Editorial
Margaret Brown
Welcome to our Summer edition of News and Views!
Writing this now, in a few weeks time, here in Scotland, Glasgow in particular, many competitors and spectators will come for the Commonwealth Games. I suspect that most of the athletes, whatever their particular sport, if not all, have their minds set on the gold medal. They will have been training hard for many months and perhaps years, and now it is time to determine how well that training will show in their performance. But there is more to life than winning gold. A number of churches and Christian agencies have come together in a programme ‘More Than Gold’ with a variety of events taking place to coincide with the Games, aimed at introducing the Lord Jesus to the athletes and visitors, for to know Him is something more than gold.
All of us are running in a race. We are encouraged in, “Forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead, I press on towards the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenwards in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:13/14). If we run well in this race we all will receive the prize – of being in the Lord’s pres-ence for ever. Eric Liddell, the famous Scottish athlete, is reputed to have said, ‘So where does the power come from to see the race to the end?..........From within. God made me for a purpose. He also made me fast. When I run I feel His pleasure.’
I so like this quote. To me it means that when we are doing the thing God made us for, we can know and sense the pleasure of God! That’s amazing, yet true, because I have proved it in my own life.
In this edition of N&V you will read of many women who have struggles as they run their particular race. Yet they are staying the course; their eyes are fixed on Jesus. He runs the race with them, and all who have gone before them are spurring them on to finish the race, and to finish it well (Hebrews 12:1-3) and so have the victory and receive the prize.
Let us stand with those who are in difficult situations at present – Ukraine, Syria, Iran and other places you may know of. Let us remember them often in prayer to encourage them, to enable them to stay the course and to finish the race for the glory and honour of the One Who has already run His race and WON!
Margaret Brown