Church Newsletter Summer 2010

We have been thinking recently about the rhythms of life as delineated in the Scriptures at the heart of which the Sabbath has a very important role. For many people life has become 24/7, each day little different from the other. Work is no longer 9-5, many people bring work home to do at night or weekends, others take on extra jobs just to try to make ends meet when more than half their salaries goes to pay the rent or the mortgage, the electricity, the oil or the gas. Finances often being juggled too using loans and credit cards etc.

There comes a point though when quality of life needs to be taken into consideration. When one realises that life should be more than just work. That your family deserve more of your time and that making money should never be the end all and be all of life. The continuing credit crunch, the uncertainty that many people have in these days concerning their jobs has made many people reconsider what are they working so hard for? Ought there not to be more to life than just work and money?

The Sabbath, instituted by God teaches us several very important lessons. Life is more than work. We are not just the work we do. We matter to God and God should matter to us. The most significant thing about life should be rather our relationship to God and to the world in which we live. People, not work, should be our priority. Work is not just for providing for ourselves. It is also that gift given to us by God that we might have the means to care for others.

We have lost this as being central to what worship is about. Sunday should be about discovering and doing God's will, our offerings given not just adequate such that we keep the church going but generous enough such that we have the means also to show forth God's care by responding to whatever may be the particular need that God has laid upon our hearts or is before us.

We could be doing so much more beginning with getting our lives priorities right. Setting Sunday aside to be a visible witness for God in our world today is I believe a vital part of this both for our own good and for our world's good.

Your minister,
Reg.