Rev'd Karen - November 2022

The Vicar’s Light Reflections

Light Reflections… “Let your light shine…” (Matthew 5.16)

As the clocks have now gone back in readiness for winter and our evenings are now becoming shorter, we have moved from a time of Thanksgiving in the Church Calendar at Harvest to a season of Remembrance. In Remembrance season on All Saints Day, we remember the Saints and Martyrs who have gone before us, those faithful Christian men and women who trusted in Christ for their salvation and who lived lives of service to Him and others. We then remember and give thanks for all the faithful departed at All Soul’s, especially those known personally to us who have given us life or nurtured us in our faith. These are followed by Remembrance Sunday where we remember loss individually and as a nation for those who have sacrificed their lives in war and conflict in working for peace. In all these commemorations is the thread that joins us together as Christians; that through our baptism we belong together as a family with Christ at the head. It is a belonging in remembrance and a remembering that we belong, that through the grace of God, He has brought us back to Him as His children, through the death and resurrection of His only Son Jesus Christ.

And it is remembrance that Jesus spoke of so movingly when sat at table with his friends on the night that he was betrayed. As he knew what lay ahead of him, he shared the Passover meal and enacted out though the symbols of broken bread and wine poured what was going to happen to him on the cross, that his body would be broken, and his blood outpoured.

‘Then he took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”’ (Luke 22: 19)

Through Holy Communion we too share in this meal, as the Priest re-presents Christ’s actions and says His words, we are reminded afresh of the sacrifice that Jesus made, and we too participate in the life saving and life-giving meal. We too become the disciples sharing in the bread and wine, the mystery of Christ’s’ body and blood given for us. St Ignatius of Antioch called the holy sacrament of the blessed bread and wine: ‘The medicine of immortality, the antidote that prevents us from dying and causes us to live for ever in Jesus Christ.’

Every week as we share in Christ’s body and blood in the bread and wine at Holy Communion, we share this collective remembrance as we are invited by the Lord Jesus Christ to feast at His table. All are invited to the meal, to receive His forgiveness and grace. Why not approach Him this Remembrance Season to feed on him in your hearts by faith with thanksgiving. Amen

Blessings, Rev’d Karen

Christ Centered...Kingdom Focused