It does seem that we might be emerging from the lockdown of the last few months.

One consequence is that on weekday mornings a single bell is now rung in our parish church and a group of us meet there and say Morning Prayer together - naturally observing the need for safety precautions and social distancing!

We are a mixed group, lay and clergy, from different Christian traditions, and ringing the bell is a signal that we are there to hold in prayer our village community, nation and world.

We hope that praying daily together at a set hour, in company with fellow Christians across the world, is a reminder that all time is special since time belongs to God alone for us to use in His service. 

This prayer is often called the Daily Office and involves regular saying of the psalms and – eventually! – reading through the whole Bible.

Hopefully our prayers do not simply depend on how we are feeling that particular morning, but we come together as very ordinary people ’just as we are’, and offer to God all that lies ahead in the coming day.

In August we keep the feast of the Transfiguration. The gospel writers all tell us of that occasion when on the mountain His disciples suddenly caught a glimpse of Jesus in glory.

Possibly for the first time, they began to realise the glory of the Kingdom that God in Jesus had in store for them.

Each morning the opening words of our Morning Prayer remind us that ’the day lies open before us’.

May we, like those disciples, be open to all that God offers to surprise us and transform us as the day continues.

CANON IAN AINSWORTH-SMITH

Ian is a retired Anglican priest, living in Milverton