The Parish Church of St Swithun, Bathford.

I think we lost something very precious...

From the Revd Tim Ling, Vicar of St Swithun’s, Bathford

I have recently returned from a trip to India. A friend of mine had invited me to go with him to teach a course at the Delhi Bible Institute. In addition to this we were able to do some sightseeing and to meet some wonderful people. If you have ever been, perhaps you will know what I am trying to say when I say that India is a land of contrasts and a country of extremes. It was inspiring to see what God is doing elsewhere in his world. I have come back with a bigger view of God and a renewed excitement for what he is doing in Bathford! I’m looking forward to holding an evening at St. Swithun’s in a few weeks time to talk about my trip.

Reflecting on my experience, I had a couple of more general thoughts. The first is, what a good idea ‘sabbath’ is. In the Bible ‘the Sabbath’ is not just a ‘day off’, nor is it a day when you can’t do anything remotely enjoyable. It’s a day to live consciously in the light of all that God has done for us – a day to enjoy the hugely varied blessings of living in God’s world in God’s presence. In this sense, of course, every day should be ‘sabbath’; but knowing what we are like, God has ordained one day in seven as a special day on which to remind ourselves of these fundamental truths – truths which refresh our bodies and revitalise our souls. To me, my time in India was truly a ‘sabbath’ time.

The second thought I had was just how well God knows us and how much he cares about us. He didn’t ordain the Sabbath because he is a kill-joy; he did it because he knows that we need it; he did it because he cares for us and wants the best for us. I think we lost something very precious when the Sunday Trading bill was passed. We always do whenever we disregard the way God has set up his world. My time in India reminded me that he really does know best, he really does care about every aspect of our lives and he really is worth listening to.

Best Wishes

Tim Ling

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.