Stoke Ferry Methodist Chapel

News from the Stoke Ferry Methodists

Revd Matt Finch 01366 387602 mattfinch@pleko.co.uk

5th Aug 11.00 Mary Hurst

12th Aug 11.00 Mick Blanks

19th Aug 11.00 Andrew Sankey

26th Aug 11.00 Hazel Miles

Do you remember as a child the saying the playground 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me'. I can clearly remember shouting it back at the school bully who tormented everyone. As I reflect I think what a silly saying it is and that it is in fact the wrong way round. It should be more like 'Sticks and stones may break my bones but I will recover from that, but your words will always hurt me'. You see for me, I know that if I graze my knee, if I break a bone there will be some recovery or healing process. Yet those hurtful, mocking, powerful words are the ones that still cause me pain. I might have a dodgy knee that plays up in cold weather but it is the words that still cause the most grief. And I think it is way with us all not matter how hard we try to block them out. How many of us have hang ups about the way we look because what somebody has said? I reckon many of us have a fear of being who we are because of words that have been spoken. So many feel useless not because they are but because they have been told they are by someone they trusted.

You see I think this is why the Christian faith is so important to me because it starts to put right the words that still hurt by affirming who God says I am. At a baptism recently we read a Psalm which did just this, to paraphrase it said that God is the one who created us for a purpose, he saw us in our mothers' womb and he says we are wonderfully and beautifully made! No matter what is said to us or spoken about us the God who created this world looks at each one of us and declares how good we are. These are the affirming words we should listen to!

I know this does not magic away years of negative words but these few do start to reveal to us who we are and begin to heal our hurt.

God bless,

Matt Finch