I can continue with the usual stories of how I have readings dumped on me at the last minute – but this week I came to Wednesday evensong equipped with my own Bible, in language I am familiar with, so when as expected I was asked at the last minute to do a reading, I did it very well.

But what I want to focus on today is the content of the service. Because there I was, sitting in my vestments in the curate’s chair, gazing at the ceiling and everything else, when the vicar started to read the Old Testament. You know how it is, when the scripture is read, and everything in the room disappears from your perception and it is just you, listening to God as he singles you out from the congregation and speaks to you, personally, directly, even from that most unexpected of places – the Vicar’s mouth in a church.

The passage was Deuteronomy 8 – shamelessly copied here from the Bible Gateway.

6 Observe the commands of the LORD your God, walking in his ways and revering him. 7 For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills; 8 a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; 9 a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.
10 When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you. 11 Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. 12 Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, 13 and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

So why did this passage apply to me?

Well the first meaning was about my training, which is approaching its end. I have had a narrow evangelical background, but now the Lord has shown me the vastness and variety of his church. It is a good land. It has denominational pools and doctrinal streams and springs. It has fruit – new believers, and the good deeds of the saints (I mean all believers). It has honey and oil – the Holy Spirit. It is a place where I will lack nothing. And if I work and dig to find out more truth and more wonder, I will find it in plenty. Don’t pick up on the details of this interpretation – just get the feel of me coming into a good land on a spiritual level.

But the second meaning is about me coming onto a good land financially as I change jobs at the end of the month. (‘Change’ as in ‘stop being an employee and become an independent contractor’). It is a promise that I will be better off [Thank God!] but also contains the warning for me – yes me personally – to remember where that wealth comes from.

The two things merge together to some extent, but it’s more that they are both expressions of the same thing – that I am moving from a time of training, testing and trial into a time of blessing.

I am excited!