Minister’s Message – May 25th, 2025

Bible reading: Acts 16:1-12.

Message.

In his poem “To a Mouse”, the Scottish poet Robert Burns is describes how the field or harvest mouse, all cosy and content in its winter nest, has its life turned upside-down when the farmer ploughs up the field and destroys its home The poem contains the famous line, which I’ll translate into English: “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, and leave us nothing but grief and pain instead of promised joy” – in other words, no matter how carefully we make our plans, something totally unforeseen may come along and upset them.

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Minister’s Message – May 11, 2025

Bible reading: Acts 9:36-42.

Message.

I’m sure that we’ve all watched or read about this week’s VE Day commemorations – indeed, it’s been impossible to avoid them! Much of the media’s attention has focused on the surviving veterans from the second World War, all of them now around 100 years old (and some of them still remarkably sprightly). There has understandably been a lot of emphasis on former soldiers and airmen who fought in and above Europe, rather less on sailors; I may have missed it, but I don’t recall hearing much about men from Commonwealth and European countries who served alongside them.

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Minister’s Message – May 4, 2025

Bible reading: Acts 19:1-9.

Message.

It must have been amazing to meet the risen Christ! The Gospels and the book of Acts give us accounts of several people who had the joy of that experience: the women early on Easter morning, the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, the frightened group huddled in the Upper Room, the fishermen on the lake at dawn. We may not precisely understand the nature of these appearances, but they convinced those who saw them. We are also given hints, both in John’s Gospel and Paul’s first Corinthian letter, that Jesus made other resurrection appearances, on one occasion to over 500 people. There was no doubt that the impossible had happened: Jesus had risen!

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