Ever felt you had to blend in with those around you, even though you hated doing so?

Ever been in the position of saying yes and going along with the rest because it’s safer to do that than be different?

What about the times you’ve really not agreed with the discussion or the plans but felt obliged to go along with them to keep everyone happy?

Doesn’t it make you feel weak and rather insipid to be someone who longs to stand up for what they believe in but are a bit scared of being shouted down because, it seems, everyone else thinks very differently to you?

Well today I’m calling out to you to stand out, dare to Continue reading

At last … the sun is shining in Dumfries. Everyone round here has suffered the constant cloud hanging over our area this week. I’ve been asking, “Will we ever see the sun again?”. We all know the answer and in fact sunny days have now arrived, but yesterday it felt as though it would never happen.

It strikes me that our lives are often like that – we feel surrounded by a gloom which we feel will never go away. The answer of course is that it’s just a season. To escape the gloomy weather this week, I’ve had to focus on positive things and remind myself that better weather is ahead and summer will come.

There are some pretty good spiritual parallels to the weather this week. There are times when we just have to keep Continue reading

Family are home again – some of them for a few days, some for longer.

Some needing to re- group and find out what is next, another is needing to be here and be cared for, even pampered for a while, another – planning. One or two missing special people in their lives… all together, yet at different stages and seasons of their lives.

I love how “home” is a place they can return to for these purposes. Where they are accepted, fed, nurtured and rested for the next part of their journey.

I pondered over “Home” and how we all need homes… natural ones, obviously, but also the home of relationship and life with God.  I also began to see that we need to “go home” now and again . . . we need the regrouping, the place of being back to where life is familiar and safe… (Ok sometimes boring!) but a place where we can re-focus on what is important and what Continue reading