Now that summer is officially here, we can look forward to somewhat better weather and lighter nights. This always bodes well for our meetings – as they start at 7.30pm in the village hall, and although the service ends by 9pm it means you can still socialise, have a cup of tea and a biscuit, and still leave to get home in daylight.
It’s the socialising and sense of family between everyone who attends our meetings that sometimes seems to be the compelling reason for a Thursday night visit. And it’s almost a ‘by the way’ that there are prayers, a minister’s address and the mandatory half-hour of messages from the world of spirit to this one, delivered by guest mediums.
But it is that content with its inclusive spiritual philosophy, its phenomena demonstrated through mediumship, that really makes a difference to people’s lives.
A life being lived with a convinced knowledge of a higher life, a further existence; a dimension wherein dwell our own dear departed, as well as those more exalted beings, and our own dear Lord himself, oft described as the heavenly realms, certainly brings people of like minds together.
The early Christians, followers of the Spiritual Way, were used to seeing and hearing about what were considered miraculous happenings, phenomenal occurrences, within their religious enclaves. Their faith was solidly underpinned by demonstrations of the truths that were stated by Jesus, accompanied by apparently natural order situations turned upside down. And his Disciples and followers also performed healing and prophesied.
As Paul of Tarsus wrote to the young church, the assembly of like-minded Christians he had founded in about 50 AD in Corinth, a couple of years later:
Now about the gifts of the Spirit, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. 6There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work.
Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. To one there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he distributes them to each one, just as he determines.’
You would be welcome at our Littleport meetings.