1% was never going to be enough. It’s been a tough year for everyone, but over the last 12 months most of us have become more aware of the pressures on our health workers than ever before. Night after night, TV gave us access to the wards and we saw nurses and doctors, often young adults themselves, talk about the strain they were under.

Through the year, we were encouraged to support the NHS. So children drew pictures to put in their windows, councils painted slogans on roads, we stood at doorsteps clapping week after week, we stayed away from the surgeries and A&E. And it was genuine – we were and are immensely grateful and proud of those who were in hospitals at a time when no one really knew how things would develop.

That’s why a 1% rise in pay became an issue last Wednesday.

Because it’s not enough to say that you are grateful, if your actions suggest something different.

It’s the old truth: ‘Show don’t Tell’. Though like all cliches, it has its limitations. The ancient joke about the wife who asks her husband whether he loves her, to be met by the answer, ‘I told you I loved you 25 years ago and if anything changes, I’ll let you know’, does contain a truth.

You have to tell people you love them, appreciate them, are grateful for them. But you also have to be able to translate that into actions.

It’s a constant New Testament theme. It’s there when Jesus warns his followers, it’s not enough to keep shouting ‘Lord, Lord’ if you don’t actually do the will of God (Matthew 7:21). It’s there when Paul suggests that you can speak ‘in the tongues of men and of angels’ but if you don’t love those around you, you’ll just be a irritatingly loud cymbal crashing around (1 Corinthians 13). It’s there when James told his church ‘I will show you my faith by what I do’ (James 2:18).

So let’s be clear and specific. It’s not enough to say you love your husband or wife, if your criticism keeps tearing them down all the time. It’s not enough to say you want the best for your children, if you don’t spend time with them. It’s not enough to say you want people to know Jesus if you’re always complaining about life. It’s not enough to say you love the church, but don’t work towards getting to know people.

It’s why you can’t offer 1% and then spend millions on making your office look more ‘presidential’. It’s why you have to show, not tell. And, by the way, this is not just about health workers but the rest of the public service as well, folks that we rely on when society’s roof looks like it’s caving in.

Jesus was right all along!

Three Things To Watch

1. Each week through March we will be releasing a short film which we hope will be helpful to you in at least 2 ways. They are short prayers around common themes and we hope you will find them helpful yourself. But we also hope that you will find them cringe-free so that you will feel able to share them on your social media accounts. We hope it’s a way to help people who might not be so sure about faith to connect with us. Let us know what you think of them to help us decide whether to do them again!

This week’s is here.

2. On Wednesday the Young Adults group met and were thinking about prayer – why it matters and how to deal with all the obstacles that get in our way of actually praying, rather than just talking about it! (If you’d like to be included in this group, they happen every other Wednesday evenings at 7.30pm – please get in touch for the Zoom link. (Alex number: 07746 130249))

As part of that evening, Andrew showed a film he had put together with three stories of answered pray...