Thoughts for the Day

To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.
O my God, in you I trust...

Make me to know your ways, O Lord;
teach me your paths.
Lead me in your truth, and teach me,
for you are the God of my salvation;
for you I wait all day long.

Be mindful of your mercy, O Lord, and of your steadfast love,
for they have been from of old.
Do not remember the sins of my youth or my transgressions;
according to your steadfast love remember me,
for your goodness’ sake, O Lord!

Good and upright is the Lord;
therefore he instructs sinners in the way.
He leads the humble in what is right,
and teaches the humble his way.

(Lectionary, New Revised Standard Version)

Thoughts

How do you learn? One of the main ways I learn is visually. So I like diagrams and I make lists, and I can often remember where a certain passage was written on a page. I'm happy making scattergrams to work out how to approach an essay - by writing the subject in the middle and then jotting ideas all round the page, before joining them up in subjects. That's how I divided the many jobs two Churchwardens did before they retired. I then grouped them together to give to a number of other people.

But are you an auditory learner? You like to listen to talks or lectures or watch videos, rather than learning by reading. Of course, you might be a kinesthetic learner who learns by experience - by doing things. Certainly I can't learn computer skills by being a member of the last category, the reading/writing learner. There is some overlap with visual learning here, but this learner wants to read and write a lot, creates a diary, and likes looking up words in the dictionary.

So how does God teach us, or perhaps how do we learn from Him? Here are some things we could try this Lent:

• Use our bible (for reading/writing learners obviously; but charts/maps for visual vivisual learners; and listen to it read aloud for auditory learners).
• Listen to sermons, Christian videos (for auditory, and in some cases visual learners).
• Help with a food bank or homeless shelter, or teach others (for kinesthetic learners,).

Where would you put singing hymns, playing Christian music, or art or drama? Could we try any of these to allow God to teach us this Lent?

Father-God,
we ask You to teach us Your ways;
so that we may truly learn about You
and about how You would have us live.
May we be open to the different
ways we can learn about our faith,
and use different technology to aid us
to understand the scriptures.
Amen.