Scripture:

‘…the word of the Lord endures for ever.’ (Isaiah 40.8, quoted in 1 Peter 1.24-5)

Reflection:

Words, words, words… we need them, and we need them to be flexible, different from numbers. Look up ‘word’ in an English dictionary and there will be examples of many uses; look it up in a foreign language dictionary and you get many alternatives. ‘The word of the Lord’ is not like that, not a spoken or written word, but a universal principle. It’s ‘seen’, ‘heard’, grasped as we experience the love which underpins all life.

The beginning of this quotation goes ‘All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but…’. It might be a message of despair, but let’s turn it on its head. When we see flowers, we think ‘beautiful’; when we encounter someone admirable, when we think on how Jesus lived and died, we recognise ‘goodness’. Of course flowers do not last for ever, nor do our bodies, but in their moment of glorious life, they give us access to the eternal ‘word’ of creative life and love. How wonderful!

David Harmsworth