From the Minister July 2010

I love the month of June !   It’s the long hours of day-light,  so much can be achieved.  I can end  the day pottering around the garden, watering my plants,  well after 10 pm.  At 9 pm it’s still not too late to go for a ride on my motorcycle  and that is the best time to do it.  The roads are quiet, the countryside smells of hay and of honeysuckle and  hedge parsley.  It’s cool .. and nature seems to breathe a sigh of relief that the heat of the day is over and everything is beginning to rest.  Everything of course except the owls and the badgers and the foxes and the rabbits and the moths and the insects and the abundant wild-life that comes out to enjoy the night, just after the sun sets in glorious splendour in what

G. A. Studdert Kennedy calls ‘ the wonder-weaving West.

 1.      ‘It is finished! It is finished! as the sun sinks down to rest,
And the sky burns blood and amber in the wonder-weaving West,
Where the clouds make golden islands like the Islands of the Blest,
For the day is nearly done.

 There’s a world of beauty everywhere and the reflected glory of God is all around us at all times of the year and at all times of the day if you just open your eyes and ears and  nose to perceive it.

 Divinity is perceived in the glory of creation across all major faiths, Christianity has no monopoly upon it.  All major faiths have their central creation myths and understand the value of contemplating the divine through, in and beyond the natural beauty of the world around us.

 It is a very strange thing though that in a scientific age we still speak of the sun  in terms of ‘ going down’ instead of in terms of it being lost from sight due to the rotation of the earth.

The sun never goes down , a theme expressed in the hymn;

The sun that bids us rest is waking

Our brethren ‘neath the western sky

And hour by hour fresh lips are making

Thy wondrous doings heard on high.

Hymns & Psalms 648 (John Ellerton)

So the day that is finished for you and me is the day that is beginning for someone else, sunset .. sunrise .. merely perspective on the same never ending  ‘ event ’.

Returning to G. A. Studdert Kennedy then;

2.      But another day is dawning as the winged darkness flies,
And the silver stars keep sentry till another sun shall rise,
For the daylight is eternal, and the sunshine never dies,
It is always marching on.      

3.      It is finished! It is finished! for the Saviour crucified,
See the soldiers stand in silence where the cruel crowds have cried,
E'en the broken-hearted mother has departed from His side,
For His day is nearly done.      

4.      But an empty tomb is waiting, and the East is silver grey,
As the angels of the morning trumpet in another day,
See the wounded God go walking down the world's eternal way,
For His task is never done.      

5.      There's an army thronging round Him as He takes the road to-night,
Can't you see your sons and brothers lined before Him left and right ?
Can't you hear their voices calling you to join the host and fight
For the God who marches on ?

I have a sabbatical next year and I’m going to look into the spirituality of the classical English poets.  Enjoy the summer, and give yourself the gift of time to tune in to God through the glory of creation.

Mike