Vicar's Blog - Feb
Welcome to February church! I’m grateful for each day the Lord gives me, and I don’t want to take waking up alive for granted (although the Sunday preaching rota often assumes it), but if I had to get an eraser and delete one month in the calendar year (in the UK, not Australia), it would probably be January! I struggle with the lack of light, with the dreariness, damp and drizzle, with post-Christmas blues, with feeling the weight of the year’s ‘to-do’ lists lying before me…even my daily step count plummets!
One of my sad habits is checking the BBC weather app on my phone and comparing today’s sunlight to that in 14 days time, and being greatly encouraged that things will get better - for example, today says sunrise 07:53, sunset 16:51 (that’s 8hrs 58mins of sunlight) and in 14 days it says sunrise 07:32, sunset 17:15 (that’s 9hrs 43mins of sunlight), with an amazing 45 minutes EXTRA sunlight in just 2 weeks! So, the tables really have turned, the Earth’s axis is tilting in favour of Gloucester, the snowdrops, Lenten lilies, daffodils, primroses and crocuses are all either up and dancing, or warming up to be - the reminder that Spring, and new life is most certainly here or on the way!
In January we took time in our 24/7 prayer week to ask the Lord to ‘teach us how to pray’ (Luke 11:1), and Jesus’ response was what we know as ‘The Lord’s prayer’. It’s been so encouraging reading all of your ‘prayer cards’ and words of scripture. I’ve been so touched by (what looks like a child’s handwriting), which says the simple but profound prayer “Dear Jesus, we pray that children who don’t have faith inside them will have faith inside them. Amen”. Lord, would you bless us all with the gift of faith to see what you are doing, and join in, even in the midst of this ‘winter season’ (and whatever that means for us metaphorically), encourage us through your Holy Spirit’s daily filling, through meeting together regularly, through Scripture, through prayer and worship, and through the signs of life all around us in your beautiful world.
This month can I encourage you to come with your Connect groups and on your own to our church five week Lent course which starts on Wednesday nights from 25th Febuary at St Andrews (7.15pm coffee for a 7.30pm start)? I look forward to seeing you there!
Please can you also put Sunday 1st March 6-8pm in your diaries for our ‘dreaming and discerning’ evening? Some of our leadership have been meeting to ask the Lord what he might be laying on our hearts as a church by way of Vision, Values and Mission, over the next five years (2026-2030). From numerous people and on numerous occasions and contexts, I’ve been reminded of the prophetic word in Ezekiel 47, where the Lord is bringing the river of life, through his Holy Spirit, bringing life to the deadest places you can imagine. Now I’ve swam/floated in the ‘dead sea’ in Israel, and it’s not the place you go to to fish, and yet Ezekiel 47 tells us that God’s Holy Spirit will bring his river of life to such an extent that (using his metaphor) fishermen will be by the dead sea hauling in fish!
Jesus promised us, in fulfilment of Ezekiel 47, that when we come to him, streams of living water will flow out from us (John 4:14), bringing resurrection life to those around us! Can we get excited by hungering to ‘live in the river’ of God’s presence, and bringing that river of life to transform those around us? If I can get moderately excited by the promise of an extra 45 minutes of light in two weeks time, I hope I can get hugely excited as we learn to live in the river of life that God has for us this month ahead! Every blessing to you all. Revd John Monaghan