Pastoral Page (Sunday 24th October 2010)

Dear Friends

Welcome to our annual Women’s Auxiliary Service. In our service today WA members will share with us some of their passion “to know Christ and make Him known”.
Over the last few weeks we have considered that we know we have worshipped when we find our lives becoming more holy, more true and more beautiful. But today we see that our worship should help us to become more loving too. John puts it this way:
In worship, God’s love reaches out to us, coaxing us to release our self-protectiveness and closed-heartedness, and to gently open our hearts. In worship we hear the whisper of God’s Spirit telling us over and over that we are deeply, passionately, loved, that nothing we have done or could do could stop us from being loved. And in this reassurance lies an unavoidable challenge. When we know we are truly and deeply loved, we are required to respond, to make a choice – to decide whether we will open our hearts to this love or retreat into ourselves, close our hearts, and send love on its way.

It is my prayer that in today's worship each of us will find our hearts softening, and opening to God's incredible love for us, just as baked, hard soil does to soft, soft rain.

In Christ's Service
Debbie