Spring is arriving at last, the temperature has risen, blossom has arrived outside my flat in Hanwell, West London, and the daffs in the corner of my back garden are blooming! Spring is the time for many when their spirits are lifted, purely by the increase of light and the arrival of Spring flowers. For others, Autumn is the preferred time when the leaves are being swept up and everything falls into a phase of rest - sleep after a job well done. One needn't choose between the two, of course, to feel that the seasons do reflect our moods and inclinations from time to time. Right now, however, it is the gaiety of Spring (when the sun shines!) that somehow speaks to us of the life that we must live out now, today. At least one can feel there is something more than just 'decoration' in the trees and shrubs and flowers that surround us in a temperate climate. Poets have tried to express this in language. Wordsworth in particular, in the 19th century, often expressed how things in nature affected him. His well known poem, I wandered lonely as a Cloud is a good example -

But there is another side to this world of ours, it's colours and beauty. Wordsworth can also describe this in, The world is too much with us -

'Little we see in nature that is ours.' Wordsworth's pain lies in our thoughtless, occasional happy-go-lucky attitudes. We are not perfect! But it is the comparison between ideas of religion and the beauty of 'nature' which seem to me to be more important. We can be carried away, as Wordsworth was, at the extraordinary beauty of the amazing things that surround us. Religion, on the other hand can wear the face of duty to be carried out, traditions to be maintained because they were hammered out centuries ago. We are not perfect! But when Christian faith tends to be seen as a 'duty', then we imperceptibly compare it with what we see around us, whether that is the beauty of nature (which can be 'red in tooth and claw' in evolution, of course!) or the life of people around us, seemingly not so securely locked in to a dogmatic theory of belief. At least, this is one cause for the Christian sometimes to find that the beauty around us does not also speak to the heart on occasions.

But there is another poet that can speak to our condition as Christians. George Herbert wrote about the love that beckons us rather than the 'oughtness' of Christian doctrines, or even of the unworthiness that we may often feel -

The whole idea, that in a very remarkable way, George Herbert in the early 17th century has defined the gospel, stuns us in the 21st century. Apart from the atonement theology of his time - (who bore the blame, which can be challenged from within the gospel), Herbert sees that the love of God for humankind is what should motivate us too. A friend remarked recently on the negative attitude of much media reporting. There has always been the idea in the media, of course, that the only news is bad news. But there are commentators today on the BBC (I could name three, but I won't!) who always end their reports or commentaries with the words, '... it can only get worse', or something to that effect. In addition there is the widespread culture of 'blame'. In this instance, Herbert's line attributed to Jesus, 'who bore the blame?' speaks straight to the heart. In other words, Christians have been called to have this love as their top priority in all one's relationships, directly or indirectly.

The gospel is Good News. When the beauty around us, in nature and in people, seems at times to cast a dark shadow around our lives so that we are not able to understand what is true and lies beyond the contemporary scene in one's life, there is a sense that, just at those times, the One who is proclaimed as Love is to be known as near, 'present'. That is a bit like a 'double think', some will say! But if one believes in God and in Jesus the Lord, he is 'present' whatever the circumstances. But that does not mean, either, as in some ideas about prayer, that God is really only known in the 'darkness', because God is regarded as 'ineffable', beyond sight and knowledge - a sort of negative approach which yields positive results! Life is too short to be complicated by these Neo-Platonic ideas such as the hymn, Immortal, invisible, which says at its close, ...light hideth thee'. To be able to manifest the gift of love is always to align oneself as a disciple of the one who loves us and is present to us always, through thick and thin.

This is all tough stuff! The gospels have some of the 'hardest' sayings in all literature.
As in Matthew's version of Jesus' sayings -

Love your enemies ... if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? ...
Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.