soundcloud.com/user-743126990/prayers-reflection-tuesday-18th-may-2021-heathfield-benefice Continue reading Morning reflection with Revd Mitch 18th May 2021

based on the Gospel of John, 5: 1-18 I was talking to a friend about healing the other day. She asked if I believed in instant healing, if someone could in God’s name bring about immediate healing. The Bible clearly tells us that this happens, and there are examples in our own times. My friend believed this had happened to her son years ago, and her belief is strong. This raises questions for all of us, because when we believe in Jesus’ healing power, we must expect healing to take place. If, then, we do not see the expected immediate … Continue reading Morning reflection 22nd February 2021

Based on Psalm 30 When we are deep in prayer, we sense the closeness, the presence of God and we are not afraid. But deepening our prayer can take time and perseverance, being patient and focussed rather than distracted by the day to day. Is this something you learn, like a skill or competence? Or does it suddenly come upon you as a gift? For me this deep sense of closeness with God is something precious but does not happen exactly when we want it to. Sometimes he gives us the quiet, the stillness, in which we can be with … Continue reading Morning reflection 8th February 2020

Based on Phillipians 3:1-14 I have been noticing lately, especially when listening to the morning reflection hymns, that well-known tunes are securely in my memory, whereas the words after the first line usually escape me. This is really annoying when it’s a hymn I love. I just end up humming along, perhaps for the rest of the day as the tune sticks in my mind. But when I read today’s Gospel reading, it happened the other way around. There was a phrase which struck me: “Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of … Continue reading Morning reflection 25th January 2021

1 Corinthians 4 In this reading, Paul contrasts the Christians of Corinth with the apostles of Christ. Does this seem strange when to our eyes they were all forging an extraordinary path, the way of Jesus? This letter was written, we think, about 20 years after the death and resurrection of Jesus. Before the Gospels, even before the first Gospel of Mark. Paul had visited Corinth and set up a Christian community there a few years before this letter was written. He almost seems to envy their position, noting that although they and he were servants of Christ, they have … Continue reading Morning reflection 15th January 2021

Reading: 1 Thessalonians 5: 12-end When I looked at today’s reading from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, in my head I was 12 years old again, reciting my Girl Guide promise. This promise became my moral compass through my teenage years, not of course always lived up to, but always in my mind as I took a bearing on which direction to go. ‘I promise to do my best, to do my duty to God and the Queen, to help other people every day, and to keep the Guide Law.’ The Law too speaks of honesty and helpfulness, of … Continue reading Morning reflection 15th December 2020

November brings us a sobering time. We began the month with All Saints and All Souls days, times of remembering those saints who have given us examples of how to be human and yet also godly, and times of remembering those of our own loved ones we have lost from this life and for whom we rejoice that their time of calm has come. Yesterday we also remembered those who have given their lives for our peace, dying in conflict serving their loved ones and their country. These November times are made for a darker sky, a drawing in of … Continue reading Morning reflection 9th November 2020

Based on Acts 26:24-end When we are faced with someone who speaks with zeal and passion, it is hard to put aside their ideas. When we listen to Greta Thunberg, it is clear she speaks with passion and commitment to her view of the world. Whatever we may think of our leaders in the world, when they speak with passion we tend to be convinced. Oratory, powered by sincerity, can change people’s minds. In the reading from the Acts of the Apostles today we witness such an example. Paul arrived in Jerusalem a strong-minded Jew, in his previous life a … Continue reading Morning reflection 13th October 2020

Reading: 1 Kings 4:29-5.12 What would we give for the wisdom of Solomon? A king who honoured his father David’s wishes, a king who understood the value of friends and allies. Solomon’s father David had been given the task of battle, but in Solomon’s time, the battles were done – “But now the Lord my God has given me rest on every side; there is neither adversary nor misfortune.” Solomon doesn’t sit back and enjoy this time, but sets about building a temple to God, to fulfil God’s will. This temple will be made of the finest materials, and that … Continue reading Morning reflection 17th September 2020

Luke 23:44-56 Many of us today see the Bible, and perhaps even Christianity, as a set of stories set in the far-off past which have little to do with today. Ancient stories, like a set of moral fables. Something we can set aside from our day to day lives, referring to them from time to time, as the Spirit moves us. But this story from Luke’s Gospel today, so simply told, so devastating in its events, is, like so many other Bible accounts, one we cannot put aside. A strange and sudden change in the light of the afternoon, the … Continue reading Morning reflection 5th August 2020