LOVE

Mark 12:30-31 (NIV)
³⁰ Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’^{[a] 31} The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’^[b] There is no commandment greater than these.”

Over the last week the news and social media have  been full of "discussions" about love..mainly relating to same sex relationships. I don't really want to get into a debate about this but wanted to reflect on how sad, upsetting and harmful I have found people's reactions and behaviour; to any other group of people it would be seen as racist.

I have witnessed people being rude, offensive, nasty and down right hurtful to others in the name of their own individual beliefs.
Don't get me wrong I am all for people having their own opinions, own thoughts and speaking their mind, what gets to me is when those opinions begin to impinge on the health and well being of others. There is no need surely for anyone to treat another human being so horrendously.

However we interpret what we believe I believe the Bible says to Love your neighbour as yourself, by doing that we should therefore be polite, respectful and not do things that cause deep hurt in others.

I truly truly love people and am hurt to the core that we can be so judgemental. We only need to switch the tv on to see how much hurt is occurring in the world through unrest in Gaza and Iraq, surely we should be doing everything we can do to bring peace to our world.

The brave and courageous Vicky Beeching shared this image this week and so I feel Billy needs to have the last word...

Testing times

There are some things in life I just can not understand,there are some things that happen that just seem not to make sense and there are questions in my head that I will be asking the good Lord when we meet face to face.... why do we have mosquitoes and wasps? Why do men in my family have beautiful long eye lashes and I don't? why can't Daniel and. I digest cow's milk? But more importantly why do some people suffer more than others?

These last 9 days have been so emotionally draining with funerals and burying of ashes as well as visiting some really poorly people. It has got to the stage where even the grave diggers are asking what 's going on as they have been so busy in Frindsbury!
People often say to me it must be horrible doing Funerals, and of course it is terribly sad but it is also a real pleasure and a privilege to meet with people, to hear stories of their lives and to share in precious moments.
The longer I find myself here the more connected I become with others. Tomorrow I am blessed with a funeral for a family I did a wedding for just last year.

What I do find difficult though is seeing suffering and especially in those so young. Over the last few months I have been blessed to meet with someone who is terminally ill and that diagnoses escalated today and I was asked to do an emergency baptism in hospital. Seeing someone so desperate to be baptised, seeing friends and family torn in grief and seeing staff shocked at the sudden change in a person is heartbreaking. But this is the place we are put in, these are the situations entrusted to us and this is the reality everyday folk are facing day in day out. I just pray that the tiny part I have played this week in so many hurting lives will bring some comfort and some peace.