This week, until the end of today, you can purchase No Ordinary Man (book 1) from Kevin Mayhew Ltd at a 10 per cent discount, using the code ORDINARY110 when ordering the title from the company’s website. With the book normally retailing at £24.99, that’s a saving of £2.50. Just type the code into the relevant box at the online checkout between the dates given.
Here, meanwhile, is the last session I’ll be posting this week from the book, to run alongside this promotion.
HAVE YOU HEARD THE NEWS?
Reading
When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them. Luke 2:15-20
The meditation of a resident of Bethlehem
Have you heard the news?
They’re saying the Messiah’s been born
right here in Bethlehem.
Honestly, that’s what I was told,
the Christ,
God’s promised deliverer,
come at last to set us free.
Do I believe it?
Well, I’m not sure.
It’s hard to credit, I admit,
but this friend I spoke to seemed pretty certain.
Heard it from a shepherd apparently,
some chap who claimed to have seen the child for themselves,
and by all accounts he was delirious with excitement,
absolutely full of it.
He may have been mistaken, of course,
or simply spinning some old yarn –
you never can be sure, can you?
And, believe me, I don’t go round believing everything I hear.
But this friend of mine,
the one who heard it from the shepherd,
he was full of it too.
You would have thought he’d been there,
in the stable,
beside the manger,
the way he spoke.
He was utterly convinced, there’s no question about that,
and as I listened to him chattering on,
I felt the urge welling up inside me,
just as he had done,
to tell someone else,
to share the good news with those around me.
If he was right then this wasn’t something to keep to myself,
not for the privileged few,
but a message for everybody,
one they all needed to hear.
But before I say anything more,
risk making a complete fool of myself,
there’s something I have to do –
something my friend should have done
and which the shepherds presumably did –
and that is go and see for myself.
Call me a cynic if you like but I believe it’s important –
no, more than that, vital –
for if you’re going to accept something,
let alone expect others to do the same,
you have to be sure of your ground,
as certain as you can be that it’s not just all some grand delusion.
So I’m going now,
off to find out the truth for myself,
off to see this child,
if he really exists, with my own eyes.
And if I find everything just as I’ve been told,
the baby lying there in a manger,
wrapped in strips of cloth,
then I shall go and tell others what I have seen –
for let’s be honest, what else would there be to do?
What else could anybody do in my place?
Prayer
Loving God,
you have given us and all the world Good News in Christ.
Help us to hear that news afresh each day,
recognising it is as Good News for us.
Help us to receive it with both our minds and our hearts,
always looking to understand more of what it continues to say.
And help us to share what Christ has done for us
so that others in turn may celebrate what he has done for them.
Amen.