We must surely have all been very impressed with members of the God Squad who slept out overnight outside the parish hall last Saturday in solidarity with the homeless of our diocese and the enormous response from the people at St Anne’s in bring in literally piles of coats to be donated to the Barnabas charity who do such fantastic work with the homeless.
Callum Knight, Emma Morley, Rhianna Hamer, Debbie Flitcroft and Hannah Price really did put their Christian faith into action!!
On the coldest night of the year the words asked of Jesus to His Church, “When I was naked did you clothe me” were met with a resounding – “Yes – we have tried to”. In Church on the Sunday morning they spoke about what lessons they had learned. They spoke about the cycle of poverty that traps people; the importance of being with one another and not feeling alone and vulnerable; how very cold it was even wearing five pairs of socks; how the cardboard that they lay on really made a difference”.
What fantastic young people we are blessed with in this Church. Who knows what our Sunday School children will be when they are young adults applying what they have been taught about the Faith and about what it means to be a Christian – making a difference.
The goodness of these five young people and the generosity of so many others is one of many reminders to us all that the Light of Jesus shines very brightly in our dark world.
There is so much goodness and so much love that outweighs so much wickedness and we need to talk about it; we need to spread good news. We as Christians, of all people, ought not be overwhelmed by the terror that is abroad in the world which we are saturated by in our “instant communication world”.
Ask yourself the question, “What is it that we pay most attention to? The good news or the bad? Which stories do we spend most time talking about? The life enhancing or the life destroying? What do we feed our souls with – the example of the God Squad perhaps?
Poverty, human tragedy and sadness is all around us but so is the love of God; the Light that shines in the darkness and which is never overcome.
May I wish you all a joyful, optimistic, hopeful, faithful, holy and blessed Christmas. And if you come across the God Squad at their meeting place in the Dungeon Inn in the Village take time to thank them for being the outstanding young people that they are.
With every Blessing. The Vicar
The Vicar with Barnabus just before he jumps inside…
The Vicar inside Barnabus and sat on 200+ coats donated following The God Squad sleep-rough night a couple of Saturdays ago.