{"id":4977,"date":"2012-04-03T11:30:53","date_gmt":"2012-04-03T10:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/richardlittledale.wordpress.com\/?p=4977"},"modified":"2012-04-03T11:30:53","modified_gmt":"2012-04-03T10:30:53","slug":"easter-and-the-second-shoe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/2012\/04\/03\/easter-and-the-second-shoe\/","title":{"rendered":"Easter and the second shoe"},"content":{"rendered":"

A time for defiant hope<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Regular readers of this blog will have noticed that things have been a little quiet on here over the past few days. You will be aware, too, that I rarely write about my own family here. However, there are moments when the personal and professional lives of the preacher collide, and this is one of them.<\/p>\n

Two years ago my wife underwent treatment for cancer, and ever since we have been waiting for ‘the other shoe to drop’. That happened on Thursday of last week, and the cancer has now appeared in her lung. \u00a0Intensive chemotherapy and surgery will now follow in short order.<\/p>\n

It’s easy to feel that news such as this could not possibly come at a worse time than Easter. After all, like many preachers I shall take to the pulpit at the weekend to proclaim God’s spectacular resurrection power and the Christian’s indefatigable hope. Surely, though -this is the very time when we need such hope? Theological truth and the realities of life have to intersect, or it wasn’t really truth at all. \u00a0For us to stand and sing ‘Thine be the glory’<\/em>\u00a0on Sunday will be an act of faith – nothing more nor less.<\/p>\n

These pages may well be a little\u00a0quieter\u00a0over the next few months, and those who are inclined to pray would be welcome to do so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A time for defiant hope Regular readers of this blog will have noticed that things have been a little quiet on here over the past few days. You will be aware, too, that I rarely write about my own family … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4977"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/176.32.230.12\/richardlittledale.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}