Pastor's Devotions by Tim Harris

It seems that over the past few months, I’ve been meeting people in some new and different ways and making some new friends along the way. There’s the young guy in the supplement store next to the gym, where I buy my protein powder. His name is Tom. We connect about three times per week, just to chat and keep up with each other. Recently, we even exchanged phone  numbers.  There’s the neighbors who came into the neighborhood about a year ago, Diego and Iva. They even recently visited our church. And, last week, Kim and I met a couple on our bike ride around the Manasquan Reservoir, Gene and Dawn. By the time we were getting ready to leave, we were as well exchanging phone numbers and talking about doing a bike ride together. Oh, I ought to mention our neighbors Amir and Ansa and their sons who originate from Pakistan and are relatively devout Muslims. This year we brought them gifts on Ramadan and they brought us gifts for Easter. Amir now calls me, “brother.”  And, talking about frien

This coming Saturday, June 18, is the Red Bank Classic 5K with over 1,000 runners participating.  In fact, this is the first time since the outbreak of COVID-19 that the race has taken place in full. (The last time was June 2019).  So it’s only natural that people are excited about getting out into the community and running together again. I know I am. After all, for many people, being able to run a 5K race like this signifies that we have turned a corner and that it is in some ways a new day and thus, we might say, a new race.   Once again, we will have a team from our church, Shrewsbury First Assembly, made up of about 10 runners (well, maybe a few walkers!). It’s a great way for us to participate with one of our neighboring communities. We will all be wearing our “Caribbean blue” t-shirts with the words, “It’s A New Day!”  Our hope is to not only run well, but to send a message of encouragement to the other runners, to let them know about our church, and most of all to let them know

I don’t usually follow news about the British Royal family. This week, however, I have found it noteworthy that Queen Elizabeth II is currently celebrating her Platinum Jubilee. That is, for 70 years now she has served as the monarch of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.  This makes her the longest reigning monarch the United Kingdom has ever had. As far as we know, Queen Elizabeth has only been outdone, at least thus far, by King Louis XIV of France who reigned for 72 years. Who knows, Queen Elizabeth just might get there!  The world has changed much during her 70 years on the throne. Think of what the world was like in 1952 when she began her reign and what it is like today. Technology, social mores, ways of doing business, ways of interacting and so much more have changed. The world feels so much smaller due to the internet and our much faster means of travel.  Life in general is quite different than it was 70 years ago. Yet, through it all, the British people have had one con