Christmas

This came into my inbox during the week and will doubtless form part of my Christmas Eve Sermon - some connection between Joe McEldry (a fine singer) failing to get Simon Cowell's X-factor Christmas no. 1 and the real meaning behind all this festive nonsense. About 24 hours left to finish crafting something based on John 1: 1-14, one of my favourite pieces of scripture.
A very happy and peaceful Christmas to all.

Facebook Prayers

Alongside the terrible weather in Cumbria, South East Scotland hasn't escaped this last week or so - This was taken on Friday 20th November, the day after the collapse of the bridge which leads to neighbours' properties who live across the river from my sister in Selkirkshire.
They are now marooned without access to their homes except by 4x4 over the fields, but I think they avoided being flooded on account of being a few feet higher above the river. My sister's family were not so lucky; the waters rose and despite valiant sandbagging, flooded the ground floor of their house "over their wellies". The water table rose until it seeped in through the floors. Thankfully, after much furniture shifting, they managed to save as much as was reasonable, and things are starting to be dried out with good support from the insurers.
Thanks to many local friends with offers of practical help, my mum for taking care of the kids and a lot of hard work, hopefully it won't be too long before they're back to normal. Facebook ensured that members of the congregation here in Peterborough and many local friends of ours were also thinking of them; saying prayers and/or sending positive vibes their way.
Several people had crossed the Yarrow River on Thursday in the hours and minutes before this bridge was lost. It could so easily have been a tragic story. Our thoughts are also with the family of Pc Bill Barker, who died in Cumbria last week, saving people from venturing out onto Northside Bridge in Workington which was subsequently swept away.

The Book Thief

I've just this morning finished this book - as the author says in the interview above, a 500 page novel set in Nazi Germany narrated by Death - who would read it?
I'm not sure how I came to chose it during one of my 3 for 2 visits to Waterstones, but I'm glad I did. I suppose it's in the tradition of the Boy in the Striped Pyjamas as far as the context goes. It's equally absorbing; just longer.
The very ordinary language of the commentary portrays the grim reaper as a rather frail, human figure and may challenge some of your preconceptions about that other inevitability of life beside taxes. The challenge to find beauty in the horror of WWII seems to connect with the recent Lectionary texts about Job and his struggle with unmerited suffering.
A compelling read, if only for the point of view of the ordinary German family, reluctant to toe the party line.

Wise Words

We reflected about Wisdom literature on Sunday - these guys were my "way in" - got people to chose from bigger images including all the other characters, which were the wise ones from Winnie the Pooh, The Lion King and Star Wars - all my own idea for once! It seems to connect quite well with Proverbs. There's another reading from that source this week - so need to think of another introductory idea now!

I've gone all LED

A new connection through ebay and now the ol' ZR is sporting some trendy rear clusters. Thanks to Arron, somewhere near Derby, the virtual car boot sale that is ebay and the efficiency of PayPal and the post office, my purchase was almost as quick as going down to the accessory shop and buying these off the shelf.
If the apostle Paul et al would have been amazed by e-mail, just think what e-commerce could have done for the collections he advocated for the Jerusalem church! It would have saved all that lugging coinage around.
I've just discovered a fascinating and useful blog whilst googling - Here is a wonderful in depth essay on the subject. I can't add any more, but there's a fairly random link - Arron the car customiser to Sam the theologian; Derby to Bristol via Peterborough - thanks guys.

Blah blah blah

Thanks to Beth for the lovely picture of me at work the other Sunday! As I said yesterday while embarrassing her (with permission) by posting this on powerpoint for everyone to admire, if you want less "Blah Blah", you lot need to do more work yourselves - hence the interactive style of yesterdays "sermon" which appeared to go well - at least many people wished me a nice holiday, so they're not upset to the point of not talking to me anymore!
Soooo, the Bread of Life - wonderful theme for worship, so many opportunities to eat. Got to church at 7.30 with a bread maker full of ingredients and plugged it in behind the communion table. By 10.30 it was nearly done and the early birds were curious about the lovely smell - objective one achieved. We decided to stick to our usual ready cut cubes for communion due to the swine flu advice - common cup not an issue for us with the little glasses though. So the loaf was served at coffee time with butter in a kind of help yourself way. Having been tortured by the smell for an hour or so, people must have been hungry and it disappeared pretty quickly.
The "preaching" went well as far as I can tell - certainly the results on the cards were very good. I'd asked people to reflect upon what it meant for them that Jesus described himself as the Bread of Life, while we listened to a piece of music. Now all I have to do is put them together into a display for folk to look at next week. John 6: 35 btw.
Off on holiday soon!

Connecting Colleagues

It's been a week or two now since a group of us started a series of "round robin" e-mails, sharing items of great import for our respective ministries (!) Our group includes an industrial/business chaplain, someone in an interfaith relations post and a colleague with schools work alongside her local church work. I think the rest of us fall into that final category of the more traditional image of a minister - weddings, funerals, baptisms, sermons, bible study, pastoral visiting etc etc.
So far, in our embryonic "e-support group", for that is what I think we wanted to set up, we have discussed baptismal promises for a six year old, recommended some good theological volumes, and shared concerns for prayer. In between, there have been interesting bletherings, misunderstandings and confusion, to the extent that someone was moved to comment about a parallel universe! It is interesting to note what happens when brief comments are taken out of context via e-mail. When people have replied back to individuals rather than copying the whole group then we've missed parts of the ongoing conversation and of course there's always the possibility that some messages have been promptly delivered to that "that great inbox in the sky" or wherever weary e-mails go to die when they can't find their way through cyberspace. And sometimes things just take much longer to explain when you're slowly typing instead of chatting face to face. Having said that, the chances of us all being in the same room outside of two Synod Meetings a year and the odd ministers' gathering seem remote. We are spread over the East Midlands from Chesterfield to Wellingborough, from Lutterworth to Stamford with Leicester, Derbyshire and Peterborough thrown in for good measure.
I sometimes wonder what Paul would have made of e-mail - at least he and all the other New Testament authors believed in writing to one another - 1 Thessalonians 5.11: Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing.
So we'll carry on I hope, enjoying receiving e-mails without large documents attached for us to read and act upon or with agendas and minutes included. Just a few musings, silly or profound, with the odd question or comment to provoke or inspire ...

Rest Awhile

This was the theme for our Sunday service on 19th July. We based our "3rd Sunday Praise" worship on the lectionary gospel passage Mark 6: 30-34 & 53-56. Jesus was seeking an opportunity to get away from it all for a while and his attempt met with limited success. We considered how the opportunity just to stop and reflect, to pray or meditate gives us a refreshing opportunity to sit back from the busy-ness of life and re-connect with God.
Just being still is something which some of us find difficult and in our planning meeting, we were led to propose a game of "sleeping lions" - something which some of the congregation found easier to enter into than others! In an "out of the box" moment, this led us on to the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" which has appeared in various guises in the music charts over the years, but has recently been popularised once again by the Disney film and stage show of "The Lion King". Adam provided an excellent set of words which allowed us to use it as a worship song which reflected on the words of the gospel reading - complete with the Wimoweh refrain!
We suddenly wondered what this word meant (should we have been singing it in church?!) But I'm relieved to report that it is simply a mishearing of the original song's chorus of 'uyimbube' which means "you're a lion" in Zulu. Sandra hoped for inclusion of this YouTube classic, pictured above, which I couldn't get organised, but maybe watching it from here would suffice?
A sleeping lion or not, we took part in an act of worship with a slightly different flavour which I hope encouraged us all to rest awhile.

"New" Church Members

On 5th July, it was a delight to welcome seven friends into church membership at St. Andrew's. Graham and Marianne, Jean, Vera and Jo have all been worshipping with us for some time but to some extent still count as folk who have recently joined us on Sundays. It was good to hear that they felt able to make the step of commitment that becoming a member involves and it was great to welcome them formally to the congregation. For Faye and Andandi, ours is the fellowship within which they have spent a large part of their school years and so, while being at the younger end of the group, they were in a sense, the "old timers". I hope their confirmation was a special event for them both - it certainly was a great joy for those present to be part of this significant step on their journeys of faith.
So, we are strengthening connections with some of our number by admitting them to the full privileges and responsibilities of church membership, as our denomination puts it. Welcome to you all!
There were those who were invited, but chose not to proceed to membership at this stage. We hope in due course, that we might welcome you officially too. There are ongoing conversations with some of you, which I hope will result in another welcome service soon. We hope, whether member or friend of the congregation, that all feel a valued and appreciated part of our church community.

Goodbye Ernest

For my first ever entry, I thought it would be appropriate to acknowledge one of my two predecessors at St. Andrew's, Rev Ernest Brittain. We held a service of thanksgiving for his long life on Saturday 4th July which I felt privileged to lead. Ernest ministered in the city first at Trinity Church in Priestgate and then in the congregation's new home in Netherton for a total of thirty years before his retirement in 1982. The St. Andrew's buildings on Ledbury Road stand as a fine memorial to his ministry.
It was good to celebrate his varied work in and around the city, and as I commented in the address, give thanks for the fruits of his labours. The gospel text we used, John 15: 12-17, was also used at my ordination which took place in St. Andrew's in Septemebr 1996. So this is my first connection - a reading which is equally appropriate at the end of a ministry as at the start.
The Peterborough Evening Telegraph kindly printed a story last week which encouraged those who remembered Ernest to attend the service, and they sent a photographer to record the event. I hope to contribute to the follow up report.
In the meantime, thank you Ernest for all the fruits of your life and ministry.