The start of rehearsals for the London Touring Cast performing Risen!- The Musical April 9th and 10th at the New Theatre Royal, Portsmouth

Gasp in Wonder – featuring Lucy Stimpson-Maynard from the album The Season of Singing recorded and produced by Ross Gill

Rehearsals for Risen! – The Musical started on Sunday at the London College of Music with Joffy Girling, our Musical Director going through harmonies with the fabulous London Touring Cast. Welcome to new cast members Max Panks who is playing Jesus, Lindsey Sarah Katie Preston who is playing Mary wife of Clopas, Dan Smith who is playing Peter and Craig Kenneth Smith who is playing Cleopas’ friend, Aaron Peat who is playing Nathaniel, Oswald Addo who is playing Simon the Zealot and Adam who is playing James Son of Alpheus.

They all sound fabulous so make sure you don’t miss them at the New Theatre Royal, Portsmouth on April 9^th and 10^th – tickets and more information from www.risenthemusical.com

Being part of such an exciting project as Risen!- The Musical is simply brilliant, but not all life is great -we only have to look at the plight of the refugees to see that. Some may ask “How can God allow so many people to suffer in this way?” But the refugee crisis is a perfect example of what has been discussed in earlier blogs i.e. It is mankind, not God who is messing things up. Yes God could intervene but if He makes all our difficult choices for us then we end up as robots which are not what we were designed for because robots can only be programmed to simulate love – they cannot express it freely and truly- only humans with a free will can do that.

Today I want to look at another jigsaw piece of explanation of why God allows suffering suggested by Stephen Gaukroger in his book “It Makes Sense.” He says “It would be disastrous if God were to remove pain completely.” He goes on to say that without pain my appendix could burst without warning, my teeth would go rotten and I would never know- I could lose whole limbs in a fire without realising it. When I go to the doctor he/she asks me where the pain is – this helps locate the problem and attempt a diagnosis and cure. Without pain the doctor’s job would be much more difficult. Pain, far from being an enemy, can be our friend. It is the body’s early warning system and without it life would be unimaginably worse than it is now.

I know we still do not have the whole answer to this question of suffering but there are more jigsaw pieces to come and next week I want to consider the belief that God understands and has empathy with our suffering because He himself has experienced it.