Catcher in the Rye

I can't always pray when I feel like it. In the first place, I'm sort of an atheist. I like Jesus and all, but I don't care too much for most of the other stuff in the Bible. Take the Disciples, for instance. They annoy the hell out of me, if you want to know the truth. They were all right after Jesus was dead and all, but while He was alive, they were about as much use to Him as a hole in the head. All they did was keep letting Him down. I like almost anybody in the Bible better than the Disciples. If you want to know the truth, the guy I like best in the Bible, next to Jesus, was that lunatic and all, that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with stones. I like him ten times as much as the Disciples, ....

(Catcher in the Rye, J D Salinger p. 130)

Not like the others

"One Of These Things (Is Not Like The Others) One of these things is not like the others, 

One of these things just doesn't belong, Can you tell which thing is not like the others 

By the time I finish my song?" 

They used to sing that on the children's programme Sesame Street. There'd be three red balloons and one blue or three tools and a shoe say, three birds and a frog, etc. Now when it comes to being a Christian then we are the thing that is not like the others, the one thing that doesn't belong. This doesn't mean that we should cultivate looking weird - wearing dated clothing or talking in a strange voice - but it does mean that our outlook has to be different.

Messiah the Hope of Israel

If you watch sport then one of the things you look for is an individual or a team that is invincible – that win everything. 

The “old invincibles” were the Preston Northend football team of 1888-89 who won all their games in league and cup that season. It has been also used for teams like Arsene Wenger's Arsenal in 2003-04 and in Scotland Glasgow Celtic in 2016-17. 

Do you know the term the great white hope? The expression was originally used in the early 20th Century when the heavyweight boxing champion was an African American called Jack Johnson. He seemed invincible and people wondered if they would ever see a white man as champion again. 

It doesn't happen so much in politics these says but there was a time when people were looking for someone who could fix everything. 

Now Jesus is our champion. He is our Saviour if we trust in him. He is the hope of Israel. By nature we are without hope and without God in this world but he has come and if we trust in him, there is hope. Trust in him today.