Rectory Ramblings…

God said to Adam “In toil you shall eat of the ground all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread”. (Genesis 3:17-19)

September arrived and it was like a switch had been flicked. The dry heat of a summer to rival 1976 gave way to a series of short sharp and heavy showers as the month progressed, giving some respite to a parched and in places a far too golden landscape. For a variety of reasons, I have personally found it to have been a hard summer, and I know I’m not the only one to feel it. It’s not just been the unusually very long hot dry weather, although it is strange the way the way nature, our working life and our family life all echo each other. 

As I look back over the summer months, the fruit borne out of my toil in the summer heat may not have been as good or as plentiful as I wanted but it is still fruit, and I thank God for it. As the prophet Habakkuk said, “Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails and the fields yield no food… I will still praise the Lord” (Habakkuk 3:17-18). And then there is other fruit, unexpected and unworked for blessings which, like the blackberries gathered from brambles that I did not plant, are simply God’s gift.  Jesus said, “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.” (Luke 12:27). Sometimes the best things in life really are not those that are asked for or worked for, but those freely and unexpectedly given. The fact is any fruit is fruit, and any blessing, however big or small, and wherever it comes from, is a blessing, and it is not the effort but the blessings we must count and give thanks to God for. 

I was interviewed recently on the radio on the effects of this year’s dry weather on farmers and farming. I was asked how do we pray for things like good weather when one person may want it dry and another wet? It’s a good question. Part of the complex answer is that our prayers must always be made in the context of the lines from the Lord’s Prayer “thy will be done” and “give us our daily bread”. Jesus himself gave us these words in response to the request “teach us to pray”. There is nothing wrong with asking for what we want, but it is better to ask God to do what he wants, and to remember that whilst he will not always give us what we want, he will always bless us with what we really need. So, ”Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” (1Thesalonians 5:18)

                                Revd Eddie