Friday 19 Jun 2020

June 19: Mark 6:14-16

Key Verse: Mark 6:16
But when Herod heard this, he said, “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised from the dead!”

Devotion:
How far are you willing to go to have your own way or to cover up a lie you have told? I know I have gone pretty far in the past, but most of the time I was found out pretty quickly and things always went South after that! I was raised in a country where racism was a way of life, not one I liked and as I grew older, not one I supported. Some of the people around me were going to extraordinary lengths to do very racist things and many times they would not even bother to cover them up – that was what they had been conditioned to believe!

After years of being away from that environment and living amongst the people in England I started to think things were so much better here, but even here I started to realise there was still racism in society. It is not something we can just switch off or run away from, it is something we have to live with and change from the inside out.

Because Herod was in a position of power, he thought he could get away with anything he wanted to do; something we still see in our leaders all around the world. There is nothing new about people abusing their positions of power to suit their own wants and desires! Unfortunately there are always people on the receiving end who get abused because of this greed and we, as Christians, need to stand up for all of us and promote the way Jesus wants us to live – by loving our neighbours!

I love living on the estate I currently live in because there is such a diverse group of people who live together; many live at or below what is considered as the poverty line on our estates here in London. We try to show people there is hope through Jesus Christ and allow them to experience a bit of God’s love where the country seems to be leaving them behind. This is just as bad as racism, yet so many countries ignore these situations just as they ignore racism. Now it the time to change. Now is the time to love your neighbour – no matter who they are!

Points to Ponder:
Do you love living where you live?

Are you sharing God’s love with your neighbours?