What we can say with some certainty is that the Gospel of Matthew was written by a person with a good knowledge of Judaism and was complete in its current form within 70 years of Jesus’ death.
Before starting to read and discuss Matthew, here’s an overview of the book and its author.
Matthew’s gospel was written by a well-educated Jew, probably between 60 and 90 CE (thirty to fifty years after the events he describes), but some scholars think it was written as early as 40 to 50 CE. It seems likely the author drew from Mark’s gospel (which was written earlier); possibly also from the text of a different early account, now lost (referred to as Q); and perhaps from material written by the disciple Matthew. The facts are lost in the past, and Bible scholars continue to change their views based on the material available and their opinions about it. Some argue that the disciple Matthew was the author, others believe this is unlikely.
The author
The book may have been written by Matthew the tax collector (also called Levi), one of the twelve apostles. Certainly this is what the second century church fathers thought. The text itself suggests that the author was fluent in Greek with a good knowledge of either Aramaic or Hebrew (or indeed both).
The debate will continue, but what we can say with some certainty is that the Gospel of Matthew was written by a person with a good knowledge of Judaism and was complete in its current form within 70 years of Jesus’ death. The structure of Matthew closely follows that of Mark with the addition of extra material at the beginning (the genealogy and stories of Jesus’ birth) and at the end (events after the resurrection).
Purpose
This gospel is focused on Jewish traditions and people, and generally draws on a broad and deep understanding of Jewish society and customs at the time of Jesus. It was probably written for the Jewish diaspora living in Alexandria, Antioch and elsewhere, Jews who would have spoken Greek in everyday life.
The purpose of the book is to reveal Jesus as the Messiah, of the royal lineage of David, and as fulfilling the Jewish Bible (the Old Testament). The author of Matthew is also clear that Gentiles are included with Jews in everything Jesus did and promised.
The Wikipedia article on the book gives a lot of useful information all backed up by detailed references. If you want to understand the background in further detail it’s a good place to start. The article about the author is also useful and provides ample references.
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Cycling through the gospels to keep Jesus at the centre of all we do.
I’m posting notes on short passages from the gospels. Come and join me in reading the passages and leave me some thoughts and comments. The notes can be used individually, or they can be used systematically to work through a whole book, or all four gospels. The most recent notes are on my Journeys of heart and mind site (JHM), and more will follow. Older material is on an older website, some links may need updating but navigational links work seamlessly across old and new.
I’ve made a start in Matthew, Mark, and now John; it’s been an interesting journey for me. You can start from any point, all the old posts remain and new ones will appear once every week or so.
Alan Hirsch has developed a model for vibrant, missional church life and at the heart of the model is the idea that Christ should be central in all that we do. Few people would argue with that! One habit that he recommends to help us keep Jesus at the heart of our lives is to cycle through the gospels as part of our Bible reading. Not only that, he recommends reading all of the Bible ‘through the lens of the gospels’.
I agree with that; and it’s where these articles come in.
Latest news:
22nd June 2025 – Today I finished the task of repairing broken links in the old version of these posts. You can now navigate the entire series using the links in each article – Matthew, Mark, and most of John. Next, I propose revising all the material from the old version, moving each item to Journeys of heart and mind as I go.
Notice how every part is sized precisely for the task it performs. The main stem is stout and sturdy, the stems that spring from it are much smaller and each one carries a number of flowers.
What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
Click to enlarge
This photo was taken at a different time and place from the previous Umbellifer image, but the structure of this flower is very similar to the previous one. The main difference is that this time we’re viewing it from below. This reveals the exquisite architecture of an umbel.
Notice how every part is sized precisely for the task it performs. The main stem is stout and sturdy, the stems that spring from it are much smaller and each one carries a number of flowers. Those flower stalks in turn are smaller yet, and each one carries a single, tiny flower. It’s exactly how an engineer might design something, each part as large and strong as it needs to be, but no more. Why and how? Well, in the case the engineer, because lightness means less material, less mass, and therefore lower cost. Failure will be unusual because the forces will have been calculated and the values increased just a little to ensure safety.
Your car is designed this way, it could be designed and built to survive a collision with little or no damage, but it would be unaffordable because of the high cost of the extra material required, and it would consume much more fuel because of its high mass. That’s why you drive a car when travelling, not a tank!
The same argument applies to plant structures. The umbel could be made to survive a hurricane, but it would demand much more photosynthesis to provide the cullulose and other materials required to make it tough enough to survive such powerful winds. That’s why coconut palms have far stronger stems than the umbellifer! Living things are not designed by engineers, they adjust to their environment little by little over many generations by a trial and error system we call evolution.
Sometimes people say, ‘It’s only a theory’, meaning that something is a bit shaky and not to be trusted. That is to misunderstand what scientists mean by the word ‘theory’. In everyday use the word has a sense of an untested idea, something you just dreamed up as a way to explain something – might be wrong, might be right. Scientists have a word for that, but the word is not ‘theory’ – it’s ‘hypothesis’. In science, a theory is something so well tested as to be essentially unrejectable. Evolution is a theory in that sense, like the theories of relativity or quantum physics or plate tectonics. Theories have almost no room left for argument.
You can’t believe in evolution, it’s not a matter of faith but of overwhelming evidence. Following Jesus, as I and many others do, is based on faith, and I write about that too on Journeys of heart and mind.
You might be surprised to learn that engineers sometimes use evolution to design things like aircraft wings. The software to do that makes a long series of small tweaks to an initial design and calculates which changes improve performance. And this process is repeated many times enabling the final result to be stronger, lighter and more effective. An aircraft wing (or other structure) created in this way is not designed with paper and pencil or with CAD in the normal way, it evolves.
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Mar 2025 (3 months before publishing this article)
Click to enlarge
I walked the Thames and Severn Canal from the tunnel portal at Sapperton (Daneway Inn) to the other end at Coates (Tunnel House) and then followed the towpath where possible to Siddington and back along the Cirencester arm to meet Donna for a coffee before walking home again. Including some detours to view additional pieces of canal it amounted to about 15 miles in all.
Coates portal
The main photo shows Cotswold countryside, with Hailey Wood on the horizon. The footpath through this field is part of the Thames Way, and on the far side of the woodland is the southern canal tunnel entrance at Coates.
Several years ago I set up the Friends of the Gumstool Brook website for a friend, and after some difficulty I was able to hand it over fully to him. I’m not as nimble with the technical side as I once was, and I feel more comfortable not having the responsibility any longer.
We drove to York to exchange Christmas gifts with Debbie, Beth and their families. You can see Christmas paper debris in this shot but don’t ask what else is going on! Fern is probably creating really good artwork on her tablet. Paz and Debbie are having a sensible conversation. We did have an excellent time, and it’s always good to catch up.
Westonbirt School
Donna ran in a 10 km event at Westonbirt School, it was a big event with a lot of runners (she competed as 3390) and it involved two loops of a 5 km course circling around the grounds and local roads. She did really well, finishing the course and being far from the last runner home.
We visited Lydiard Park near Swindon. It’s owned by Swindon Corporation who look after it well – a bit like a National Trust property. The grounds serve as a public park with play equipment, a cafe/restaurant, and places for ball games and so forth.
The house has an interesting history and is well worth a visit. It’s available as a conference centre and for weddings and other events, and includes accommodation for guests.
Weston-s-Mare
We also spent a week in Weston-super-Mare, looking after the dogs for Donna’s brother Paul and his wife Vanessa. The photo shows Knightstone Harbour, with Brean Down beyond on the left and far beyond that, on the right, is Exmoor.
The highlight this month was our expedition to northern Scotland for the North Coast 500. We flew from Lulsgate to Aberdeen Airport while Isobel had a week in Weston-super-Mare with Paul and Vanessa; our journey out was on 17th June and we returned on 26th.
On our third day we visited John O’Groats, it had something of a Land’s End feel to it which is, I suppose, entirely to be expected. But looking towards the sea instead of the crowd-focused gift shops and cafes, you see the old harbour from which many an Orkney or Shetland ferry will have left or landed and small fishing vessels come in to land a catch.
Museum
Earlier the same day we’d explored Wick, once famous for the large scale of its famous herring fishing industry. The town has fallen on hard times with the loss of its major source of income, but tourism is beginning to bring some income back, aided by a really great fishing museum.
Paul and Vanessa visited us on 7th, and Tony’s funeral was on 17th at Cheltenham Crematorium. The lady who presented the address was very good indeed and everything went well. There were quite a lot of guests, Tony’s brother Ken with his wife Anne and their daughters and families, Paul and Vanessa of course, and more.
Fine weather made it better and we were able to chat outside, spaced according to the COVID rules though it didn’t seem too bad as each family could gather more closely within their own bubble.
We were having email problems with our web hosting company and as they were unable to fix the issue I decided to move to a Swedish company, one.com. It took a little time to get everything moved over, but it resolved the email difficulties and I soon had scilla.org.uk moved over and all the DNS aliases set up for jhm, chris, photo, and so on.
World events: The number of COVID cases worldwide passed 7 million on 8th June and 10 million on 28th; and there were border skirmishes between China and India.
I visited Thorganby on 13th, driving up through heavy rain most of the way. Donna couldn’t make it this time, but it was a good day. We visited Elvington for Aidan’s football awards day which included some sheep racing as well as football! In the evening Beth and the girls came over and finally I drove back home.
And I met my sister, Rachael, for coffee and lunch at Bosworth’s Garden Centre in Burton Latimer; it’s conveniently about half way between St Neots and Rugby.
Donna bought a new, purple HP laptop at PC World in Bedford. I suggested she spend a bit more on a higher spec device but she wanted the purple one!
I uploaded a new, revised version of Jesus, Disciple, Mission, Church (JDMC), a booklet on following Jesus based partly on the work of Alan Hirsch. I was very active in church life at this time, working with Several groups of people in and around St Neots. One of these was an Open Door Church small group run by our friends Roger and Carolyn. We met once a week for prayer, to sing, and to listen to the Holy Spirit’s guidance. Normally we would meet at the Church office.
World events:Lithuania officially adopted the euro as its currency; and the Kobanî massacre was one of three ISIL atrocities during Ramadan.
We began work refurbishing the old sports shop in Cambridge Road, St Neots, to turn it into a coffee and book shop. The old place had become dreary and old-fashioned inside and out, but we were confident that a new, fresh, bright colour scheme would make a very considerable difference. The major tasks would be to install a small kitchen where the changing cubicles had been, and build a service counter with coffee machine and display for cakes and so forth.
Aidan’s party
On 13th we visited Thorganby for Aidan’s 4th birthday party; dinosaurs and their footprints were everywhere, and Aidan was impressively knowledgeable about the different species. The food was dinosaur-themed too.
We visited our friends Geoff and Dawn who live in Corfu, Dawn’s daughter married a Greek so they have grandchildren in Corfu, and it’s a lovely climate. We spent a week with them using a little guest room in their garden for sleeping but eating and spending all day with them at home and around the island.
Mum’s note
Rosie and Richard were married (Rosie is my niece, Rachael’s daughter). Here’s something my Mum wrote for Rosie when she was born and brought it along to present at the reception! It’s so typical of my Mum.
At work at Unilever Research, I helped with some aspects of developing the Lipton intranet site and was helping set up new PCs for Knowledge and Information Systems (KIS).
World events:Wikipedia was featured in TIME Magazine; and there were protests in several European cities against software patents.
Unilever’s Colworth Web Team was set up, I was a part of this and worked for the team for almost all my years at the company..
Our friends Tony and Faith came to visit and we took a look at the Monk’s Wood Reserve that they wanted to see.
Ripon
We had a holiday in Yorkshire, hiring a cottage in the picturesque little town of Masham and visiting the surrounding countryside. We loved Masham itself, and also Ripon which I’d never visited before. We did a tour of the Black Sheep Brewery, right in Masham itself, really interesting and good fun as well.
June was definitely a good month, but also a busy month.
The photo shows Beth and Grandad (Judy’s Dad) at Hilcot, between Cheltenham and Cirencester. Grandad’s dog, Skip, is in the water and would probably have got himself hosed down when they arrived home in Charlton Kings!
Judy was beginning to lose a little weight at this time though was still fit and well and not in any discomfort. She had read somewhere that drinking vegetable juices might help with cancer so we bought a juicer and submitted all sorts of vegetables to its noisy, destructive action.
Beth must have been sitting A level exams this month, while Debbie was busy with her finals at the University of the West of England in Bristol. These were important times for them both, with significant implications for the future depending on the results.
World events: A US F-16 fighter was shot down over Bosnia; and Space Shuttle Atlantis docked with Russia’s Mir space station.
I chatted with Bill Giles the BBC weather forecaster at the Bath and West Show where I was working on the Long Aston Research Station (LARS) display.
At the allotments
A few days later, we drove to Charlton Kings, Cheltenham to visit Donna’s Mum and Dad, Madeline and Ron. Ron had an allotment nearby and he took us up to take a look at it. Like everything Ron did it was impeccable, not a weed in sight, all the plants raised in the greenhouse in his back garden, everything in dead straight rows. Quite regimented, really; but growing well. The allotment in the photo is not his, in the only one I have of him on his own plot, he’s far away and there’s no detail.
Larchmount
Towards the end of June, Debbie took a leading role in the Larchmount Players summer comedy in which bombs were transported on the London Underground and the other passengers made life extremely difficult!
World events: JK Rowling had the initial idea for Harry Potter; and the 14th FIFA World Cup was transmitted from Italy to Spain in high-definition TV.
There was country dancing at the Yatton Junior School Fete. Beth was involved in this and there were a lot of families and friends watching. I think I missed the fun because I was at work.
Fancy dress
Debbie and Beth also took part in the fancy dress carnival procession through the village. Here they were setting off, still in the school grounds at this point. Beth was wearing a clown costume made by her great-grandmother, Nor. I believe it was originally for my Uncle Dick to wear!
World events: The Schengen Area was created by five European states; and Route 66 was officially decommissioned.
Debbie and Beth went on an expedition with Mum to climb the stone stairs to the top of Yatton’s church tower. It must have seemed a lot of steps, and then all of them to do again to get back down. At two-years-old I dare say Beth might have been carried, but Debbie must have climbed up and down the entire way.
In Clifton
Here we are later in the month, crossing the Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol. It was clearly a hot day (flaming June), we were a very typical young family, Judy and I were still both thirty-one-years-old when she took this photo.
Debbie was three-months-old around the middle of the month and was probably able to hold things by herself. I’m guessing about the date of this photo, it might have been taken in July.
We hadn’t moved into our new home in Yatton yet, but the paperwork was all being processed. We didn’t move, I think until July or August, but at least by this time we probably had a definite date and would have given our landlord at the Belmont Road flat notice of our leaving date.
Exciting times!
World events: The Suez Canal reopened after the Six-Day War; and military rule ended in Greece with the formation of the Hellenic Republic.
This month spelled finals for Judy in Aber (Aberystwyth), and for me in Bath. As usual, for me this meant working in a hot exam room for hours and hours while suffering from a heavy dose of hay-fever. It was really not helpful!
I’d been studying Horticulture in year 4, while Judy was studying Biochemistry in year 3. The photo shows the Bath campus from the air around 1968. The large, pale construction site towards the upper right is the new maths and computing centre which was complete and in use by the time I graduated.
World events:Soyuz 9 carried a two-man crew for a record nearly 18 day spaceflight; and Brazil defeated Italy 4–1 to win the 1970 FIFA World Cup.
This month, Rachael had her 8th birthday and Ruth had her 9th, both of them were finishing an academic year at Querns School. Dad’s 39th birthday was also in June. If you want to see the riddles and their answers you’ll have to read the card.
I climbed Cirencester’s Parish Church tower and took some photos from the top, and also visited the World Gliding Championships at South Cerney with Dad and Günter, a German exchange student living with us at the time.
The school term ended in June, and that was also the end of my first year at Cirencester Grammar School. This is the main front entrance inside the lobby; turning first right led to the imaginatively named, two-storey ‘Red Brick Building’, second left was the Music Room, and right was the Library. Outside is a view across Victoria Road. (I took the photo in 1966, but nothing significant had changed.)
Ruth’s fourth and Rachael’s third birthdays were in June, Cindy was eight-years-old and I was still eleven (but only just).
This photo shows the corner of Cricklade Street (left) and Castle Street (right) in Cirencester. It’s based on a photo on the Wilts & Glos website.
The end of the school year was approaching as the second half of the summer term slipped by. I knew we’d have the long summer holiday and when we came back to school in September I’d be in my third year, not the second year any more. I was six-years-old at the time, but I’d be seven when we went back to school.
We went to Weston-super-Mare with Granny and Grandpa and stayed in one of the old hotels at the northern end of the front. I remember being fascinated by the waiter opening the doors on the wooden gramophone cabinet to make the music louder. We also visited Wells Cathedral on this trip.
(I know I remembered the gramophone from just two years old because I asked Mum and Dad about it much later when visiting them from Yatton. They were astonished and told me when and where it had happened. They remembered the name of the hotel we’d stayed in: The Lauriston).
At the end of May Dad travelled to Northern Ireland on leave and with some difficulties made it to Coagh on 29th. On 1st June they visited his old Ballinderry radar site and found it to be ’empty and derelict’. On 2nd they travelled to Belfast and had lunch with Mum’s Aunt Annie and her husband, Uncle Samuel. They sat in the sun outside City Hall and an American took their photo for them. After saying ‘Goodbye’ Dad caught the train to Larne, boarded the ferry, and was back in Stranraer in the evening, he wrote in his diary, ‘Horrible to leave Lilias’.
He then spent the rest of his leave in Cirencester catching up with the family and by the 10th he was back at camp in Alford. On 16th he spent a lot of time at the Butlins fun fair with others from camp. Radar duties continued 24/7 but with Germany defeated, the likelihood of hostile aircraft would have been zero.
There’s not enough information to write something for every month in the 1940s. Dad’s diaries start in January 1943, so for January 1940 to December 1942 I’ll write about things I know, or draw on dated photos and documents. Sometimes I might use a photo or document with a guessed date.
Dad was fourteen-years-old on 4th June, and most likely at school at Rendcomb College just north of Cirencester on the Cheltenham Road. The family home was ‘Churnside’ at 37 Victoria Road on the eastern edge of Cirencester. Mum was still eleven and living with her parents in Coagh, just inside County Tyrone on the border of Londonderry.
Tower St Nursery
One of the Jefferies’ nurseries was at Tower Street, this was on a plot of land that had once been very much larger and in the countryside on the southern edge of the town, but the town had expanded and the nursery was now surrounded by newer development; large parts had been sold off over the years, no doubt at a good profit.
The small piece that remained contained the Warehouse where seed-cleaning machinery occupied the top floor. The lower floors and the cellar were used for storage and processing of horticultural supplies and implements of all kinds. There were a number of greenhouses used for plant propagation and growing on in pots of various sizes. These were heated by a coke boiler feeding warm water through large bore pipes; during the winter months the boiler had to be tended and recharged with coke at roughly twelve hour intervals, usually around eight in the morning and then again around eight in the evening.
There was a packing shed in use all year round. Plants and sundries ordered by customers were packed in wood wool, tied up with raffia,and wrapped in sacking as required to protect them on their journeys; then delivered by horse and cart to local destinations in Cirencester and nearby villages, or taken to the nearby Cirencester Town Station for longer journeys by rail.
The photo is from a cine film taken in September 1960. The sign reads ‘Royal Nurseries, J Jefferies & Son Ltd, Cirencester’, but that aside, the greenhouses, pathway and warehouse would have changed little since 1940.
Anything that appears in this section will be material that I believe belongs in this decade. Items will not be in sequence within the decade, but where I can make a good guess of the date I will do so.
Stamp removed
This is an item that can be dated precisely. It mentions a nine-year-old, and other items with it as well as use of the name ‘Tigger’ show that it was part of a birthday present trail of clues for my Dad (he was known as Tigger by close family). As he was born on 4th June 1926, it’s almost certain that this trail was laid on 4th June 1935. It’s in my grandfather’s hand writing so we also know who laid the trail. And the stone steps and sharp right turn to a dark room describe the access to the concrete air-raid shelter where a step ladder must have been stored at the time. This little piece of paper tells us so much!
World events (June 1931): French industries warned that the US Smoot-Hawley bill would trigger an international tariff war; and the Dow Jones tumbled to its lowest level of the year due to anxiety over the Smoot-Hawley bill.
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What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
Click to enlarge
Here’s a bumble bee busy collecting nectar from a meadow cranesbill flower in a field margin just a brief walk from my home. The cranesbills are wild geraniums, close relatives of the pelargoniums; both genera are widely grown as decorative plants in pots or garden borders.
The photo is sharp enough when enlarged that you can see individual pollen grains on the bee’s black, furry body. Click the thumbnail image and stretch it to full size, then look for little white dots on the bee, those are the pollen grains.
Mutual benefit
The bees and flowering plants co-evolved, ancestors of both succeeded best in the presence of the other. Presumably the bee ancestors fed on the pollen of wind pollinated plants, incidentally transferring pollen more efficiently than the wind. And plants that provided sugary solutions and flagged this with colourful leaves near the nectar and pollen source were more successful than those that did not. After a while the insect and plant species were locked into a mutually beneficial relationship. Flowers are wonderfully adapted to attract bees and supply them with energy and a protein source to feed to their larvae. Bees are wonderfully adapted to collect and store nectar and pollen while moving some pollen grains from one flower to another.
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What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
Click to enlarge
This is a flower head of cow parsley or one of its relatives, a wild plant that grows extensively in Britain on untrimmed grass verges, along hedgerows, and in similar places. It’s a member of the carrot family, the Apiaceae ( until 2011, Umbelliferae), the word ‘umbellifer’ is related to ‘umbrella’ and you can probably see why!
The umbellifers are an interesting group of plants, including carrot, parsnip, celery, parsley, dill, fennel, coriander and many more. Cow parsley, like the others listed here, is safe to eat – but be very careful; hemlock looks much like cow parsley and is deadly poisonous. The infamous giant hogweed is another harmful umbellifer.
It was a hemlock extract that the Greek philosopher Socrates was required to drink following a guilty verdict in Athens.
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I suggest sharing a link or two with friends. And leave a kind comment on some of the posts – nothing encourages writers more than hearing from readers!
The ‘Run with Patience’ website
Verbatim – 2
Run with Patience
I’m sharing a lovely post from the blog Run with Patience, it’s informative, great advice, and a short but fun read – all rolled into one.
Here’s the ‘verbatim’ part – an extract…
Researchers have discovered that when we perform even one act of kindness, our brains release a cocktail of feel-good chemicals—dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin—all associated with pleasure, connection, and well-being. In fact, the release of oxytocin in particular (often called the “love hormone”) is the same chemical surge we experience when we fall in love. That means holding the door for someone or offering a word of encouragement can light up your brain the same way a romantic connection does.
While you’re there, have a look around at some of the other articles. It’s good stuff and there’s plenty of it. I can heartily recommend everything I’ve read there so far. If you agree, I suggest sharing a link or two with friends. And leave a kind comment on some of the posts – nothing encourages writers more than hearing from readers!
Useful? Interesting?
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The natural world always behaves like this. It attempts, in its own way, to overcome every obstacle put in its path. Organisms of all kinds make the best they can of every situation.
What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
Click to enlarge
Fancy a swim? No, I don’t either.
As with the last two Image of the day posts, this is once again from the River Great Ouse. Rubbish of all kinds gets into the river by a variety of routes. Sometimes people may just chuck stuff in – empty cans, plastic wrappers, paper bags. More often, perhaps, they leave items on the grass or the path, the wind blows, and voila! More flotsam.
But there’s not just human junk here, there are a lot of feathers too, mostly swan feathers though there might be goose and duck feathers as well. And there are leaves carelessly discarded by the trees in the park. However, the situation is not as bad as it seems; the photo was taken in a little corner where the river current doesn’t reach, a stagnant space where, if things move at all, they go around in lazy circles. There’s also some kind of floating weed here, thriving amongst the trash.
The natural world always behaves like this. It attempts, in its own way, to overcome every obstacle put in its path. Organisms of all kinds make the best they can of every situation. Often, the impact of floating waste is negative, but sometimes there may be exceptions.
On a much larger scale
I expect readers are aware of the massed floating zones of plastic at the centres of our oceans, the so-called Pacific garbage patch is the best known example although there are others. Some organisms have adopted these patches as suitable places to settle and there are now thriving colonies of algae, fish, and more. Attempts to collect the plastic for removal may need to be reconsidered and the situation is still under investigation.
Humans individually and collectively
It’s tempting to assume that my individual action has little effect. And there’s some truth in that – If I throw away a plastic sandwich wrapper as I walk in the countryside (having a quick look around first to see if anyone’s watching, of course), it’s easy to assume it doesn’t matter. But if I do it it every day that will be 365 plastic sandwich wrappers lying in the countryside. And if a thousand other people do the same thing that’s a third of a million wrappers. Suddenly the problem seems greater than I first imagined!
Collectively we are doing an enormous amount of damage. We need collective actions to make things better. This is happening, and we can all contribute, individually and collectively. If I act to improve things a little, and do it often, I will make a real difference. Or a local group removing litter from public spaces can make a larger difference much more quickly.
Somehow, collectively, we need to change from causing more damage to thinking things through and acting more responsibly. If we can’t or won’t, things will go from really bad (where we are now) to far, far worse (a place we definitely don’t want to be). Yet there’s still time, if not to put everything right, at least to reduce the harm very significantly.
It’s not only about rubbish
There are many things we can do to help the world cope better. Some of the links below offer good practical suggestions. Thinking about what we eat, how we use water, reducing energy consumption (and many other actions) can help the planet.
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17:20-23 – These next three verses are amongst the most significant things Jesus ever said. These words are the mission statement for the church. Sometimes it seems to me they’re more of a ‘missing statement’ for us than a ‘mission statement’ because we overlook the implications. There’s great depth here if we will only pay close enough attention, so let’s step through these words in detail.
17:20 – Jesus is very clear that he is not praying only for the twelve followers who were with him as he spoke with his Father. No. He explicitly says, ‘I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message’. Who is that? It’s me. It’s you. You and I believed through the message brought to us in the Bible, written partly by people Jesus knew personally, taught, journeyed with, ate with, people he demonstrated his love to, some of them would soon see him die and later see him again alive. After praying for them he prays also for us!
Oneness every which way!
17:21 – He wants you and me to be one, just as he and the Father are one. There is nothing that you and I might differ over that can stand between us as two of his people. Not doctrine, not denomination, not wealth or poverty, wisdom or foolishness, not gifts or apparent lack of them, not skin colour or attitudes to this or that in church life or beyond it. The goal is not to be right, the goal is to recognise that our reconciliation was very, very costly. Loss of life and separation of Father and Son is what it took to bring peace and oneness to and between you and me. And we, in our shiny new oneness are to be part of the eternal oneness of the Father and the Son. Why? So that the world has a chance to believe that the Father sent the Son. It’s plain in verse 21. Yet there’s still more!
17:22 – Just read verse 22 again. The Father clothed his Son with glory and he passed it on to you and me! What? Why would he do that? So that you and I can be one just as the Father and the Son are one.
17:23 – And in this verse we see that Jesus is in us, and the Father is in Jesus Why is that necessary? It’s because within the threeness that we refer to as ‘The Trinity’ and sometimes think we understand, there is also a oneness, a complete unity. The Father, the Son and the Spirit are not just close friends in some unique way, or close relatives. The Holy Spirit is often described as ‘The Spirit of Christ’, and Jesus said, ‘If you’ve seen me you’ve seen the Father’. So when John tells us that without Jesus, we can do nothing (John 15:5), that implies quite undeniably that without the Spirit we can do nothing and without the Father we can do nothing. The astonishing thing that we rarely notice is that all of us who follow Jesus are now part of the Trinity. If you can’t quite swallow that idea, let me state it slightly differently. In John 15:5 just mentioned, Jesus says we need to remain in him and he in us. Well, Jesus is undeniably in the Trinity, and we are in Jesus – therefore… You fill in the dots.
The need to believe
We’d better start understanding and believing this, because if we don’t we can do – nothing. How amazing is this undeserved gift that we are now one with the Most High, one with Jesus, one with Yahweh, with the Spirit. We can make further supporting arguments for this claim.
We are a ‘royal priesthood’ (1 Peter 2:9), royalty is about authority and rule, priesthood is about bridging the gap between earth and heaven, enabling people to come into the Holy Presence. Jesus is King of Kings and he’s also the Great High Priest. We are in him. We do what we see Jesus do (we’re his disciples, or apprentices), just as he did what he saw the Father do.
We are ‘filled with the Spirit’ (see this search). Filled (in a different context) doesn’t mean half or three quarters, it means completely full and running over (Luke 6:38). Jesus is our head and we are his body, we are in him and he is in us. We were created a little lower than the angels; but I’d submit that in Christ, we are considerably higher than the angels!
But we should be very careful not to become proud or puffed up. We do not deserve to be one with the Most High, it’s a gift obtained at great cost, our humble gratitude is appropriate and required. And notice too, in verse 23, that the Father loves you just the same way he loved the Son before the foundation of the world. You are loved with the same love Jesus received before the beginning. And Paul wrote to the Galatians that love is greater than faith and it’s greater than hope. It is the greatest thing of all (1 Cor 13:13). This new life we received in Christ enables us to be and do all the things he will lead us into.
Some readers may feel I’ve gone too far in this post. If so, please leave a comment. I can’t guarantee to change my opinion, but I will certainly read all the comments and respond to them.
Next time, we’ll take a look at the final three verses of John 17.
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Downtime is recuperative. It gives us time to just be, time to think, contemplate, dream. And when we return to the business of the day, perhaps we’ll do it with renewed vigour and purpose.
What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
Click to enlarge
I took this photo in 2012 when we lived in St Neots. It shows one of the bridges across the River Great Ouse in Bedford, much of the area around the river is parkland. It’s a wonderful breathing space in the heart of the hustle and bustle of the town and a relaxing stroll at lunchtime is always good in the middle of a busy day. There are places to eat and drink, or you can bring your own food and find a place to sit on the grass or choose a bench by the water. Lovely.
Downtime is important in our lives, it’s not good to be busy all the time. So whether it’s a week’s holiday, or even two; or a day off; or just 30 minutes in the middle of the day in the sunshine – downtime is recuperative. It gives us time to just be, time to think, contemplate, dream. And when we return to the busy business of the day, perhaps we’ll do it with renewed vigour and purpose.
And there’s something else in this photo.
Crossing a bridge
It’s impossible to miss the man crossing the footbridge. He looks purposeful, yet relaxed. The placid beauty of his surroundings would make it easy to feel relaxed. He’s crossing from one side to the other and I think he knows where he’s going.
Now I’m going to say something that some will accept and others will reject. But please reject it slowly if that’s your response. Read to the end and then reject it if that’s your decision. The man on the bridge is like a person following Jesus. That’s a bridge I have crossed in my own life. We’re all free to choose, but before walking away (if that’s your choice) please consider that even if you don’t believe all of his claims, Jesus is worth your attention because of his philosophy. He chose kindness, love and generosity over the prickly hatred and meanness that we so often see in our world. Jesus is worth hearing for his non-spiritual views, quite apart from anything else. Take a look. I did. My story is here on Journeys of heart and mind.
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Journeys of Heart and Mind 
