Category: Uncategorized

Praying for Ukraine’s future

Sunflower field in Lviv, Ukraine. Image credit, Getty

Ukraine sunflowers
According to an entry in the 1993 Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Spaniards brought sunflowers from the New World to Europe in the early 17th century. The flowers were subsequently introduced in Ukraine in the mid-18th century and it was adopted as the National Flower. It has also been adopted throughout the world as a symbol of the love, support and prayer for the people of Ukraine. The Sunflower’s brightness and joy is a heartfelt expression of hope for the children of Ukraine.

Increasingly more and more children are suffering, becoming injured, dying or made orphans. As usual it is the innocent who pay such a great price for what human beings do to each other. They are the victims of demonic activity in our world and they need or love and support the most. They are God’s sunflowers and the hope for God’s future. President Zelensky not only recognizes this but also, that it is they for whom the nation of Ukraine must fight and must care for. This is his recent posting.

Below that is a prayer inspired by the children of Linton URC Church England.

Loving God,
We see the pictures on the news, we hear the stories in the playground;
What’s happening in the Ukraine is scary and we don’t know what to think or do.
We know it’s happening in other places too, places like the Yemen, Afghanistan, Palestine.
So much fighting, so much bullying and injustice, so much to understand.
But you are with your children, no matter where they are, so we know we can talk to you.
Be with the people of Ukraine and everywhere where there’s fighting.
Be with the babies, the children, the young people when they are afraid or anxious.
Give strength to the people who love them and help them.
Give courage to those who stand up to oppression and speak out for peace.
Touch the hearts of those who are threatening others and teach them a better way to be.
Jesus taught us that your way is the way of love and of peace.
Help us to trust in your way, and to do our bit to act in your way wherever we can,
Loving others and being peacemakers in our own small corner of the world.

Amen

The Mothering heart of God

MARY MAGDALENE’S DAWN

The mothering heart of God
beats in the silent dawn,
a pregnant pause
amongst the shadows of expectancy.

She comes,
hesitant, afraid,
yet full of love.
She, who embalmed his body with her hair,
fragrancing him with the perfume of her dreams,
now awaits the final touch,
the grief-insistent moment
– final parting.

Not to be.
Tomb empty.
Solitary gardener
watering the sun-streaked sky.

For her
Confusion,
Perplexity,
Heartbeat of pain
pounding,
drowning out the heart of God.
Almost.

‘Mary!’
Heart stopping but she hears.
‘Rabbouni’

The beating heart of God,
Reaching, embracing,
Enfolding her own heart.
Mothering
Bringing new life to birth.

Mr. G

Stitched together by God

Here is a response, from my friend Gill Henwood, to the recent posts on darkness and light.
The photo above relates to the reflection below.
There are many ways we can express  the insights of Scripture, and using crafts like needlework or quilting are two such powerful ways. So often the study of God’s word to us are expressed in a cerebral way, yet, throughout the ages reflection on Scripture is often expressed though art, music, sculpture, crafts, to name but a few. Gill offers an insight about this.

Gill’s reflection.

I recently was part of an online workshop ‘Sutura Dei’, led by Miriam Jessie Fisher from New Zealand. Miriam shares her stories of women in the Bible and the inspiration they are to us in 2022. Her work is presented through stitching including quilts and poetry. After reflection on the hiddenness, exile and journeys of Eve and Hagar (in Genesis) expressed in beautiful quilting, we were invited to use stitching ourselves.

I had found an old curtain – a Laura Ashley fabric c 1985 – and cut off a piece, and some rather worn lining from the back. I only had three thread colours: black (which became my wanderings), white (God’s presence), and cream (the Spirit blowing where it wills).

Out of my first messy black dark wilderness wandering stitches in exile, I found God had been there, when I threaded the white –  through all the twists and turns, and, through knots in the cotton at points he had held me safe. 
The lining scrap was my grubby self, still connected but loosely – discarded litter but almost a kite, ready to fly… I found myself threading the cream and black into the needle together. The loose chain stitches linked my journey with the Spirit’s. I left the needle in because the story and the journey are yet to unfold….

I realised at the end of the quiet stitching time that the fabric was an underlying paradise garden that had been there all the time. I glimpse hints of paradise often out in the fells of the Lake District and in gardens. These glimpses are  gifts when the Spirit stirs, bringing light into my darknesses. 

Yes, I’m the rough lining, utilitarian and dull, but glorious paradise is intimately near, and we are stitched together through hiddenness, exiles and journeys.

May God be present with us in darkness still, till light dawns and paradise is glimpsed anew….

Gill xx

Deep Dark

In response to Mr G’s earlier piece, Dispelling darkness with light came this.  When asked how I imagine God, the sensation that always forms within me is of deep, rich, velvety darkness – an enfolding – and a profound sense of safety.  There’s something a bit imperceptible about it: neither warm nor cool, but at blood heat, meaning that at times you have to pay attention to notice God’s presence.  A bit like a second skin….  It’s strange in a way that this image or feeling should have formed for me because as a child I was scared of the dark – but maybe that’s telling too – something about trust, perhaps. 

And at times, when things seem bleak and dark and starved of light, it feels as though God might be absent too.  That primal fear of the dark night and what it might contain surfaces in us and leaves us feeling alone and anxious. 

So much of our language revolves around the notion of light countering the darkness.  Yet it was God who said ‘Let there be light’ – God, who existed before the light came into being.  So seek and know God in the darkness too…

Piers