When the UK was on the cusp of lockdown, back in mid-March 2020, I wrote an email to our church members to encourage them in the Lord Jesus for the coming days. I wrote a second email that week and from there it settled into a twice-weekly mailing. Each one was reflections either on a specific Bible verse or passage or perhaps a biblical theme more generally. Each email concluded with the words of a hymn.
As the pandemic and the lockdowns continued, so did the emails. Other friends asked to be added to the mailing list.
Here we are, some 15 months and over 120 email articles later. The emails were posted to this blog under the Joy in the Journey label (a title for the emails chosen in relative haste, referencing the song by Michael Card).
I’ve chosen to continue writing but to reduce the frequency to weekly, on a Wednesday, from 30th June (except for when I’m away on holiday). And I’ve decided to do so via a Substack newsletter with the same name as this blog, the waiting country.
Where’s that phrase from? Well, for those who know me it will come as no surprise that it’s part of a line from a song - “and starting out we find the waiting country”. The song is called Rags to Riches by The Blue Nile and was on their first album, A Walk Across The Rooftops, released in 1983. I loved the line and the phrase seemed to me to be an apt way of thinking of the Christian life - we start out and find the waiting country, a country that was already prepared and waiting for us, and also a country in which we are waiting, for our Lord Jesus to return from heaven and for the fulness of God’s healing reign to be known throughout a renewed creation.
If you find these articles helpful to you I will be more than glad. It was a joy to me - a joy in my journey - to write the original pieces over the past year. I’ve been very thankful for the encouragements received from a number of people and their expressions of appreciation. If these help you to lift your eyes in hope and worship of the Lord Jesus Christ then the effort in writing them will be more than repaid.
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