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Over more than ten years I have written 3000 reflections on this Food For Faith for those who are seeking greater maturity of Christian faith.

More recently each post has been followed with an invitation to readers to make their own comments after reading a post.

Very quickly I realised that there was pure gold in the experience that people were sharing and many readers commented that they wanted to hear from more people sharing their experience of God in families and workplaces, relationships and all the complex ups and downs of twenty-first century living.

I was deeply encouraged and decided to invite people to write and send me one experience of God in 400 words.

Within three weeks I had received ninety contributions and these were published in November as Fifth Gospel Living. Click the image below for more info.

Since publication many people have commented to me that they had intended to write but didn’t get around to it, or that they know of others (family, friends and workmates) who would have written with a bit of encouragement.

SO, today I invite you to write me 400 words sharing one experience of God. In your prayer ask Jesus what you might write and send to me before Easter 2025.

This collection will be published later this year.

Encourage others to write.

If you have already sent me a reflection and would like it to be included please let me know.

The working title for this second volume is simply “MORE FIFTH GOSPEL LIVING.”

To encourage you here are my comments from the first pages of the first volume:

This compilation of reflections, shared with the title Fifth Gospel Living, is a celebration of the presence and action of God in the personal experience of the People of God.

More than a decade ago I began to write regular posts for the Food For Faith website inviting readers to share their own reflections as comments. It soon became evident that my jottings were prompting others to tell of their own experience of God. My perspective and experience may have been interesting for others but more significantly my reflections seemed to encourage readers to share their own testimony. From this moment my daily delight was hearing from others who contributed their personal experiences of God in the joys, hopes, griefs and anxieties of their own lives.

The Gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John rightly have the most honoured place among all Christian texts. However we also appreciate that those who wrote these texts and others who three centuries later discerned that these four (from among others) would be the canonical Gospels of the Church, shared their own experiences of God in Jesus Christ so that readers might also come to believe – and that by believing may have life in his name of Jesus Christ who is THE Word of God. (John 20:31)

It is only right therefore that two thousand years later we also share our present experience of God in the same way and with the same purpose. For this reason and with this confidence I have no hesitation in naming this collection of reflections Fifth Gospel Living.

It remains a fact of Christian faith that Jesus Christ spoke two thousand years ago in a land we still refer to as The Holy Land. But it is also a fact of faith that Jesus Christ IS speaking and IS teaching, IS preaching and IS healing in our own time and in our own neighbourhoods. Our lands are therefore Holy Lands.

I look forward to hearing from you – john@fff.org.nz

In Christ

Send your date and time to add to the list, and just turn up at at one of the advertised gatherings, just one hour, focussing on where we are encountering Christ.

TODAY WHANGANUI
Thursday 27 March 7.00am
St. Mary’s Church – & every Thursday
Invitation from Kate

TODAY NEW PLYMOUTH
Thursday 27 March 10.00am
Stumble Inn, 200 Mangorei Road
Invitation from Joan

CHRISTCHURCH
Monday 30 March 10.00am (& every Monday)
Moku cafe, Bush Inn Centre
Waimairi Road.

KAPITI COAST
Monday 31 March 11am to noon
The Cafe at Harrison’s
23 Peka Peka Rd, Waikanae beach.
Invitation from Catherine