We talk about the ‘silence’ and “stillness” of the countryside, but it is a full chorus of communication.

I was reflecting this morning that perhaps this is meant to be teaching us something? Namely, the ‘sounds’ of nature which are both relaxing and full in the summertime.

I gave my daughter headphones and my son AirPods for when we travel but now regret it’s overuse in the young. It’s where I feel we shut off our senses by being permanently on headphones as we travel and thus shutting out others with headphones and everybody now seems in their own little world, we were not designed to be like this. We were designed to be open, to communicate, to be allowed to be a boisterous chorus, calling to one another across the forest floor. When we are in nature here, I hear as I sit here now, the sound of the bullfrog, the cricket, the hummingbird, the distant duck’s cry.

These sounds do not frighten us, in fact far from it, they comforts us, we sleep better with the rush of the water, or the breeze rustling through the forest trees. It’s even got a name “White sound”, some people can’t sleep without it and play it in trendy hotel rooms if you ask for it.

So true “silence” is never in fact ‘silent’ because nature is about communication, nature communicates with itself, even when we shut out and shut off.

It is God‘s way of saying, ‘listen you are all in this together, you must support and love one another, you must get together and help one another through life and to live well and love well and not be lonely’. It actually says ‘it is not good for man to be alone’.

Each animal relies on the other for life, to not be eaten, or taken out and we have the same dangers, if we do not stick together and look out for one another, we become stunted in some way. If we do not draw together alongside one another.

Christ’s first act after being baptised and tempted was to find twelve people to share his life and ministry with, not thousands, just twelve, we are not called to be everybody’s best friend- even Christ had his own best friend in John - we are not necessarily even called to be married, Christ was not and was the most perfect human ever to live, but we are called to live in community and to be open and serve the people we meet.

So this week, think about the importance and the connectedness in nature and how this in turn connects us to one another, that we are not alone, that we should not live lives just looking inside, dulling our senses to the sounds around us.

We were made to be restless until our hearts are reconnected with God. Why is that?

It is because the Holy Spirit is the ultimate Family; father, Son and Holy Spirit. When you look at a Family, you can’t have less than three, you need a mother and a father and out of which comes a child. We even call people having sex, “making love” because actually at the centre of creativity is love. We can say, ‘yes to love’, even if we do not have a husband or wife or child, we are still all part of God’s family and connected to one another. This is the lesson of Jesus and why to, ‘to love one another’ is his ultimate command.

So today, ask God to fill you with the sounds of love, ask God to show you who needs some love. And remember the words, “If you ask you shall receive” and as you give out of yourself, you will receive more love from the divine source as you ask for it and so discover the life that you have given, is so much fuller than a life just kept to yourselves.

So, take the risk today, smile at the stranger you pass, open the doors of your heart to those God prompts you to do so on your path…and… Be blessed.

For thus says the Lord:

Your hurt is incurable,

your wound is grievous.

There is no one to uphold your cause,

no medicine for your wound,

no healing for you.

All your lovers have forgotten you;

they care nothing for you;

for I have dealt you the blow of an enemy,

…

Thus says the Lord:

I am going to restore the fortunes of the tents of Jacob,

and have compassion on his dwellings;

the city shall be rebuilt upon its mound,

and the citadel set on its rightful site.

I’ve just left my little puppy, his eyes so full of trust, his gentle spirit quite remarkable for once so young. But he had an eye that kept being red and sore, the eyelid lashes went in and he needs a few simple stitches for them to grow out the other way. Even as we were in the waiting room, somebody suggested he could become a therapy dog because he was so calm.

It felt heartbreaking leaving him in the leather chair in the surgery, knowing he was going to be put under sedation and have to have an eyelid which is turning inwards and scraping on his eye pulled out the other way.

Of course I couldn’t explain to him that he needed the surgery for his own good, or it would be painful forever. We had come back from holiday and his eye had looked swollen and bad and I thought to myself, what is going on? Why is our poor little beautiful Puppy have this happened to him? It’s so unfair?

But I have always reflected that life isn’t fair, and in fact, some of the things that we have to do to improve our lives involve a painful bit of surgery first.

It felt a bit like a reading for today, which starts with all the sins of Israel which God was justly punishing them for, but then He relents because of course his heart is full of compassion, he is full of mercy and his love is everlasting.

When things don’t go as we want, or according to plan, we can feel it so keenly and be so resentful and wonder what God is doing. Sometimes it’s simply human sin, others turning their back on God and we get caught up in that. But just as they have the freedom to turn away from God we have the freedom in moments of crisis, or in any moment at all, to turn towards God.

The trusting face of the Puppy made me feel so sad leaving him behind- but I knew that it was for his own good.

God’s honing of the the Israelites to make them understand that sins have consequences, is also for their own good.

We all know people with ‘no boundaries’ and how this marks them, and limits them for life. Without boundaries we are prey to all sorts of addictions. Without the boundaries of discipline we can have an inability to focus on anything long term, which means we cannot produce anything worthwhile as all productivity involves discipline. Or indeed without boundaries we can cease to truly care deeply for those around us because that involves sacrifice and giving of ourselves and not the world revolving around “me”.

Gods takes the focus back to Him when we turn to Him, the reliance back on to Him and He teaches us compassion through his compassion for us.

So when we are hurting, physically as well as mentally, we can turn to Christ who said, “forgive them they know not what they do’ as they were hammering the nails into arms on the cross. Arms Spread wide with love.

“It is finished”. What is finished?

Our suffering?

No,not until the end of time. But our suffering alone is finished and death is finished- death has been overcome.

I prayed with my family and friends here for our little puppy.

C.S. Lewis loved animals and used the talking animals in his books, most famously a lion as his depiction of Jesus in the Narnia books. I well remember the scene on Easter morning at the little church, St Peter’s, next to Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge, my father reading to us all at the dawn service the moment when after the mice have tied through the ropes that bound him, Aslan rises from the dead, to the delight and bewilderment of all the children.

The same little church, where I lit a candle on the Easter Saturday, which was the day of his passing, his passing to the other side. I picture all the little dogs he has loved over the years ahead of him, greeting him there.

I feel certain that in heaven all sorts of creatures we hadn’t imagined will be there.

But for now, in this world, when we go through trouble, let us take heart from Jesus’s own words, “In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world” John 16:33

Our peace therefore is in him, even as we wait for surgeons and results and things that don’t always go according to plan.

My lovely little innocent puppy was a reminder to me to me that this surgery is necessary for him to live a long and full and happy life- a short time of pain for a huge amount of gain. We cannot always see why things happen that are hard, but we know that God is with us to give us peace and walks alongside us as we follow his way…

Let us find our peace in him today whatever our circumstances and…

… be blessed!

This is the story of the feeding the five thousand which was the reading this past week from Matthew in the lectionary. But it is not just in Matthew, it is in the other gospels too. In the gospel of John it adds it is a boy who comes forward, giving his lunch to the disciples to give to Jesus. A child, offering his meagre lunch, as an offering for the impossibly large group to feed them. (John 6:8-11)

This seems pointless and impossible and yet in the hands of Jesus it brings the opportunity for God to perform a miracle as he turns to heaven and asks God to bless the food.

Perhaps you feel like the boy with his packed lunch- what can I do that can help with so little? The needs are so vast and deep and wide and I’m just one. How can I enlarge anything?

Unlike the boy, we often think too much, we don’t step out in faith and surrender it to God. We reason that our small part won’t make a difference, so we don’t act.

But it did.

And it still does, when we do.

We think small, we use our own minds and think this is impossible what’s the point? What will my “tiny act of obedience” do?

Well what did it do? The boy gave as he was asked to do, from the little he had, he gave it all. And what he gave, well it fed thousands of people and left twelve baskets of leftovers too. We cannot outdo the generosity of God.

Perhaps we think this is just a nice story?

It is not.

It is a miracle in all the gospels for a reason, so that we don’t forget that miracles are possible when we offer the little we have to God because nothing is impossible with God.

I know of many such miraculous stories of the impossible multiplication of God- not just then but now. Just listen to Inspired, Simon’s podcast, if you don’t believe me https://bit.ly/4pIxCTq

The key is they are very specific, often just for the time when we need it and for his purposes and that moment.

This story is really to remind us all about giving our gifts- however small we feel- to God to see what he will do with them. Sharing it - not hoarding it- but blessing others with it, which in turn blesses ourselves.

God’s need is simple; give me what you have - however small you feel it is, however insignificant and watch me, see what I will do with it. Watch me grow it and bless the world with it.

The God who created the world out of nothing, who said ‘let there be light’ is not limited by your imagination, but by His own- which is infinite and everlasting.

So go ahead, give your ‘little gift’ and watch him multiply your willingness to give all you have, back to the one who gave all he had for you. Watch him do more than you can ever dare to hope or imagine with that ‘little gift”.

See it bless, not simply yourself, but others, so many others...

If we hold on to what we have, what happens when we die? Nothing.

So what will happen if we dare to give it all back to God?

Why not try today, ask him today- total surrender of all that you are, all of what you have, back to God - give all of it - don’t hold back - and see what he will do with it, bigger and better blessings for so many than you dared to hope or imagine.

When you do something for a bigger vision, listen to the voice that says ‘sell all you have to buy this place”- like we decided to - then we began to live in community- this may not be your calling - this form of hospitality but I enjoy it and it is ours. And as “seek the kingdom of God first”, what God is calling you to do- well it will become clear. Just be open and as you dare to hope and imagine- as it says ‘all the rest will be added on to you as well’. God is a generous loving creator who wants the best for our lives…

…So what are you waiting for?

Jesus is asking - like he asked the disciples - what food do you have? Just the one child’s packed lunch, but it fed everyone there over five thousand people- because God is beyond time, the rules of nature, your fears.

He made not just the world, and all the universes behind it and beyond it, but he made you. You are not an accident or here because of fate. You are his gift to the world...

How will you make a difference? What is he calling you to do today? Something that no one else can do? What is he calling me to do too? What is the legacy you are building? What will be there when you’ve gone? Now is the time, don’t hold on to power let it go…expand your horizons…take calculated risks. Love is a risk- giving yourself to anything is a risk. Have courage to take that risk.

Think about it this way, you take risks in your life anyway, you’re going to be hurt in your life anyway, life is difficult anyway. But when risks with God, the risks he wants you and asks you to take or for expanding the world and his kingdom in it.

What he calls you out to do, using your gifts for His glory will be so much more than you dare to hope or imagine.

Well, then you have eternity at your disposal and his own plan for your life to seek out and implement. It really is gaining a life following Jesus, a life which was never yours in the first place, but the gift from God.

So remember our lives are a free gift anyway, so it’s no hardship giving the gift of ourselves back to the God who made us - to show us how to spend it wisely - it makes sense!

We are easily distracted.

So, let us give our whole lives back over to God again today, surrender it all again to God today…and….every day and…

Be blessed!

Helen

Reading a passage from John’s gospel yesterday, I only noticed these words, half way through verse five in chapter fifteen of John’s gospel, for the first time really- about “bearing much fruit” yes, but then at end of verse 8 Jesus speaks of “becoming disciples”. Surely, as we are already in chapter fifteen here, Jesus is speaking to disciples who have been with him through thick and thin already? Aren’t they already his disciples?

In fact, it is an active word he uses here. Another translation reads ‘showing yourselves to be my disciples’. It is by doing something they reveal themselves to be his disciples.

So as modern day disciples, how do we do this today? What does it mean to ‘bear much fruit?’ ‘Becoming disciples?’ How do we show it? How do we be it?

Just as then, so now- By participating- as we participate in the creation story, by being creative ourselves, in other words, ‘bearing fruit’ so we each ‘become’ what we are ‘called’ to be. Each fruit has a seed to create another fruit, as do we.

You may think you have nothing much to give or to do. Not true, we are all unique and have something to offer, ask and you will receive is this promise. No one else can do what you can do.

So start by asking yourself, well, what talents have I been given? What talents can I grow and develop? Like fruit, allow to ripen and be shared in my life?

If you are a performer, singing and writing, or an artist, drawing and painting to the glory of Gospel, this can be your way of ‘bearing much fruit’. But there are other ways. Spending quality time with others, active listening and story telling. Walking in the woods and mapping the way, creating a meal, or painting a scene, making a puzzle, or solving a beautiful mathematical equation, playing a game, outdoors or indoors, or inventing your own games, just using your imagination.

There are many, many ways we bear fruit.

Spending time with one another, cooking, shared meals and shared conversations, shared experiences, spending time over coffee or watching a sunset, or sitting by a river or somewhere quiet to regroup. Watching a film or show together or making a film or play yourselves.

We have disconnected our creative pursuits from the “Creator of all things”, but they do not need to be disconnected.

Our talents were not designed to be disconnected. We were not designed to be disconnected, we were designed to be tribes, races, families working together, doing life together, bearing fruit together - recreating life, together.

At one of the most difficult times of my life, when I felt rejected by those I thought and believed loved me, when vows made to me were broken and it broke me inside too, I decided to use the gifts - the gifts of song and songwriting that God had given me, to write songs of sorrow, but also of hope in what felt like a bleak time.

It was a time when all I had to give at that moment was my ‘free creative gifts’ but it was enough. It was the gifts I had been given by God, to share, and everything else had been stripped back from me. At that moment I found myself on my knees in prayer and instead of despairing, a feeling of a deep sense of peace and inner freedom and hope whelled up within me. I found myself full of praise, defiant praise, whilst the devil tried to strip me and stop me- giving it all back to God, who was in any case was the initial giver, made me free to fully be me. I became unafraid.

I stopped worrying about what others might think about me and what I created- if they’d like it. I just didn’t care anymore and I just kept creating, fear, gave way to love- and creativity, as seeking the “perfect love of god” cast out the fear that had held me bound and back for so long. It didn’t matter what anyone else thought of me, or my work, only God. It was freedom, true, deep, freedom and I wanted to share it with others. The sounds, the poems, the words I wrote began to become about letting the light in…

The songs I wrote at that time were not therefore about death and despair, or even primarily about heart ache and heart loss, despite my circumstances, for the most part I wrote defiantly about life and love and hope and how we can find light even in the darkest of places. Like the Psalmist David, who was surrounded on every side, aware of his own sin, longing to walk closer to God, but drew from each song he wrote, a defiant note of praise to God, I came back to the realisation that I too break vows, I too sin and I too need forgiveness on a daily basis and from that place of repentance, recognising humility as the key to deep joy - a deep desire to get right with God.

From that moment of abandonment in life, God was able to break in with his mercy and love and show me life- lead me towards hope and forgiveness and help me move forwards towards the light.

In fact, my very strap line now comes from that album’s title- “Letting the light in..” I had to do that then, I need to do that now, daily.

We are all broken, living in a broken world and in need of a daily dose of forgiveness and forgiven-ness.

I had forgotten, over the years, as the CD sat gathering dust in a box, forgotten that title for the old original album until I rediscovered a box of those old CD’s clearing out our home.

I had just used it subconsciously when a close friend, Tammy, suggested I should have a signature strap line as she had on her emails. Thinking it was a good idea the phrase - long buried - resurrected itself into my consciousness and popped back into my head. It seemed the right one, the perfect summary - summing up what my desire in life is- to let more of God’s love and light in…to both myself and my parishioners and those I meet along life’s Way. In fact, as someone pointed out to me, my very name, Helen, taken from the Greek root word “Helios” which means ‘sun’ and the name Helēnē It means ‘torch’, ‘shining light’ or ‘bright’. So it seems appropriate as I travel back now from Athens after a wonderfully sunny and special summer holiday with my family…to a wedding of one of our old Moorings’ alumni allowing the light to shine in on their marriage and hope for the future together, that I just rediscovered in the box of my old CD’s that the title was, ‘Letting the light in…’

Then it hit me- I am using it now as my strap line because it is prophetic title, for prophetic songs!

All those tracks, recorded over twenty years ago, lovingly mixed in a little studio called “The Cowshed”, (before the hand lotion and other products had even been thought about) were about letting light in at a very dark time of my life.

The album was produced by the very brilliant jazz and 80’s session singer, with a cult following in his own right, Ian Shaw, whose masterful encouragement at getting me to do layer upon layer of B.V.’s myself, over the live band tracks, gave it a rich edge.

So that little album, which was then picked up by Decca records as part of Universal group, just after their success with Jamie Callum, meant I went from sleeping on my sister’s sofa bed, to getting my own place in trendy Bethnal Green, a large airy flat in a block appropriately named ‘Minstrel Court’.

Before my life in the UK had really started, I suddenly had a career. But, as with record labels so often, they don’t want you to manage yourself- they brought in the “Professionals”, so that we went from the centre page of The Sunday Times’ culture’s next big thing and faces on the back of every bus- when I ran my own label - LoudMouthMusic Ltd- to being the ‘next year’s project for Universal and Decca because they had already spent their marketing budget for that year on something else. The album was ‘put on hold’. So, the fruits that album might have born, got ‘shelved’ for another release date, the title of the album changed, some jazz numbers added in and the album remixed and our band “Honeyriders” replaced our old album as the title of it. The new and shiny one wasn’t bad and used a very good production team- but it hadn’t the old raw energy of the first album which we recorded in a week by simply ‘cracking on!’- as I liked to say to the band. That year we won the “best newcomer” at the ‘Marlborough Jazz Festival’ and we were asked to perform in Ireland and around the country. I was just about to fly off to Cannes to represent UK talent before Britain’s got talent had even been invented!

But meanwhile, that summer, just before I flew out- with hopes riding high- I met James, fell in love and turned my devotions to him rather than the band- so when we married, I turned my attention away from touring and bands, to family and home building. To fostering love with real people, in real time and anchoring myself in that.

My kids joked that I had ‘given up being a pop star to marry dad’ and may be I had. But this brings me back to fruit. What is the purpose of fruit? To nourish and feed those around us. Fruit that isn’t given away, withers on the vine. I had focused on lasting fruit; family, friendships, faith. I never regretted it.

I’ve anchored myself to home ever since and watched it gloriously flourish and grow and me along with it. The family, our friendships and future generations coming in and bringing more in with them. The wedding we went to this weekend was just one more piece of that fruit, the folk we had introduced them to meant they worked hard got on the housing ladder got married in the place of their dreams. So wonderful to see. All their hard working and effort paying off.

I trained as a priest, parking my music on the shelf for the moment, though still singing praises and leading worship both classical and popular in the churches where I worked. Then exploring “Theosis” which was my father’s own theological obsession and his wonderful reflections on it. I started to lecture on his beloved Jesus prayer which illustrated and enabled Theosis so beautifully, I found I was using my theology degree and training after all to guide and shepherd others towards the living presence of Christ. So to then go on and study a Masters at Ridley Hall here in Cambridge with Malcom Guite’s guidance on piety and poetry and write sermons, lectures and poems, to still speak around the world, to still record and hopefully encourage others to let the light in. I really feel have lost nothing simply gained in life. I’m planning to sing at a place called the cedars in New York on November 13th, with the wonderful Sophia accompanying me on harp- I’ve never stopped singing and writing songs, it’s really just who are you writing for? Yourself glorification or reflection of the creator’s allowing his light to shine and through that bringing others towards that eternal and everlasting light themselves…

So life far from contracting life, when we offer it back to God, to Jesus as a servant, well it expands and bears fruit beyond our wildest imagination.

Just look at the disciples, yes they mostly died young, yes they didn’t fully grasp all that lay ahead. But they loved Jesus, they followed him and they knew life is not just about the here and now but about eternity- how we serve our creator. Yes they were mostly simply fishermen from Galilee , but god used them to build an empire for eternity. Yes they could have stayed safe in their village, anonymous and now long forgotten- simply stayed fishermen, but they chose to follow the way of the cross, which is the way of love, life and self sacrifice, a way that leads to hope and light and to fish for people. They chose to be a light and they still bear fruit to this day through their stories.

We are too easily distracted by the temporal and use our gifts for our own narrow aims but life is so much higher and brighter and bigger than that. God has a plan for your life that is so much bigger than yours.

The fishermen could just have fished for fish- but instead they led others to Jesus and are remembered by millions every year, each saint’s day and their stories retold every year to us all- they became fishers of people as Jesus predicted they would, simply by following Him.

As a young girl, I’m sure the distractions of the world would have been too much for me- my gifts would have been short lived and all about me - as it was (quite frankly) for some of my friends now still in that world- the weight of fame is heavy to bear. Now I am not saying you can’t do both, but it is harder. Much harder.

However, instead, I turned to my family, I invested in people and home and place and figure that had made all the difference. ‘The road less travelled by’ became my motto. It has remained so ever since. However things have been, we can always turn back to christ and start now again. Start planting seeds now, in those around you, seeds of love. Seeds of hope, Seeds of life and light.

The seeds of my songs are still there, planted long ago and when I dusted off my old CD, imagine my surprise with the words of the cover song, ‘Colour’ - its theme felt modern. It is about faith, in a world of machines. I realised with a sense of excitement perhaps that it was not meant to be a hit then, but a hit now. It is a prophetic track, the theme “feeling like a machine”- almost human, but not pppppquite- lacking - what? A soul? A faith? A hope in the eternal? Is what AI lacks.

‘Blood down to the bone thicker than lead, poppppsurface alive cellularly dead…’ it’s now how we are when without faith, without a soul. Dead.

The word ‘colour’ in the context of the song is signifying a faith- a belief in more than what is seen- which is more than two dimensional- which is how CS Lewis brilliantly depicts a life in heaven versus a life in hell, in his book ‘The Great Divorce’. It is going from a grey, drab existence of hell, cut off from community and life in suburban streets living further and further away from your neighbour, to the full techni-colour reality of heaven and harmony and beauty and the reality of all creation singing praises to the creator- even the leaves of the trees!There is a bus ready to take you every day to heaven, but not everyone gets on. Some are too busy arguing at the bottom- including theological discussions on the meaning of life! Some get on, but decide to get off before it leaves, worried about what is to come or feeling they’ve left something behind...

Nowadays, we have become so much more about ‘experiences’ and capturing a moment, rather than actually living in that moment- too busy looking at our phones, to look up.

‘Colour’ was written by me over twenty-five years before the advent of AI, before the smart phone, before we started to rely on ChatGBT and photograph our meals rather than just eat them, before Facebook or TikTok or instagram- before even Youtube had got going. So as we realise machines can do somethings better than we can, there are things they cannot do. They cannot be moral... they cannot build communities. They can help us- they are good servants, but they are bad masters. We must not let them master us, for they do not have souls. We must be the ones to not simply ask the questions, but the right questions and give them the right answers, in order for them to preserve the right answers for the next generation and the one behind and beyond that.

The moral, ethical, answers for the future generations to live and thrive by. For the AI robot they cannot “create” internally, they are parasites on actual creativity and our ideas - because they do not have a soul. So we need to sew seeds now for them about human flourishing and how we achieve it- so they can help us bear fruit that will last. It is we who need to give AI a moral and ethical version, if we are not to end up in darkness- we need to sew seeds that let the light in now, and we need to do it today.

‘Colour’ is a song about this faith, it is a song about soul- deep truths- life- and it is a song for now. A prophetic song. A song with the warning seen and sewn in for life. It is not simply about black and grey, but colour- and seeds of that colour must be sewn and formed by us, to bear lasting fruit for the future.

As the human race, we need to reclaim our creative arts as a defiant, deafening cry, against the passive passing on of our gifts.

We must not allow them to “wither on the vine” and see the great truth behind all things revealed to us in the life of Christ that we are known and loved and gloriously made.

You are unique and your voice needs to be heard- perhaps your gift isn’t ‘song’, but whatever it is- as you allow the light in - the light of Christ’s love for you, who from the cross shouted the final defiant cry to death, ‘it is finished’… Death is finished, Jesus wants to share risen life with you and with me starting now, today.

Don’t let things happen ‘to you’ but create, create, create!

Choose life now, a daily choice against just being sucked into the machine.

Do not walk into life now as if dead- come to life, bear fruit, fruit that will last- and start by allowing the light of Christ to show you your gifts and your talents, do not believe the lie of the enemy that you have none. Or even that you can ask AI to do it all for you - there is a joy in creating something ourselves- even imperfectly, as every finger painting toddler will tell you. There is a joy in expressing ourselves and so many new creative ideas come out of mistakes we make - post it notes, crem brûlée, Eton mess- to name but three! We all are created in God’s image, every one.

Allow the love of the father in heaven to transform your faith from something small, a small seed, into a full vine, that can and will grow over a lifetime, as we spend a lifetime becoming and discovering what being disciples of Jesus today together means for each of us and collectively together as we connect- not just through WiFi only -but in person- seek others out- allow mistakes to happen and turn into something good and in it all and through it all, look to love well and … …be blessed!

Life is not about what I earn, or what I own, but rather how can I become the truly magnificent human being God intended me to be?

How can my light shine, so that I can give light to the world?

How can my unselfish, loving actions today, make life a little brighter?

I had a dream, but when I woke it made me feel dissatisfied with my life, it was full of “what if’s?” but it is my choice to stay dissatisfied and to not see it for what it is, the devil’s scheme to try and get me off course from the course I am choosing, defiant joy and hope in things as yet ‘unseen’, “Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice.”.

In some ways, my course never changes because if my anchor is the changeless God, centred in Christ, if my anchor is the love of that changeless God, centred in Jesus, then it can keep me stable, secure, fulfilled, in any and all circumstances. That is how Paul was able to say, “ rejoice all circumstances”, even whilst he was in chains.

Right now, I am sitting gazing over a beautiful scene in the centre of Athens looking at the hill where he reputedly preached his sermon of the ‘unknown God’ to the Athenians. I can see, even from here, people who have climbed up to look at the view which is largely unchanged from what he would have seen then speaking to them. Athens was a powerful nation then.

He spoke in a language they would understand. The ‘unknown God’ was a dedication they had amidst all their other alters to many other gods. Paul helped them realise that God could now be ‘known’ through the presence and life of Jesus, His son and that He was the God of all the gods, the creator of all things and they just needed to call on his name and thereby discover this deep love, the love of god which desires mercy and not sacrifice, as they turn to Christ and his way of the cross.

His ‘burden’ to love the world is a lighter load. He is the willing servant of us all, teaching us how to truly love and so enables us to love in return. The secret to the fullness of joy each heart longs to know.

Paul’s use of their own altar to illustrate that point, the “unknown God” now ‘known’ in the person of Christ, is a reminder to us all that we have to meet people where they are and use language that they will understand. Christ calls us to love people for who they are now and to call them into a relationship with him, so that they can become who God created them to be. We are all called, called to love, chosen and loved as we are.

We have to start this process with the person we often find the hardest to love of all, ourselves.

So today, you may not have the view that I do sitting here in this blissful place in the centre of the Greek city, which was once the centre of the world, but you do have Christ’s open invitation to enter into that relationship with him wherever you are on life’s journey or however far away from him you feel today- it is a daily offering.

Athens itself is also a stark reminder that Greece is no longer the centre of the world - as it once was, the capital city was already superseded by Rome during Paul’s lifetime, the Roman Empire now faded from glory and so on. Brave generals fight for their countries and empires come and go, but the only true centre is Christ.

God calls you and me today, he has been calling us before time and will be there after it ceases.

May we be centred on Jesus today and anchored in his deep, never ending, everlasting love for us today and every day and so… …Be blessed!

Babies have a similar effect. You can’t rush a feed, you need to slow down. When the baby sleeps you have some precious moments of quiet - the choice to fill them, or to take a few moments out to rebalance, is a choice we all face.

In every day there is a chance to be still; we can all be still, even for a moment, or not. Breathe in now, just deeply, the divine love for you, before you fear, or love or hope, or think of the next thing on your to do list, breathe. Breathe in and breathe out, in and out and…

…be blessed!

Helen

Contrast this with the day before… The day before, I arose early, whilst it was still dark, sat by the river at dawn, spent an hour just looking at the river and trees and watched the world awake. The whole day felt totally different from today and yesterday. I felt calm and at peace, my day had lots in it, but it felt manageable and easy. Those around me rushed and stressed and I was able to wipe their stress away like a waterproof coat, better still, I was able to help them improve their day by not reacting to their stresses and strains with some of my own. I was able to be light, rather than shade.

Contrast that with today, I felt somewhat overwhelmed as I looked at my calendar and all the people and things and places I was supposed to juggle. I finally managed my quiet time but I was not focused on it and found my brain kept disengaging and I was totally distracted.

So I’m now actively seeking how I can spend more time just ‘being’ without a phone- without online activity, just sitting and observing life. This is the modern day “treasure” because even when we are ‘alone’ we are scrolling through our phone, messages, WhatsApp, social media and emails. We feel the need to respond NOW to everything.

My father moaned to me that before the invention of the television he would go into the woods with his brother and play endless games which they made up. They would build kingdoms and whole civilisations, read books, collect stamps, quote poems. Or come in on a rainy day and compose plays and paint scenes for their puppet theatre- with paper characters. Then compose stories and sketches to amuse their family and sing around the piano after dinner, reciting the poems they’d learnt off by heart. Basically- they would go and do something creative.

So when I sat watching ‘how to make something’ on Blue Peter, with those now immortal words, “Here’s something I prepared earlier”. Most of the time I was too busy (he pointed out) watching how to make the next thing, to actually make anything at all. You see television was the beginning of teaching us passivity- you’re more active when you’re asleep apparently, because at least your mind is being exercised by dreams. Even the wireless (as my father always referred to it) left you some imagining to do, what the speaker or singer might look like? Or, if it was a story being told, you could imagine the characters. But as soon as you add visuals and a scene, all the mystery and imagination are gone.

But even then, it could be a collective experience, with so few channels to choose from we all watched the same things- there wasn’t a choice. So, when we were found watching television in the TV room, he would stride in and switch it off and turn to us and say, ‘Go and do something creative’. By which he meant, play a game or the piano, sing a song or make one up, or indeed write a poem, or learn one by heart. Indeed, I went to see my Aunt Caroline recently with my sister, and she started singing funny little songs as she ate her food, ‘this is the way we eat our food, yum yum!’ And songs I had long forgotten that dad used to sing like, ‘yes we have no bananas, we have no banana’s today!’ It brought back the fact that he used to sing all the time, doing so many activities and so did I to my kids, instinctively. I even wrote a Lullaby and recorded a lullaby album of all the songs he and my mother sang to me at night, to comfort me as I went to sleep, so I wouldn't forget them.

At some point, somewhere in the last five years, as social media has grown and smart phones become the norm, we started to decide the internet is more interesting than the person who is sitting in front of us because their opinion might bore me and I can’t wait to find out what is interesting about them, so I’ll not bother to get to know them at all. We retreat into our phone and computers and there is no longer a designated ‘TV room’ such as we had in our home growing up- a place where you went to share in the activity of watching a film or a show together. Every room can now be one because we have screens and limitless access to films everywhere. This means even the joint activity of screen watching has become individualised. My daughter has already watched the film someone suggested we should watch together on her own…

When I was small we had three TV Channels and could only watch the ten o’clock news on ITV everything else was on the “beeb” - it was deemed too vulgar to watch ITV which meant on a Thursday night at 7:30pm was Top of the Pops and at 8pm, if we begged to stay up, we were allowed to watch ‘Dallas’. Everyone watched it. Everyone. The next day at school we would all be talking about it. The biggest episode was ‘Who shot JR?’. He was the most hated as the oil tycoon villain with the put upon alcoholic wife. There were bumper stickers with it on, and the whole world held its breath to find out who had done it. And you had to wait… for ages… for the next series. There were no binge box set watching- delayed gratification was an essential part of building momentum.

Far from letting our life get bigger and more expansive whilst we think we are better informed- as we only feed our own appetite and curiosities for whom are we to learn it? If we don’t build Community? Then why do we bother to learn more anyway. We no longer link in this way- few people watch an event at the same time- perhaps with the exception of royal weddings and the funeral of the Queen, I can think of few events we all watch as a nation in the way we used to when it was small, it’s no longer a collective experience but an individualised personal preference. Everyone used to watch the Eurovision Song Contest for example- everyone.

The more time we are left alone and isolated with our thoughts and ourselves, the more anxious we are likely to become. It is easy to start comparing our lives with others, finding that we lack something- we don’t have the perfect diet, bodies, lifestyles and that something we lack can be filled and fulfilled by the endless scrolling and clicking on advice or new regimes. But the reality is we actually are missing something. It is the other- the other we are called to serve and live in community with.

When Jesus says, ‘Do not be anxious but in everything with prayer and supplication bring your requests to your father in heaven’… he says so because He knows it is good for us.

We need to be needed, we need love and we grow strong when we look up and out instead of down and in…

So today, perhaps take a moment to pray first. May be spend time just being and enjoying the places and spaces around you? And perhaps if you are on the bus, the train, the tube- strike may open up a conversation with the other person opposite you, if it feels appropriate. Ask them about their story and their life and find in those meeting points a story that can enrich and enlarge your own and so….

… be blessed!

Helen

When you are hit by unexpected circumstances, it is easy to despair. It is easy to become vengeful, become spiteful, to feel bitter.

Jesus was abandoned by all of his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, whom he had loved, lived, nurtured and worked with for over two years. Whilst one of them at his last supper on earth was going to betray him, he broke bread with him anyway, he ate with him anyway. But as both God and man, both inside time and beyond it, he knew Judas’ heart, he knew he would betray him and yet he took Judas into his inner circle and he loved him anyway. He could see the reasons for his betrayal which even we cannot now understand, he understood Judas and had compassion on him. He didn’t throw him out, he left if his own accord. We all have the potential to be Judas to turn our back on God, to deny him, to deny his existence to ignore his promptings and to not believe his promises of eternal life for those who love and follow him. We all stumble, make mistakes, aren’t “good enough”…But God knows us- he loves us anyway, even as the sinners we are.

Jesus realised how the key to building your life on firm foundations is building friendships. Friendships is how we connect with God and one another. But ultimately the only friendship that really matters, for all the others to be built upon and to thrive under is the friendship we develop with God. Others are fragile because they are frail, human and even when they try to love us, they will let us down.

But building our life on the love of God alone, above all others, is the key to a stable life. We no longer rely on, nor need the approval of others, nor indeed allow their words and actions to harm us. In fact, we can even feel compassion for them, as we begin to view everyone through God, their creator, their father’s lens. Just as Christ did. Just as Christ forgave Peter “the rock” on whom he would build his church. After he betrays Jesus, Jesus asks him to ‘feed his sheep’ to become his foundation of the church - three times he asks if he loves him, just as Peter had denied Jesus three times as he was being questioned and tortured, so he affirms his love for him three times after that event. It cements in Peter’s mind not only that forgave him, that he knew before he did it he would do it, but that, despite that Jesus loved him anyway and would entrust him to building his church here on earth alongside his other frail human disciples- alongside those who ran away in the Garden of Gethsemane. When we ‘repent’ turn back to God, he doesn’t hold our sins against us, he forgets them and entrusts us with building his kingdom. It doesn’t matter what we did before, last year, last month, last week, or even just a moment ago, Jesus loves you anyway too, right this minute, no matter how far you have strayed from the light, no matter how dimly it shines in you. We just need to open the shutters of our hearts once more and let his light back on, let him back in, build a relationship with God through reading his word, the Bible, through prayer and fasting and going to church- finding community- not just online but in person- we need each other to build lasting treasures of the heart.

If we are defined by the people we know, the places we live, and the jobs we have, the stuff we possess, we are building our house on sand. What truly matters is do we know we are loved and known by God?And can we reach out to those around us and give them a taste of that love?

When we fully embrace that truth, that we are loved and known by God, even in very difficult circumstances, even when others come and hate us, and want to kill us, even when we are being persecuted in the press, vilified at home, and our friends forsake us, we are still immovable.

That stability and certainty of the love of God for us, is why from the cross, as well as acknowledging the forsakenness he felt, as God allowed Jesus to die, as he was not rescued from his circumstance, as he paid the full price of sin, so we didn’t have to, he also cried out, “father forgive them they know not what they do” and “it is finished”.

What is finished?

Being alone and cut off from the source of all love, God- it is finished.

The cross is the bridge back over which we are all invited to come, all of us sinners are now welcome to enter into the presence of God once more. We just have to invite Jesus and his Holy Spirit to come into our hearts. We just have to open our hearts and let the light in.

We cross the bridge in a spirit of love and forgiveness, so that when someone wrongs you today, you cry out to the everlasting, never giving up love of God to forgive them and leave it in his hands.

It is the greatest freedom we can have, to allow that light to enter so deeply into our hearts, minds and souls, that we are not defined by our bitterness or disappointments in life, nor gloat in the misery of others, but rather so filled with that love, that we desire mercy and not sacrifice for our enemies. As we wallow in the love of God for us, we begin to see so clearly our own sins, before seeking to judge another.

It is this freedom of forgiven and forgiveness- freely we have been given and freely we give, that makes us full of joy. This overflowing joy, of knowing we are loved all the time, even when we screw up, it is this knowledge that nothing can separate us from the love of God, that gives us room to love because he first loved us and so be blessed!

Why not wallow in the love of God for you today- focus on verses in the Bible that remind you of that truth- however you are feeling right now, that “God so loved the world that he gave his only son so whoever believe in him, may not die but have eternal life.”

And…

… be blessed!

Helen

I am because I am loved

God is begging to come in and show us mercy…

Our hearts are so full of unforgiveness that we find it hard to really believe that we are loved by God. If we really understood the deep, deep never-ending love of the father, if every day we soaked in it, like we soak in a bathtub, we would be transformed by that grace.

Jesus spoke to his father daily, not because he had to, but to top up on this truth that he was loved, I am because I am loved. The first thing the father said as Jesus was baptised in the river and rose out of the water is, “This is my beloved, who I love, listen to him”. That’s the first thing he says before he has been tempted, perhaps that is what sustains him through it- the knowledge of such deep love? Unconditional. Before he has chosen a disciple - the knowledge of such love helps him make good choices. Before he has performed his first miracle, the knowledge of such love makes him fearless and encourages him to do the seemingly impossible things because nothing is impossible for God, no thing! And the only limits come from our limited understanding of such deep love for us. I am because I am loved.

We have to start by knowing we are loved deeply by God. We cannot love others, we cannot even love ourselves, without this knowledge. That is why the first Commandment is, ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind’. Once you are steeped in that love, you have the courage to love your Neighbour as yourself. But it has to start with acknowledging we find it hard to speak to God, to find God, to be aware of God, to feel God in our hearts and our every day living. It is this reason that every day we ask forgiveness for, that we feel cut off from the connection, he is still calling us. It is not because he is not waiting for us, but it is rather because we cannot commit ourselves long enough in the day to seek him first. We are distracted by so many things, eBay, IKEA Amazon, books, tweets, videos and others, always more pressing than turning first to God. So we need to turn ourselves back to the source of our divine happiness at the start of the day, which is not some ethereal yoga retreat or mindfulness exercise, but is found in the personhood of Christ the one person through whom we can be connected with God, being both God and Man, who showed us in his life and his works and all his wonderful words, how to live a life that is fully connected to the love, to the source, perfect love Casts out fear. The love that makes us fully alive. I am because I am loved. So getting closer to God and his divine presence is not in the end about emptying ourselves it is about filling ourselves with ‘good things’ starting with the love of the father- our father in heaven. Not some ethereal presence but a tangible force unveiled and embraced and embodied in the life of Christ.

When I was a child I realised in my simplicity that I did not have “perfect” love and I was unsure how I could therefore cast out fear as the verse instructed me to do, “Perfect love casts out fear”. As I grew older, I began to see that it isn’t about me trying harder to be perfect, it is about allowing the perfect love of Christ into my heart more deeply and so being transformed from within, outwards. A light is a good image here because the lightbulb is the source in the centre of a light, if you don’t have the lightbulb the lamp is just a lamp, but once you have the lightbulb it is a light that can enable others to see too.

So let your light shine today that people may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven who loves you more deeply and more fully than an earthly parent could ever do and...

… Be blessed!

You are the light to guide the way for the next generation and should you choose not to, you leave them a little darker tomorrow than today. But take courage, there’s someone who said- I am the light- you can at any moment turn towards that light- the light that dispels the darkness and say- abide- abide in me and I in you.

You can become a house for that light. And what is that light? It is love.

So open your heart to ‘the light of the world’ the true light that casts out fear- that perfect love which is not your own, but of which you are a part and which you are free to give, because it is freely given. But you need to forgive yourself, first. Do not fear, “Love covers a multitude of sins” and you need to start by loving yourself, not in a narcissistic way, but rather in a way that allows more of that light into the darkest places of your soul. It is from vulnerability that we find love, whilst we are pretending we’re perfect, we will never achieve that goal.

By opening the shutters of your heart- you are letting the light in….

And…truly able to love those around you- not the perfect person they expect you to be, nor indeed the perfect people you assume they going to be, but rather loving each other us as forgiven sinners who ‘failing towards love’ who are letting God’s light in and…

…Be blessed!

Helen

1 Samuel 17:37

“The Lord who rescued me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will rescue me from the hand of this Philistine.”

Have you ever been in a situation where you feel the odds are stacked against you? Perhaps you just keep putting off something you know you should be doing? Take courage.

This reading is taken from the story of David and Goliath at the moment when David offers to enter the fight. He is just a shepherd boy, with no experience, his own brother mocks him and calls him conceited when he arrives, he tells him off for leaving his sheep to come down and “view” the fight. But David isn’t just observing, he is outraged that no one in their army is standing up against the ‘uncircumcised philistine’. In other words, he is the only one he really has faith, the faith that God will rescue them and is with them, whatever the circumstances look like. David, versus the seasoned fighter, like a defenceless boy against a gladiator, but he has the most powerful weapon of all- trust in God and his own experience of defending his flock against bears and lions. This is someone who knows how to fight- without army weapons and without armour, but with skills and wisdom learnt on the hillside and trusting God to guide and prompt him- he has his own weapon of choice always on him- the sling shot - he has trained and taken aim- trusting God as he does so. Goliath is fatally wounded by a simple stone in the centre of his arrogant head, the same head that David cuts off and carries back to Saul as proof of their victory against the giant. Nothing is impossible with God.

What are the Goliaths in your life right now? Those things that look terrifying and looming over you- but with God’s wisdom and grace you have the skills in your own hands to overcome?

Turn towards God and allow his hope and his wisdom to guide you today. Hand over each thing that stands in the way of your peace, each temptation, each desire to procrastinate rather than create- you are made in God’s image. If you dare to face the lion and bears in your life with courage, turning to God for help, what seems impossible now, will be possible. Don’t simply be a bystander - as David’s brother was- be a participant.

Ask God to lead and help you today, whatever you are facing and…..

Be blessed!

Helen

The invisible string is the light, light is what joins us all, it feeds our soul, we need it to thrive, plants need it to grow, but we cannot see it. The “ eureka” moment is depicted as a lightbulb- so light is also energy and creative thinking- problem solving and warmth.

‘Let there be light’, the first words in Genesis, the word “ Genesis” itself meaning the beginning of something… and light is “the dawn”, the start of the new day, dusk is the finishing of it.

Let there be light.

These were the first words that God says to create the world. When we are being creative, we are actually mimicking our creator and we are made in his image his ‘creatures’ and the world replaced the word “creatures “ (created beings) with ‘consumers’ (this has a negative implication simply taking not giving) but that is not who we are, we are actually happiest when giving. We are called into being, to create, like our creator and even the act of being born is a creative one, we create ourselves, bringing new life into the world being the ultimate act and expression of creativity without which we would not be here, we could not exist so let us remind ourselves we are creatures primarily not consumers, we create ourselves first before we consume anything we produce...do not let someone else label you as that because words matter, we matter, you matter, we are matter.

‘Creative’ comes from the Latin word to “bring forth”, “make” or “produce”. So it is a “doing” word with a tangible outcome, linked to God.

This means that actually “let there be light” has deep significance.

As we walk into a room we can bring light or not, it is our choice. Words decide how people perceive us, they bring hope and light or not.

Words then are not useless but the most powerful thing we possess. The old adage, “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me”, is rubbish.

Words can hurt deeply, deeper than we can imagine. It takes years to get over a parent telling us we are an idiot, or we are not worth anything, or not good enough, or we look too fat, or too thin. It takes two minutes to get over a broken bone in comparison. Therefore, what we say, breathing life or death, is the most important thing of all. So guard your tongue, make sure that the things you say are life giving, not just to people around you, but also to yourself.

It’s so easy to tell yourself, I can’t do this, it’s too impossible, it’s too difficult. I don’t know what to do, I don’t have time…At that moment many ignore the prompting of creativity welling up inside, that burning ambition or desire that lights up their soul because it seems too big. In that moment, seek God, turn to God, the spirit knows what to do. God created the world out of nothing, everything that is even an idea in your head, started off as nothing and now it’s an idea, you can bring it to fruition. Every big company, every Corporate, started off as just somebody’s “idea”somewhere, at some point. Why couldn’t it be yours?

God is in charge of the banks, as well as the people, as well as all the beauty all around you, he is in charge of the whole earth, the planets and numerous stars, the universes and galaxies beyond our own. Look at nature- the fabulous, extraordinary, extravagance of it all.

Look out now all around you at how He made creation- the sun, the moon and the stars and be inspired. Look up today at the beauty you take for granted the sky, the clouds, the stars, the trees, the leaves the sun...

Let there be light!

It starts with just a word- speaking it out, “let there be light” today and let it start with me.

And… be blessed!

Helen

Being in this present moment, in this garden, in this time of hope, learning to listen to God in the lapping water’s edge, in the singing of the birds in the sound of the oars on the water, the sighs of the trees, their leaves rustling in the wind, like a long breath.

This is what I am leaning and learning - that in this moment I can draw close to God, who is ever present even when I am lost in the cares of this life.

I need nature to refocus me on beauty, truth and love. The free gift of nature encourages me to reconnect with my Creator, which is what we have in natural beauty, beauty all around us echoing the beauty within, which is the small, still, voice of God opening the door and beckoning us in.

Today perhaps try to find a moment to step out into the sunshine, or rain, to snatch a glimpse of the sky, to soak in the glory of it, and to listen to the wind in the trees and the birdsong. To just stay still in that present moment for a moment, just being, being present as our present to God and….

…Be blessed!

…We are.

God isn’t hiding, we are.

Prayer is all about coming back to the here and now..

What part of us is able to detach? It is our mind and thinking- we think about the past, the future, but we dwell in the present. Being is in this moment.

The essence of prayer is being, being present in this moment.

If you think back to the story of the Garden of Eden, it is Adam and Eve who hide from God, who realise they’re naked. Thinking they perceive they’re naked and they are ashamed.

Perception is always in the here and now I see you and see the light and the sounds and smells. But thinking makes our mind wander- what if God sees me naked? Has he already? Should we make clothes?

Just being, this is in this moment- it’s perceiving, looking at what’s all around you. Drinking it in. It’s why I love being here- I enter almost immediately into the garden and encounter the imprint of the divine all around me and can breath it in. I can just for a moment wait a while and be here. Anchored in this moment. Moored here.

Why did I ‘buy a garden with a house attached’, as my husband likes to say. In fact, what he actually says is, “Most people buy a house with a garden attached, but you bought us a garden with a house attached”.

This is because I perceived that the magic is in the garden, in the land, in the ground, in the river. We take it for granted our need to step outside, until we cannot do it.

Lockdown was hardest for those with no space to go outside. Why? It is because when we go out into nature and look and listen, we are in the moment perceiving creation- God’s welcome to us- his gift. We become downcast without the ability to go outside which is why prison is a punishment and a home is a pleasure because we have the freedom to go outside not remain in our room.

God isn’t just in the heavens, he’s here in the core and reality - just listen, smell and don’t think. You will feel it.

Body is here and now our body anchors us in reality. Your and my body are the temple of the Holy Spirit- go inside your body, not inside your thinking- your mind wanders- what will I eat for breakfast, who will win the next election? It goes forward and backwards- into the past and into the future- but your body is here - it is grounded in the now. It is concrete. Feel it. Feel you have feet and a head and breath.

This week I went to a leadership conference and to hear a talk on stillness and the speaker said,

“Close your eyes, feel your left knee and feel your hip. The first thing I realised is I am not in touch with my body at all..that I am here and I am in my body”.

As I begin to feel my body, I feel the spots of discomfort in my body- I breath deeply into those spaces and places, I felt the tension dissipate...

He says, “And the spirit is present and I hadn’t even prayed.. here and now sitting still there God is. He is closer to myself than I am to myself”.

He urges us, “Don’t detach, not from your emotions, not from your body, be present in this moment, feel your body”.

It was hard to do. I like to fidget. But it was somehow good and refreshing going over each part, allowing myself to feel it. Then breathing, deeply in and out- down to my stomach and up to my throat. Feeling it as he said.

As Teresa of Avila said, “Had I learnt earlier what a king inhabits my heart, I wouldn’t have left him alone so often.”

“Practice every day going deeper” he says. He does an hour a day.

How do I do this? Perhaps how do I even do ten minutes? Well I form a habit- I inhabit my body and I take my prayer rope to ground me, to anchor me, to draw me back from the distractions that come in and try to take me away from the presence of Christ.

As my father used to say, I ‘practice the presence’ and being present with the words of the The Jesus prayer, deeply breathing in the words, “Lord, Jesus, Christ, Son of God,” deeply breathing in the spirit of Jesus.. then gently exhaling out all that hinders, breathing out on the words, “have mercy on me, a sinner’ but always coming back, at the very end to “Lord Jesus Christ”. It begins where it ends- and is both Alpha and Omega - having mercy on me- the God of infinite kindness and love having mercy on me, enfolding me in his embrace- his creation his spirit forming within. Crying out his name as I invite the spirit to dwell more deeply.

The speaker, Johannes, for that is his name, said that ‘doing things, speaking- the essence of a relationship, is not words- but being together. In fact words that are born out of silence carry depth.’

It is true being able to read, or sit quietly, alongside someone is comforting only when you know them well. It can feel awkward when you don’t.

I have my own prayer room- a little chapel- we say daily prayers there, but I have made places to be chapel all over the garden- a Japanese open space, a grey pavilion - the greenhouse- the swing seat by the river. These are all places and spaces to encounter the divine.

“Do it at a time when you’re fully awake”, Johannes urges us.

Christian Contemplation is relational, it is the opposite of Buddhism. It is not some sort of gnostic mindfulness, an emptying of self. But rather, a deeper true awareness of self. Meditating on Jesus is not emptying ourselves, it filling ourselves with the person of Christ, allowing His presence today to enter more deeply in. Asking his Holy Spirit to guide, fill and restore us.

So do it when you’re fully awake, sit, be aware of your body, breath- be present - and let the love of Christ, the Holy Spirit fill you…

And… be blessed!

Life has a strange way of throwing things at us we don’t expect, that are hard to deal with, and that if we let define us, would destroy us. However if we take up our difficulties and hand them back to God they can become a way into understanding his grace for us more deeply. Everything in life does in fact take energy and effort and it means if we desire to build something worthwhile, we need to say “yes” to some things and “no” to others. There is always a choice to be made and sometimes long term it can feel hard to deny ourselves in the moment, but as we do so, we see true, deep, lasting growth and happiness as we seek our long term best, not just for us, but for those around us.

It strikes me that so often we have become all about “saving our lives”, rather than finding them. In other words, what is in this for me? How can I look better? How can I be thinner? I look on Facebook now at a friend’s message and every other picture below it is an ad for a “thinner body” or “better face”. If we spent as much time working on the inside, instead of on the outside, we’d all be saints by now! I am not anti-caring about our bodies, I work out too and try to eat well, we are God’s temple after all, but it can’t be all about my looks, or we stop looking deeper both at ourselves and one another- getting fit is good, but making it our life is a short sighted goal and a temporary achievement as compared to nourishing our souls which we should also view as daily activity.

I have begun to see that when we give over our whole selves to God, this means entering into the pain of those around us and understanding where they are coming from. This then opens us up to empathy, seeing things from God’s perspective and not just our own. This is a life long journey which we are on all together.

It struck me that the deep empathy of Christ on the cross is that He understood the pain of the robber next to Him, and his deep desire to be forgiven and that the robber totally saw and understood that Christ didn’t deserve to die and he acknowledged this by asking to be remembered when Jesus came into His Kingdom, he believed Jesus was the Son of God - whatever appeared to be the reality in front of him- he believed. It was an act of defiant faith and hope even as he was dying and deserved to be there.

Like the robber, we all, at our core being, long to be loved for who we are. Christ saw him and loved him. And said, “Today you will be with me in paradise”. He rewards our faith in the unseen heavens around us as we cry out to be remembered by Him.

I know we can all become distracted by many things, but it comes down to this good news, the most important news for each of us, that God does love us all, in that deep way, just as we are, and not even as we hope to be- like all the ads on social media promise. He says simply, be with me today in paradise - come as you are. And once we fill ourselves up with that love, that deep unconditional love, we can start giving it out to others, the sacrifice of having to go the extra mile, feels like nothing, when you realise what that does for the one in front of you and how it makes them feel. There is the empathy in seeing it from God’s perspective. Even the pain of getting fit, feels like less when you realise how it makes you feel and enables you to be healthy for those around you- to help them, can be your motive. And just like the pain of doing scales makes you a better singer or musician, we cannot avoid sacrifice to achieve things, in fact we need to embrace it to lead abundant lives.

It is inevitable in life that we have to sacrifice to become good and better at anything- we need to sacrifice our time too, to truly love our friends and our family- kids only know us if we are present for them and they will only not be on their devices, if we aren’t on ours. So carving out time for one another is something that pays dividends in the long run.

In the end, we find life in the community we inhabit, not in the commodities we buy. Fostering friendship and community can feel like giving out, but we get back in so many ways, seen and unseen, when we do.

Yesterday, I had an altercation with somebody on the street because they didn’t want a friend of ours parking near their house on our street- perhaps they felt there were just too many cars there. It felt sort of unreasonable, as their own home has a driveway and the person was parked on the public part of the street. So when somebody becomes aggressive like that, it’s natural to defend the friend and be aggressive back. But then I started thinking about what it must be like to live in one of the little houses along the road with their small gardens and to have people coming and going past all day as we live at the end in the cul-de-sac with a large garden and so we don’t have that traffic. Yes, of course people are visiting others not just us, but we have a lot of friends and folks coming to see us and perhaps it feels evasive and perhaps if I lived there, I would feel annoyed at another car parked. Perhaps?

So I felt cross with myself for not having more empathy for their situation, in the heat of that moment, how could I have been kinder? What should I do now?

Well, I don’t do this often, but I decided to go out and buy some really beautiful flowers, a plant rather than cut ones, that could grow in their garden. I left it on the doorstep with a card of apology that it had upset them. By the way, I am really not that nice, so I know it is God working in me that prompted me to do it. But, do you know what? It felt good when I had done it. It gave me joy, it was a random act of kindness that filled my soul and made me feel lighter and my life more abundant.

So, here’s my suggestion for you for today, try to avoid listening to things that talk about “our rights” and focus on what is right. It is just a more healthy way to live. I also believe it leads to abundant life to have a very large dose of forgiveness up your sleeve, which you can ask to have injected into your bloodstream at any time by the Lord Jesus Christ because His blood has been shed for you and for me, for all time, so that we are reconnected through our loving Saviour with our Heavenly Father, who has an everlasting embrace of never-ending love waiting for you and for me, which can and will fill us with joy, whatever circumstances we find ourselves in.

So why not ask God to give you an opportunity to share a random act of kindness with someone today, perhaps even someone who doesn’t deserve it? Just like Jesus himself did from the cross, as a final act of kindness and forgiveness to the robber on the cross next to him who repented. This final act of love of Jesus, even in agony, shows that it’s never too late to do so, at any point in our lives, and taking up our cross means looking out for the other. So, why not try it today? And…

… Be blessed!

Why should we praise God?

I was thinking about this as we led a joyful procession around the church, complete with children waving palms joyfully around the building, last week on Palm Sunday. Praising Jesus as he entered in Jerusalem and he fully too entered into that moment, sitting on the colt, knowing that in less than a week those praises would become shouts of “crucify him!” Yet it didn’t stop him, living in that moment, enjoying the praise, caring for those around him, by fully entering into the joy of those Hosannas.

Why praise? Well when we praise it takes our focus off ourselves, our needs, our desires and focuses us fully on God.

When I really enter into praise, I have no time to be sad, full of self-loathing, judgemental, or a perfectionist. I am just focus on the loving, all encompassing, eternal nature of God. As we enter into his ‘courts with praise’ and thanksgiving that allows more of him to enter into us.

How then do we draw near to God? Is it by giving him a long list of our desires and wishes? No, although he likes to hear our desires and wishes and give us the deepest desires of our hearts. But he knows in advance that the deepest desire is to be loved and love in return. This is praise, to praise is to love, deeply and unreservedly. Repentant of our neglect in the past, of our distractions, of caring too much what others think and caring too little about what God thinks. Our disobedience, our disbelief, our doubts - we lay them all aside, we leave them behind, as we praise. It’s simply letting more of God’s light in. Praise! Praise the Lord oh my soul. As we praise the focus shifts from us to God. We are enabled to live in a larger and more faith fuelled way. It is the light at our centre that we turn on, the radio frequency that we tune into, it is the living water that quenches our insatiable thirst.

Praise! We draw near by focusing on God, the goodness of God, his majesty, our own fears, trials and troubles melt away. This is not to say we cannot be sad, we cannot offer up ourselves and all our shame and fears to God but praise puts them in perspective.

So why not lay aside whatever else you are doing and begin to fearlessly praise God today? Start your day with praise.

Enter into praise, heartfelt praise, whole self praise, singing, jumping around or just being still, listening to praise fully, be it Tallis or Tim Hughes - enter in and fully engage with your heart mind and soul and….

…be blessed!

This is the fifth week of Lent, when we can take a moment to contemplate the blood of Jesus - his sufferings - those sufferings for us- on the cross, so today we can hand over our “lack” and our “failings” to Him.

Take the places where you feel lack, take them to the cross today, and allow the love of Jesus to wash over you, to wash you clean and renew and refill you.

Being washed clean means coming just as we are, we follow the way of the cross ourselves, from our own fragility and frailty and bring that, our human condition and diseases to Christ to transform and to begin a work of healing. To enable us to look outward and to become upward looking from our soul, inside out, now filled with his love to pour out of ourselves into the world.

In other words, the way of self-sacrifice, putting others before ourselves because Christ not only shows us the way, but is the way. Now we can follow Him by asking God to prompt us to engage with the needs of those around us, filling us up with his Holy Spirit to bring us insight and wisdom, as we dwell more deeply in him and so dwell more deeply in the sins and frailties of the world He created.

Stilling our hearts long enough to hear the still small voice’s promptings.

So today my question to you is: ‘What ‘right’ is God asking me to give up today?’

How can we see our neighbour as someone to focus on, rather than as someone who is an interruption or our family perhaps?

How do we interpret the world around us, in the light of the love of Christ?

How can we as we repent of our sins?

How can we begin by not putting our needs always before those around us?

How can we realign ourselves with the servant king who says, whilst we are being punished and punishing ourselves, about our ‘lack’ that we can and should look to Jesus- to fill our empty souls.

As he says, even from his cross, even as his blood is being poured out for us, “Today you will be with me in paradise.”

So why don’t we allow Him entry to our souls so we can start paradise living today.

Let us hand over our whole hearts to Him in penitence and faith again today- opening our eyes to the needs of those around us and….

…be blessed!

But, before you do…

… spend half an hour in prayer and praise, just praising God for being so good all the time.

Thank him for all the wonders He’s done in your life, in that of your family and friends and make yourself remember the things that have been miraculous in your own life, the answers to prayer. If you find it hard to do, then ask him to show you.

In this season of apple blossom and flowers on bud and bloom, perhaps go outside and praise him there- for the beauty of nature? For all created things.

Or, if you are hiding away, or in turmoil and trouble, wherever you are, praise him for inner peace- the peace which passes all understanding and which no one can take from you. And….

…And perhaps start with this Psalm 102, the Psalm for today, which is written not from a place of deep praise, but actually from a place of deep sorrow and desperation. But, despite that, it still is “praise” because the Psalmist is choosing to believe “my help comes from the Lord”.

So join with me today in daring to believe that it is true and…

…be blessed!

Helen