Mandy Baker Johnson

It’s like the Queen leaving Parliament,
To come to tea with me.
It’s like the music of all the world
Crammed onto a single CD.

Can you imagine a mountain range
squeezed down to a grain of sand?
Or an ocean poured into a rain-drop?
Fort Knox reduced to a gold-band?

It’s like a galaxy of spinning stars
spun down to a single flame,
It’s like the greatest book in all the world
Contained in a single name.

It’s bigger than that and smaller than that,
It’s the Creator condensed to earth,
It’s the Power and Peace and Promise of God
Fulfilled in this human birth.

Chris Bambrough

Hello, Lord God.

You have taken a good long look at me, haven’t you?
You know me inside and out and back to front.
Whether I’m feet up with a glass of wine or reluctantly doing the vacuuming,
you know what I’m thinking.
You know when I’m off out for a coffee with a friend
and when I finally climb under the duvet;
Nothing gets past you.
Before I’ve even decided what I’m going to say,
you know what it’s going to be (even when I shouldn’t say anything at all).
You surround me on all sides.
You have touched me with mercy.
I can’t get my head around it;
It’s far too big for me.

There’s nowhere I can go that you aren’t already there.
How can I get away from you?
Why would I want to – and yet there are times when I do…
If I’m having a great day where everything goes my way –
If I can’t do anything right and I feel like giving up, you’re there too.
Even if I drag myself out of bed to see the sunrise.
Or if I fly to the other side of the world,
Wherever I go, you’ll show me the way.
If I say, ‘That’s it – it’s all gone wrong,
there’s no point in trying any more,’
you can bring hope in the darkest of days
and turn trouble into triumph.

Because you made the very heart of me;
You put me together just the way you wanted me.
Just look at me – I’m a masterpiece!
Yes, me, even me.
Even when I don’t feel like one, I know that you don’t make mistakes.
Your creation is flawless.
From before I was born you were watching me,
As I grew from the tiniest of cells, you took care of me.
From the earliest moments of my existence, you were full of love for me.
You had a plan for me from the very beginning;
You hold my life in the palm of your hand.

Oh, Father, if only I could grasp who you are;
you are so far beyond my imagination.
If I could get a glimpse of your glory
it would blow my mind.
Awake or asleep, you are right here next to me.

Lord, check out every last bit of me.
Look at my heart – at what I believe and what I feel,
and in my head, at what I think.
You know what I’m like.
If there is any part of me that you would change,
Show me and help me to put it right
so that I can be all I can be –
so that you can use me for all that you can –
so that I will be yours for eternity.

Amen.

That’s my Psalm 139, Father.  My Lord and my God.  Here I am.

Helen Murray 

Rejection is something every human being will suffer at some point in their lives; sometimes it’s obvious and sometimes it’s the little things that you don’t think really bother you but are chipping away at your very soul.  It’s when you should be feeling complete and whole in Christ, but you’re feeling bruised and shattered.

No one was more despised and rejected than Jesus – even on the cross, those who said they would never leave Him turned and fled… and He must have known.  Even in the harsh truth of full rejection, Jesus forgave and prayed to His Father for another.  He had the strength to do this because He knew He had the acceptance of the One who brought the earth to life.

So know this:  every person you meet in life could and probably will reject you at some point; but there is One who looks on you with full acceptance.. .and in the end, He’s the one you’re living for!

For You formed my inward parts; You knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are Your works; my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from You, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in Your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Based on Psalm 139:13-16 (quoted from English Standard Version)

  Ruth Barbour

Do you ever get frustrated with salesmen who come knocking on your door at the most inopportune times, peddling their latest offers?  I certainly do!

Some friends and I were chatting about this recently.  Well, maybe ‘having a rant’ would be more accurate – complete with finger wagging and arm waving, only just stopping short of a hearty ‘hear hear’!  Anyway, one friend described an experience she’d had with a film company, and it got me thinking….

Despite her lack of interest, the salesman was desperate for her to sign up.  She eventually argued that she and her husband didn’t really watch many films so it wouldn’t be worth it.  His answer to that?  An incredulous look and:  ‘What, you don’t watch any films?’

Doesn’t this remind you of an experience another woman once had?  Think back – quite far back – to Genesis 3 (Genesis 3:1-6 if you want a bit of homework) and how the serpent persuaded Eve to eat the fruit on the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Now, tempting as it is, I’m not saying that door-to-door salespeople are the devil!  However, a couple of things did strike me hearing my friend’s story.

1)  Temptation is so easy to give in to!

I know, this is stating the obvious – we are fallen people living in a fallen world, and the devil uses every trick possible to tempt us.  My friend found herself arguing her way out of a hole because the salesman twisted her words back at her – just as the serpent misquoted God’s instruction to Adam and Eve.  The fall came not so much because they ate the fruit, but because they first entertained the serpent’s argument, listening to and reasoning with him.  It’s so easy to be enticed by clever arguments (a challenge for me and my big mouth, for sure!) – if you don’t want to get into trouble, don’t go near it in the first place!  My friend would have probably been much better off had she shut the door on him from the beginning.  James 4:7 says:  ‘…Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.’

2)  Shoulda woulda coulda…

That’s all great in theory, but – not to repeat myself (well, okay, to blatantly repeat myself) – we are fallen people living in a fallen world.  Our lives are filled with daily ‘shoulda woulda couldas’.  BUT… we have grace!  Or, rather, God has freely given us grace, sending Jesus to die for us then raising Him up again.  So every time we mess up and go back to Him sorry and broken all over again, He forgives us.  Not only that – He sees us in the light of Jesus’ perfect holiness.  I reckon Isaac Watts had it pretty spot on – ‘amazing grace’ indeed!  (Check out 2 Corinthians 12:9 if you don’t believe me.…)

So what?  Well, it’s quite obvious, really.  If I’m a recipient of such amazing grace, surely I also have a responsibility?  I have a responsibility to share this grace:  by telling others about this amazing gift from God to everyone who will accept it, and by living it out myself.

 Put on, then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other….
Colossians 3:12-13

Now there’s a challenge if I ever heard one!

So the next time a salesman comes knocking on my door, I’ll probably get stroppy, shut the door in his face, regret my missed opportunity and be reminded, once again, of my need for grace…!

  Ceri Skinner