Category: Thought for the week

Apart from faith and family my two main passions are music and photography. I distinctly remember the first time I was deeply moved by a piece of music I was a 9 year old boy at the time.. My parents gave me my first camera – a Kodak Brownie 127 – a year later and I used it for the first time during a family camping holiday in mid-Wales. I took several pictures of some chickens that visited our tent each day on the search for scraps of food.

Photographers love cameras and all the associated equipment. Which was my favorite camera shop? Jessop’s of course. Music lovers pass many hours browsing through LPs and CDs at record shops. Which was my favorite shop? Yes, you’ve guessed it, HMV. Unless you are not a watcher of TV news or a reader of the papers, you will know that both of these long established and very well known retailers have gone into receivership and are no longer trading. For me, and for many others like me, this is very bad and very sad news indeed.

Many would say to me, “shops are a thing of the past, internet retailing is the future”. I would reluctantly have to agree with them and say that this new age of buying and selling has many advantages over the old way of bartering for goods over the counter but think what we are losing – community.
The Post Office closed suddenly in the village where I lived some years ago and I remember the profoundly negative effect its demise had on village life. It seemed that something of the village died that day. The number of people walking back and forth from the village centre plummeted and there were far fewer opportunities and much less reason for people to leave their homes and bump into friends and neighbor for a catch-up and a mardle (gossip). Community life was severely damaged.

Do you know, it’s possible to go to church on the internet these days. For some time there have been “Virtual Churches”. You can hook up with them to experience worship, teaching, prayer and to become part of an “on-line community”. I can see the attractions at this time of year….. No getting up for me at some unearthly hour on a Sunday morning and making my way to church on a dark and freezing cold morning. All I would have to do would be to crawl out of bed, go downstairs, fire up my computer and lead my services from the comfort of my own study. I could even record the material, broadcast it automatically and take Sundays off. Now there’s a thought!

But Jesus didn’t come just to teach us facts about the kingdom of God, or to encourage us to sing songs and pray in isolation. No, he came to show us and to encourage us to build a new community. And true community can never be virtual. True community means being with people, sharing the same space, breathing the same air. Seeing one another, talking with one another, and even touching one another. Church is community – church people are in community with one another and with God – and that is why it can be such a life giving, joyful and essential thing to be part of.
James Nash – Rector of the Church in the Woottons

Looking outside my front window I see the snow falling and covering Kings Lynn with a beautiful blanket of white. Soon I will hear the kids outside throwing snowballs, laughing and playing in this new playground, wonderfully created for such a time as this. I have a tendency to moan about the cold. I’m really beginning to feel it now that I am getting older. Not to mention the after affects it has. Slipping on the icy pavement, frozen pipes and cancelled buses, to name a few. But for a moment, looking out my window as I see this clean, beautiful blanket of white, I am reminded of Christ and the price He paid for me to be that clean before God. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin and though our sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow if we choose to believe and receive Him as Saviour and Lord. It’s amazing how God’s creation can inspire the thoughts of a man like me. To be drawn to His Son looking out the window as the snow falls.

Vince Proffett, Calvary King’s Lynn

I’m not a great one for New Year’s Resolutions. Those vague aspirations to lose weight, get out of debt and exercise more are bound for failure by now. They are not “smart” and haven’t motivated for resolve. It is two weeks into 2013 now, so why not grab a piece of paper and re-plan for some real life change in 2013?

Firstly don’t have too many goals – our minds just can’t focus on more than five.

Secondly make them SMART – Specific (identify exactly what you want to achieve), Measurable, Actionable (every goal starts with a doing word like Quit, Finish…), Realistic (it will stretch you but is possible) and Time-bound (it has an end date).

Thirdly write them down – a friend of mine has his goals on a post-it note by his desk.

Fourthly go public. Tell friends or family, post it to facebook, start a blog! People will ask how you are doing and that is a powerful motivator!

This year one of my goals is to “Blog my way through the whole Bible everyday at www.thegatewaychurch.info/blog”

Why not make one of your goals to read the whole Bible through – it’ll only take 12 mins per day and it will do you good! I’m using the Murray M’Cheyne Plan

Andy Moyle, The Gateway Church

What are your goals for 2013?

Just before I moved to the Woottons I took a three month sabbatical which I spent living in my caravan making my way along the East Anglian coast, and eventually, with my wife Linda ending up in the Scottish Highlands.
My journey began on the Dengie Peninsular formed by the River Crouch to the south and the River Blackwater to the north. I stayed on a farm not far from Bradwell-on-Sea and could get to the coast by walking a couple of miles through reclaimed marshland. The flat landscape, the big skies and the tranquillity reminded me of parts of Norfolk and it was easy to find peace away from the hustle and bustle of normal life. Within easy reach was The Church of St. Peter on-the-wall built by St. Cedd in 654 AD on the foundations of the Roman fort of Othona. Cedd had travelled by boat from Lindisfarne to spread the good news of Jesus to the East Saxons.
My journey took me to the Suffolk coast and then around the Norfolk coast from Great Yarmouth to Burnham Thorpe. My wife Linda joined me for the second half of my trip and we journeyed up north to Loch Lomond, the Kintyre Peninsular and the shores of Loch Linnhe near Fort William.
I spend the first three days of my sabbatical in silence. I find that “retreating” from normal life in that way is a very good way focus on prayer and my relationship with God. I think our busy, noise-filled lives mean that so often we are unaware of God’s presence and we so easily miss what he is trying to say to us. My first rule of prayer is to create space for God.
I found God in the silence certainly, but also in the beauty of creation. Whether watching the stormy skies over the Blackwater Estuary, the waves lapping onto the shores of Winterton beach, or being overwhelmed by the majesty of the mountains in the west of Scotland I feel inspired to wonder at God’s creative acts. How strange then to hear so many references to the thoughts of scientists like Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking rubbishing the idea of God and dismissing people with faith as deluded. To these two gentlemen and others like them I want to say – stop trying to explain away God with science but open your eyes and see the work of the author of creation. Then stop and listen for the still small voice of God.
The Revd. James Nash Rector of the Church in the Woottons

The purpose of mankind is to manifest good in a myriad of ways and thereby to give glory to God. Because of the complexity of good an individual usually requires training, practice, repetition and the co-operation of others in order to manifest good.
If a person does wrong (sin) the co-operation of other people is lost so that it becomes difficult for that sinner to do good. But Jesus knows that sinners can still do good. The church therefore runs charities which co-operate with any person wishing to do good, whatever their past mistakes.
CAFOD (the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development) is the international aid and development charity for the Catholic Church in the UK. CAFOD is 50 this year. By focusing work on the poor and the marginalised of the world, CAFOD provides not only development and emergency aid but CAFOD also campaigns, with other organisations, to change the root causes of poverty and injustice. In Lent 2012 UK Catholic parishioners donated over £8.7 million to CAFOD.
Campaigning works. Previously successful campaigns include; the Jubilee 2000 petition which achieved $110 billion of debt cancellation; the co-founding of Fairtrade in 1992; the signing by 144 countries of the Ottawa agreement which bans the manufacture, sale and use of land mines; the ‘Make Poverty History’ campaign which increased aid to developing countries by $50 billion; the ‘Ethical Trading Initiative’ and the ‘Clean up your Computer’ campaign which improved the working conditions in developing countries; and the ‘Unearth Justice’ campaign when 7 major jewellers signed up to the Golden Rules, improving justice in mining. In 2010 CAFOD joined with other charities to urge the government to maintain spending on overseas development to reach the agreed 0.7% GNI by 2013. Last year UK aid treated 100,000 HIV sufferers, vaccinated 3 million children, built 12,000 classrooms and trained 100,000 teachers in developing countries.
In 2012 CAFOD ran a ‘Thirst for Change’ campaign to bring basic services of clean drinking water and sanitation to more people in developing countries. Over 60,000 people signed the petition. Currently 783 million people lack access to clean water and 2.5 billion lack access to safe sanitation. It is estimated that a child dies every 20 seconds because of preventable infections caused by poor quality water and sanitation.

Jesus continues to make good manifest because God is the source of all good.

Peter Coates.