Dear Friends,
The seven weeks between Easter and Pentecost always feel a bit strange to me, it is as though we remain in a kind of hiatus, but I think that a bit like the season of Lent, we have an opportunity to reflect. I remember being at a meeting once where we shared Holy Communion, the very experienced Minister who was presiding took a loaf of what looked like home-made bread and ripped it apart and I somewhat indignantly thought that with all his years of experience as a minister, he might have been quite skilled at breaking the bread.
Rather than concentrating on the service, I found myself somewhat fixated on this bread, which a few seconds earlier had been perfect, and now, it was destroyed and as I thought, the penny suddenly dropped. Jesus had been perfect, but after human beings had done their worst, his body was beaten after flogging, his brow was damaged from wearing a crown of thorns, his side was split from the spear and his hands and feet from the nails. His body was broken.
I think of the world today and as we face heightened tensions over the situation in Ukraine, a state of emergency in Sri Lanka, political issues in Pakistan, mass killing in Mali, the ongoing problems in Syria, Tidal waves, storms, earthquakes, goodness me, the world today feels to be broken. We talk glibly about living in peaceful times, but the world is far from being a peaceful place. The Church feels to be broken, as we attempt to recover from all that we have just come through.
But there is hope! In the midst of everything that is horrible in the world, we are witnessing examples of extreme generosity, people are opening their homes to strangers, I attended a meeting of Church leaders in Ipswich to discuss helping the refugees and over eighty church leaders attended. We are seeing people giving generously to food banks, so that those who are struggling are given a helping hand.
People are treating folk to coffee and chat, trying to ease them back into society following the lockdown.
Jesus told his disciples to wait for the coming of the Spirit. We are the broken body in the world today, waiting to be healed by God. I therefore urge you to keep praying, keep giving and keep hoping.
With best wishes.
Derek