Today could be the day for a new opportunity. You might meet somebody for the first time, hear something that changes your mind, you might start a new book, finally get around to signing up to that online course, or join that gym class you’ve been putting off. There are plenty of opportunities to be found in our ordinary, if we have eyes to see them.
As students start their university careers, the options for how to spend their time, their money and their talents, expands overnight. Now they can learn to play quidditch, re-enact medieval battles, volunteer with local charities, try church, play ultimate frisbee, and put on Shakespeare plays in abandoned warehouses. The campus is a land of opportunity, covered in intersecting roads of new experiences. Our nineteen year olds are in the driving seat, even though people like me are working hard to help them steer.
God is a God of endless opportunity. There is always a quiet invitation to go deeper, to know more of Him, with every new experience and circumstance we face. In trying a new physical challenge, perhaps God whispers, “I have made you stronger than you think.” With every artistic act, whether that be painting or music or poetry, perhaps God himself smiles at the creativity of creation.
We don’t have to be starting university to start something new. We don’t have to be students to be learners. We can all keep open, keep exploring, keep asking bigger, better questions to God and to each other.
Father God, may we see today as an opportunity. May we remain open to you and to the people we meet. May we embrace trying something new and may we be life-long students of wisdom and of truth. Amen.
Blog taken from BBC Radio 4's 'Prayer For The Day': listen HERE to the broadcast (none of us were up at 5.43am after all!)
Photo by Paulette Wooten on Unsplash
