespread turmoil, the wars, the rise of extremist theology especially as seen in the actions of Islamic fundamentalism and the so called Islamic state with their associated butchery; the health fears generated by increasing resistance to antibiotic therapies, lack of social provision for people as they age, and the recent outbreak of Ebola, a virus that even makes the Islamic state look puny. It can be tempting to suggest that the world is falling apart, and no doubt there will be groups spreading a message of Armageddon and impending doom and catastrophe.    Prominent in the USA is a belief in the imminent rapture; there has even been a mainstream movie made about this in Hollywood recently. I am not here to promote those ideas.   Personally I think it is theological bunkum, and I believe that the readings we have heard today shed light on that and on something potentially...

I have a confession to make.   I spend a seemingly inordinate amount of time on computers.   That may sound surprising to some as I am a Physiotherapist, and for a lot of people that creates a vision of infra-red lamps and massage (all sorts of things that I or my colleagues hardly do any more).   Actually I suspect that I spend at least 50-60% of my time working at a keyboard.   Then there is the inevitable work at home, including preparation for this very sermon, not to mention the apparent absolute necessity of social media sites such as twitter and facebook.   Some of you may be thinking what really is the point of all this, and how does it impact on God’s message to humanity.   Well, for my part   I am inevitably exposed to opinions from people both Christian and non-Christian about a range of issues.   Some of that opinion can be inspiring, and can lead me to reflect deeper about my own relationship with God, a lot of it sadly is the opposi...

Just imagine for a moment that the Church hired people to help clean up the grounds and paid them the living wage, and then ended up paying those that had turned up for an hour so the same as those who had been at it all day.   If you had turned up at 9am and worked until 5 in the afternoon, would you feel OK about it? Somehow, I think the majority of us probably wouldn’t.    This story from Matthews Gospel would have been clearly understood by the audience.   After all we are talking about people who lived day to day on a subsistence level.   They knew how much they ought to be paid, how much they needed to be paid.   Their continued existence would have depended on it. Jesus wasn’t talking to the equivalent of City Millionaires here, he was talking to the working classes; even the Pharisees would not have been rich.   Money in 1 st Century Palestine was like today, held by the few; i.e. the rich and powerful. So, there is something ...

One of the problematic questions that challenge the church intermittently surrounds the question of miraculous healing, particularly why it is that some people apparently experience the wonder of healing experiences and others do not.   The argument that suggests that people who don’t experience healing lack sufficient faith is at the least unhelpful and at the worst harmful.   Many people have given up on the church because of unfeeling comments by those who claim a Christian faith.   Other arguments include a Christian version of the Insha' Allah   of Islam.   Sadly we are left with an image of God who chooses capriciously who to heal and who to leave.   I have just finished reading “Simply Jesus” by N T Wright, a book that doesn’t focus on healing miracles specifically.   My understanding of the book is that the author is suggesting that this thorny issue be set within the wider context of the rescue of the whole of creation. With the fall,...