Bend our wills to love your goodness and your glory

Today is the Sunday next before Lent; it’s the last Sunday in this short period of Ordinary Time before we move into the Lenten penitential season — It’ll be Ash Wednesday this week. We can see in this Collect that we’re beginning to prepare for Lent; acknowledging the disorder of our sinful lives, and asking [...]

Give us reverence for all creation

In the Church of England our readings and Collects, today, encourage us to think about the Creation; and today, The Second Sunday before Lent, is sometimes referred to as Creation Sunday.
I don’t really think, at least in my experience, that enough is made of Creation Sunday. It would be good for all of us to [...]

Trusting in your word

Trusting in your word
The longest of the psalms, Psalm 119, is a hymn of praise to the value of the Scriptures. We read in verse 127 the words, “Truly I love your commandments more than gold, more than fine gold.” The Holy Bible is worth its weight in gold. That’s because those who have studied [...]

Receive the gifts of your love, new every morning

Receive the gifts of your love, new every morning
The gift of God’s love is a tremendous thing. It’s good to know that God loves us as much as he does, even more than the person who loves us the most. It’s a good feeling.
The gift of God’s love, however, is about more than how much [...]

Live each day with confidence

Live each day with confidence
I am something of a worrier. Now that wouldn’t be so bad, but, I know, there are times when my worrying will have an adverse effect on my life. But I also know, that that is very definitely not how God wants me, or us, to live our lives each day. [...]

You call us to fullness of life

You call us to fullness of life
In today’s Collect, for the Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity, we’re reminded that we are called to fullness of life. But what is it, what is the “fullness” we are all promised in this Collect and in the words of Jesus, “I came that they may have life, and have [...]

Whose glory is around and within us

Whose glory is around and within us
We never have to look too far to see and experience God’s glory, it surrounds us. This beautiful world, God’s world, that we live in is a reflection of that glory. There have been many attempts recently to make new lists of the Seven Wonders of the World. There [...]

Defend your Church from all false teaching

Defend your Church from all false teaching
It seems that “teaching” in one form or another has been on my mind recently; this is the fourth post in the last week or so that talks about it in some way. See the others here: A Special Teacher; Teach by Example; and The Parable of the Child.
There [...]

May we trust in your mercy and know your love

May we trust in your mercy and know your love
Sometime around the middle of the nineteenth century, Frederick Faber wrote the hymn, “There’s a wideness in God’s mercy”. That would have been soon after he converted from Anglicism to Catholicism, and founded what was to become the Brompton Oratory in Kensington. Before that he’d spent [...]

You search us and know us

You search us and know us
I really like the psalms. When we read them, and especially when we worship with them, we are connecting with people who have done the same since well before the time of Jesus. In fact, Jesus himself, would’ve used the psalms as a part of his worship experience in the [...]