Click here for how to find us.

Rector writes,
"Chocolate cake and party hats"

As a parent I know the importance to children of a birthday celebration. It is a day to have a party, fun with friends and receive gifts. The fact that it marks the day you were brought into the world in some cases with some trauma, and took your first breath doesn’t register, appeal as much as a messy chocolate cake and party hats.

As adults esp. those a little longer in the tooth there is the tendency to play down the significance of a birthday, to dampen down any celebration, to want to keep it quiet, to not want to bother anyone or reveal your age, as if it doesn’t matter as much, as if you don’t matter as much because you are getting older and only death awaits.

Certainly the world of today; fashion, careers, cosmetics, tells us that to be young is to be valued and beautiful and to be old and sick is not. As a result people are striving, putting everything into trying to look younger, to reverse the clock.

Let us pause and remind ourselves of why Christians have much reason to celebrate the ‘years’, the chocolate cake and party hats so to speak.

The Psalms in the Old Testament speak to the broad spectrum of human experience and the emotions that go along with them. Even in the worst situation, the most inconsolable there is hope in God the creator and sustainer of all things.  Hope of living anew, reason to celebrate. Psalm 62:1 ‘for God alone my soul awaits in silence; from him comes my salvation’ and so ‘let everything that breathes praise the Lord (Psalm 150:6)

The weekly readings in this Easter season have focused on Jesus resurrection appearances with the aim to leave little doubt that Jesus rose from the dead, that Christ was victorious. That in the resurrection of Jesus Christ God gave birth to a living hope

‘Since the first days of the church, Christians have allowed this living hope  to shape their perspectives, priorities and  practices, have realized renewed vision, vitality  and viability in their personal and communal life.  As a result, they have experienced personal transformation, and exercised a compelling and influential presence in the world around them’.    (www.dioceseofalgoma.com- ‘congregational development’)To live in the presence of the risen Lord being shaped daily by a living hope if that isn’t reason for chocolate cake, party hats and good company, at any age, well  !!!! 

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…” 1 Peter 1:3

Your servant in Christ,
Peter

PDFs of "Rector writes":

Epiphany
Holy Communion
Valentines Day
Lent
Easter