As we celebrate this seven-week season of Easter from Easter Sunday to Pentecost, we remember that following Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, God promises us a new covenant, “a new creation”. At the centre of this new creation is a new commandment, “love one another as I have loved you”. To love as Jesus loves certainly needs some practice. “God so loved the world that he sent
his only son”. How do I bring love to this season and beyond?
Paul and Barnabas “put fresh heart into the disciples, encouraging them to persevere in the faith.” We all need encouragement to persist in our faith, particularly now, as the ‘creature’ in many parts of the world thinks that a Creator is superfluous to their needs. How the development of technology and science has impacted the sense of control, expertise, and power that
people think they have. And yet there are those, including some ‘experts’, who realise there is still so much that is a mystery and we can never fully know God.
Believing in God is not about intellect, but about having a genuine relationship with God. It is about encountering God and falling in love with the Creator, Redeemer and Holy Spirit. Faith comes, only rarely, all in one overwhelming and extraordinary moment. Still, more often
it deepens over years of openness of heart to God, in silence, in deepening love, in loving action, in failure and getting up again, in little resurrections until God, Love, fills our hearts. No wonder we need encouragement, perseverance and ‘fresh hearts’.
Who or what do I depend on to deepen my faith?
Whom do I encourage, and who encourages me?
Am I comfortable with mystery, paradox, and not
knowing?
Reflections by Kath Knowles
