Thoughts from The Vicarage with caring for others, Sunday and Lent.
Greetings and welcome to our new readers, please find attached Pews News.
We celebrated the feast of Candlemas, the presentation of Christ in the temple last Sunday – a pivotal point as the tree and crib are taken out of church as we now look Lentwards – and beyond – to the temptation, passion and death of Jesus. Lent may conjure up many thoughts for you – often they are to do with a giving up or a letting go. The idea being that one is then more able to make space or give attention to God and matters spiritual.
We will be holding Lent groups once again this year and will be using the booklet Dust and Glory with 40 daily reflections and prayer. I have some copies available please email me if you would like one at £2 each.
If you would like a longer read the author, Dr Emma Ineson has also written the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lent Book Failure: What Jesus Said About Sin, Mistakes and Messing Stuff Up. This runs alongside and elaborates upon the smaller booklet along with questions to stimulate your thinking and prayer.
In school we prepared for Lent with my home-made wilderness (!) in a baking tray with sand and rocks and thought about Jesus being hungry, suffering thirst in such a place. After half term we will think about Lent in terms of caring for others which is of course one of the most important things we can do to make a positive difference in our world. In Romans chapter 12 verse 13 we are encouraged to “Share with God’s people who are in need.”
So this Lent, instead of giving up you might like to think about helping either the West Berks Foodbank or the local one in Lambourn by giving an item or two each week of Lent. There’s a super poster attached to this edition of Thoughts which takes you through Lent week by week offering suggestions of what to donate. Simply buy one or two of the suggested items each week during Lent and put them in the Foodbank box in the churches. We’re also putting a poster on the church railings to attract others to join in. Maybe encourage all members of the family to join in as they make a choice of which item to donate each week!
Caring for others is of one of the most important things we can do to make a positive difference in our world. News of the disastrous earthquake across Turkey and Syria has drawn a lot of media and charitable attention as the plight of so many thousands of people has become so vividly evident.
Remember to come along on Saturday if you’d like to find out more about the Christian faith, what goes on in church or are simply curious you’d be very welcome to Come and See on Saturday 3.30 pm at the Vicarage for tea, with coffee a possibility and cake! Simply come along and share a cuppa and cake as we chat through some of the questions and thoughts we may have. No query ever too small in my book!! Just drop me a quick line, call, text and if you forget just come along – all welcome.
This week our Diocesan Bishop Steven has once again spoken powerfully, this time at the General Synod, the national assembly of the Church of England this week. Just a couple of hours ago General Synod voted in favour of a motion to offer blessings to same-sex couples in civil partnerships and marriages after an eight-hour debate over two days. Approval of the motion allows same-sex couples to go to Anglican churches after a legal marriage ceremony for services including prayers of dedication, thanksgiving and blessing. For more information, please go https://tinyurl.com/2p9hmny3
Looking ahead to Sunday as I prepare my sermon, I found myself wondering if you read the gospel or any of the texts? Don’t worry there’s no test!!
This week’s Gospel is part of the sermon on the mount – the bit when Jesus says don’t worry about your life, don’t worry about tomorrow. All easier said than done sometimes.
I think that we are invited to live like what we believe is true, which in fact it is, whether you believe it or not — that God is like a generous father who knows what you need, and a nursing mother for whom it’s impossible to forget her baby at her breast (Isaiah 49:15). Don’t fret about the future but enjoy the present moment. And consider the psalmist “I have quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother” (131:2).
But it’s not always easy is it? I resonate with the farmer-poet Wendell Berry (born 1934) and his poem The Peace of Wild Things. Here he echoes the words of Jesus about the worries of life:
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
For more on our Gospel next Sunday do come along! Looking forward to seeing you meanwhile,
God bless
Julie