Reflection for Saturday 25th April 2020

“And everything is in your hands, our lives, this world, you have a plan,
nothing is impossible for you”….
This is a line from the song we’re playing at the end of the Livestreaming
services on Sundays at 10.00am.
This track is: ‘You can move mountains’ on the Worship album called: ‘I have
not forgotten’, which our son, Andi Foster, recorded in 2012. It’s on the
website, if you’d like to hear the whole song. The lyrics are very relevant and
full of hope in these times. They are inspired by Psalm 95 v 3 – 7: “the Lord is
the great God, the great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the
earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him. The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land. Come, let us bow down in worship, let us
kneel before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God”….

In Wednesday’s Reflection on St Mary’s Website, Charlie spoke about Earth

Day. Every year the Earth Day Network, (organizers of the original Earth Day),
selects an environmental priority to engage the global public.

The Network explains “The enormous challenges – but also the vast
opportunities – of acting on climate change have distinguished the issue as the
most pressing topic for the 50th anniversary year. At the end of 2020, nations
will be expected to increase their national commitments to the 2015 Paris
Agreement on climate change, so the time is now for citizens to call for greater
global ambition to tackle our climate crisis”. It continues:

“Climate change represents the biggest challenge to the future of humanity

and the life-support systems that make our world habitable. Unless every
country in the world steps up – and steps up with urgency and ambition – we
are consigning current and future generations to a dangerous future.

Earth Day 2020 will be far more than a day. It must be a historic moment when
citizens of the world rise up in a united call for the creativity, innovation,
ambition, and bravery that we need to meet our climate crisis and seize the
enormous opportunities of a zero-carbon future”.

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EARTH DAY 2020 THEME: CLIMATE
ACTION

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We repeatedly hear others and ourselves speaking of these Strange times or
Unprecedented times, resulting from the Coronavirus panademic. Time is a
mystery that does not cease to puzzle us. Philosophers, artists and poets have
long explored its meaning, while scientists have found that its structure is
different from the simple intuition we have of it. Carlo Rovelli is an Italian
Physicist, who was speaking on the radio today about ‘the Order of Time’. He,
amongst many others, wrestles with and writes about Quantum Physics
theories in his book ‘The Order of Time’.
Earth is believed to have formed over 4.5 billion years ago. It is the third
planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbour life.
According to radiometric dating and other evidence, Earth's gravity interacts
with other objects in space, especially the Sun and the Moon, which is Earth's
only natural satellite. Earth orbits around the Sun in 365.256 solar days, a
period known as an Earth sidereal year. During this time, Earth rotates about
its axis 366.256 times, that is, a sidereal year has 366.256 sidereal days.
Our minds, unless we are Quantum Physicists or considering ‘Time’ from other
disciplines, find it impossible to take in what that means. Yet “nothing is
impossible for you”… “You hold the earth in the palm of your
hands”….continues the song.

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Just a few months ago, Greta Thunberg, the Swedish 17 yr old Activitist for
Climate Change instigated a movement which mobilised thousands of young
people around the world and, controversially, children and young people took
time out of school to line the streets. Now, many of those children in the
current time are in lockdown, unable to go to school and the streets are
empty. Amidst the heartbreak of the Coronavirus, can we sense the heartbeat
of the Creator God calling us back to himself and, as Kay was speaking of
yesterday in her Reflection, to treasure what is all around us and the chance
encounters with people we can have, even in social distancing? It takes ‘the
power of ONE to pull together. These times need us all to pull together. Greta
Thunberg remarked “Coronavirus and climate change must be tackled
together”. Whether we’re teenagers, or acclaimed academics, there is a voice
for change.
“God saved the earth with only one life”. God looks to us to be the living
caretakers of the earth and of each other and not to leave behind all the
harnessed energy for good, when the guidelines suggest we may leave our
homes. Let’s use this time not just to look at ‘now’, but to look much further
ahead, joining in with the One, “who controls time and crafts eternity” He
calls each of us to be ‘the one’ to join in with ‘The One’, with hope that comes
from the power of the Holy Spirit ….. in His time.
“We believe that the best is yet to come…we will see your glory….know your
power….we’ll see you moving here….”