September 22

³⁵ By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.  John 13:35

Have you been affected in any way by the recent referendum in Scotland? The word referendum was a new one to me although I had heard it many times so I looked it up. Here is the definition,

'a general vote by the electorate on a single political question which has been referred to them for a direct decision.'

Now if you consider yourself to be non-political and live in the England, then this issue might have had no effect or relevance to you. On the other hand if you are Scottish and live either in Scotland or across the border in England then a yes or no vote, as it turned out to be, would have affected you dearly.

One commentator said ‘like an egg they (the Scottish) have go to learn to live together’. I thought that this was a good analogy of how we as Christians should learn to be with each other. Like the warring factions of Northern Ireland two decades ago, people born in the same country, under the same sun found themselves at odds with each other, for political reasons. Yet and still, like the white and yolk of an egg, they were linked at a cellular level – birth.

Do we need to have a referendum in our local churches to ask the single question, have we love for each other? I will leave you to ponder your own answer to that question, but like the votes that had to be counted, you had better have your evidence.

This song is 'brilliant' as quoted and sented by Bryn. It is 'Love grew where the blood fell' by John Starnes.  Please click on the picture to listen.

       

     Housekeeping details for you

     The point of this short blog will become clear if you decide to use this reading in the way we intend it. Netherfield Seventh-day Adventist Church believes in healthy churches. You can see what that means if you head to the relevant Healthy Churches page of the website. We also want other churches to be healthy. That means you can join in our campaign to create healthy churches, with healthy people serving the people in those churches.

     A healthy church is one where Jesus comes first. A healthy church is one where the people work together to put Jesus first. One thing we are doing is to join people together to spread that news. I would like you to look at our prayer partners page. This will explain how we want you to use this short devotional. Very basically we want you to find a like-minded Christian friend who you will join with to : choose to pray together every day, decide together on a way to serve other people together, to help them grow as Christians - and to invite the Holy Spirit into your life every day. This blog that you will receive every day simply gives a common spiritual purpose. If you are a newcomer and want to join the blog with this object in mind click here