A message from HANNAH JEFFERY, RECTOR OF THE BENEFICE
I recently took a service at All Saints Dingley and had chosen for the opening hymn ‘God is love: let heaven adore him’. Although I’ve sung that hymn many times before on this occasion verse two resounded with me in a way it never has before. The words are thus:
‘God is love: and he enfoldeth all the world in one embrace:
With unfailing grasp he holdeth every child of every race.
And when human hearts are breaking under sorrow’s iron rod,
Then they find that self-same aching deep within the heart of God.’
These last two years seem to have been full of sorrow in so many ways as the world has grappled with Covid and now, as I write, the Ukrainian crisis is unfolding and is just unimaginably devastating. As I sung that verse yesterday I did feel as though my heart was breaking, along with so many others in the world, but I was struck afresh by that reminder that when my heart breaks, when the world’s heart aches so does God’s. He aches with us and part of prayer is about our sharing our aching hearts with his as we continue to pray for his divine intervention. Whilst knowing that God aches with us doesn’t solve the problem, there is somehow something very comforting knowing that he is right there with us, weeping and aching and lamenting the pain in our world. I invite you as you pray for whatever makes your heart ache to picture God within you and beside you, aching with you; because there is the reminder that God is not ‘out there’, but rather that he is intimately present, feeling with us our every ache and prayer sometimes simply is just that – our sharing our aches with God and knowing he is feeling them with us.
But of course it doesn’t stop there. We can pray too, with confidence, for God’s intervention and pray we must. We don’t know when or how he will intervene, but we have the promise that ‘sin and death and hell shall never o’er us final triumph gain’ (from the 3rd verse of the hymn), which of course is based on the promise we have from the book of Revelation, that one day all will be well. In the meantime let us never forget that we have seen time and time again God intervening through history, let us never forget that we see in Jesus’ life and resurrection a foretaste of victory over sin and death and therefore let us never forget to intercede in faith for God to intervene, whilst at the same time, knowing his heart is aching alongside ours.
‘God is love: and he enfoldeth all the world in one embrace:
With unfailing grasp he holdeth every child of every race.
And when human hearts are breaking under sorrow’s iron rod,
Then they find that self-same aching deep within the heart of God.’
These last two years seem to have been full of sorrow in so many ways as the world has grappled with Covid and now, as I write, the Ukrainian crisis is unfolding and is just unimaginably devastating. As I sung that verse yesterday I did feel as though my heart was breaking, along with so many others in the world, but I was struck afresh by that reminder that when my heart breaks, when the world’s heart aches so does God’s. He aches with us and part of prayer is about our sharing our aching hearts with his as we continue to pray for his divine intervention. Whilst knowing that God aches with us doesn’t solve the problem, there is somehow something very comforting knowing that he is right there with us, weeping and aching and lamenting the pain in our world. I invite you as you pray for whatever makes your heart ache to picture God within you and beside you, aching with you; because there is the reminder that God is not ‘out there’, but rather that he is intimately present, feeling with us our every ache and prayer sometimes simply is just that – our sharing our aches with God and knowing he is feeling them with us.
But of course it doesn’t stop there. We can pray too, with confidence, for God’s intervention and pray we must. We don’t know when or how he will intervene, but we have the promise that ‘sin and death and hell shall never o’er us final triumph gain’ (from the 3rd verse of the hymn), which of course is based on the promise we have from the book of Revelation, that one day all will be well. In the meantime let us never forget that we have seen time and time again God intervening through history, let us never forget that we see in Jesus’ life and resurrection a foretaste of victory over sin and death and therefore let us never forget to intercede in faith for God to intervene, whilst at the same time, knowing his heart is aching alongside ours.