By Revd Mark Ackford

As some of you will know I have recently been under the weather with a dose of Covid, thankfully I am now on the mend, my period of self-isolation has ended, and dog walking duties have resumed much to Bailey’s approval.

On one of my walks a day or so ago I came across this painted rock lying beside the footpath, which with it’s yellow sun, blue sky, white clouds and green countryside cheered me greatly as I coughed and spluttered my away around the village trying to shift the cold which Covid seemed to have given me as a lingering gesture as it worked its way out the system.

Maybe the person (a child I am assuming) who had painted it had placed it there for just the reason to cheer up those who passed it by, or maybe it was placed there to mark the passing by of themselves and as a reminder for us who spied it out of the beauty of God’s creation and our duty to care for it. Whatever the reason it brought a smile to my face and a sense of hope for the future.

Rocks and pebbles come in many different shapes and sizes. Growing up in Somerset with easy access to the county’s rivers and beaches I noticed that the pebbles found on the beach formed gradually over time as the water washed the sand over them like sandpaper over hundreds of years had given them a smooth, rounded appearance. However, the pebbles that I found on the riverbed of the river Axe flowing through the village of Cheddar where I grew up were not as smooth as the beach pebbles, no sand there and the current was much gentler than the pounding from the waters of the Bristol Channel.

I don’t know about you but sometimes I think that I feel like one of those pebbles, with the water washing over me, turning me over and over, moving me from place to place, being washed by a current which I have no control over, being bashed against other rocks and pebbles, not knowing where I may end up. Sometimes it can be gentle like in the riverbed and other times it can feel like a gale, a storm at sea.

But as a Christian, my life has been placed into God’s hands. You could say, my pebble has been placed in an ocean where the current is controlled by God, the creator of the world. It is constantly being bathed by waves of the Holy Spirit as God continues to smooth my appearance so that I can become more like him.

As I move through life my pebble will still encounter other pebbles and bits of my pebble will be removed in that process as God removes things from my life preparing me for what is ahead. But as I make that contact the same is happening to the pebbles I meet as I figuratively rub up against them. Pebbles are often used to landscape, build and to decorate and I think there are similarities to this in my life as I bump into others on my journey through life with Christ. May those bumps result in a change to the scenery of the earth and to the lives of other people (landscape), may they be used to shape his Kingdom (build) and make the earth a more beautiful place (decorate).

Where is your pebble in the ocean of life and what it is being used for? Is it just floundering around in the ocean of the world being washed by circumstance with no purpose or is it in the ocean of God, being washed and smoothed by the creator of the world, being shaped by his Holy Spirit to look more like Him, with a purpose and hope to go landscape, build and decorate?

I know where I want my pebble to be, and I hope and pray that you do to.