Dear Friends

Many of you will have heard of Joni Eareckson Tada. You may have read some of her books. Joni was left paralysed after a diving accident which occurred when she was only seventeen years old. She has been confined to a wheelchair ever since. However her handicap did not stop her from living a life of active Christian service, nor did it stop her from marrying her husband Ken. She writes movingly of her wedding day. As she waited in her wheelchair to come forward to the altar to meet her groom, she noticed that thanks to the chair there was a big greasy mark on her dress. The chair though dressed up a bit for the occasion was still the awkward thing it always was. To make matters worse, her bouquet of flowers slipped off of her lap and were now off centre. Her paralysed hands could not rearrange them. She certainly did not feel like the picture perfect bride. However she inched her way forward and looked down the aisle. That is when she caught sight of her groom. Listen to her own words:

“I spotted him away down front, standing at attention and looking tall and elegant in his formal attire. My face grew hot. My heart began to pound. Our eyes met and amazingly from that point, everything changed. How I looked no longer mattered. I forgot all about my wheelchair. Grease stains? Flowers out of place? Who cared? No longer did I feel ugly or unworthy; the love in Ken’s eyes washed it all away. I was the pure and perfect bride. That’s what he saw and that’s what changed me. It took great restraint not to jam my “power stick” into high gear and race down the aisle to be with my groom.”

As we approach Christmas time once again, I have been thinking about what lies at the centre of our being part of the Church of Jesus Christ. The words of one of our most traditional hymns remind us that at the centre of the Christian experience is the most unlikeliest of romances, between the utterly lovely and sinless Son of God and people like you and me:

“The church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord

 She is His new creation by water and the word

 From heaven He came and sought her to be His holy bride

 With His own blood He bought her, and for her life He died.”

Jesus did not leave heaven for Bethlehem and for Calvary in order for us to have a merely intellectual or formal or philosophical relationship with you and I. He is looking for intimacy with us, to be one with us forever. He loves us with passion and with commitment that never ever wavers. I pray that this Christmas and in the coming year that many of us will catch sight of the love in Jesus eyes that says to us, “I came to the crib and the cross for you.” And as our faith catches sight of the love that brought Jesus to this earth, may the words of one of our more modern worship songs come true. May we be released from any morbid introspection, and “Forget about ourselves and concentrate on Him and worship Him.”

Morag joins me in wishing everyone of you a Christmas and a New Year full of God’s blessing and peace.

Kenny Borthwick