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From the Reverend Kate Bottley:

It wasn’t my turn to preach at church the other week, it was Elizabeth whose name was on the rota. She’d taken as her theme the subject of talents, the things we are good at and she’d asked the gathered congregation for examples. Little hands shot up. Sophie, 5 years old and a natural born performer shouted ‘I can do handstands, look!’ demonstrating down the main aisle of the church. ‘I’m brilliant at Maths’ said one 7 year old and little Joshua got all confused when he was asked what his special skill was and shouted ‘Cake’ at the top of his lungs, the eating of or the making of I’m still not quite sure.

But what I did notice is that despite the grown ups in church outnumbering the children by at least 10 to one, not a single person that answered the question was over the age of 9.

As kids we shout ‘Look at me’ while we do forward rolls over the monkey bars and beam with pride when our homework is pinned to the fridge but as grown ups we don’t shout as loudly, frightened that we’ll be branded a show off and when someone praises us for a job well done we’re more inclined to play down our achievement.

The bible talks not only about each person being special and unique in the eyes of God it encourages each to ‘let their light? shine’ Jesus in the famous sermon on the mount put it this way ‘Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl, instead they put it on a stand and it gives light to everyone’. Not an invitation to brag about our blessings but an encouragement to celebrate the good stuff and the things we do well, so that it might bless others.

And if we’re shy about saying it ourselves perhaps it up to each of us to encourage one another, to tell someone if it’s a job well done, to recognise and celebrate the God given talents of those around us.

So I’ll start Chris – I’ll start… well done for this morning’s show, I think you’re doing a great job!