Thoughts ...

The Bigger Picture

The other day I had the pleasure of accompanying a group of enthusiastic young people to a number of health and safety workshops.  The purpose of the day was to look at ways of preventing serious injury and even to save life.  For instance, what would you do if someone fell into the River Wye?  Would you think of tying jumpers and clothing together to form a rope?  Or even emptying a plastic bottle of water to act as a buoyancy aid?  Well that’s the sort of thing the children and I were learning together.

However, one of the seminars really made me think.  A young woman police constable took us out on the road to a public telephone box and asked us under what circumstances would we dial 999.  A useful discussion ensued on the sort of situations which would merit an emergency call and how we would go about that.  However, unbeknown to me, another police constable disguised as an ordinary member of the public was attempting to break into a number of cars in the same street to see if the children would notice and how they would react.  I have got to admit that I missed this completely!  My excuse is that I was looking to see if the children were paying attention, rather than what was going on around me.

Isn’t it strange that in our efforts to look at the details we lose sight of the big picture?  We are swamped with rules and regulations to the point where we forget that all life is precious to God, that’s why He sent Jesus in the first place, to simply say that He loves us.  He even knows the number of hairs on our head.  He cares for us that much.  So when we get overwhelmed with detail, let’s make it a New Year’s resolution to look to God to give us a clearer perspective of what really matters in our lives.  We all need to be in the business of saving lives and we in the Church should be aware of the bigger picture and that this is what the Church is here for.

Rev. Kevin Cecil