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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Rev Richard Littledale

Good morning.

Ministers’ meetings aren’t what they used to be. Instead of meeting in a church hall, snatching glimpses of other people’s noticeboards over our sandwiches, we join in from home on our various computers. We do to check in with each other, and to see how things are going in our different churches. On this particular occasion, instead of simply comparing notes about life and work, – we were asked to talk about whatever we had been reading recently.

Usually, the first one to jump in on such an open session, I held back. I felt a slight panic about what the answer to the question should be. What had I been reading? Could I remember anything about it? Would it measure up to the worthy tomes read by my colleagues? When somebody explained that they had been reading a history of Jerusalem, and somebody else an analysis of Protestant church history, the anxiety levels went up a little notch. Thankfully, I remembered not only the silly novel I had been reading, but also a book about theological and emotional recovery from the pandemic, so that was alright.

How quickly we feel intimidated, even in a group of supportive colleagues! Maybe we all feel the need to measure up. In reality, it is more about measuring up to God than to each other. That is the thing which really matters. Consider the ancient words of Micah the prophet:
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God
I think that is quite enough to be going on with, no matter what I am reading!

Dear God, today we ask that we might worry less about the things which don’t matter, and more about the things which do.

Amen