Holidays

My wife and I have recently returned home from our summer holiday, and it has been the kind of holiday which we always enjoy very much. We are well aware that other people enjoy other kinds of holiday. Some stay in this country while others go abroad. Some like the seaside while others prefer the countryside. Some like activity holidays while others prefer somewhere to relax. Some like to go to the same place year after year while others prefer to visit a new place each time. Some want to walk; others want to swim; some want to sunbathe; and others want to keep in the shade.

We ourselves like to stay in places where there are stately homes and gardens to visit. Just like people and their holiday preferences, stately homes also differ from one another. Some are older than others. Some are larger than others. Some are homely while others are grand. Some have formal gardens while others have parkland gardens, many of which were designed by the great ‘Capability’ Brown; and some have a combination of both types of garden. We have noticed that the restaurants in some of the stately homes proudly advertise that much of the food being served has been grown in their own kitchen garden.

Among the gardens we visited this time, the one we enjoyed most was a water garden near Weymouth, which was deliberately modelled on Monet’s famous garden in Giverny in France, complete with water lilies and Japanese bridge. The garden was not attached to a stately home, but had been created in a disused stone quarry and had completely transformed the former industrial site. It reminded me of the lake in Southwater Park which was similarly created in the former brickworks site.

One of the great advantages of a holiday is the opportunity it provides to appreciate away from home the amazing beauty of the world which God has created. So also today, in our annual Harvest Festival celebration, we have an opportunity to remind ourselves, through the gifts of flowers and food, of God’s creative wonder and his gracious provision for our physical needs.

Howard Gordon