Collect for 2 Sundays before Lent
Almighty God, you have created the heavens and the earth and made us in your own image: Teach us to discern your hand in all your works and your likeness in all your children; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit reigns supreme over all things, now and for ever.
Romans 8: 18 – 25
Matthew 6: 25 – 34
‘So do not worry about tomorrow’. Trust me, says Jesus.
People talk about ‘earning trust’, as if trust is a reward for positive behaviour. They consider that because they feel they have done lots of good stuff in the past, people’s trust in them should be mandatory.
But in fact, trust is not ‘earned’. It never can be. It can only be awarded. Jesus never forces us to trust Him because of what He has done. He died for our sin, unconditionally – and then gives us a choice. He asks us to award Him our trust when the future consequences of obeying Him will likely cause suffering, hardship and ridicule. In our pain, we shout to God; Why have you forsaken me?
Trust answers that question by proclaiming ‘Thy will be done’. In the face of whatever may befall, we trust in His love. Our trust in Jesus is the gift we award Him, given freely and unconditionally. He will never, ever, betray it. Our prayer is simply ‘Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit’.
Faith means little when God’s plan is the same as our plan. Faith is everything when it isn’t. When we don’t understand, when the things of the world tempt – and often overcome – us. When disaster happens. When we feel alone and helpless in the face of tragedy; all we can do is turn to Him, and leave the future in His hands.
Remember – F.A.I.T.H. – ‘ Forsaking All, I Trust Him’
Previous Posts
Praying Together 5th March 2023
This day is all that is good and fair.
It is too dear, with its hopes and invitations to waste a moment on yesterdays.
Praying Together 19th February 2023
If suffering did not exist, we could never know joy. If there was no ‘evil’, we wouldn’t be able to recognise ‘good’.
Praying Together February 5th 2023
Goddess or Saint? The stories are interwoven, in many cases feeding off each other. But whatever the reality, Brigid’s care for the poor is the common theme – living a life of love and service, for all creation.
Praying Together 29th January 2023
We don’t have to wait for eternity – we can be the body of Christ right here, right now. And then we can begin to take our part in the healing of the Nations.
Praying together 22nd January 2023
The annual Week of Christian Unity seeks to respond to the prayer of Jesus the night before He died, as recorded in John 17,– ‘that they may become completely one’.
Praying Together 15th January 2023
No matter who we are, however sincere our commitment, sooner or later – probably sooner – we’ll blow it. Fortunately, that’s not the end of our Christian life.
Praying Together 8th January 2023
Essentially, our Plough Service is a way in which we can say ‘Please’ – just as on Harvest Sunday, we say ‘Thank you’.
Praying Together 1st January 2023
What does the LORD require of you but to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God?
Praying Together 25th December 2022
It only takes one candle to be lit and the darkness loses its power to frighten. That is our mission.
Praying Together 18th December 2022
In a hundred years, and for hundreds of years after that, the Nativity story will still be told, as it has been for the last two thousand.
Praying Together 11th December 2022
Few of us will be called by God to do something earth-shattering. But we will all be called to fulfil His purpose in our lives.
Praying together 4th December 2022
It’s not how we serve between Christmas and New Year that matters, it’s how we serve between New Year and Christmas.