Do you know about St. Patrick? Do you know about his amazing story? I know that it’s fun to celebrate the day named after him, but it’s far more significant when you understand why he should be celebrated. Born to an important family in Scotland, he was kidnapped by Irish pirates in the year 403 and sold as a slave in Ireland. Though he had been raised in a Roman Catholic family, he did not come to embrace the true God and His Christ until his time of slavery on the Emerald Isle. He served as a slave for six years, and in that time he came to offer constant and fervent prayers. Patrick recounted, in his autobiographical work called Contessio, that he developed the habit of praying at least a hundred times in the days and then as many times in the evenings. During his time of slavery, he received a vision from God telling him to leave his master and head for the coast. After obeying the vision, Patrick found himself arranging to ride a ship off the island and eventually going home.

That’d be a nice story if it ended there. It would be wonderful to know that God did that for a lowly and lonely captive. Yet Christ went beyond freedom and into service with Patrick, just as He intends to do with all of His disciples! Patrick was trained to be a priest in the Church, and in time had another vision - this time of an Irishman pleading with him to return to Ireland. Once again, he obeyed the vision, and he was on his way back to his home of slavery so that he might declare their freedom in Christ. While he wasn’t the first missionary to Ireland, Patrick was the first effective missionary of the island. His influence in Ireland would later come to be the source of Ireland’s role in saving western civilization, but that’s another story

Well, New Hope family, we can certainly guess that Patrick had no plans or intentions of going to Ireland to serve as a slave for six years. He couldn’t have known it, but God was planning to use it for His eternal glory and for the salvation of multitudes! Patrick obeyed, and he found that God truly does work all things together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose in Christ Jesus.

What does March hold for us? Who can tell? God willing, we’ll have chosen an associate pastor to join our family and to join in our mission of making “competent, confident and committed disciples of Jesus Christ who will do the work of God’s Kingdom in our community and in the world.” Individually and corporately, we are at God’s mercy at all times. Of course, there’s no place we’d rather be because we know that God’s mercy and grace are beautiful, loving and good. We’ll trust Him to use our good and bad times, our great and tragic times, to shape us, equip us, and use us for His eternal purposes. Amen? Amen!

Pastor Ryan