What he was sure of was that he had not been here before. What he was also fairly sure of, well as sure as one can be in such circumstances, was that just moments ago he was laying asleep in his bed.

But now, well now, he was somehow somewhere completely different and completely new. And so, bewildered and bemused, he stood and looked around him.

There before him lay a long narrow path leading to a small hill. Next to it was a long crystal clear river. Looking down he saw his reflection in the river, and it was then that he noticed his clothes, or more specifically the long amazing multi-shaded coat that he was wearing.

Taking the hem of his coat in his hand he looked at the fabric. To his amazement it was made up of tiny pictures. Pictures of things that had happened in his life. Things he had done with others, to others, for others, and things that others had done with, or for, or to him.

As he viewed them he soon noticed that some were colorful and happy, whilst others were dark, grey or black and white.

Looking down at his reflection in the river once more he couldn’t help thinking how much more colorful his coat would be if it only contained bright, colored pictures.

Returning his attention to his surroundings he then spotted what he thought was a figure on the hill in the distance. Static, almost surreal, the figure seemed to be beckoning him onwards.

He considered his circumstance. He knew not where he was or how he got there. He knew not where he should go, nor indeed who the figure in the distance was. And yet somehow he was neither concerned nor afraid. Somehow he was but at peace.

Walking on he slowly approached the figure who had beckoned him and on approaching him he could sense such peace and love from this man.

“Can you tell me why I am here, or even where I am?” He asked the figure.

“Has not your life, for so long now, been leading on this self-same path?” Was the smiled and only response from the man.

Kevin thought for a moment or two.

“You seem confused.” The man suggested.

“Have I died?” Kevin asked. “Is my walk now over?”

“No my child.” The man comforted him. “This is but a vision, a momentary pause.”

“Why?” Kevin asked. “Why the pause?”

“Perhaps there is something you must learn.” Came the gentle response. “Is there something on your heart?”

At first Kevin remained silent, and then slowly he looked once more at the coat he was wearing.

“Yes my child?” Came the gentle encouragement for Kevin to give voice to his thoughts.

“Um, well, I mean, well it’s this coat,” Kevin spoke softly almost nervously. “It seems to be made up of so many wonderful pictures. Pictures of my life. Bright, colorful happy pictures, and yet amongst them are so many dark, black and white and less happy pictures.”

“Yes indeed.” The man smiled. “And?”

“Well,” Kevin continued, “I know that you have brought me this far and indeed through all of those times, but I wanted so very much to stand before you and make you proud of me.” Again he fumbled with the fabric of his coat. “And it’s just that, well I can’t help wondering, thinking, how much better my coat would look if none of the darker, sadder, black and white pictures were there.”

Sheepishly Kevin looked up into the eyes of the man before him.

Gently taking Kevin by the hand the man led him once more to the river side.

Look at your reflection,” he told him.

Kevin did as he was told and to his amazement all of the darker, sadder, black and white pictures had gone.

Tears began to form in Kevin’s eyes and then trickle slowly down his cheeks.

“What is wrong my child?” The man asked lovingly.

“It’s my coat.” Kevin offered through his tears, “It has lost all of his marvel and wonder.” He sniffled as he lifted the fabric to show the man.

“I thought that if all the sadder, darker greyer, black and white pictures were to go,” Kevin continued, “I would be left with wonderful, bright and happy colors.” He glanced once more into the eyes of his companion. “But instead there are holes, gaps, missing pieces, and even the wonderful bright happy colors of the pictures that remain seem less happy, less colorful, less bright.”

The man smiled. “And so the child learns the lesson he was to learn.” He smiled. “For many times in your walk will you face times less happy, less bright, less colorful. Many times will you face sadness, trials, difficulties and even great hardships. But remember even these times have their purpose, and even these times can be used for my glory. Yes even those darkest of times can I use according to my will and my purpose.”

“I, I am so sorry.” Kevin whispered. But his words were met not with anger or disappointment but with love and warmth as the man simply directed Kevin’s gaze once more to his reflection in the river.

There in front of his eyes his coat was restored to how it was before, no gaps, no tears, no holes, no missing parts. Happy parts, sad parts, shaded parts and glorious colorful parts all back together in their rightful place once more. Once more it was complete and whole again.

Looking up Kevin looked for the eyes that had met him with such love and compassion. But instead of seeing them all he saw was the wall of the bedroom he had been laying in before this had happened.

“Yes Lord, the child has learned the lesson he was too learn.” Kevin whispered through a yawn. “And he is grateful Lord.”

Over the past few weeks I have been juggling physical illness, mental fussiness, the tormenting voices and negative internal dialogues with trying to build a website for the big local festival that is coming up. Something that my son volunteered me to do since he is very involved in it’s organisation of it.

It seems so long since I last blogged and I am itching to get back into the swing of regular blogging. Hence my sitting doing so over a lovely and most healthy turkey salad. And the chance to get out of the house is most welcomed as well.

Matt (my son) and his partner Trish, are munching away on their lunches and I am enjoying their company. Actually I have seen a lot of them lately – Matt because of the website and Trish because I have been helping her with her college assignments.

But both of those are a true blessing to me and isn’t that what parents are for?

I can’t help reflecting, as our television screens seem to be filled with more and more seedy programs glorifying and encouraging wayward teenagers, pubescent pranks and perpetual promiscuity, just how blessed I am by my children and their partners.

I am old fashioned – in my parenting, my ways and my attitudes and I make no apologies for that. Additionally my faith instills and requires morals which all too often seem seriously lacking nowadays.

My faith, like my church are core to who I am and are the very foundation of my approach to life, love and parenting.
I am so very thankful for my children but I recognise (and in fact celebrate) that their adulthood ( and indeed their teenage) does not remove them from being my children or from needing the love of a father, it (they) instead simply present us with needing to find new, effective and mutually acceptable ways of showing and offering that love in Christ.

Hey, it’s an understandable assumption   But the truth is that it is not a typo and I deliberately chose to use the word weak and indeed to write this post at this time because it seems so appropriate and  is so on my heart right now.

Holy Week in the Christian’s calendar is the time when perhaps more than any other time we remember Christ’s arrest, trial, torture, crucifixion, burial, resurrection and ultimately His ascension.

But if I may, for the purpose of this post, I would like to invite you to reflect with me on just one aspect of that time – that time after Christ was crucified and before he rose again.

I wonder how the disciples felt at that time?  How would you have felt if you had been one of the disciples?

You meet a man who claims to be the Son of God and who changes your life in a radical and unmistakable way.  You dedicate your life to Him and He rightly becomes the very center, and in many ways, the very focus of your life.

You spend all of your time with Him, eat with Him, talk with Him, travel with Him.  You witness and share in His deep love and compassion for people, see Him speak prophesy, heal the sick, give sight to the blind and mobility to the lame.  You witness first hand the miracles and wonders that He performs and you believe with all you heart that “truly He IS the Son of God” and “truly the Kingdom of God is upon us!”

And then suddenly He is taken from you!

This ‘Son of God’, this ‘Promised One’, this ‘Messiah’, this ‘Saviour of the World’ was; betrayed by one of your own, arrested, tortured, placed on trial, and then crucified!

“Will He come down off the cross?”, “Will God smite His enemies and rescue Him?”, “Will the heavens open and God Himself speak?”,  “Does this sudden darkness mean God is about to act?”  These are all understandable questions aren’t they?  Realistic expectations?

But no.  None of that happens?  Instead He dies and is taken away and buried in a tomb.

He is gone!

As suddenly as He came into your life, He is gone from it.

All that is left is a sealed tomb and an empty cross!

All that you are left with are questions and a deep longing in your heart”

How would you feel?  What thoughts and questions would flood through your mind? What would you do?

Go to that tomb?  Wait for something to happen?  Perhaps return to that now empty cross – standing there simply looking at it with so many thoughts, so many questions, so many emotions flowing through your heart and mind?

What now? What comes next?  Surely that can’t be it?  Surely it doesn’t end here? Surely something else has to come?  Surely there must be more?  Surely this newness must continue!

Step forward in time with me, if you will, to more recent years.  1985 and a young 23 year old man. A young man who had believed in God all his life and indeed who could never remember a time when he did not believe in God.

And yet somehow that wasn’t enough and he knew it.  Somehow knowing there was a God but not having a relationship with God left a void in his heart, an emptiness, a sense of “there must be more to life.”

Then an evangelical mission came to town one preaching on Christ Jesus.

It would spend two weeks in local school and village halls and then 4 weeks in a 4000 seated Circus tent.

Every night there would be a service with praise and worship, a guest artist, a sermon/bible teaching delivered by the evangelist Eric Delve and then an invitation to respond and invite Christ into your life and to have a living relationship with God through Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

I had a lot of time on my hands in those days and so for the first two weeks I was heavily involved as a steward, traveling to all the venues and helping out.  Then when it moved into the Circus tent I took on the role of security coordinator.

For four weeks I, along with other volunteers in my team slept, ate, worked and served in that tent and every night we would be part of the ministry and service.

It became my life.  The more I heard about this Christ, the more I wanted, needed to know Him and to serve Him.  The more involved I was the more involved I wanted and needed to be.

I was letting Him into my heart and giving my life to Him and I knew it, felt it, needed it, lived it.

Finally on the last night of the mission I too responded to the alter call and went forward.  I wanted to make that public confession and witness that I too had given my life to the Lord.

And then the mission ended!

The evangelical team, counseling team, worship team, stewarding team, security team – everyone left and returned to their normal lives and to their home churches.

The circus tent came down was packed up and taken away and I returned to my one-roomed apartment and to, well to, to what exactly?  What was next?

My life, my heart, my faith had been so full of Christ for those previous six weeks but then the focus of that fullness, the

I remember so clearly going back, a few days later, to the site where the circus tent had been and standing, staring at the huge empty circus of different colored foot-trodden grass where the tent had been.

Just as the disciples could have stood before the site of that empty cross all those years before, there stood I before the empty site of that mission – asking similar questions – searching for similar answers…

“What now? What comes next?  Surely that can’t be it?  Surely it doesn’t end here? Surely something else has to come?  Surely there must be more?  Surely this newness must continue!”

In truth I a have spoken about two very real and very specific episodes of doubt and of questioning.  Understandable doubt and understandable questioning – one in the life of the disciples and one in my own personal life.

But of course many of us face times of doubt don’t we?  Times of question?  Times when perhaps the faith that we once had does not seem so real so vital as once it did?

And my personal experience is that for many of us who face challenges and difficulties with our mental health, times of doubt and questions and indeed times when the troubles of life seem to become overwhelming and get in the way of our faith are quiet frequent and normal.  But doe that make us weak?  Does that mean we are not Holy?

Indeed is there, can there, be such a thing as the Holy Weak?

Well I for one am convinced that there can and are those who are both Holy and who experience times of spiritual weakness.

Mark 9:24 – ²⁴ Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” (NIV)

Romans 8:26 – ²⁶ In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. (NIV)

Matthew 5:3 – “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (NIV)

Yes I am convinced that there are those who do experience times of spiritual weakness for whom Holiness is still a part of their lives or can still be part of their lives.  And what is more I am convinced that that Holiness is not taken from up when we face times of weakness but instead is afforded to us in greater measure when we face those times of weakness by calling on the name of the Lord and giving it to God in prayer.

Earlier, in what I now freely admit has become a fairly lengthy post, I shared about the first time when that spiritual weakness was faced by me.  Shortly after I came to know Christ in fact.  But there have been many other time when I have faced such weaknesses, such times of trouble and trial – such times of doubting and questioning.

And I am sure that there are others for whom that is also true – especially within the mental health community – and sadly often as a result of the way others within the body of Christ have treated us.

But I want to encourage you – you who, like me consider yourself at times to be part of the Holy weak and especially at this time – this Holy week.

“I will not leave you as orphans…” (John 14:18 NIV).  These are the words Christ Himself spoke to the disciples when He was telling them of His having to leave and when He was (unbeknown to them) talking about that arrest, torture, trial, crucifixion, burial, resurrection and ascension that we spoke of earlier and which is so prominent in our hearts and minds at this time of year.

No matter how weak we may feel, no matter how un-holy our lives may have become, no matter how hurt or down-trodden we believe ourselves to be, I am convinced that God does not want us to either feel as orphans, live as orphans or be orphans.

Christ promised – in that same conversation with His disciples – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit for His disciples – for the believers.  That same promise is, I am convinced and have personally experienced, available to each and every one of us who have made that commitment to Christ.

So the question I ask you is – do you feel orphaned?  Are you living as an orphan?  Have you let the hurts and troubles of life and any personal spiritual weakness that you have felt rob you of knowing the fullness of God’s love through that relationship with Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit?

Because if you have, I am convinced and certain that this is not what God – our heavenly Father desires for you.

.

You know, those who seem to throw their toys out of the pram the minute something goes – or seems to go – wrong.

And the fact is that we have probably all, or at least most of us, done this at some time or other in life.

And in truth it is a behavior which we see in most toddlers.

Won’t they (and we when we were younger), at one point or another have done this – thrown their toys out of the pram?

When it first happens most parents will; bend down pick up the toy, brush it off/clean it, and give it back to the toddler concerned.

Sometimes, of course, the toddler sees this as a being fun.  So naturally they throw it out again, and often the parent will repeat the whole returning process.

But of course with human nature being what it is, the more this happens the more rewarding it becomes for the child and equally the more frustrating it becomes for the parent.

So the process reaches a point where the parent cottons on to the fact that it has become a game and so – not wishing to reward the child or encourage it and allow it to become a learned behavior – they simply warn the child (if the child is old enough to understand) or simply refrains from returning the toy to the child.

It is, I think we would all agree, a perfectly natural and common place event in childhood and parenting is it not?

But what happens when it isn’t a child involved?  What happens when it is an adult and not toys out of a pram but people out of a relationship? And what happens when the learned behavior is already their and that person – being discarded – is YOU?

I am, I think, many things to many people.  Different people see me in different ways and that again is, I think very natural.  To some I come across as very approachable and very caring.  To others – or so it seems – I come across as detached and uncaring.   To some the practical joker and yet others a very serious,  deep thinker.

Actually, I can even remember one time when I was standing next to a lady in church – whom I had known casually for some months but never ever really had a cross word with or any long or noteworthy conversation with – when she turned to me and said, “I have to tell you Kevin, you really scare me.  I just find you so intimidating.”

I have to admit that I was both stunned and somewhat surprised by the revelation and how it seemed to come out of absolutely nowhere.

I also have to admit that I was very saddened by that revelation.  After all, it isn’t as if I am some sort of Ogre

Now don’t get me wrong, I understand that I am a big guy.  Actually a very big guy and I accept that my size can make me a little intimidating.

I also understand that the way my mind works I am often deep in thought and do on occasion – either as a result of my schizo-affective disorder or my Aspergers – sometimes respond more deeply (or conversely say simply things) which others would perhaps hold back on.

But none of these are intended to push people away or intimidate.  And neither of them demonstrate how deeply I do care about people.

Actually, I personally think that it is something that people often get very wrong about folk who experience mental health struggles and especially those of us who have Aspergers.  They somehow think that we just don’t care or do not have emotions on the same level that they do.

The truth is of course, – or at least in my experience the truth is – that they are very wrong and we do care – sometimes more deeply than others may – we just demonstrate it and process it in different ways.

So when something happens and someone gets upset and throw’s YOU out of their pram, closing the door to you and ceasing all communication it can be very hurtful.

Not least of all because it means that you can no longer show them the love that you have to offer and which in a lot of cases they actually need.

It is of course quite natural to say, “Well good luck to you then.  If you don’t need me or my love then who cares?”  But the fact is that deep down inside, perhaps under the initial hurt, we do still care don’t we?

And to accept anything else, to stop loving that person, to allow our focus to be on any hurt, to allow those hurt to become bitterness and to fester is unhealthy for them, for us and as Christians to our faith.

No, I am convinced that the truth is that when this happens our loving them doesn’t have to stop.  The only thing that stops is their ability to see and fully know how much we love them perhaps.

So instead this is when our love, which by now admittedly probably has a greater cost to us as we need to surrender those hurts,  needs to take a different form and to be offered solely in prayer.

And whilst it is true that prayer should have formed part of our love for them all along, it is in the surrendering of those hurts – in the heartfelt love and caring for the person who has caused us that hurt by rejecting us – which will also guard our heart against bitterness.

And that in turn allows our doors to remain open for when they have calmed down or seen things differently – perhaps more clearly.  And in so doing – to allow for the healing that needs to take place.

Why am I blogging about this now?  Well because a couple of days ago this happened to me.  A misunderstanding caused someone, someone I have known but a few days and yet already care so very deeply for, to throw me out of their life and to close the door on my love.

Did it hurt?  Yes very much so.  But as I have said, it is at times like this when our love must take a different form.  Why?  Because that is what love is and that is what I know God would want for and from us.

Stigma does so much damage doesn’t it?  It hurts and cripples and it closes doors to so many people. Doors that should be open to them more, in many cases than to most other folk because the need is so often greater.

Doorways to belonging, to tolerance, to understanding, to kindness – dare I say it – to acceptance?

I have written many times – either specifically in a dedicated post or incidentally within other posts, about isolation and what it can do to a person.  UI have also mentioned the isolation which I face for most of my week and how I seem, on the face of things to be able to cope – almost to prefer this.

And yet the more I reflect on stigma and what it does to us the more I question whether or not I have simply – as a result of circumstance – taken an easier option or become accustomed to what it basically a wrong situation.

This afternoon something appeared on my Facebook page which made me once again sit up and think.  It is a song performed by artists – street artists effectively – from across the world and it starts with the statement …

This song says, “No matter who you are, no matter where you go in life, at some point you’re gonna need somebody to stand by you.”

I really hope you enjoyed this video clip as much as I did.  But even more so I hope that…

If you, like me, have been a victim of stigma inflicted on you by others YOU truly know that YOU are not alone. or

If you are usually the one inflicting that stigma or treating others badly as a result of it, YOU are better than that and YOU can make a difference by not being that way.

So I leave you with this thought…

No matter who WE are, no matter where WE go in life, at some point WE‘re gonna need somebody to stand by US.

Or because you are in “that place” again where doing anything, thinking anything, attempting anything is just too big a stretch for you?

But even more than that I wonder how many times you have felt forced to make excuses, to lie, or create some falsehood or some diversion away from the real reason why you didn’t do it, go there, participate?

Where other people’s expectations, or their inability or seemingly dogged unwillingness to understand creates for you either a silence where your voice simply isn’t worth using as it won’t be heard or a world of conflict where telling the truth simply doesn’t seem an option?

In my own situation, having hidden my physical and mental health issues for most of my life I suddenly had a full mental and physical breakdown back in 1999 and as a result of that the “cat was very much out of the bag” as they say.

Since then I have pretty much refused to hide my mental health issues and I have tried, where possible to be fairly open about them with most people that I meet on a regular basis and with whom I am likely to have any noteworthy relationship.

But here’s the deal.  I am now 51 years old and I live alone and have very few people to whom I have to answer, or indeed care for on a one to one daily basis.  And with that comes tremendous freedom.

But I recognize that not everyone has that same freedom and that my circumstances are quite unusual.  I don’t face the same social pressures that many of us face.

But what about those who do?  What about those for whom those things that I spoke about above – the hiding, the shame, the ridicule – the stigma is still so very real?

I cam across this video and it really spoke to me.  I hope and pray it speaks to you also.

And that is so very appreciated by me.

This time the award was given to me by dear Ellen over at Moonside and the respect that I have for her and for her writing simply adds to the value of the award for me.

Accordingly the rules are as follows:-

1. Display the Award Certificate on your website (okay I done didded that)
2. Announce your win with a post and link to whoever presented your award (okay done didded that also)
3. Present 15 awards to deserving bloggers ( hm see note below*.)
4. Drop them a comment to tip them off after you’ve linked them in the post (done didded that [subject to the note below])
5. Post 7 interesting things about yourself. (okay I can cope with that)

*So having complied with rules 1 and 2 I need to explain why I am not technically complying with rule 3.  I have received this award before and on those occasions I have awarded the award to folk so to re-award them – or to award to yet another 15 bloggers would detract from the award in my opinion.  So below (having already awarded folk with this award you will find the few blogs that I have recently become aware of and that I do sincerely want to award this award to.

Dissociative Monologues

My Dualities’ Blog

Redheadcase’s Blog

SentiMENTAL paRANTing

And now for 7 (probably not so) interesting things about me…

1. Generally speaking, my manic episodes do not present themselves in physical ways (excess cleaning, reckless shopping, hyperactivity etc) but more in mental ways.  Racing thoughts, weird and wonderful journeys of complex thought patterns and processes going off on the most amazing tangents.  The only physical signs of this (apart from an inability to focus on one conversation and the tendency to zone out into my own thoughts) would be countless notes and writings and the fact that very often (when in this state) I will write the end of a paragraph or the beginning of the next paragraph in the middle of the paragraph that I am trying to write. (If that makes any sense)

2. When I am alone I have a tendency to watch three or four television programs at once by flicking through them. I find that I can keep up with the story lines of each of them and often get bored just watching one at a time. Although I must admit that my ability to do so seems to have lessened as I have gotten older.

Thankfully I am not so bad as to have numerous Tv’s in one room.

3. Conspiracy theories – bore me to tears.  They are nearly always based on the merest and thinnest strands of evidence and false and often badly manipulated premises.

4.  Whilst I am not anti  competition I find competitive activities within small groups and especially families are off putting to me as my experience of them is that they nearly always end up in upset and disappointment for folk.

5.  I can read books and writing that is upside down just as easily as I can read them when they are right way up.  Unfortunately I can’t do so when I am upside down as I get too preoccupied thinking, “this much weight should never be balanced on such a small head”

6.  I am left-handed.  When at school they tried to get me to change to being right-handed but I refused and continued writing left-handed.

See how much of an awkward beggar I am and how stubborn I can be when I set my mind to it?

Hey they are my hands, surely I get to choose which one I want to use!

7.  One of the saddest statements that I ever hear is when someone doesn’t have a relationship with God or Christ because they have been hurt by relationships with other believers.

So there you have it, my not so interesting interesting facts.

Again I am so very grateful to Ellen for her having awarded this award to me and I hope that those few I have nominated will understand that this is awarded to them out of respect for what they do.

Kind Regards and God bless you.

Kevin

There are a number of passages in the Bible which make me sit up and question, sit up an reflect on, their true meaning.

Indeed there are a number of passages that lead me off on wonderful journeys of discovery.

Likewise some passages which I thought I had understood will often leap out at me with new meaning, new significance, new revelation.

But then, more than any other writing, the Bible for me stands unique as a constant living and fluid unfurling of narration, a living explanation of the relationship that I have with God through Christ.

One such passage that has often caused me to sit and reflect is that of 1 John 4:18…

¹⁸ There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. (KJV)

“But perfect love casteth out fear.”  Its an interesting one isn’t it?  Especially if, like me paranoia, or anxiety, forms part of your mental health. And especially if thqt paranoia forms part of your schizophrenia or your schizo-affective disorder and those ‘voices’ or that inner dialogue asks such things as “see you have fear, so you are not made perfect in love – what does that tell you then?”

The key words for me here however, is that of “casteth out” or in the NIV ” drives out”.  In the Greek the word is βάλλω (ballō) and means to throw out or get rid of.  So in answer to those voices and that inner dialogue I have to say, “how can you cast out, drive out, throw out, or get rid of something that you don’t have?”

It is a valid point isn’t it?  You have to have something in the first place in order to be able to cast it out or get rid of it?  So having a faith in God through Christ doesn’t mean that I will never fear or have reason to fear, it instead challenges what I do with fear when it comes my way.

So let’s look at that for a moment…

I wonder how many of us as parents have had our child or children wake up from a bad dream or nightmare and in their fear automatically call out to us of come to our bedroom door in search of us?

Or if you have no children how many of us can remember doing that ourselves when we were children and had a bad dream or nightmare?

Just going to Mum or Dad and getting their reassurance and the security that that offered dealt with that fear didn’t it?  The faith and trust that perfect love that a child has for and in and from his or her parents casts out that fear.

Isn’t (and shouldn’t) the same be true in respect of the fear that we face in life as children of God?

Can’t we go to Him in faith through Christ knowing that as our perfect heavenly Father we have that perfect blessed assurance?

God is our heavenly Father and His love is perfect.  In Him we have comfort and joy, as the old song goes, and yet there is no where in the Bible – as far as I can see – that says that through a relationship with God through Christ all threats, all trials, all troubles will be removed from us.  In fact there are several places that indicate that they may well increase.

I have long since said, that one of the fundamental roles of a parent for a child is in many ways to be representatives and representations of God until the child is able to understand and develop his or her own relationship with God through Christ Jesus.

That source or comfort, of reassurance, of guidance and protection that we should get from our parents – especially in our younger years – is an excellent example of this and I fully believe that as Christians it is the perfect love of our heavenly Father that enables us to cast out all fear.

Some students of the bible will no doubt suggest that since this verse being preceded by the words of verse 17…

¹⁷ This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus.

it would indicate that this passage is speaking of the day of judgement, but I would point out that actually it is also about how we live our lives up to that day.  Consider the words of verse 19 I would add…

¹⁹ We love because he first loved us.

We love because He first loved us and it is that perfect love that provides is with the courage that we need to run the race for which we are called.

Yes things have and in many ways are still tough and I know that I am not alone in that and that many others are going through equally if not tougher times.  But as a child of my heavenly Father, His perfect love gives me the strength to go on

In my post “A. W. O. L.” (posted March 4th) I briefly explained how I had not been well for some time and how due to this (and the cold weather) I had not felt able to post anything coherent or noteworthy.

I also thanked everyone for their very kind concern and messages of encouragement and “well-wishes” and would very much to thank everyone again now.

The good news is that I am very much on the mend now and have been busy working away on a couple of projects that I have been wanting to do for a while now.

The truth is that I had found myself in a bit of a hole, quite a deep hole really – and I would wager I am not alone in experiencing these.

I knew that I was in one and indeed could see the light at the end of the tunnel and hope that I would soon reach the end of it, but actually reaching it was something entirely different!

Mentally I have been struggling also.  Thankfully not so much that I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.  Isn’t that often what depression can be like? That no matter whether the light is there sometimes we just can’t see it?

Physically I have also been struggling and sometimes, no matter how bright the light or how desperately I may have wanted to get to it, I just haven’t had the strength of means to reach it. So it was as if the light at the end of the tunnel seemed unreachable for that time.

Thankfully I was not alone in all of this.  I had the kindness of many of you and the support and care and encouragement of my family and friends and my church family and even more I had (and have) my faith to help me get through it all.

So I am very encouraged!

Not only do I feel much stronger but now I even feel as if I am climbing out of that hole that I was in and I am looking forward to getting back into the swing of things!  (Of course I have to exercise wisdom and caution and ease back into things)

As I said before, I am so thankful for all the care and support that I have had and for all your kindness.  I am also extremely thankful for my faith which has without doubt helped me through this last episode

I promise you that there is no need for concern.  I am fine but just not well enough to be able to post anything coherent or note worthy enough for posting and additionally it has been so very cold over here and far too cold for me to be able to spend much time in my study which is another reason for my not having posted of late.

I will be back to posting when my health (and the weather) improves. But thank you once again for all your kind comments and notes and messages of concern.