Hello Everyone

Over the past months, many articles have been written, numerous television programmes made, all around the subject of the Coronavirus Pandemic and this coming Friday there is a TV programme called ‘A Pandemic Poem – Where Did The World Go?’   This is based around a Poem written by Poet Laureate -Simon Armitage, a Colne Valley man who many of us will have heard of.  

These are some of his thoughts about his Pandemic Poem 

‘There is a message to be learnt about taking things easy and being patient and trusting the Earth and maybe coming through this slightly slower and wiser – given that one thing that’s accelerated the problem is our hectic lives and our proximities and the frantic ways we go about things.    Poetry is by definition consoling because it often asks us just to focus and think and be contemplative.’

To learn more of his thoughts – Friday evening 9.0pm

The following  poem is written by Gary Clayton a member of Hayes Lane Baptist Church.

As we read it, we ask that God will help us to focus on what is said

In the year of plague, in the year of COVID,
Like seeking our Daily Bread day-by-day,
Each day we looked to God to provide,
Each day we looked to God, to survive.
Each day we shopped to live, not lived to shop.

In the year of grace, in the year of COVID,
We didn’t ‘Give up church’ for Lent, 
But learned to ‘do’ church differently, 
Discovered that buildings close and meetings end,
But the Church – the Body, not the building, goes on.

In the year of contact, in the year of COVID,
Email, phone, letters, Skype, Zoom, 
Messenger, WhatsApp, Microsoft Meetings, 
These manmade messengers came into their own,
Carrying our voices, words, thoughts and prayers 
To the homes of those – like us – forced to endure, 
Stay at home, or sally forth briefly,
Hoping against hope that all would be well.

In the year of trial, in the year of COVID,
Some comfort ate, and some got fit,
Some went for a walk – or a run.
Some sofa-surfed on crisp-strewn couches,
Some grew their hair, while others grew apart.

In the year of fear, in the year of COVID,
We saw far fewer cars, and even less people,
Covered our noses and concealed our mouths. 
Felt dread when we coughed, 
Our eyes watered, or we felt unwell. 

In the year, in the year, in the year 2020,
We lost friends. Lost family. Lost contact,
But gained something too.
But when the time’s ended,
And when the plague, the epidemic, the pandemic,
The outbreak ends – will we have learned? 
Will we have changed? 
Or will we just… go back to normal? 

Let us continue to pray that God will give wisdom to each one of us, to the churches, to our nation and to the world that we can all learn from the experience of this pandemic and that we can go into the future seeing things in a new way and much more from God’s perspective.

KEEP SAFE, KEEP PRAYING

Peter