Facebook

I've now been on Facebook for a couple of weeks now. I've put a few details about myself, imported my blog and invited a load of mates to join. What do I do now? What's it for? I'm not really sure, but I also seem to keep going back to it to see what people are up to. Either I'm of the wrong generation or this is genuinely just complicated work avoidance!

A rite of passage

Let it be noted that an important step in the process of becoming a vicar type person has occurred. The time was 8:00 a.m. The date was May 20th 2007. The place was St. Peter's, Littleover. The service was Book of Common Prayer Holy Communion.

The event?

I wore robes in public for leading part of a service. Precisely, I wore a cassock alb what I had borrowed from a cupboard at college. All was fine, apart from the occasional kneel on / stand on the hem event.

This is not me, but it's not far off...

Mission Impossible?

One of the great things about college is that sometimes you can end up getting a whole load of really good input from experts in a field, on the same subject, in a fairly short space of time.

At the moment I am in the middle of module on Mission Theology and History, which is all about how the church has and should go about its mission. Last week we had, as part of this, a session from John Finney, a retired bishop who led up the Church of England's approach to the Decade of Evangelism, helped design the Emmaus course, and continues to write and teach about evangelism.

Today, we had a double helping. This morning we had a college lecture from Robin Gamble, whose job title is, "Canon Evangelist" in Manchester Diocese. Basically, he teaches church leaders in evangelism and church growth, not just in Manchester, all over the country.

This afternoon it was onto George Lings. This guy is at the cutting edge of thinking, observing and working out what is going on in the Church of England, especially with regards to Fresh Expressions of Church, and Mission Shaped Church. It was seriously impressive to see someone with a brain the size of the planet, and vision to see patterns and models of church growth think on his feet and engage with the issues facing the church.

It was very encouraging to see the passion and expertise that these guys have for mission and church growth. But, to leave it at that would be to miss the point. Today is Ascension Day, when Jesus returned to heaven following the resurrection, and Robin preached on this at our college communion service tonight. His basic thrust was that Jesus came to do God's work: to proclaim good news; to heal the sick; and to cast out demons. Jesus has gone now, so who's going to do the work?

We have to. Not just the experts, though it's great to have them, but us, all us normal Christians who have experienced the Good News, healing, and freedom, we have to take them into the world.

Living in Hope

Life has been a bit tough over the last month or so. Liz picked up a chest infection over Easter, and the bugs causing it have seen off the various antibiotics that have been tried, though they do seem to finally be succumbing to a new one, Levofloxacin. As a result of this, Liz has been advised to stop working. This is particularly hard t0 hear, as she was looking forward to getting back into work and had just started doing a day a week at Little Peaches, the nursery at college.
We're both quite tired and more than a little fed up with the situation, as we try to balance child care, work at college, placement requirements and both of us getting enough rest.

In all of this, we also continue to ask where God is and continue to ask for healing for Liz. There are a few things that we are working through that are coming out of this.

One is the idea from Paul's letter to the Romans which says that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope, which will not disappoint us, because of God's love for us. The challenge here is to endure and not despair.

The idea that has helped with this comes from one of the gospel stories. I spent 3 hours on Tuesday morning in lectures on the healing miracles of Jesus. Something I was really in the mood for, with an ill wife at home :-0 Anyway, we were talking about a story related by Mark about a healing. In this story, the first thing that Jesus says to the person is, "Your sins are forgiven", and only later, "Be healed". One of my fellow student asked what the person's reaction might have been when Jesus forgave. Was it, "Oh great, now what about the legs?"
Are we so hung up on seeing the physical healing that we forget the fantastic news that we are forgiven? The thing that will secure our eternal perfection of life, to the extent that the sufferings of this life are not even worth considering, is already complete in Jesus, and this is the certain hope that can defeat our despair.

I do believe that God heals physical things. I know that God has already healed the relationship between us and God, and that we can trust God for that. In the meantime, I don't really know why Liz is still ill, but we will persevere in prayer, and live in hope.

Today I choose to follow You
Today I choose to give my "yes" to You
Today I choose to hear your voice and live
Today I choose to follow You

As for me and my house
We will serve You
As for me and my house
We will spend our lives on You

Brian Doerksen & Sandra Gage

Proud Daddy

My daughter is a dancer, two steps towards the Rainbow Award:

Samba - Highly commended

"Danced with good feeling for the rhythm of the Samba. Very pleasing to watch"

Salsa - Commended

"Trying hard with this rhythm, pleasing movement"

Well done Tabitha