Minister’s Message
“Then Peter stood up with the other eleven apostles and in a loud voice began to speak to the crowd...”
Acts 2:14
Recently I was reminded of some of the wonderful old choruses and hymns I learned at school and Sunday school: “Tell me the old, old story of Jesus and his love.......” and “This is my story, this is my song…”
Telling stories - the art of storytelling - is a universal skill, spanning all cultures, which most of us experience for the first time in childhood and continue to enjoy as we grow older. We love to be told stories, and to hear other people’s stories, whatever age we are, don’t we? And personal stories are usually the most fascinating and often the most moving.
In my work as a minister I have the privilege of sharing stories with other people, both hearing their stories & sharing my own story, and it’s often a humbling experience. As social beings we’re made to tell our stories to each other and it’s a great thing to do while we can - think of how many times at funerals people say they wish they’d known the full story of someone’s life before they died, so they could have talked to them about it!
At Pentecost we celebrate the arrival of the Holy Spirit, promised by Jesus to his disciples. It’s an exciting story of how thee disciples lives were changed and transformed in a way that helped them to tell their stories of what they’d seen and heard and learned about Jesus, who he is, and how he changed and still changes people lives and the world. The gift of the Holy Spirit enabled the disciples to fulfil their mission from Jesus, which was to go & tell the world the good news about Jesus and God’s radical way of love, and encourage others to follow him and live their lives by following his ways of grace, love and forgiveness.
I’m a great fan of stories with happy endings, maybe because I’m an optimist, but as Christians we know that everybody’s story can have a happy ending, because of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross for us, his defeat of death & the power of evil, his resurrection, and his promise of new & eternal life when we invite him into our hearts and lives as our Saviour.
The trend in our society is to sell your story, especially if it involves someone famous. What a contrast that is with the mission we have as Jesus’ followers, which is to tell our story, for free, especially as it involves the most important person who ever lived!
Jesus sent his disciples out to share the good news of his saving love and he’s calling each of us to do the same. Surely the best way to do that (and one that Jesus suggested!) is to share our personal stories of what a difference it makes to have Jesus in our lives, and our stories of where & when & how we’ve experienced God’s presence in our everyday daily lives for ourselves.
We may be tempted to think our story isn't important or interesting enough to tell - but God has given each of us our own story to tell, so that we can share the ways in which we’ve personally experienced God’s love and grace in our lives.
As another hymnwriter put it: “Lose your shyness, find your tongue, tell the world what God has done: God in Christ has come to stay; we can see his power today.”
So how about sharing your story of Jesus and his love? After all, no one else can do that for you!
Jane <><