Pastor’s Thoughts – Autumn 2024

Dear friends,

Holidays over, are you ready for the new season? Well, maybe you are and maybe you aren’t. I have to say that Cornwall seems a distant memory now, and perhaps you are feeling the same about your holiday. The problem with holidays is the frantic preparation getting ready to go, followed by frantically trying to catch up when you get back. It can make you wonder whether it is worth it!

Of course, travel today is so much easier than it was. I know airports, traffic jams and delays can be extremely frustrating; but it’s only in the last hundred years that people have really travelled anywhere at all. Before that few people ventured outside of the area in which they were born. Travel in those days was usually about moving to find work, unless you were in the armed forces or extremely rich. Back in biblical times, it was really only merchants, soldiers and administrators that went anywhere. Of course, Jewish people were more used to travelling than others because they had to visit the Temple in Jerusalem. Many of them started from places outside of Judea because the population had been dispersed by military conquest.

For the last few weeks, we’ve been following Paul’s journeys across the eastern Mediterranean to many of those dispersed communities, as he preached in the synagogues. Travel was pretty tough for him. When you look at the map of his journeys, remember that he probably did most of it on foot! And arriving was not any easier than travelling. We’ve seen him face opposition, rioting, false imprisonment, violence and shipwreck. We’ve seen how his journeys took him eventually to Rome, not as he had hoped, as a visitor, but as a prisoner.

When Paul looked back on his life, I wonder what he thought? Was it the satisfaction of knowing how many had come to know Christ through his ministry? Was it the frustration of knowing that he had not been able to visit every place that he had intended to visit? Actually, we can get an answer to those questions by looking at Philippians 4:12-13

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through Him who gives me strength.

Philippians 4:12–13

Paul, had that unusual combination of soaring ambition and contentment with his situation. The reason for this is that he had a very powerful sense of dependence upon God. He didn’t wear his adventures as a badge of honour, nor did he see his failure to go to all the places he hoped as failure. He knew that wherever he was he was in God’s presence, and he was ready for whatever opportunity God brought his way.

I wonder if we are the same? Some of us are facing some profound changes and some tough situations in the future. They may not the kind of things that Paul had to face up to, but the typical things that life brings to us can be very challenging. Like Paul every day is an opportunity for us to meet people, share God’s love with them, speak to them about Jesus, even just to demonstrate what a Spirit-filled life looks like. We won’t be perfect, we won’t always make the most of every opportunity, but like Paul we can travel with the expectation that God is with us, and that we can face every situation through Him who gives us strength.

John