Daily Scripture‘That night the Lord stood near him and said, ‘Keep up your courage!’ (Acts 23 v 11)Daily Reflection Courage – the willingness to face uncertainty without fear. We are living in uncertain times right now – no-one knows what the next news update will say, and we can’t know what the world will be like 6 months from now. In the verse above, Paul has been beaten, imprisoned unfairly, but the Lord appears to him and tells him to keep up his courage. Very often, whenever the Bible talks about courage, it starts by saying “ Do not be afraid..” Courage is the absence of fear. Deuteronomy 31 v6 says this….”Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid, for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you”. You have a helper in life - One who will never leave you, One who can dispel all fear and give you courage to face the day – His name is the Lord. Vicki Young
Daily Scripture‘Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’’ (Luke 10:25-28)Daily ReflectionThe lawyer who gave Jesus this answer, was quoting the Jewish prayer known as the Shema, after the first word of the prayer in Hebrew, which means ‘Hear…’. This prayer, which Jewish believers recite twice daily, acts like The Lord’s Prayer does for us, setting out the tenets of the Jewish faith: The Lord is one, the Lord is the only God. We are called to love him with all that we are and all that we have. When we want to pray to God, a good place to start is always with the simplest, most comprehensive prayer. Even when we cannot find our own words to speak to God, the Lord’s Prayer gives us all that we need to know, just as the Shema did for this Jewish lawyer.Revd Ylva Blid-Mackenzie
Daily Scripture‘Almighty God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you; pour your love into our hearts and draw us to yourself ...’ from today’s CollectDaily ReflectionThese words are quoted from St Augustine (354-430), who is remembered as a bishop, philosopher and theologian. However, his youth and early adulthood were far from saintly, and his path to faith was long and by no means smooth. Like many in our own day he spent much of his life looking for ‘happiness’ in sex and every kind of self indulgence, but was left only with a sense of dissatisfaction and emptiness. It was only when he experienced for himself the love of God (largely thanks to the faithful prayers of his mother, Monica) that he found what he had been searching for all along: peace and purpose and real fulfilment.Let us pray that God may draw us to himself and that in him we may find peace.Revd Rosemary
Daily Scripture:From today's Collect: 'Almighty God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you; pour your love into our hearts and draw us to yourself...'Daily Reflection:These words are quoted from St Augustine (354-430), who is remembered as a bishop, philosopher and theologian. However, his youth and early adulthood were far from saintly, and his path to faith was long and by no means smooth. Like many in our own day he spent much of his life looking for ‘happiness’ in sex and every kind of self indulgence, but was left only with a sense of dissatisfaction and emptiness. It was only when he experienced for himself the love of God (largely thanks to the faithful prayers of his mother, Monica) that he found what he had been searching for all along: peace and purpose and real fulfilment.Let us pray that God may draw us to himself and that in him we may find peace.Revd Rosemary
