Jen, Craig & Russell
Here we are, at the last Sunday of the Easter Season, with Pentecost just around the corner. Tom Miles will be presiding and preaching this Sunday, with Gary and Jen out at the Annual General Meeting of Conference. Tom’s theme: Up, Up and Away.
GLEANINGS… an interesting word from the Conference Executive Secretary, Rev. Doug Goodwin… his message for the Annual Meeting:
Isaiah 41:10… “I will hold you in my hand”
The recent swine flue frenzy is just the most recent example that we live in fearful times.
To be sure, there is much to be fearful of, and as our population ages our fears will only increase.
The scriptures, too, encourage us to fear… but interestingly the only one we are to fear is God. Everything and everyone else we are not fo fear. We tend to say, “Fear others and don’t worry about God,” while the scriptures say “fear God and don’t worry so much about others.” As usual, the Bible turns our reality upside down.. or at least tries to.
“Do not fear, for I am with you … I will uphold you with my victorious right hand.” The One whom we are to fear is also the One who holds us, strengthens us, helps us, protects us. This is a present reality and a future promise.
I am not sure what fear of the One whol lovingly holds us might look like… but I do know that it puts all our other fears into a much different perspective. In an anxious age and within an anxious church, it enjoins us to relax a little, to put aside our saviour complexes, to be more generous and forgiving of one another, to be more welcoming to the stranger, to be less suspicious of our sisters and brothers in the church.
We are cupped in the gracious hands of a gracious God. What have we to fear?
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