by Donna Hill | 2021 Apr,23 | Pastor's Desk
I’m not sure about you, but one of my great wrestles in becoming more Christlike is that sinful tendency to see my time, my resources, my life as belonging to me. I like to control it. I like to own it. I like to decide what happens and when.
God, in His great grace and wisdom, seems to work in our lives reminding us how little we truly control and that it all truly does belong to Him. So often these reminders come in the way of hardship and loss with the call to surrender ownership and control.
If our Heavenly Father was a despotic God, a cruel, tyrannical God who acted arbitrarily and selfishly for His own ends, knowing we belonged to Him would cause us to tremble and live in fear and apprehension.
But praise Him that this is not our God!
Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies your with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
Psalm 103:2-5
by Andrew Corbett | 2021 Feb,11 | Pastor's Desk
Bonzai trees are amazing. The Japanese discovered that they could trick a big tree into thinking it was always meant to be a very, very, small tree. They would take a cutting of a maple or oak tree and coax it to form its own roots and then plant it into a very shallow glazed earthenware pot. Each time it developed a shoot they would prune it back appropriately. Once the root system was developed, they would upheave it out of the pot and trim its roots back before repotting it back into its shallow pot. They would then repeat this process over and over and over until the miniature tree resembled its fully mature huge relative — except in miniature form. At some point the bonzai tree becomes convinced that it was always meant to be a miniature tree. Again, I think there is a spiritual parallel to draw from this process of bonzai tree making…
by Donna Hill | 2019 Jun,28 | Pastor's Desk
THE STEADAST, RELENTLESS, UNMERITED LOVE OF GOD Recently I shared the story of Joni Eareckson Tada who, as a teenager, dove into shallow water, breaking her neck and becoming paralysed from the neck down. God has brought immeasurable blessing from her life despite it...
by Andrew Corbett | 2019 Jan,24 | Pastor's Desk
home > Pastor’s Desk > For The Love of Pete! FOR THE LOVE OF PETE! How many chances should you give someone who continually let you down! I think John Mark might think the Apostle Paul would say “One!” Some of us might be a bit more forgiving...
by Andrew Corbett | 2018 Aug,9 | Pastor's Desk
FORBEARANCEForbearance has nothing to do with with your forebears (although, come to think of it, it might). Forbearance has to do with patiently bearing disappointment with others. It is most commonly called for when we have occasion to be disappointed with someone...
