for this reason I give thanks

Christ the King!

Culmination of the church year. The end of what’s been, and looking forward to the hope that we share

What a year it’s been!

crazy stressful

we all sometimes wonder whether we’re doing OK or not.

When everything gets crazy, it can be hard to tell

There’s this thing that I’ve noticed oer the years

Coping with stress

our ability to cope with stress is always a bit up and down

most of the time we cope OK, but every now & then something comes along that tips the balance, and we just can manage.

What happens when the background level of crazy gets raised up?

We tend to think that we should still be able to cope as normal - after all the stresses in our lives aren’t all to do with COVID, right?

But it actually pushes the whole lot up to the surface. Stuff we’d usually breeze through drives us crazy, and we feel like we’re falling apart over nothing.

Pauls starts by giving thanks

Letter to the Ephesians late int eh piece. Living under house arrest in Rome

Full of encouragement and advice about how to live our lives well as followers of Jesus.

Beloved

we tend to measure ourselves by what we think we’re lacking.

Church year starts with Jesus. His love is our foundation and his love is our hope for the future.

We may not always feel like it, but we are beloved.

Not the end, but the beginning of something new

The start of this epistle sounds like a benediction. A blessing at the end.

We’ll get there with Jesus

Christ is at the centre of who we are and who we can become

As we finish this year, and we look forward to the next, I want to encourage you that we are oding OK, and that we are not in this on our own.

Let Paul’s words be an encouragement to us, just as they were to the fledgling church in Ephesus. And let them be a model for us in how we encourage one another.

Encourage one another. Think of one person who you have appreciated this year. Give thanks to God for them. Thank them.

Read it out again to finish

Ephesians 1:15–23 NIV

For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.