Dear Congregations,
My gran once said to me, 'joining the journey of Jesus is a starting line, not a finish line.' What did she mean by these words? Well, I think she meant the faith journey leads us into a lifetime of contemplation and action; a lifetime of growing spiritually. So here is a question for each of you - In what ways has the journey of faith challenged you to grow as a Christian? The answer to the above question will be different for each of us in every season of our life, for the joy of the faith journey is that it is forever changing us. the challenges that come to us in our twenties and thirties will be different to those that we meet in our forties, fifties and sixties... and in every decade of our life.
Just recently I have been having to make a lot of extra journeys for various reasons. But the thing about journeys is that they are never quite the same; there is always something new to see, something new to notice. There is always something that has changed on a journey no matter how many times you have driven or walked that same route before. Things that you need to be aware of and take notice of because they can have an effect on the outcome of our journeys.
on our journey through Lent, 26th February to 9th April, these 40 days, we will journey with Jesus as he travels towards Jerusalem with his disciples, teaching them as he goes and then as he faces rejection, is arrested, tried,convicted and executed and then the joy of Easter morning.
We travel this journey together and as we do, we look for new things that we are suddenly aware of, things that we might not have noticed before or heard before, things that speak to us again of the grace of God. The truth for us is that at the end of the journey we will be transformed; transformed by opening our eyes again to the wonder of our God, our God who lived and died for us - for you, for me and asks us that we journey with him.
Shalom
Alison.
