Thought for the week (we 5th October 2014)

From today tax disc which have been on our windscreens for over a hundred years will no longer needed. It’s abolition in favour of a totally digital record of ensuring we’ve all paid our road tax begins today.

The first ever paper version of the tax disc was issued in 1921, since then it’s been a permanent feature of our motoring lives. From Fords to Ferraris the ever observant police and traffic warndens could keep an eye and look out if you were even a day over the date your tax expired! Now all this will be done electronically as the innovation of cameras have brought more prosecutions than even the most zealous of traffic wardens.

There’ll be no more queuing at the Post office with renewal form, insurance certificate and MOT in hand, waiting with bated breath as the document were carefully checked. There was nothing more frustrating than waiting in the queue only to be told that the form had not been completed properly or that it was not the actual policy but certificate of insurance that was required. And that seven day ‘grace’ or note on the windscreen ‘Tax in post’ – were they ever really legal?

Change, of course, is very much part of our lives. The Bible speaks much about lives which were wonderfully and sometimes radically transformed by the power of God’s love.. Jesus brought hope to the lives of many who were lost, lonely and afraid. His love reached into the hearts of even the most hardened and changed them forever. The Apostle Paul speaks of himself as a ‘new creation’.

Saul the callous persecutor made into an Apostle and a saint by God’s amazing grace. Perhaps we too need a change o heart, to allow old grievances go, to help change the lives of those who are lonely and in need in our community.

Then the light of love will shine more brightly and that’s the best change of all!