Kelly Owen shares a Thought for the Day:
"At Life Group, I sat with my friends, as we usually do, but this time felt different. We often bring with us some of the burdens we are carrying – anxious teens, work stresses, or the tension we have with someone close to us, along with prayers for friends or family who are unwell or struggling with life. Yet, with the atrocities happening in Israel and Gaza right now, it felt somewhat insignificant to be complaining about our so-called ‘third world problems’.
"We read verses from Micah together, chapter 6 (v7-8):
'... He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.'
"…and reflected on how God knows us, right to our hearts, and it doesn’t matter how many ‘theological boxes’ we tick (going through the motions perhaps when we meet together at church or saying the Lord’s Prayer more through familiarity than with meaning), God simply asks us to be fair to ourselves and others, to be merciful, forgiving and humble. Big asks actually when you think about it, when all around us feels like rage and death and destruction.
"How to connect humbly with such a world right now?
"I am of course keeping the conflicts around the world in my prayers, but I thought about how I could demonstrate some of that mercy and humility with people around me, those ‘difficult’ people, the ones who ‘aren’t like me’ or who are angry, stressed or afraid. Perhaps I could start this seemingly huge ask of God, not by saying, like the war, it’s out of my reach, but by trying that little bit more to show something of Jesus in what I am going to do these next 24 hours?
"It might be starting an email asking how someone is – rather than jumping straight into the to-do list, or reaching out to that ‘difficult’ person and breaking that chain of bad feeling, or even sharing something of your faith with someone who needs comfort right now.
"God tells us that we can all do something to make this world a better place – why not start with where we are, right now?"
#micah6 #lifegroup
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