Love For All

a verse or two

“My friends, if someone is caught in any kind of wrongdoing, those of you who are spiritual should set them right; but you must do it in a gentle way”. Gal 6:1

Spiritual Walk and Musings: Love For All

Tax collectors were among the most unpopular people in Israel. They were making themselves rich by ripping off their fellow Jews. No wonder the people muttered when Jesus went home with the head tax collector Zacchaeus, a man who was good at being bad. Despite this Jesus loved him; in response, the little tax collector was changed forever. In every society, certain groups of people are considered outcasts because of their political views, immoral behaviour, or lifestyle. Don't give in to social pressure to avoid these people. Jesus loves them, and they need to hear his Good News.[adapted from LABC] 

To Pray and Ponder: A gentle way: I used this prayer halfway through last week's sermon - I thought some folk might like a copy of it.

Lord – help us not to use your tremendous grace as a place to wipe our feet of any responsibility to be responsible people.

Lord – help us not to use your tremendous grace as an excuse to not bother to self improve, to not bother to stop wrongdoing.

And yet Lord – sometimes life turns very difficult to cope with, family get sick, time collapses, prioritising hospital trips and what-not takes over. Or unwanted news from left field kicks when we are down, and Lord, there is no amount of saintliness that can get us through such difficult times without wrongdoing.

Lord - may we be spiritual enough to help, to help those who need help – and may we be able to do it in such a gentle way that no more hurt happens.

And may we who have been hurt, forgive; may we learn and may we move on with no tally of rights and wrongs.

And may we who have been hurt – be able to look at the hurter – and see beyond the hurt done to us and understand how the hurter is hurting, may we see their stress, their anguish, that they are overloaded, and Lord, may we see that they don’t need our judgement, they need our love, our forgiveness and your grace. Amen

God Bless, Jon

kingdom of heaven is like treasure

a verse or two

“[Jesus said,] 'The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” Matthew 13:44 (NRSV)

Spiritual Walk and Musings:

The following is written by Peter Graystone from www.surefish.co.uk
“I was brought up to go to church (never thinking there was a proper alternative), was dismayed by tragedy into dropping out of worship, and drifted through college life vaguely aware that some truly ghastly people met as a Christian Union. Then in my mid- twenties, not looking for him at all, Jesus took hold of me. It wasn't the church, nor middle-class Christian morality, nor the disciplines of faith (all of which I still struggle with many years later). It was the character of Jesus who reached out and grabbed me and he hasn't let me go, although I've shaken hard enough. The character of the man who - brought up in the artisan middle-classes, educated, intelligent - turned his back on all of that and made his home among the poor, relied on others, defied convention, stayed single, trod a delicate line between friends in the brothel and the synagogue, inspired people that a world of justice was not only possible but desirable, and died with words of love and forgiveness on his lips.

My godson has asked for a metal detector for his birthday. He has asked for it over and over again since February, because he's convinced that there is something buried in the local woods, where there was a Roman settlement. Have you any idea what a proper metal detector costs! But he is so single-minded that I don't see how I can get him anything else. And if he finds something and proves my scepticism wrong I will be so happy! I've got a hidden agenda to go with his hidden treasure. I'm praying that somewhere along the line in the future of a wonderful little boy (and preferably after he's had an opportunity to fling a small handful of wild oats as far as they can decently go) he stumbles upon Jesus as a treasure of inestimable value. He knows the name; he knows routine; he's been surrounded by the love of Christians all his life. But I'm waiting for the day when, unexpectedly I'm sure, Jesus reaches out and grabs hold of him. Because then he'll find that everything else that was important to him, metal detector and all, can be traded in with much rejoicing as he makes his journey home.”

To Pray and Ponder:

What in or around your home - alive or inert - do you treasure more than anything else? Before you sleep tonight, spend some time enjoying it. As you do so, think of the treasure that Jesus talked of which puts the values of the world into their proper perspective 

A prayer by George MacDonald (1824 - 1905)
Jesus, into thy hands I give the heart
Which left thee but to learn how good thou art. Amen

God Bless, Jon