Thought for the Day 2025

1st January 2025

Romans 12:18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

As we move into 2025 and a New Year, we have the opportunity to make changes. We can each do our bit to make the world a better and kinder place for all. We can know Peace ourselves through giving freely and joyfully to those around us; that giving can be in the form of time, patience, company and material gifts. We can give to charity, help our fellow human beings and free ourselves from the binding chains we have forged from our poor past behaviour and choices. Repentance, the turning round of life, is offered freely by God to all. Jesus coming that first Christmas was to do exactly that, offer us the chance to turn our lives around, to become forgiven people of peace and joy in our communities and to spread that peace and joy to those around us. It is in living out peace and joy in our homes, families and communities that makes a difference and will change people’s lives for the better. Have a happy and blessed new year!

2nd January 2025

Luke 1:30 The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God.

A great deal of nonsense has attached itself to the figure of Mary over the centuries. Popes and church leaders have made proclamations with no evidence or knowledge. She sums up the inconsistency and contradictions of a Church which took 600 years, to declare officially that women had souls, and another 600 years, after that, to begin to take seriously the theological implications of Jesus’ humanity. That debate lies at the heart of the confusion about what exactly it is that we celebrate each Christmas. The very point with Mary is that she is indeed human; for if Mary isn’t human then nor is Jesus, and if Jesus is not human then we are not saved. Jesus is both fully God and fully human. Mary’s existence as a human physical woman has been problematic for the church too. Mary’s virginity and her motherhood have been used down the centuries to limit options for all women: and even today in the 21st century there’s still a judgement about those women who are neither a virgin nor a mother. Look how long it took to allow women in ministry and even now they are not equal with men.

3rd January 2025

Luke 1:53 he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

The recent events in France and the sexual abuse of a woman by her husband and so many men show us that we still live in a world where politicians, judges and men can belittle women and treat them as property and less than them. We still live in a culture which thinks it can tell women (and men too, for that matter) what to eat, how to look, how to behave. The radical vision of Mary’s Magnificat is not a song for just women. It’s a song by a woman, which has and should become the song of every person who shares that vision of a better world, where the hungry are fed and the powerless enabled, where wealth and influence are equally distributed, and nobody is made more perfectly in the image of God than anyone else. Mary’s song isn’t a fantasy, it isn’t a fairy tale. The evils of anger and greed are as much of a threat now as they ever were, perhaps more so. Change that began with Mary continues with us.

4th January 2025

Matthew 2:1 In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem.

As we come to Epiphany, we think of the Magi or Three Kings journey to find the New King. When they found Jesus, without any hesitation, they fell down and they worshipped. They encountered the presence of God and they responded with total surrender. These wealthy, well-dressed men from the royal courts of Persia fell to their knees before a tiny little child on His mum’s lap. How humble were these Magi. They saw this child and saw a king more powerful than Herod. They were so moved that they threw open their treasure chests and they gave Jesus their all. These Kings, these Magi were changed. They heard God and went home a different way; they went home different people. God changed them, will we let God change us?

5th January 2025

Matthew 2:12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

As we remember Herod and the Magi, think about this: Which one are we? Herod was all about power and wealth, and the things of this world. The Magi had the things of this world, but they understood that there had to be more. Herod knew what he had could be taken away from him. The Magi were at peace, because they had found Jesus the saviour. Herod was a driven person who wanted success more than anything else, who did whatever it took to get what he wanted, even if it meant hurting other people. He insisted on being in control. Is that us? Or are we one of the Magi? People who know that there’s more to life than the things of this world? Who are willing to follow God’s call wherever it leads? Willing to humble ourself and worship fully? Willing to open our treasure chest and give Jesus the best we have? Herod or Magi. Which one are we? Which one would we rather be?