“Back to Basics”

The news in the last few days has been full of news of an upsurge in covid-19 cases. This isn’t just “somewhere else”, the local media yesterday was reporting on a sizeable outbreak among employees at the Sidoli’s factory in Welshpool. The English government has introduced new country-wide restrictions. We wait to see what, if anything, the Welsh government will do.

How do we respond as Christians? If we have pinned our hopes on a continued, steady, scaling back on restrictions, we are bound to be disappointed. But as Christians our hopes are elsewhere. In Romans 8v37-39 Paul writes, “…, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that … nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

As Christians our hope is that God has loved us in Christ Jesus our Lord – above all by sending him to die for us on the cross – and that absolutely nothing in the universe can separate us from that love.

This is a time to go “back to basics”. To stand firmly on the promises of God. To say, “By God’s grace I have Jesus, and he is all I need”. To say, “My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness”. Is that where your hope lies?

Remember that in all things, “God works together for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8v28), and the present time is a wonderful gift of God to help us to shift our hopes from what is uncertain and passing, onto what is certain and eternal – the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Tim