Dear Friends

Happy New Year to everyone!  I do hope that 2010 will be a year of real blessing for everyone and for our church.  I thought it might help to begin the New Year with some wise words …

‘What if the three wise men had been three wise women?  Well, they would have asked for directions and arrived on time, helped deliver the baby, cleaned the stable, brought a casserole and given the child much more practical gifts.’ (Susan Perlman). 

I wonder if, like me, you wonder what the child Jesus’ reaction was to the coming of the Magi?  Whereas the shepherds we know from Luke’s gospel were out on the hillside and came and saw the baby in the manger, our information about the Magi is scant.  We don’t know exactly where they came from, Matthew simply states they came ‘from the dawn’.  We don’t know how many of them there were, tradition and religious myth over the centuries has indicated that there were probably three, matching the number of gifts, even giving them names(!).  We don’t even know when they arrived, simply surmising from Herod’s actions against boys in Bethlehem under the age of 2 that it must have been within the first two years of Jesus’ life.  So we know little about them and although we may smile at Susan Perlman’s comments in actual fact the Magi did ask Herod for directions, they arrived in God’s time, they did exactly what God had placed on their hearts to do in worshipping the new born King and gave gifts which have been indications to Christians of the Messiah ever since!

Why do I say these are wise words then?  Well I believe that 2010 will be an exciting year for us at Alderley Edge Methodist Church but we need to be careful; we need to be as wise as Magi!  Firstly we need to ensure that we always ask for directions by offering to God all that we do personally and corporately in prayer.  Secondly we need to ensure that we are following God’s timetable - which can sometimes seem frustratingly slow or incredibly fast.  Thirdly, we need to fulfill the tasks we are given
by God - and we need to be aware that this may sometimes mean difficult times for us personally as we have to do things that go against our own grain but are following God’s will.  As we have prayed in our Covenant prayer ‘your will, not mine, be done in all things’.  And finally we need to be ready to offer everything we have, our time, our talents and our money, to bring glory to the King of Kings.

What if the three wise men had been the congregation of Alderley Edge Methodist Church?  … Well, why don’t we follow the star of the King of Kings in 2010 and see where he leads us?
 
Yours in Christ
Ben