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We have a great Diocesan Safeguarding Team, excellent Parish Safeguarding Officers (Nicola and Zoe) and all of us who volunteer or lead are required to undergo checks and receive thorough Safeguarding training; yet, as 1 Corinthians 13:1-8a reminds us, if we have “all these things but do not have love we gain nothing”.

Not all of us are called to an official role in the church but we are ALL called to love and more than this, we are commanded to love, John 13:34-35, as Jesus loves us, without exception, without limits, without partiality.

Sadly, these readings have often been used to encourage those who have been wounded or harmed by the church to forgive and forget.  But love requires that truth is spoken and justice is served. 

From 5th October, Morning Prayer will be said in church on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays at 9am.

Today we celebrate the harvest.  We give thanks that we have been given all that we need to survive and thrive.  

In a time of uncertainty, when harvest yields across the globe have fallen, this morning’s readings both celebrate abundant harvests:

Luke 12:16-21 tells the story of a man who had such a bumper crop that he needed a bigger barn.  We might call him a success: someone who has produced abundantly.  We might call him prudent: someone who has planned for the future. Jesus calls him a fool.

Today is the feast of St Michael and All Angels.  Angels are God’s messengers and in both of our readings this morning they move between heaven and earth.

Jacob dreams of them going up and down a ladder in Genesis 28:10-17 and, although God promises to be with him wherever he goes, Jacob believes that the gate of heaven is in this particular place.

However, when Jesus meets Nathaniel in John 1:47-51, he describes himself as the ladder joining heaven and earth.  The place where heaven and earth meet is not a holy place as envisaged by Jacob but is a living, breathing human being.  

“The story of workers in the vineyard, in Matthew 20:1-16, is my all-time favourite parable because I need to be reminded that it’s not about me!

Of course, the workers who have “borne the burden of the day and endured the scorching heat” are furious when those “who worked only one hour” get paid the same amount.

Just as the prophet, in Jonah 3:10-4:11, is furious that God is prepared to show “abounding and steadfast love” to his enemies as well as to him.

We know that everything we are and everything we have is a gift from God.  Yet we still act as if we must earn God’s grace and we still get annoyed when God is equally gracious to those who have clearly done nothing to earn it.