Healthy Rhythms     (24 October 2022)

Today I woke up with a sore body and a foggy brain. I have Covid, so I’m not surprised. But what being unwell makes me realise is how often I take good health for granted. Good health or wellbeing, physically, emotionally, socially, spiritually and economically is something to be treasured and to thank God for, but it is also something we can nurture through consciously and carefully choosing healthy rhythms to live by.

Robin and I take a short autumn break each year - it fits in well with our respective work diaries - so a few weeks ago we took off for an exploration of the Northumberland coast. What a beautiful part of our country! What huge expanses of white sandy beaches and changing skies; designated an area of outstanding natural beauty. While we were there we went across the tidal road which links Holy Island, Lindisfarne with the main land. We walked and reflected and explored and listened to stories of when Christianity was first proclaimed and established in Northumberland by St Aiden at the invitation of King Oswald. St Aiden wasn’t the first missionary. Roman Christians had come before him, and King Oswald had invited another pioneer before him to spread the Good News of the Gospel of love and forgiveness, but conditions had been judged too harsh, and the people too barbarous and heathen. St. Aidan was an Irish Christian Missionary monk from the Island of Iona, arriving with 12 other monks in about 635, and establishing a monastery on the Island of Lindisfarne.

What sustained him in his pioneering missionary ministry? It was not only his calling and commission and the team of monks he brought across with him, though these things made a big difference. It was also his choice to observe and keep a rhythm of life: contemplation and action, prayer and ministry, retreat and advance, ebb and flow. Just as the tides ebbed and flowed around the island, enabling safe times to cross and times to remain on the island, so Aiden and his fellow monks went out to preach, teach and plant churches, but also retreated to the monastery to pray, read, worship and contemplate.

Coincidentally, during our visit to Lindisfarne and Northumberland I began to read a book called ‘Healthy Rhythms’, the first chapter of which talks about ‘The Missional Spirituality of Lindesfarne’, including the practice of ‘Ebb and Flow’, drawing on the example of St Aiden. Of course for us it is not as clear cut - we don’t live on an island, or in a monastery - but we are still called to develop healthy rhythms of life which keep us spiritually and emotionally fit. Jesus himself took time to rest and pray, and after his disciples returned from a busy missionary journey, Jesus told them, “Come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest awhile.” (Mark 6:31).

I have been challenged, once again, to diarise times to retreat, reflect and worship, as well as to go out and share the Good News of Jesus Christ in word and deed. ‘Missional spirituality is marked by the ebb and flow of the Christian life. So it should be with us: our mission to the world should flow from a deep well within us, from the very presence of the living God.’ (Mark Dunwoody and Winfield H. Bevins, Healthy Rhythms for Leaders: Cultivating Soul Care in Uncertain Times, p366).

Prayer, St Aiden

Leave me alone with God as much as may be.

As the tide draws the water close in upon the shore,

Make me an island, set apart,

Alone with you, God, holy to you.

Then with the turning of the tide,

Prepare me to carry your presence to the busy world beyond,

The world that rushes in on me,

Till the waters come again and fold me back to you.

Amen

St Aiden, Holy Island