Hello everyone.

Unconditional Acceptance   –   Pete Greig –  leading a short reflection on the App – Lectio 365       

This week I am consciously making space for the Holy Spirit to challenge my lifestyle… … and shape my attitude towards the great biblical priority of hospitality.

Pause

As I enter prayer now, I pause to be still; to breathe slowly; to re-centre my scattered senses upon the presence of God.

Pause and pray

Prayer of Approach
A prayer from the fifth century AD by Augustine of Hippo:
Grant me, even me, my dearest Lord,
to know you, and love you, and rejoice in you…
Let the love of you grow every day more and more in me,
that my joy may be full in you.*

Rejoice and Reflect
I choose to rejoice today in the place God has planted me in, and the faith he has planted in me, joining with the ancient praise of all God’s people in the words of Psalm 52:
I am like an olive tree, thriving in the house of God.
    I will always trust in God’s unfailing love.
I will praise you forever, O God,
    for what you have done.
I will trust in your good name
    in the presence of your faithful people.

Psalm 52:8-9

Pause and pray

Today’s reading opens a new vista, calling me to cultivate an equally accommodating attitude towards my brothers and sisters in Christ….
May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.

Romans 15:5-7
In this beautiful benediction, the apostle Paul prays that my attitude towards other Christians would be as accepting as Christ’s attitude towards me. This is an extraordinarily low bar!
Our unity is not to be based on believing precisely the same things; that would make us a sect; nor on behaving in precisely the same ways; that would make us a cult; but rather on belonging to the same Father through the unconditional acceptance of his son Jesus Christ: that is what makes us a family.
As Nicky Gumbel says, ‘I used to look at other types of Christians and ask “What’s wrong with them?” But these days I ask “What’s right with them?”  What can I learn from them? What do they have that I need?’
Why is it that I sometimes have more grace for non-Christians than I do for my brothers and sisters in Christ? Thinking now of a Christian who annoys me, I ask You Lord to give me eyes to see them the way You see them, and an ability to accept them the way You do too.

Pause and pray
I thank God now for a church or a denomination other than my own, asking the Father to bless them, and enjoying the smile on His face as I do so. These days I ask “What’s right with them?”  What can I learn from them? What do they have that I need?’

Yield
As I return to the passage, I open my ears to hear Your Word, and my heart to yield to Your will once again.
May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.

Romans 15:5-7
It’s easy to miss the two key hinge phrases in this passage: ‘so that’ and ‘in order to’. Paul prays for unity ‘so that’ with one mind and voice we may glorify God and ‘in order to’ bring him praise.
Whenever we acknowledge that there are indeed other rooms in the House of God, and other branches in his family tree, the result is praise and glory to the Lord. As the apostle John puts it, ‘If we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.’

(1 John 4:12)

Pause and pray

Yielding Prayer
Father, I give my front door key to You. My house is Your home.
 Bring whoever You want, whenever You want into my private space this week.
Jesus, I relinquish my schedule to You. My days are in Your hands.
 Help me to welcome interruptions this week as gifts from You.
Spirit, I surrender my possessions to You. All my stuff belongs to You.
 Help me this week to ‘share with the Lord’s people who are in need.’ (Rom. 12:13)

Yielding Promise
And now, as I prepare to take this time of prayer into the coming day, the Lord who loves me speaks to me saying:
Trust in me with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to me, and I will make your paths straight.

Proverbs 3:5-6

Closing Prayer
Father, help me to live this day to the full,
 being true to You, in every way.
Jesus, help me to give myself away to others,
 being kind to everyone I meet.
Spirit, help me to love the lost,
 proclaiming Christ in all I do and say.
Amen.

* Freely modified from Prayers of the Early Church, ed. J. Manning Potts, 1953

KEEP SAFE – KEEP PRAYING      

Peter

Join us in church or online for Sunday morning worship. All welcome!

9:30am – St Bartholomew’s – Meltham (can be joined via YouTube)
9:30am – St James’ – Meltham Mills
11:15am – St Mary’s – Wilshaw (can be joined via Zoom from 11am)
11:15am – Christ Church – Helme

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/JRfz8SNQzvM

Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85226939863?pwd=VTd6OUxlVUpWeVNRNGFRTUlKZ3RaQT09

Hello Everyone

Over a year ago we began to feel and experience the impact of the Covid 19 Virus Pandemic. The pandemic might be unique in our experience, but it is not unique in history. It comes with a hard impact on life, worship and community. Very quickly we were drawn together to pray for ourselves and peoples of every faith and nation of our world. Lockdown offered us an opportunity to read the scriptures afresh, seeing through the lens of those writers and poets who lived lives very different from ours but conscious of their mortality and the fragility of life.

And people stayed at home

And read books > And they rested >And did exercises > And made art and played >

And learnt new ways of being > And stopped and listened >More deeply >

Someone meditated > someone prayed > Someone met their shadow >

And people began to think differently > And people healed >

And in the absence of people who > Lived in ignorant ways > Dangerous > meaningless and heartless >

The earth also began to heal > And when the danger ended > and People found themselves >

They grieved for the dead > And made new choices > And dreamed of new visions >

And created new ways of living > And completely healed the earth > Just as they were healed.

This is supposed to have been written by Kathleen O’Mara in 1869 for the then pandemic of typhus then reprinted for the Spanish influenza of 1920, the outbreak of which killed more people than the entire losses of the First World War!

Presently

We are living with the variants of the virus and at the same time trying to get to something like normal in commerce, business. and communal living.

In the many and various circles of life, people are accepting that we are entering a journey towards a new normal. New because change has already set in and will continue to change and develop. We need to ask the Question what will the New World look like and what might it be like for each of us ?

When this is all over

Lord, when this is over, may we never again take for granted:

The handshake with a stranger,

Full shelves at the store,

Conversations with neighbours,

A crowded theatre,

The taste of Communion,

A routine check up,

The school rush each morning,

Coffee with a friend,

The stadium roaring,

Each deep breath,

A boring Tuesday,

Life itself.

Lord when this ends may we find that we have become more like the people we wanted to be, we were able to be, we hoped to be and may we stay this way – better for each other because of the worst.

IT IS IMPORTANT TO PLEAD TO THE HOLY SPIRIT FOR OURSELVES– BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY TO PRAY FOR THOSE IN THE POORER NATIONS.   OUR OWN HEALING IS DEPENDENT ON JUSTICE AND THE SUPORT EXTENDED TO THESE NATIONS.                                      

KEEP SAFE – KEEP PRAYING

 Peter

It’s Trinity Sunday! God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit!
Three in One and One in Three! Holy, Holy Holy!
Join us in church or online for Sunday morning worship. All welcome!

9:30am – St Bartholomew’s – Meltham (can be joined via YouTube)
9:30am – St James’ – Meltham Mills
11:15am – St Mary’s – Wilshaw (can be joined via Zoom from 11am)
11:15am – Christ Church – Helme

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/qlOi6RrDF9Y
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89541841029?pwd=TFBrWVFtYlZiK25QOXRoZUliZmF6UT09

Welcome to the June edition of the #Meltham parish magazine. Thank you to all those who have contributed, it really does help to make it YOUR magazine. This month we look back over the recent years of the Crossroads Project and the wonderful work they do. We continue our feature on how a hymn or song is helpful to express your faith and Pam gives an honest account of her road to confirmation.

We continue to include the Daily Readings and Prayers, it can help in our daily prayer life and either start or finish the day focusing our heart.

The next issue will be a summer bumper issue hopefully full of exciting submissions. The next deadline for our DOUBLE ISSUE will be Friday 18th June. Please send your submissions via: melthamparishmagazine@gmail.com or via the vicarage letterbox (150 Huddersfield Rd, HD9 4AL).

Hello everyone

RENEW US BY YOUR SPIRIT – MAY 24

WEEK  4 —  1—SILENCE  —The other side of words

When we do come to God. Or when we return to God. Or when we receive Holy Communion and hold that broken piece of bread in our hands. Or when we hear a passage from scripture that moves us. Or when we see in each other a love that holds and sustains us. And when we know we are loved, the only real response is silence.

There is a place beyond words, where the heart rests in peace, in the knowledge of being known and loved.

Not all of us experience such love in our lives. Some of us have been very damaged by life’s injustices. But the love we receive from Jesus, the love that is from God, is secure. It is waiting for us the other side of words. We only need to turn.

PRAYER

Loving God, our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you. Hold me, for the storms are raging and the waves crash over. Be my rest and my security. And even though human touch and human love is so beautiful and so longed for, help me to know today that it comes from you and, like everything that is good and beautiful, will return to you in the silence of your eternal and never changing love. Be with me as I hold myself and hold others in your embrace.

2  PENTECOST

Receive the Holy Spirit.  In the Bible there are two accounts of how God gives us the Holy Spirit. First, the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, today’s celebration. But in John’s gospel, on Easter day itself, with the disciples locked away like so many of us have spent the last year locked away, Jesus breathes on them and gives them the Spirit. (see John 20.22)

Both stories have important things to say, but this year, with all the challenges we face, and knowing what lockdown has done to us and how many of us have slipped from the practice of our faith, I am holding onto a picture of Jesus coming to each of us and breathing his life and goodness into us. “Receive the Holy Spirit,” he says. “My spirit of peace.” And then He sends us into the world: praying for others and serving them in the name of Christ.

PRAYER

Overflowing God, breathe the spirt of Jesus into me and into all those who long for peace, especially those who have drifted from your way, got stuck in their faith, or who have not yet found a way to believe. You believe in them. Renew them by your Spirt. And today may your Church be filled with joy.

READING

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. (Romans 5.1-5)

3 FINALLY

If you have worked your way through these thoughts and prayers over the last four weeks and made some notes about how you feel about God and how you make sense of life, and if the promises of God that we receive in Jesus are even beginning to make you wonder whether there is more to life than the things you see around you, and more to hope for than the fleeting promises of the world, then the best way of knowing and following Jesus is in the company of his Church. We’re not perfect. Far from it. We are also followers in the way, working out how best to live this life and trusting in God, knowing how much we need God’s love and forgiveness to keep us going. We are not an organisation looking for new members. We are a company of travellers and explorers who are very glad to have new people help us. We have things to share with you, but you also have things to share with us. Together, we can travel God’s way.  And for those of us  who are members of a  church community  let us continue to pray for the work of God’s church both locally, nationally and worldwide.

Keep safe.  Keep Praying

Peter

It’s Pentecost (or Whit Sunday as it used to be known). Join us in church or online as we welcome the Holy Spirit. All welcome!

9:30am – St Bartholomew’s – Meltham (can be joined via YouTube)
9:30am – St James’ – Meltham Mills
11:15am – St Mary’s – Wilshaw (can be joined via Zoom from 11am)
11:15am – Christ Church – Helme

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/6yqVw8IjINU
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89541841029?pwd=TFBrWVFtYlZiK25QOXRoZUliZmF6UT09

Hello everyone

WEEK  3

1  HELP–Send your Holy Spirit

In order to live the way of life we see in Jesus, we need help. We can’t do it on our own. We can’t manage in our own strength. Who can we help today by our prayers and example?

As the Church waits to celebrate the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost, let’s remember that Jesus calls the Spirit ‘helper’.

God knows we can’t manage on our own. Of course, we can’t. After all, we are made for community with God and with each other. Jesus makes this possible by uniting our humanity with God in his own person. The Spirit is the spirit of Jesus, helping us become like Jesus and uniting us to God. All we need to do is let go of the pride that puts self-first and cuts us off from God, and in the end from everyone else as well. Overcoming God, make me new in the Spirit of Jesus so that I can truly become the person I am meant to be. And today may your Spirt help me help others, especially those who have drifted from your way, or who find it impossible to believe, or who are trapped by fear and guilt. Set us free, God. Set me free to be myself. Free to help others.

PRAYER

Overcoming God, make me new in the Spirit of Jesus so that I can truly become the person I am meant to be. And today may your Spirt help me help others, especially those who have drifted from your way, or who find it impossible to believe, or who are trapped by fear and guilt. Set me free, God. Set me free to be myself God, make me new in the Spirit of Jesus so that I can truly become the person I am meant to be. And today may your Spirt help me help others, especially those who have drifted from your way, or who find it impossible to believe, or who are trapped by fear and guilt. Set me free, God. Set me free to be myself. Free to help others.

READINGS

Jesus said, “I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” (John 14. 25-26)  

Jesus said, “ This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.   You are my friends if you do what I command you.” (John 15. 12-14)

2–  Adore — Ambassadors for Love

The greatest gift of the Holy Spirit is love. We are most like Jesus when we love and adore each other, and when we love and adore the world.

Love is not just romantic love. It is the complete self-giving that we see in Jesus. This is the love the world needs if we are to navigate a way though the huge challenges we face.

Following Jesus, returning to the life of his Church, means being part of this great love affair. We become God’s agents of change, God’s ambassadors for love in the world.

However small or fragile your faith is, most of us have strong feelings of love. They are from God. Use this love to change the world. One heart at a time.

PRAYER

Quickening God, fan the embers of my little faith. Help me see that the love I feel for those I love is from you. It shows me that you are real, that you are love itself. Be my friend. And today, draw me back into the fellowship of your church and help others, who also long for love and acceptance, to find it in Jesus, the one who lays down his life for his friends.

3– CELEBRATE –Give us our daily bread

On the night before he died, Jesus had a meal with his friends. Breaking bread and sharing wine, he said they were his body and blood. He was giving them a way of understanding what his death and resurrection would mean. He was also giving us, for all time, a way of being nourished by his risen life.

It is hard to be a Christian on your own. You cut yourself off from this food and drink. And because faith is not a private thing, but a way of life lived in community, then we need to nurture this life in celebration with each other. This is what the church is: the bunch of men and women who know how much they need each other and need God. Join us. We need you.

PRAYER

Bountiful God, feed me with the bread of heaven, and give me today the things I need for today and save me from wanting more than my share. There are so many people who are hungry for love and thirsting for peace. Help me to help others find their place at your table.

READING

The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?  Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. (1 Corinthians 10. 16-17)

God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.  In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.  Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. (1 John 4. V 11)

KEEP SAFE

 – KEEP ON PRAYING 

Peter

PS  In earnest prayer pray for Bolton and India in the grip of variant strains of the Covid Virus.

Pray for or own country as it relaxes the guidelines in selected areas of our life together.

We ask that people will exercise due caution and keep the world around them safe.

Join us in church or online for Sunday morning worship. All welcome!

9:30am – St Bartholomew’s – Meltham (can be joined via YouTube)
9:30am – St James’ – Meltham Mills
11:15am – St Mary’s – Wilshaw (can be joined via Zoom from 11am)
11:15am – Christ Church – Helme

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/y2QXWFU9sN0
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89541841029?pwd=TFBrWVFtYlZiK25QOXRoZUliZmF6UT09

Hello everyone

RENEW US BY YOUR SPIRIT — MAY 10

WEEK 2   –1 SORRY –Turning around

Jesus begins his ministry with the word repent (see Mark 1.15) It means turn around. You’re going in the wrong direction. Re-orientate your life.

The whole world needs to hear this message. Whether it is the way we treat each other or the way we treat the planet, we are going in the wrong direction. No one seriously disputes this. The world has to change. But who has the answers? Who do we follow?

Jesus says, follow me and you will be walking in the light (see John 8.12). Jesus gives us a way of inhabiting the world and living with each other that is, truly, the world’s best hope.

It begins by turning around. By following him. The Christian faith is a way for everyone.

PRAYER

Steadfast God, redirect my life and redirect the life of the world. Help us to live in peace with each other and with the planet. And today help me to tread lightly on the earth, praying for others that we may all find for ourselves the way of being human that God shows us in Jesus. Give me the chance to start again. To turn around

2 –OFFER — A new heaven and a new earth

The offer of the Christian faith is the offer of abundant life (see John 10.10). Not a life lived somewhere else, but this life lived to the full; this life lived in the way God intends.

Some people have never really heard this offer. They thought the Christian faith was just a private thing with God, a way of getting to heaven. But God doesn’t just promise life after death, but heaven come down to earth, a better and more fulfilled life now. It starts by turning around. We see ourselves in right relationship with God. That God is the source of life. That we are the ones who have received the gift of life. Acknowledging this, our hearts overflow with thanksgiving. We start to live differently. We follow the way of Jesus. We pray that this way of life will be found by everyone.

PRAYER

Generous God, pour your abundant life into my heart. Help me to live differently. And today may others see and receive this offer of life through me.

Do not let loyalty and faithfulness forsake you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. So you will find favour and good repute in the sight of God and of people. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. (Proverbs 3.3-6)

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone.

(1 Timothy 2.)

3–Make your life a prayer

What then should we pray for?

Paul sets the bar of expectation very high. We should pray for everyone. We should pray all the time.

I see it this way. Make your life a prayer. Make your life an offering. Ask God that your life and your prayers, your words and your actions, might make a difference in the world. To follow in the way of Jesus means living a Jesus shaped life, so that all the good things that we see in him can also be seen in us, at least in part.

In this way our following Jesus is more than attending services, or even believing certain things. It is a way of life. A way that makes a difference for us and for the world.

PRAYER

Transforming God, make me more like Jesus. And because I know my life is not like that, show me Jesus today. And change my prayer from asking things for myself to asking you what you would like for me, so that my life can be part of your story. And help me to pray for others, that they may know Christ for themselves.

SEEP SAFE – KEEP PRAYING —–

Peter