Thought for the Week

Many people have a favourite Christmas carol. For me there is a line in O Little town of Bethlehem that resounds each year, ‘the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight’.

Each year this is true. What are our hopes, our expectations, our plans for Christmas this year? Even John the Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus, wasn’t sure (he was, like us, only human). He sent a message to Jesus asking if He was the one, or should they expect another? John had expected dramatic features of the Messiah’s coming along with everyone else at the time. Yet Jesus came in such a surprising way, and in His ministry revealed the Kingdom not through revenge on enemies, judgement and force, but through compassion and healing, mercy and forgiveness.

Jesus turns all our expectations upside down. As we prepare for Christmas we focus on Jesus who became the least of all. The abundance of God’s love revealed by becoming the smallest of all, a tiny human child.

Jesus reveals the sheer greatness and infinite vastness of God’s love and mercy that for each of us always exceeds all we can ever expect or hope for. Paul

Prayer for this week

O Lord Jesus Christ, who at your first coming sent your messenger to prepare your way before you: grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries may likewise so prepare and make ready your way by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, that at your second coming to judge the world we may be found an acceptable people in your sight; for you are alive and reign with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

God for whom we watch and wait, you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son: give us courage to speak the truth, to hunger for justice, and to suffer for the cause of right, with Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Readings this week

Isaiah 35 : 1 - 10

James 5 : 7 - 10

Matthew 11 : 2 – 11