LUKE 19 VERSE 5 We recently enjoyed a visit from our youngest daughter from the USA, and during the two-week visit we also played host to three friends for a weekend as they joined us in our church’s 100-year celebration. Though two of our friends used their Roma van in our drive overnight, the preparations…

Every year my husband tells me he isn’t going to try growing aubergines again, and every year he does. And every year we get some fruit off the plants he has grown from seed. Part of his initial reluctance to grow them is that it seems to take a long time for them to germinate,…

Photo: West Devon: A30 Okehampton turn off © Lewis Clarke, via Geograph/Wikimedia Commons. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0. Original image can be viewed  Here Back in the mid-80s, I was living and working in West Devon while engaged to a girl from the West Midlands (who would later become my wife!). That meant that I…

Yesterday I was tidying the top drawer of my desk, its one which I do not very often touch.  It has those things like sunglasses, stapler, bookmarks, fans, staples in it, and at the back forgotten, it has a few other random items as well.  In a money bag I had carefully kept a few…

I was invited to our Boys Brigade awards evening last night. I suppose I go along maybe once a term to help out with craft activities or to gatecrash their carol service. I always enjoy it – we have a small but lovely group of enthusiastic boys and some excellently dedicated leaders who put together…

Psalm 1:1 ‘O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth’. Reflection Names are descriptive and sometimes evocative. The name of our church fellowship in Framlingham is predictably unexciting, but it does describe the kind of fellowship we are in a way intended to be clear—although whether it is clear remains…

I guess most readers of these thoughts either go on holiday sometimes or used to do so. I wonder if you prefer to plan holidays to new places so that you can explore another part of the world, or whether you like to go to familiar places?  On one of my holidays this year I…

In a recent Bible reading (NIV), Proverbs 3: 5 and 6 state, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” I told my wife that I preferred the translation I had been familiar with for the first thirty…

We have a Victoria Plum tree in our garden and despite the drought and the apparent lack of pollinators we seem to have had a bumper crop of plums. I love to wander in the garden and eat the fruit straight from the tree. Unfortunately we seem to have a heavy infestation of plum fruit…

I know!  We haven’t even had Christmas yet and here I am wishing you a very happy new year! Joking aside I’m sure many of you are aware that the Methodist new year always starts on September the first.  Why is that?  Good question.  I don’t know if you are aware but every year I…