Sunday's coming!

Mark 1: 9-15, Genesis 9: 8-17 Lent has begun. Whether we have given up something we normally enjoy (like chocolate) or have taken up something (such as more time to pray) or maybe if we’re reading a Lent book or attending a Lent group, there are many ways that we can use the days of Lent to walk more closely with Jesus as we prepare for Easter. But terrible news has crashed into all the relatively cozy ways we have found of following Jesus, as we heard this week of the murder of 21 Coptic Christians by Islamic State in Libya. Whatever the political rather than religious reasons for those murders, the fact is that they were singled out because of their faith. The footage of the grieving families was truly harrowing to Western ears – the raw grief of people left bereft by this awful slaughter. The familiar cry goes up to heaven – where is God when the followers of Jesus are suffering? But Lent is meant to teach us that whatever the deprivation, the suff...

Readings: Mark 9: 2-9 and 2 Corinthians 8:8-12 Today many churches, in their worship, will be thinking about Church Action on Poverty Sunday. We are one of them. So let’s start by thinking about poverty. What does it mean to you to think of someone as impoverished? It can’t just be about your income being below a set level – because whether that is enough depends on where you are in the world, what your expectations are, what everyone around you has. Yet we know poverty when we see it – poverty is not being able to make choices – your children can’t go to school because you can’t afford the books or the uniform or the school meals - you have to leave education to start earning to support your family - you have to use a food bank and be grateful for what you’re given - you have to struggle constantly to get to the end of the week without despair But what do I know about poverty – with my regular income, my comfortable house, my nicely-filled ba...