Eek - I'm an evangelist!

I don't really like the word "Evangelist".  It conjurs up visions of shouty men in the middle of town telling people that they're all going to hell at the tops of their voices.  Either that or suit-wearing professional speakers who hold big Christian rallys in stadiums.  Not me at all, and, despite my strong Christian faith, I don't consider myself much of an evangelist.

However, the word originates in Greek and its original meaning is that of a "bringer of good news", and the word is also used to denote someone who is enthusiastic about a cause.  And that's what I was for a few weeks earlier this year!

A man called Tom launched a thing called the "Swindon Cycle Challenge".  This was a friendly competition, with lots of prizes, that got companies across Swindon trying to get their staff riding bicycles.  As a slight aside, I thought that this was a GREAT way to promote cycling.  The organisation provided lots of promotional material and incentives for people, as well as having a good webstie, updated often, with associated email updates too.  They did everything but provide the bikes!

Anyway, as a member of the little sports and social committee at work I took it upon myself to promote this within my office.  I truly became a cycling evangelist!

It was pretty hard work.  I had to do a lot of haggling and persuading.  Some people thought I was a bit weird and there were lots of excuses that people gave for not getting out and riding a mile or for 10 minutes on a bike, despite the offer of free cinema tickets, cycle accessories, and entry into prize draws for those that did!

I was even referred to as "Swindon's answer to Lance Armstrong".  Hah! I wish.

But I think that it's important to promote cycling, make people realise that you don't have to fire up your car to do that short journey.  I'm aware that not everyone can commute by bike like I can, and that if you have children or luggage then it's not really an available option.  But there are LOTS of journeys that could be done by bike, and there are lots of good reasons to do them by bike!

This process has been a real challenge to my faith.  Cycling isn't the only good news I believe I have to share.  I'm willing to become renowned in my workplace for being a cyclist?  Am I willing to become renowned for being a follower of Jesus?  That's a whole world more scary.

Somehow, talking about faith is awkward and embarassing.  Our culture isn't one where we talk much about beliefs, especially if they are controversial.  Talking about cycling, or what music you like, or what football team you support is OK.  But I wonder what would happen if I decided that I needed to be, not a Lance Armstrong, but a Billy Graham; telling people not about two-wheels, but about hope and joy and goodness.  What would the reaction be?  Would it even be acceptable?  Could I use my sports and social club to help promote a prayer group or to advertise church services and events?

I just don't know, and, at the moment, I don't really know how to start finding out.  But I should take courage (ah...that's where encouragement comes from); I've now been an evangelist, it wasn't that scary, it got mixed reactions, but the whole cycle challenge experience has given me a new confidence to talk, not just about cycling, but about my faith too.

Discipleship Academy and SoulSpace

I've had an inspiring evening with these two little events. They won't mean much to some so I'll try and explain.

"Discipleship" is lots of things. For me it's the process of being a disciple of Jesus Christ, learning his ways, following in his footsteps, trying to lead a godly life. What's a godly life you might ask? Well, part of the process is finding that out. There are general rules but it's worked out in different ways for each person, and each time.

We've just had a new youth minister start at our church and he's really interested in helping people on this journey and is exploring ways of doing this. Discipleship Academy and SoulSpace are two of these things.

Discipleship Academy is mostly for the young people of our church, but I'm tagging along as a "fellow journeyer". I'm hesitant to call myself a "leader" in this activity because I'm actually going through the process myself.

This is intended to be 12, monthly sessions looking at, and equipping us to do discipleship.

I missed the first session, but went along today and it was really inspiring. The youth minister has produced a set of what I would call "tools" (things like study, reading, finding space, journalling and attending church) which we're all discussing the use of and encouraging each other to actually do. It was really good and I'm sure that these tools and sessions will be useful for us all as we try to do "discipleship" together.

SoulSpace is the new minister giving our Sunday evening church service a bit of an overhaul. We won't be doing this every week, but it will happen 2 weekends every month.

The idea of this is that rather than do a typical church service (a "hymn sandwich" as he called it today), we'll be trying to do church things in different ways. Sometimes we'll sing, sometimes we wont. Sometimes there will be a talk from the front. Sometimes we'll have group discussions. Sometimes we'll have other creative forms of worship or prayer. We'll just try, as a community, to learn from God and respond to him in different ways.

And community is key in both of these activities. This is something we'll do together. But also something that is not confined to Sunday evenings - the things we learn, the things we're encouraged to do, will, hopefully, spill over into the rest of our lives.

So tonight we've looked at:

• using the Bible as a tool. How can we use it? How do we break it down into bite-sized chunks, read it, understand it, and apply it to our lives; and
  
• authenticity - being real. How do we carry all this church stuff with us in our daily lives. Are we honest with people about who we are, and what we believe in? Or do we hide for fear of being "found out" and embarassed about that key part of our lives: our faith?

These are both difficult things to grapple with - Jesus didn't promise us following him would be easy. But I've been really inspired tonight in both these things, and the fact that a little pocket of people around me are also grappling with them helps a LOT.

We also had a really good church service this morning. The speaker did lots of storytelling, which I always find a powerful way of communicating. The story was of Joseph and the key thing I got from it was that he wasn't called by God. He didn't have God speaking from a burning bush like Moses, or a revelation from angels or anything like that. He just did what he thought he should be doing and God lead him and worked through him. Some people have things that God clearly wants them to do, but the rest of us shouldn't feel left out - God can do great things through all of us who follow him, wherever we are!

It's weird writing publicly about my faith, but in the interests of taking a step in discipleship and being real, I feel I must be writing more about what God is doing and saying. My faith is more important than my cycling, gardening, housework, DIY, music and technology interests, but that probably doesn't come across here. I hope it will in future!

Gardening and Gods

I quoted from the Bible's book called "Exodus" only yesterday - here's a bit again from the 10 commandments: "You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below..."

It's hard to see what this might mean in modern times. We try to turn it into idolising things like wealth, fame, or work, and I'm sure that these are things we need to be careful not to become the focus of our lives, but somehow it doesn't quite seem the same. These don't feel like Gods somehow.

There are people out there that really do have other "Gods". Maybe they worship mother earth, or the rain gods, or the sun gods. Lots of gods have been created to symbolise things that we can't control and people ask them to control the things that we can't control. If I sacrifice a lamb to the rain God maybe he will send the rain we need for our crops? Is our scorching weather and drought because I've been a bad person and the weather Gods are looking down on me

As a new gardener lots of things start to take over your life. Weather is one of them. And it's getting personal! Who's in control of all this, and how do I get them to send the weather I need?!

It's annoying when it doesn't rain. I fear drought and our one 120l water butt will only last us a week or so. But it's also annoying when it's cold, or cloudy. Our plants love water, but they love heat and light too.

Gardening really puts you in a position where you depend on the weather. And it feels sometimes like it's having a go at you. I can clearly see how people saw drought and floods as punishment, prayed for rain, or for it to stop raining. I can understand the anthropomorphisation of nature. I can understand the relationship that people have had with the elements.

I can understand why these people had weather Gods, and that, somehow, makes the commandment all the more powerful.

I'm not a 7-day creationist, but I love the imagery of the creation story in the book of Genesis in the Bible. A book which clearly asserts that God, the God of Israel, and now the God of the world, made everything and has it all in his hands. I love the little details intended to dispell the myths of other Gods, such as the storytellers throwaway comment that "He also made the stars" (Gen 1:16) - you know, just while He was at it, might as well make a few little stars too.

And Jesus confirms both his deity and his power over nature in the calming of the storm and other such miracles.

So, I have a new understanding of other Gods. But I also have a continued faith in the one true God.

Nothing Changes

Back in April I read this article in the Guardian and tore it out and left it on my bedside table for comment. Sorry for taking so long to getting round to it.

About 4,000 years ago...

Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, the whole mountain trembled violently, and the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Then Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him. The LORD descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain...And God spoke all these words:

• “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
• “You shall have no other gods before me.
• “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below...
• “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
• “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates...
• “Honor your father and your mother...
• “You shall not murder.
• “You shall not commit adultery.
• “You shall not steal.
• “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
• “You shall not covet ... anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear...

This year...

The internet was awash with gossip because the Joseph Rowntree Foundation had descended upon it. The news stories were served up from it and the internet trembled in anticipation at the announcement of their latest social research findings, and the sound of the journalists grew louder and louder. Then the journalists spoke and the voice of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation answered it. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation descended to the internet and sent their press release to the news web sites...and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation spoke all these words:

"I am the Jospeh Rowntree Foundation, who has surveyed 3,500 people, and have revealed a strong sense of unease about some of the changes shaping British society:

1. "you shall build stronger communities;
2. "you shall not be selfish;
3. "you shall not be greedy consumers;
4. "you shall have good moral values;
5. "you shall have strong families;
6. "you shall not make victims of young people; and they shall not perpetrate anti-social behaviour;
7. "you shall not comsume too much drugs and alcohol;
8. "you shall strive to remove poverty and inequality;
9. "you shall be tolerant and inclusive of foreigners; and they shall respect you;
   
10. "you shall not partake in crime and violence."

When the people saw the research report and heard the radio reports and read the newspaper commentators, they trembled with fear.

Nothing Changes

I hope you get the point. The lists have their differences, but it seems that "social evils" have changed little since the time of the Israelites wandering in the desert.

As a Christian, I despair slightly. God gave these commands in order to protect His people, to help them. Jesus summed the laws that God gave as 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' and "Love your neighbour as yourself".

Have we not learned? And what will it take for God to get the point across to his people, the whole world?

"Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the LORD. Blessed are they who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart."

Back to Church Sunday

Churches are amazing organisations and, despite the fact that they should (in my opinion) be quite free of bureaucracy, they are organisations and they need structures involving lots of people in order to function.

One of the structures that we have at our church is the Church Meeting. This happens every other month, and we had one last night.

One item on the agenda was an initiative called 'Back to Church Sunday'. This is a Sunday in September that has been picked out as a day to invite people that used to go to church back to church.

I'm not sure what I think of this. Surely every Sunday is potentially a "Back to Church" Sunday, or a "Go to Church for the First Time" Sunday. And I think I'd rather have ongoing encouragement to invite friends along than only be encouraged to do it on a specific day. Churches should ALWAYS be open for people to come back to.

Also, what will the service be like? I'm expecting it to be "special", which doesn't seem right because what if the people we invite come back the next Sunday and find it's different?

It IS a good initiative - as you can see, it's already got me thinking about how open our church is to newcomers, and what I can do to try get better at asking people along. I will support it and try to join in. And maybe doing a one off event like this will kick-start something bigger and ongoing.

But I think we need more than just one day for this...it should be an ongoing part of our Christian lives.

Church Planting?

This is a bit of a multi-purpose Blog/Email/Journal type entry that will probably pop up in various places - apologies if you come across it twice.

A while back I mentioned something that was going on that I couldn't really mention. Well, now I can mention some more, though I will have to remain a bit vague for reasons that will become clear.

Introduction

Sally and I are, possibly/probably, going to be involved in a church plant in a new part of Swindon that isn't yet built. It's very exciting, but a little bit scary and unknown. This message will probably be the first of many on the topic.

History and Background

When we first moved to Swindon we searched around a bit for a church that was our style and found Upper Stratton Baptist Church (USBC). It wasn't massively local, being a couple of miles away, but it felt like the right place to be.

Shortly after committing to being at USBC, we joined a small group. For the uninitiated, a small group is, well, just that. Where the typical Sunday church service has many people and is lead from the front, a small group is a group of around 10-12 people who meet together during the week. Small groups, or house groups, or cell groups as they are sometimes known, enable people to connect at a deeper level, get to know each other better, share their experiences, learn from each other and pray for each other. It's just a more personal way of meeting together as Christians.

Almost immediately we felt that our house group was important. Sally and I had a sense that this small group could be a little church of its own, and that maybe our small group leader might one day start a new, house-based church. Some would refer to this as a "church plant".

The problem was...where??? There are plenty of churches in Swindon, and no shortage of them in the area that our small group meets in. So we dismissed it.

Gentle Revelations

It turns out that there's a new development in Swindon going on. A group of churches in the area have been praying about the development for years, and, now that it's starting to happen, they're looking to have a Christian presence there.

Our small group leader feels called (and there a lots of signs that its the right thing to do) to move into the area and be forming a Christian presence in the community from very early on. And it looks like the small group might be involved quite closely in this.

Some will find it odd that God appears to "speak" or to "lead" people to a particular course of action. I believe that this does happen. But I've really never seen the messages so loud and clear as they are for this.

The Mission

So, here's the Mission, if you choose to accept it: help our small group leader establish a Christian presence in this new development from the word go, and work to build community, welcome people to the area, and show those moving in a huge amount of love by serving them, being generous, and accepting them as friends and neighbours.

Any group of Christians will probably become known as a "church", but we're hesitant to define what that means for us just yet, and we certainly have no plans for a building.

For those that recognise them, the words "relational", "missional", "cell church" and various other buzz words have been bounced around, but I hope the paragraph above gives some idea to those that don't know what they might mean.

Our Involvement

That's the story so far in very brief form. I could say lots about how the churches of Swindon have been working together in wonderful ways, how funding hasn't been an issue, and how people we didn't expect to have been incredibly encouraging about the whole thing. It really is too good to be true.

There's also been other things going on that have really brought our small group together in the last few weeks. We're a very tight knit community who love each other and are all very excited about being a part of the new community.

So what's our involvement?

Well, we've obviously been supporting and praying for the team as this is a massive change for them, and quite a big risk. But we've also been considering our own involvement.

Now, I'm normally practical, working through issues and thinking things through thoroughly before committing to them. But in this case, everything in me says "well of course we're going to be a part of it". When opur small group leader told us what she was up to, we already knew, and I think we already knew that we would be a part of it too.

We're both hugely excited and want to be involved in as much of a capacity as we can.

It's not all simple though. We've had to ask ourselves if we're doing this because we think God is calling us to, or because we just want to be part of a new exciting church that lots of our close friends are in too.

We're wondering just how we can be involved in a "missional, relational church plant" when, at present, we're unable to actually move into the area.

We've also recently become aware of the practicalities. There's always politics when a group of people are involved in change and this is no exception. There will be some real challenges along the way.

Though God's call seems clear to us...we have to be sure that we're following God's call for us as we proceed.

To put it another way, some good friends of ours are waiting for a definite call from God before they commit to being involved. We're the opposite, waiting to see if God calls us NOT to be involved.

What happens now?

Well, we don't really know. Things are happening extremely quickly, but they are also being revealed a little at a time. We had a really good meeting with the small group the other night to discuss what the "shared values" of the new "church" might be (worthy of a whole blog post of its own), and we're all praying, asking God questions, looking for answers, wisdom, guidance in faith that they will come.

I can't give too much detail in a public forum, but I'm hoping to be able to post bits and pieces about what's going on here; to record the process that we go through, but also in the hope that those reading may be able to support us.

I will try to use as little church jargon as possible, though such a thing is hard when you're writing about such a topic.

It's obviously something that could be quite a big change of direction for us and consume a lot of our time. As I said before, it's exciting and scary stepping into the unknown in faith. I hope to be able to share some pretty exciting stuff here as time goes on.

Eeek!

Spiritual Networking...what might that look like?

We were at a wedding yesterday and had the fortune of staying over with good friends. Friends that we know REALLY well and easily slip into deep conversation with.

While we were there someone mentioned that they miss this deep conversation and that they wished they were better at using email to prompt discussion on important, spiritual, theological matters with us friends that they were close with.

The two IT techies in the room immediately saw the problem solving opportunity and in no time at all we'd coined the phrase "Spiritual Networking". If you can use the Internet to do "Social Networking", why can't you use it to stimulate your spiritual life too?

We're not really sure what this looks like yet and the idea is developing. I think it's a closed online community where people post and respond to each others thoughts. Is it as simple as a bulleting board, or discussion forum? Or is there something more?

We're looking at how to get something like this going on a small scale. Google Groups, Yahoo Groups, a shared Blog, a closed Facebook Group and various other suggestions have been put forward, but I think we just have to choose one and go for it and see what happens!

General Easter Update

It's been a while and we're off on holiday tomorrow so here's a few thoughts to jot down before I go.

Easter and "The Passion"

It's Easter Sunday. Easter is obviously a hijacked pagan festival - witness the eggs and bunnies that symbolise new life as spring approaches - heck the date of easter even changes with the lunar cycle! But, regardless of that, this is the time when Christians celebrate that Jesus rose from the dead and brought us a new and different sort of life. God has forgiven us of the wrong we've done and we can follow Jesus in faith knowing that he died and was brought back from the dead to live forever. I join with the many today who shout "Hallelujah" - Praise the Lord!

It's been a good time of reflecting on what Jesus did and why it means so much to us. It
saddens me that people have so little understanding of the man at the centre of the Christian faith. I'm not the sort to ram it down people throats, but if they ask I'll happily explain, and highly recommend, my faith, that I have come to see as the truth. But the
occasions to explain to people are sadly limited, even at this time of the year.

Encouragingly, this year, the BBC has done a screening of a 4-part film of "The Passion" - the events of the last few days of Jesus' life. This has been very interesting to watch. Many have tried to interpret the events in their own ways down the years. I like the BBC's attempt. It feels quite real and give you a good sense of what Jerusalem was like at the time, and some insight into why certain people may have done what they did on that first Easter. What it lacked for me was a spiritual element - little prayer, no angels, no miracles, no fear of God. I thought the pharisees more interested in what was going on that then disciples. It felt earthly, lacking a heavenly God. A tale told, but somehow lacking the essence of what was really going on. A political revolution was definitely going on, but the "kingdom of God" seemed relegated to little more than a nice-to-have desire of the heart. I think it lacked...well...passion!

But good on the Beeb for showing such a thing. And don't get me wrong - it was a REALLY good re-enactment of what happened - captivating and compelling. It was just very non-committal too.

Oh, and there seems to have been a lot of chocolate around. Not sure what that's about.

Small Group Leading

I attend a thing called a "Small Group". This is a group of about 10 people from church who meet during the week to chat, pray, study the bible and share news together. Small groups are an important part of church life as they enable people to connect and meet in God's presence in a deeper way than you can in a larger group on the Sunday.

This week I led the group in a study. It was the first time I'd done this for a long time and it seemed to go down well, but I'm not entirely sure. It's always hard to judge how these things look from the other side. I really enjoy preparing and leading groups like this and I hope I'll get to do it again.

Garden

With 3 days off before our trip away, we were meant to be gardening. Both digging and planting. But the weather's been AWFUL. Snow, sleet, hail, rain, gales, freezing temperatures. So that'll have to wait. Longer days are coming so I suspect some evening digging may be required. We've not planted a thing yet and only have a small patch of weedless garden.

House

So instead we've been concentrating on the house. Sally's a star with painting and has made great progress on the dining room. We've committed quite a lot of the last couple of days to tidying up the edges and we're VERY nearly done. Here's the before and after:

As well as painting we've also put up another nice light. I confess, I thought this was a bit over the top for the small room, but Sally loves it and it is a beautiful thing and we got it for half price.

Wiring the new light in was interesting (as are most thing involving the electrics in our house). We have "loop in" wiring, so three cables come in from the ceiling; power in, power out, and the loop to the switch. This makes for a complicated bit of wiring to get the light connected up. However, in this fitting, the live and neutrals seemed to be wired backwards. All the black cables were where the reds should be, and vice versa. A quick chat with my dad and a few diagrams later and it appeared to be safe. After all, the previous fitting worked!

It seems that normally you have the three live wires tied together with power coming back from the switch to the light on the "spare" neutral cable. In our case, we had the three neutrals tied together with the spare live coming back from the switch. From a "logical" circuit point of view this means that the switch is on the neutral side of the light, rather than the live. There was no reason why it shouldn't work. And, indeed, it does!

I'm sure I should be more scared of electricals than I am. I'll get a nasty shock one day.

Rats!

Darn it. The rats are back. We've heard vague scratchings recently and dismissed it, but they were definitely up there last night. I can only see one little hole outside that they might be getting in. We've put fresh poison down and some proper rat traps in the loft. Grrr....

Cycling

Not much going on on the cycling front. I've been doing longer trips into work and back and generally enjoying being out on the Felt. Both bikes need a good clean which I was hoping to do this weekend and haven't got around too. Oh, and I had to replace another spoke on the Raleigh. Not sure how this one broke but fixing it was easy having done it before.

Had other transport problems too when the car started spluttering a bit on the way back from the outdoors show. Kwik Fit fixed it with a new clamp on the exhaust - the existing one had come loose. They charged me £2. Bargain!

Other Developments

There are some other interesting developments going on that I can't really talk about too. These are very much connected to our spiritual and church life and involve some interesting changes that are going on around us. Some of this is stuff that we thing God has been telling us might happen in some way over the last year so it's very exciting seeing how that might come to fruition. Please, if anyone's reading, don't ask us any questions because we can't answer them. I probably shouldn't even be putting the teaser out.

More will be apparent in the coming months, I hope!

Holiday

And so to probably our most anticipated holiday so far. We're only going to York and the Lake District, but we've both had such a hard few weeks at work that we REALLY need it. We're looking forward to our first bit of fell walking on our own (how will we get on without a more experienced guide?), and we'll hopefully have a rest in there too.

I will probably be quiet for a few days, both Blog and Twitter-wise. Back with some photos on Saturday!

Persistent Prayers Paying Off

This is a follow up to the post about praying for good health.

Last Sunday our church had a "Healing and Wholeness" service. They do this a couple of times a year and the idea is that we believe God wishes, in some cases, to heal us, and, in all cases, to bring us wholeness.

And so I had Sally and one of the Elders pray for me in person.

Talking about being prayed for is weird, mostly because spiritual things aren't easy to describe in words. In some cases you don't feel anything when you're being prayed for. In other cases you will get a sense of peace, or happiness. Sometimes there is a physical sensation of some sort. And at other times more unusual things happen - for example, I've seen people fall over, semi-conscious, kinda like shutting down physically so that God can work on the spiritual stuff - forced meditation I guess!

Anyway, in this case not much seemed to happen. Does that mean that nothing has actually happened? No! Not really. I believe that whenever we speak to God something happens - he hears us, understands us, and though we may not see, hear, or feel the effects, we have made a request and had it heard. A bit like sending a letter to Santa - nothing happens when you send the letter, but you will (eventually, if you're a good boy/girl) get some kind of response!

And on that Sunday certain things started moving. Later, at home, I prayed and had my own little conversation with God. Again, it's hard to explain how but I felt that God "spoke" to me - not in words as such, but a message arrived in my mind or my spirit or something - and he said that I could "start thinking again". Certain things, in my head, have kinda been on hold while all this illness and injury has been ongoing. God was telling me that I could take those things off hold.

That was a bit odd as I didn't feel any dramatic improvement at that point.

However - in the morning, on Monday, I felt like a different person! Really, overnight the pain had gone from being a painful, broken, sort of pain, to being a tired, weary, will-be-better-soon sort of pain. Psychologically I felt MUCH stronger too. It really was a remarkable change - I suddenly felt like me again. Oh, and I was really hungry!! My appetite increased substantially!

Following that I've had a steady week - the pain has come and gone a bit, but it's not felt harsh and difficult, it's continued to feel like recovery rather than injury. I've been laughing, smiling, joking, and enjoying myself.

I'm not about to enter into a discourse on the nature of prayer and answers to prayer here - maybe another time - I just want to record my experience and give thanks for it. I'm happy for people to dismiss this as coincidence, or psychology, or a perfectly normal physical recovery. But I know that something slightly more than that has happened. As William Temple once said: "When I pray, coincidences happen, and when I don't, they don't."

Persisting with Praying for Health

Last year was a very difficult year for me, health-wise. Read elsewhere if you don't know why.

I know that sometimes I've overreacted, I know that there are plenty of people with much worse things wrong with them. But I've had more than my fair share of annoying, niggling, painful, exhausting, frustrating things that have kept me from feeling like myself and doing the things I love doing and feel called to do.

As a Christian, one of the big things I have to deal with is the issue of suffering. If I'm doing my best to please God and follow Jesus, why do I get persistent failures of health? Why does God let this happen. Why doesn't God do something about it?

There's no simple way to explain why suffering happens. We just live in a world where things do go wrong - mostly it's our own fault! But I believe that God tries to use those difficult times and brings good out of them.

Most of what I've been through is, as someone recently stated, "just stuff". Some of it's caused by my own behaviour (e.g. bad posture, or cycling too hard and fast). Some of it is just being ill - we get bugs, we fight them off, it happens!

I've learned a lot through the last year. God really has used it for good. I've learned how I cope with illness. How I don't like to stop but I NEED to sometimes, and that's OK, people don't mind (in fact, they positively encourage it!). I've learned to recognise and deal with stress. I've learned about some physiology and a lot of psychology too! It's not been wasted suffering.

But I am very frustrated with it and so I'm taking action. I'm going to ask God if he WILL intervene and help me get better. I think I've had enough and I want to be myself again, and I'm going to get some good people around me really, persistently, praying for good health for me.

Of course, people have been praying all through the year, and I've had various "breakthroughs" as people have done so. I believe that God does sometime heal miraculously. I know that most of the time he doesn't. But I'm going to go and ask him and see what he thinks or says about it.

And I'm not going to stop when I'm better, I'm going to get these people to keep praying that I stay well once I am well.

This isn't a sermon on suffering or healing - I'm not qualified for that sort of thing. It's a statement about my beliefs and intentions.

Let's get praying properly, let's go and nag God a bit, and see what happens!

Putting God First

A mixed weekend. Mostly joyful with the marriage of two good friends in London and good time spent with our old London church family.

On Saturday I woke up feeling very tired and like I was fighting something off. I didn't think I'd make it through the wedding ceremony, but did , and was then prayed for and, praise the LORD, felt a whole load better.

My back got better later in the week, and then has been suddenly and worryingly worse again today. The pain has stopped being muscular and now feels like a sharp, nerve-type pain. I was literally in tears with pain earlier.

But time with the St Simons church family is always time of being inspired and challenged. The focus of the weekend for me was putting God first. I had some amazing conversations about this with people, heard amazing stories about how people have put God first, listened to God and followed what he's telling them to do. People who seem to have discovered (or are discovering) that when you really put God first, the other things sort themselves out.

Even the sermon this morning, from the first chapter of the book of Jonah, was about putting aside "idols" to do what God wants us to do. It was a real theme.

I could write lots but God was very present this weekend. I'm inspired to pray more, to listen to God more, to talk more openly about what God is doing, and about my faith. The people of St Simon's are so outward focussed, so keen to share what God is doing (and he's doing lots). I take courage from that. And I've had some good times of prayer with others this weekend where the LORD has already spoken.

So despite my physical ailments, lots to give thanks for. I feel joyful despite my pain. I have plenty of theological meat to chew on (anyone want to study the book of James with me?). I have lots to get on and do too.

The LORD is good and I pray today for J & A who got married, that he will bless them with each other as much as I have been blessed with my own, beautiful, loving wife.

Finding purpose

So, it's been a long year. It's been a hard year. I've been ill a lot. I've not achieved very much of what I thought I would. I enjoy physical activity and I've not managed to do much.

On the up side we have bought a house and very much settled in Swindon, into our jobs, and into our church.

I've now had a period of feeling well for a while. Things finally seem to be fixed. So I'm taking stock, looking around and thinking "Phew, OK, so that's over...what now?"

To help with that process I'm re-reading a book that's quite well known in Christian circles called "The Purpose Driven Life". It's written by famous American church leader who does lots of "purpose driven" stuff. It's a very American book - though I can't really explain why. But if you can see through the American Evangelical-isms it's a good book.

It's just what I need right now. It's taking a very beaten and battered soul inside of me, and taking it back to the basics of my faith. Why am I here? What on Earth am I doing? How do I find God in all of this? And what does he want me to be doing with my life.

Hopefully I'll be reporting back sometime...watch this space.

Naturewatch: Web Building!

Possibly not for the arachnophobic. Some action shots of the fat spider building a web. The sun was shining down and making the web glisten so I thought I'd try and catch it on, err, well not film exactly, but you know what I mean.

The reason I'm a bit fanatical about spiders is that...well...they're just amazing. They have these 8 legs and they build this super-strong web thing with stuff that they naturally produce to catch their food. The co-ordination required to spin a web is phenomenal, combined with their apparent ability to fly between high places to put up the initial outer structure of the web. Watching it happen is just incredible.

I am someone who believes in God and, though I don't believe the literal 7-day creation, I do believe that God created the natural world around us, and when I see something like a spider spinning a web I can only watch in awe at the detail and intricacy with which God made things.

Book: Prayer by Phillip Yancey

This book was recommended as a good read on prayer but didn't live up to expectations.

Before I wrote these notes on it I did some searching and it's hard to find a bad review of the book. And I have to say that, despite the slow start to it, the book did grow on me as I read it, and it did inspire me to pray more and differently. But it was with relief that I finished it. It was just REALLY hard going.

This is probably more a reflection on me than on the book. Let me explain...

Much as my writing is very long and waffly, I like my reading to be concise and to the point. I like stories and illustrations, but they should help make the point rather than clog up the book and make it slow going and repetitive. Plus, I read non-fiction books like this slowly and carefully, taking everything in, underlining what's important, so I don't need the same point to be made several times.

You can probably work out that I thought that this book was too heavy on anecdotes, too light on simple, to-the-point theology, and too repetitive. The book IS a meandering journey rather than a write up of the destination. It's a discussion rather than a sermon.

In a book like this it is sometimes important to reinforce a point but, particularly in the early chapters, I found Yancey going round in circles without making much real progress. After reading about a third of it I wondered what I was going to get from it other than lots of questions and fairly stock answers.

I found later chapters were a bit more practical and inspiring and Yancey's honesty and openness about his struggles with prayer really make the book. By the end I has the feeling that he has somehow gained some mastery of the topic and he had managed to share it with me. I just wish it hadn't taken him so many words to do it.

I didn't find many points to disagree on, though Yancey's theology is obviously very open. He's not afraid to tackle the difficult questions, and not afraid to leave you without a firm answer either.

I'd like to see an edited version distilling his findings into a much shorter work. But worth reading if you have the time.

Book: Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell

A friend of mine used to keep notes on books she had read and films she had seen. I hope to occasionally jot down what I think of books, films, maybe music here. Not reviews, but reminders to me of what the thing was about and what I thought of it.

I've just finished reading "Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith", kindly loaned to me by a friend.

It's a book about...well, I'm not sure what. It's a general overview of what the author - the "pastor" of a large, fairly liberal church in Michigan - thinks about Christianity I suppose.

It's a controversial book for some. I agreed with most of it but had problems with some things. I'll just give a very quick overview of the chapters (or "movements" as he calls them). Forgive any use of church jargon that you don't understand, it's hard to talk about these things in a brief way without using words that either mean nothing or are loaded with meaning.

The chapters have names, not numbers, and are as follows:

Jump is about the building blocks of faith. He touches on "creeds" (statements of faith) and explains how they are useful but need to be flexible (like springs, not bricks), and why it's OK to have questions and why joy is important.

Yoke is about different teachings, truth, and how it's important to interpret the Bible. By this he means both understanding what the writings would have meant to their original audience 2000 years ago, and in terms of re-applying what is said to our culture today. His biblical, historical and cultural knowledge shines through the whole book and is very interesting.

True. I suspect this is a controversial chapter and I found it difficult myself - especially his notion of finding truth around us. I agree that you can find elements of truth outside of what's written in the Bible but he seems to think that, if it seems OK to you then you can call it truth. I'm a bit more fundamental in that I think there is an ultimate truth to find, and that you can find things that are "good" outside of that truth, but not all the "good" things are "true", or indeed helpful. I do agree that we are too inflexible with our beliefs and application of truth and that this is bad, but I found Bell to be too soft with the general notion of truth itself.

Other bits of this chapter were good with stuff about how God is everywhere but we don't always recognise it, and about taking our faith with us into our whole lives...good stuff!

Tassels is about being real with ourselves and healing of the soul. There's some of Rob Bell's story of how he came to lead this huge church and then have a bit of a breakdown and what that all meant for him and how God helped him through it. He explains how we also need to go through a similar process sometimes. Pretty nitty-gritty stuff that's easy to read and hard to actually be real with, but full of great truth. Includes a great section about the sabbath!

Dust is about "discipleship"; that is, being called by and following in the teachings and life of Jesus. Again, lots of historical and cultural background make some very interesting reading but other then a good feeling about being chosen, I didn't feel it challenged me much.

New is about grace and the process of being "made new" which happens when we believe in Jesus. Essentially about how we get forgiven for "sin" (the wrong stuff we've done)
and how, if we believe in Jesus, this happens by what God has done and not by anything that we do. It's about being who we were meant to be and making the world more like it was meant to be. There's a call to action in there somewhere and a challenge to be people who "bring heaven to earth".

Good continues the theme talking about renewal and how heaven isn't somewhere that we will be going, but rather somewhere that the earth will one day be. It's coming here, rather than we're going there. Rob Bell's real frustration seems to come out here as he talks about what the "church" should be. This is what it's all about. Creeds, teachings, truth, healing of the soul, discipleship, grace, all leading to us - people that follow Jesus - being people who lead a life of serving God and serving others in order to bring the goodness of heaven to earth. Phew.

I enjoyed the book. It was a good and easy read. Rob Bell writes in a very conversational style and obviously is a very knowledgeable and wise man. I'd love to read more of his explaining of the Bible and the Jewish culture and traditions.

A few things I didn't like - aside from where I didn't necessarily agree with him.

I think he overuses metaphor. Bricks, tassels, velvet Elvises, superpastors, tour guides. It peters out after a while but at the start he really overdoes it, stretching the analogies further than the springs on his trampoline.

And I think he's not challenging enough. He makes some good points but, as I said before, a warm feeling is about all I got. Maybe it's the conversational tone? It made me want to think about things, not to actually change them.

The overall feeling I'm left with is that he should be writing a different book. Perhaps if he focussed more on the history and less on the philosophy I'd find him a better read? But then, if he did that he'd be writing a completely different book. And I think I quite liked the book. But I might need a second read to be sure. Martin, can I borrow it a bit longer???

Buying a house

We've done it! We've had an offer accepted on a house!

Actually, it happened a lot more quickly than I thought it would. So quickly that I didn't get to write anything about the house-hunting process.

You build it up in your head as being this huge thing that's really hard and takes ages to do but no...despite the differences that Sally and I had about what we wanted from a house and a neighbourhood, the fourth place that we looked out got us both very excited. We put an offer in
on Saturday and it was duly accepted.

I had some hesitations. Does God want us to buy a house? How do the notions of borrowing and spending that much money fit in with my faith? Am I just following the crowd and the culture? Is this really something that we should be doing, or should we be stepping out in a different,
more counter-cultural direction?

I never asked those questions about renting. Perhaps I should have?

I did spend some time praying about the decision. I thought hard about a little story in the bible where a man goes to Jesus and, excitedly, says "I will follow you wherever you go". Brilliant, we might think. How good, we might think, to see someone making such a passionate statement of commitment to following Jesus' teaching!

But Jesus knows the man's true motives and replies by saying that "foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head".

What does this mean? Does it mean that if we want to follow Jesus we should never settle anywhere? How does that fit the theme of community that runs through the bible, of living, sharing, and serving God together? Is buying a house too much of a commitment to stay in one
place? Or should I be settling into a community and trying to make a difference there by sticking it out, making friends and serving others?

This story is followed by another about a man who wants to follow Jesus but has a few things he wants to do first. It's a story about priorities. We should be following Jesus first, whatever that may mean for us, and doing the other things alongside that.

As I prayed and asked God about the passage and about our move I felt God saying that the most important thing was to follow Jesus. Buying a house is fine, as long as it doesn't make you lose sight of what's really important. If the house, job, money, friends, car, holiday, wide-screen TV, or any worldly thing starts to get in the way of loving God and loving our neighbours, then we need to re-prioritise.

It's early days yet and there's plenty that can go wrong, but we hope that one day soon we will own our house. But doing so MUST be an activity that enables us to love and serve and follow our God, not one that distracts us from it.

How do I know if I've got spiritual gifts?

We've been doing a thing at our church called a SHAPE course. SHAPE is an acronym, standing for "Spritual Gifts, Heart, Abilities, Personality, Experiences". It's intended to help you look at those five things, think a bit about what things you have that fit into those categories, and work out what things you might be able to do well in serving God.

The Spiritual Gifts bit was first and, as you might expect, raised the most questions.

It's clear from the Bible, more so in the New Testament, but also in the Old, that God gives particular "gifts" or abilities to people and he does this "by his spirit"...that is, those abilities are specifically given by God in a "supernatural" kind of way.

From my point of view, gifts of the spirit fall into two categories:

1) things that are always obviously of God when they happen, such as:

• healing
• prophecy (speaking God's thoughts to groups of people)
• words of knowledge (when God tells you something - like prophecy but different)
• miracles
• tongues/languages and interpretation.

I will call these the "difficult gifts" - because it's more difficult to believe that we have them, and requires more faith to use them...I think.

2) things that might be of God but you can never be sure, such as:

• music
• administration
• hospitality
• wisdom
• teaching
• leadership

I specifically draw a line here between the "difficult" gifts and the "non-difficult" gifts because this is the main thing I want to speak about.

In my experience the "difficult" spiritual gifts are less commonly found. I know lots of people who seem to be blessed by God with real ability in music, hospitality, and teaching. I know few prophets, healers and miracle workers.

Yet it doesn't make sense to me that God would distribute the gifts unevenly. In fact, because he's such an awesome God who should choose to reveal himself and his thoughts to his people, I would expect to see MORE healers and prophets than the easier things.

Which makes me wonder if maybe there are lots of people that are healers, prophets, miracle workers, etc that don't know if they have those gifts? And if this is the case, how do we nurture these gifts in people? How should the church encourage people to "seek the greater gifts" as the bible says? How do we know if we have the difficult gifts if we don't have opportunities to try and use them? How shall we go about discovering who our prophets and healers are?

This is really the main thing I've learned from the SHAPE course. That we should be praying and asking God for the difficult gifts - he tells us to do this. But how practically should we be trying out these things if we think that God has given them to us?

Movements and Organisations

A friend has given me a very interesting little book to read to read called "Accompanying young people on their spiritual quest".

It's a cracking book and very well written (that's very high praise from me!) and, oddly, my first interesting thought about it is not about the book's key subject.

While discussing how the church perceives young people it introduces the topic of Movements and Organisation.

In this case the "movement" is the Christian religion. The notion being that the "church" (by which I mean the global body of people who profess faith in Jesus Christ) is not static. To quote the book "its thinking and practices remain open to question and open to change".

Yet any large "movement" requires some form of "organization". Which poses a problem, because organizations have boundaries and procedures which limit movement.

It's a continual challenge, I find, at work, in my local church, in my friendships and relationships, even at home, to be disciplined and organised, and yet, remain open to change. On the one hand I'm a very organised individual who likes order and structure and gets annoyed when things are out of place. On the other hand, I retain the right to change my views, move on, do things differently. There is a creative part of me that likes to operate outside of formal structures.

It's important not to become legalistic about anything, especially in the Christian faith where the central concept is love: a thing that has no real boundary or definition and which, practically, can be expressed in many, many ways. AND it is a thing which means different things to different people. It can't be given an organisation because it's too woolly to pin down to a process.

Organising can be difficult for the similar reasons. What organisation works for one person may not work for another. Some churches have very set forms, called liturgy. Written out words that are spoken or sung during a service. Some church services are entirely based around such liturgies. Others have no written form whatsoever. Who's to say what's right. Horses for courses isn't it?

Which all leads to much confusion. How do we love? How do we organise? How do we not become legalistic?

We see in the bible how Jesus, our role model for all that we do, interacts with children. "Become like them" he says, as he gives the legalistic priests a good telling off about their stubborn ways. Yet when faced with a large group with some work to do Jesus organises them, splits them up, gives them instructions, and sends them out.

One of the "Accompanying" book's ideas is that children represent the movement side of church, wanting to grow, but not necessarily according to the rules of the church organisation. I wonder what we can learn from them about moving on, and about growing in our faith and in who we are as people. I wonder if we need to rebel occasionally against strict organisation. I wonder if we need more chaos in our lives or the other way around?

I've love to draw a conclusion, state something profound that I've learned from thinking about this and say what I'm going to do about it, but I think this is probably a journey. One of those things that we'll never get right, and a balance that we'll always be tweaking with.

One thing I've learned since becoming a Christian is that answers aren't always necessary. Sometimes it's just as important to just ask the questions.

Weddings

Yesterday was the wedding of some good friends of ours. A brilliant day, great church service, good worship, very much a wedding where God was present. A real sense of two becoming one and a change of status in their relationship.

It was interesting going to a Christian wedding with a mixed bunch of people (some who would prefess a faith in Jesus and others who wouldn't). It made me wonder what other people make of Christian weddings.

I always find Christian weddings special. It's not just a spoken commitment with a bit of ritual wrapped around it. The parts of the typical English wedding ceremony are all very meaningful to Christians; from the opening words of the vicar, the songs, the ceremony itself, the prayers, through to the final blessing at the end.

The marriage is centered on the vows and the commitments made in them, and it usually marks a very deep change in the couple's status. Often they have abstained from sex before marriage, and probably haven't lived together. And, of course, there is the real sense of celebration of the bride and groom as individuals, and as a newly formed couple.

Whereas, admittedly not all of them, but most church weddings of non-Christian people, I find a bit false. It's odd to hear people speaking and singing things that they don't necessarily believe, and I find it odd when the party afterwards is made more important than the marriage itself. This is not a sensation that has been exclusive to my Christian life. I went to a church wedding of some friends even before I started finding out about God and it just felt awkward.

Yet I find myself wondering what other people make of it all. Do people who don't follow the Christian faith find Weddings of believers different to weddings of non-believers? Does it seem "special" to them? Does it seem more meaningful? I wonder what our worship looks like from the outside?

Of course, I don't wish to devalue the marriage of people who don't follow Christ. The commitment of marriage is incredibly special and I support it, uphold it, and respect it however it is done. I would much rather people get married, if it's the right thing for them to do, than not get married!

But as a little windows into the lives and rituals of believers, I wonder how these ceremonies look and feel to others, what effect it has on them, and what we might be able to learn from their experiences.

Sunday evening brain dump...

Another Sunday evening Brain dump then.

Things to write about:

• Sunday evening's talk at church
• More on social networking
• Thoughts on Work
• Storytelling!
  

Sunday Evening's Talk at Church

Before I write this, a vague note about how I intend writing about my faith here.

I do have an assumption that no one else is reading this, that it's all for my own benefit. Yet I feel compelled to write as if I'm talking to someone that really doesn't understand what my faith is all about.

Why? A few reasons:

1. It will be a good exercise for me to get me using non-Christian language to talk about my Christian experiences - we have far too much jargon that we use within Church and it must be completely baffling to those outside. Hopefully I'll explain things as I go along.
2. It may help anyone that MIGHT be reading to understand what I'm talking about.
3. It will probably help me write clearly and say what I want to say rather than using words that I only half know the meaning of.

With that in mind...

Church service was good tonight but raised some questions! The music was excellent with lots of songs about being thankful - really got me in the mood.

The talk was based around a video by an American guy called Rob Bell. The video is called "Kickball" and is about wanting things and needing things. It explains how if we see God as "our father" (as the Lord's Prayer starts), he should know what we need better than we do. If, as children, we got everything that we asked for, then that would actually be really bad. So, if we see ourselves as God's children - a picture often portrayed in the bible - then we shouldn't expect to get everything that we ask God for in prayer because He knows better than we do.

The video also said some stuff about how God is "good" - by which we mean ultimately good; a concept that we as humans probably can't quite grasp - and as such, if we don't get what we ask for then it's because God has something better in mind.

Which is all GREAT. Only it's set against the week that just went by when I discovered that:

• a couple I know are breaking up after being married for 2 years - seemingly without much hope of reconcilliation
• an wedding I was going to has been cancelled
• a friend of mine is really struggling with her faith because she has an illness which, despite lots and LOTS of faithful prayer has not gone away - she's not been healed despite our asking a God who we believe can miraculously heal - and also because of some other sad events that have happened to people close to her.
  

All of these things happened to people who've followed Jesus INCREDIBLY faithfully for many years. Amazing, amazing people who've trusted our "good" God through thick and thin.

Now, people do have choice, and relationships are difficult, so I can see how the break-up and the wedding problems can come about because of the actions of people. God's will is (probably) for those relationships to work out, yet things don't work out because we're not God's puppets, subject to his every whim. We have choice and we can choose to do the wrong thing. Though I add that I don't know where those relationships have gone wrong and at what point wrong choices were made and by whom.

But a seemingly-pointless death and an illness that won't go away? People don't choose them! How could God have something better in mind?

This is, of course, the age old question of suffering for which there are many standard answers, most of which are pretty useless unless you already have faith in God. Faith is defined in the bible as "being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see" - choosing to believe despite the fact that sometimes evidence is to the contrary.

My response tonight? Well, I'm going to struggle on. I'm going to pursue my faith. And I'm going to change the way I pray. If God knows better than I then my prayers should be asking him what he wants for me, my family, my friends, etc, rather than me coming to ask him for what I think I want or need.

Please don't thing that if you read that you can tear my faith apart. My God has done some amazing things and I could tell far more stories of God being GOOD and not giving me things because he has something better in store. That IS my general experience.

I DO believe that he'll pull through in the situations I've talked about, and I look forward to sharing that journey here. Probably with myself but, hey.

Social Networking

So, we discovered Facebook today, as stated. What an odd thing.

MySpace has been my only real experience of online Social Networking so far. It has been around for a while and I really don't like it for anything other than reading up on the plans of some of my favourite bands...especially the up-and-coming Iko. MySpace is too cluttered, has too much advertising and is too much about self-promotion. It all seems a bit random and chaotic.

But I was invited to Facebook by a fairly sensible person that I trust the opinion of. It was also mentioned by some other very reasonable, humble and grown-up people over the weekend I just spent with friends in Swindon and London. So I signed up to see what it was all about.

I was oddly compelled by it for a few hours. Interesting seeing who I knew was on there and what was on their profiles. There was a strange sense of fun in searching for crazily titled "groups" to be a part of, such as "Wintles" and "The Magic Roundabout, Swindon, Society".

But...what's the point? What need does this social networking serve? I know who my friends are and I can chat to them or email them if I need to get in touch. Friends Reunited gave us the opportunity to reconnect with lost classmates and colleagues but, well, we probably lost touch because the friendship wasn't that strong and, heck, I can hardly keep up with those people I've NOT lost touch with.

It was fun for a while but I quickly got bored. It'll be interesting to see if it serves any purpose over a longer period of time.

The only real thing that redeemed it today was the finding of another Ross Wintle. Seems I'm not so unique after all!

Thoughts on Work

Going back to work last week made me realise that I'm not very happy there at the moment. My boss is being great and doing all he can to make thing better though. I'm praying that God will show me what I should be doing to make my work life better. I may have a sabbatical later in the year or something.

Storytelling...will have to wait for another time. I leave you (or possibly just me) with an inspiring article from a Christian youthworker who's getting alongside kids in very much the same way that Jesus drew alongside the rejected people of his day.