Viewing all items in Resource Category: Editorial

Father, Thank you for sending Jesus to be one of us and to show us how you want us to live. Thank you that He chose to live for us and to die for us. Thank you that when He returned to you, He didn’t leave us to flounder but sent us His Spirit to...

The tax collector had climbed a tree Trying to see what it was all about ‘Come down Zaccheus, I’ll eat at your house’, And Zaccheus’ life was turned inside out. Simon the Pharisee invited the Lord And at the meal a woman came in, With tears and perfume she anointed His feet And Jesus responded...

When we opt not to vote We ought to take note That it’s not been forever like this; Not that long ago It would have been so That we’d have to give voting a miss! Unless we were rich With cloth of gold stitch A Lord or a Peer of the Land A country Esquire...

(from Isaiah 60) Rise and shine – your light has come! Glory of the rising sun! See! God bids us all to shine With the countenance divine! For the earth in darkness lies Hear the lost benighted cries. See! God’s glory now appears! Comfort to the nations’ tears! Raise your eyes and look about! Hear...

O Lord, grant that we may not be like porridge Stiff, stodgy and hard to stir But like cornflakes:  crisp, fresh and ready to serve.   Anon

Lord, grant me a simple, kind, open, believing, loving and generous heart, worthy of being your dwelling- place.     By John Sergieff, Russian priest, 1829 – 1908

It was: 400 years ago, on 23rd May 1618, that the Thirty Years’ War (Central Europe, mainly present-day Germany) began.   One of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history.  Millions of people were killed.  Finally ended on 15th May 1648. 200 years ago, on 4th May 1818 that Britain and the Netherlands signed...

If, like me, you wonder how on earth people coped with the sheer horror of the carnage on the battlefields of the First World War, two pieces of writing suggest an answer. One, the poem ‘For the Fallen’, I wrote  about last month. In this article I would like to consider the poem, subsequently an...

Ramadan this year runs from 15th May to 14th June.  You may wish to join in with more than one million Christians worldwide who spend this month praying for Muslims. You can download a prayer guide that provides churches, small groups and individuals with helpful information on Muslims: what they believe, where they live in...

Whoever organised the very first flower festival? One thing for sure – they would never have guessed how popular the events would become.  Flower festivals are held in thousands of parish churches each year, and some have blossomed into floral extravaganzas that can take months to plan, attract large crowds, and raise significant sums of...

Where do you go to hear the terms pettling, flowering, barking or puddling? Derbyshire, or course – where the tradition of ‘well dressing’ goes right back to 1394, when two annual displays in Tissington and Buxton began. Nowadays, there are dozens of well dressings held across Derbyshire each summer. So – how does one dress...

Israel became an independent state 70 years ago this month, on 14th May 1948, as the British mandate in Palestine finally came to an end. The very next day Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and Syria invaded Palestine, and a 13-month war began.  The Arabs and Jews had been in tension with each other and the British...