A slow death Dear friends It is the time of the year when the leaf canopy is lush and verdant, and the woodland floor at its darkest. Except that it isn’t. There are parts of the forest floor which are lighter than they should be, as the canopy overhead is thinning. A good place to notice this is at the bottom of…
Pilgrimage of the people Dear friends Many thousands of Brits have made their way to Germany, and finally Berlin during the last few days and weeks. The enthusiasm of “We just had to be here” and “I couldn’t miss this for the world” along with the realism of “I could have gone to Thailand for this price” made for a good natured…
Exam Season Dear friends For a lot of young people we are in the waiting period of tenterhooks that comes after the examinations are completed, but before the results are published. There is a strange combination of uncertainty, perhaps even self doubt, along with the trepidation that comes with the unknown future. Did we give as good an account of ourselves as…
Spiritual Strength. Dear friends, Have you wondered why it is that some churches, some places, and occasionally some people, seem to attract others? People visit – sometimes on a deliberate pilgrimage, or sometimes they “just have to go,” but can’t really articulate any reason. There is a great sense of peace, comfort, security, and “homecoming”. We are, I believe, intuiting the often…
Tax – to pay or not? Dear friends, Jesus famously once got into a row about taxes. The Roman Empire paid for itself by imposing levies upon the lands it conquered, arousing no little ire in the conquered peoples who were possibly less enthusiastic about the Roman empire than the Romans themselves. Some Jewish leaders, fed up with Jesus’ popularity with the…
Office space required Dear friends The Team Ministry is looking for an office space! After over twenty years at The Grove, Stoke Row, and with thanks to the kindness and hospitality of the Robin family, the property is now being sold, and we need to find a new home. The Team office is the place of work for Mary Daniels, our part…
Pray your part Dear friends, When it comes to election season, most of us have a fairly limited tolerance of the media’s seemingly inexhaustible supply of political introversion. “Never mind about the nation’s toenails,” we cry at the radio, “ask why the legs are missing!” Its an important season in which we have an opportunity to not just think about the big…
Normandy 2024 Dear friends, There is a little patch of Normandy in Checkendon churchyard. Lt William Temple was among the very first to land in France, coming from the sky with the 7th Battalion (Light Infantry) of the Parachute Regiment, on the night of the 5th/6th June 1944, part of the 6th Airborne Division. He was a platoon commander, (No1 Platoon, A…
In the blood Dear friends, It is something we all take for granted – that our blood flows. Yet when we are cut, if all is working as it should, it clots as cells knit themselves together on exposure to oxygen. But day by day, as we breathe, our blood nevertheless carries this same oxygen round our vital organs and, wonderfully, removes…
Tongues of Fire Dear friends, A few days ago the earth was bathed in glory. A (22 years) rare solar storm sent great arcs of fire in the form of solar flares far out from the surface of our sun, and the associated bursts of high energy atomic particles, after a couple of days in transit, reached the earth. These particles, funnelled…