After Easter: 6th-9th April 2015

After all the services of Holy week and Easter Day, for which there was deep appreciation, it takes a little time to get back to a more typical rhythm. So often I have written of “the unexpected setting the agenda,” and that this is often what ministry is all about. It doesn’t make for an organized life, or at least the organized events have to be open to interruptions, but God is often in the interruptions.

Two unexpected events/encounters took place for me this week in the form of two families, both visiting Bahrain wanting to trace close family members.  The first was the granddaughter of Sir Charles Belgrave, Personal Adviser (“Chief Administrator”) to the rulers of Bahrain from 1926 until 1957, as “Chief Administrator”. I remember reading his memoir early on in my time here. She and her family wanted to find the grave of her father James Belgrave who was born and died out here.

The second was a family wanting to find the grave of a baby who had died shortly after childbirth in Salmaniya Hospital particularly on behalf of the baby’s mother who having given birth never really had been able to bond with her baby and never attended her funeral.

In both cases I drove the family to the New and Old Christian Cemeteries, and had the privilege of praying with them at the gravesides.