The start of the football season has been interesting for football lovers. Manchester United with an new manager but losing; Arsenal looking better; Sunday’s Spurs-Chelsea ‘battle’; Palace holding Liverpool to a draw last night…
Tonight Pete and I will go to Carrow Road to watch Norwich play Huddersfield. After three games without a win we’re hoping for better.
If Norwich win then Huddersfield must lose…
Our hot weather continues. Many have enjoyed days on the beach; sea-front bars and cafes have been busy; outdoor barbecues, and music festivals have gone well.
Local farmers have poor harvests; gardeners have brown lawns; firefighters are constantly busy. ‘Nice weather for ducks,’ we say when it’s raining. This isn’t.
Today’s local forecast: ‘…Heavy Thundery showers possible later… they are very hit and miss but if you catch one it could be torrential and cause flash flooding.’
The weather’s winners and losers?
We listen to plans to deal with our financial problems… price rises, possible tax cuts… ‘there will be winners and losers.’
Many teenagers are anxiously waiting for GCSE and A-level exam results… hoping to be winners… And the losers?
Abba famously sung:
The winner takes it all
The loser has to fall
It’s simple and it’s plain
Why should I complain?
…about choices, fate and disappointment… love’s winners and losers…
Life’s winners and losers? ‘Loser’ as a term of abuse!?
Brian McLaren, in ‘Do I stay Christian?’, describes how, throughout history, the Christian Church has created winners and losers.
The winners are usually white, male, powerful, rich, heterosexual… and right. Losers are anyone who isn’t. The powerful winners defend their own interests and keep winning, leaving the losers to keep losing.
…Jesus brought a ‘spiritual movement of equality, emancipation and peace…’
St Paul says: ‘You are all children of God through your faith in Christ Jesus… There is no longer Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male or female… (perhaps ‘winners or losers…) For you are all one in Christ Jesus.’ (Galatians 3:26-29)
malcolmsmusings.org 
Even as a young teenager I was skeptical of the perceived “Christian Church”. It seemed quite different than true “Followers of Jesus” who operated within the church.
When we get down to the level of being “disciples” of Christ in or out of the the organized church nearby, we look and act like Jesus, who, as you have said so well “…Jesus brought a ‘spiritual movement of equality, emancipation and peace…” an ultimate winner and declared so someday.
Well said sir.
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Thanks Gary. I was brought up in the church and so accepted it unquestioningly. These days, I still love it, but the more I see the ‘Christian Church’, past and present, act in ways that seem to be neither ‘Christian’ nor ‘Church’ the more important it seems to focus on being a ‘Follower of Jesus’, and, with His help, doing that well.
Go well
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