'Happy' New Year

As we start 2011 I want to wish you a very ‘happy’ new year. But in twelve months time, how will you know if it has been – happy that is? Towards the end of last year David Cameron announced a £2m plan to develop a measure of well-being, saying that Gross Domestic Product “is an incomplete way of measuring a country's progress”. He is not alone – Tony Blair floated the same idea, and long before either of them, the US Senator, Robert Kennedy, stated that the GDP measured everything "except that which makes life worthwhile".

The cynics amongst you might point out that when the economic situation is poor politicians will obviously start searching for any measure of progress that might put them in a good light – but let’s not dismiss the idea just yet. We might, however, want to discuss what we actually mean by happiness. Is it the same thing as work/life balance or well-being? Is it dependent upon the circumstances we find ourselves in, or somehow deeper than that, an inner sense of positivity and joy?

The original Hebrew of the Old Testament has a word that I think sums it up well – Shalom! In our English versions we translate it as ‘peace’, but it’s much more than that. The word ‘wholeness’ might be closer to the mark, a sense of ‘completeness’. This isn’t about having everything we want, either materially or emotionally, but rather entering a spiritual place where our connections with one another, with God, and with the world he has made, are being restored and deepened.

In February we’ll be starting a new style of service at Lode Chapel called ‘Healing Space’ and it’s this sort of ‘happiness’ that we will be inviting people to seek after and find. The word ‘healing’ comes from the same root as ‘wholeness’ and when Christians pray for healing we ask God to bring his Shalom into the midst of the ‘dis-ease’ of our bodies, minds, hearts and souls. It’s true to say that God doesn’t always bring physical healing, but most people generally feel a greater sense of ‘Shalom’ after they have been prayed for – and sometimes miracles do happen.

If you're local to Lode Chapel, and could do with a bit of Shalom in 2011, you would be welcome to come along and receive confidential prayer support. Details will be on our websites (http://www.lodechapel.org.uk/ and http://www.re-new.me.uk/) later this month. There’ll be no sermon, no singing, just plenty of ‘Healing Space’.