Pastoral letter from Richard Steven, The Rectory, Herstmonceux Tel 01323 833124
e mail: ra_steven@hotmail.com
Dear Church Members and Friends,
Here we are at the gateway to a new year, what can we be sure of in the days
ahead?
I wrote this pastoral letter last year but feel its message is ever relevant
even though many of us are quite likely facing new and different issues for this new
year.
My Mum had a short poem in our living room when I was growing up. One of it’s
lines said “at least we can be sure of spring”, and that is quite true. If anyone
knows this poem please let me know as I would love to be able to read it again.
It is
always good to have something to look forward to such as spring, something that is
sure to happen. It helps if it is not in the too far distant future.
There is also something from our faith that we can be sure of in the uncertain days
ahead. God’s Grace is available. The word grace appears 170 times in the New
Testament. This word ‘grace’ means free and unmerited favour.
One of the best know Christian hymns is ‘Amazing Grace’. This hymn speaks
initially about God saving even the worst of us from our sin, and of course that is
the main reason Jesus came to earth, but the hymn doesn’t stop there it goes on to
speak about how God can continue to assist us with this amazing grace as we go
on throughout our lives. Here is a bible verse that clearly indicates this. ‘Let us
approach God. so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time
of need’. (Hebrews 4v16). God gives to men and women like us who need an
energy other than our own to face and deal with the various issues and problems
that life brings. The only thing, other than not knowing that these riches are
available to us, that restrict us from receiving them, is to fail to approach God to ask
for his help.
John Newton who wrote ‘Amazing Grace’ had been a terrible person in his
behaviour by anyone’s standards during the early years of his life while working in
the British slave trade. However he discovered that God still loved him when he
called out for God’s help and salvation when aboard a sinking ship in a mid Atlantic
storm. He and the crew survived and Newton also had experienced an immediate
and sound conversion experience of God’s mercy and grace. Even the crew
noticed this as he immediately stopped swearing, something he had excelled at
before hand !! After 16 years as a reformed character he was ordained as a Church
of England Priest for the remaining 43 years of his life.
During these years he wrote
‘Amazing Grace’ and other well known hymns such as ‘Glorious things of thee are
spoken’. During the last twenty years of his life Newton became an ally of William
Wilberforce, leader of the Parliamentary campaign to abolish the slave trade. He
lived to see the British passage of the Slave Trade Act 1807 passed prohibiting
the slave trade throughout the British Empire.
A very good biography on his fascinating life and God’s amazing grace at work is
called ‘Newton the Liberator’ by John Pollock. I have a copy that I am quite happy
to lend out, please ask. May you have a very Happy New year as we look forward to Spring and also more
of God’s amazing grace in our lives and in our very needy world