Category: random thoughts

Love life live lent (Ash Wednesday) – Say sorry

Love Life Live Lent, random thoughts

It’s possible that I apologise too much.  People sometimes say that to me. Maybe they even think that I don’t have anything to apologise for.  Maybe they think that someone in my position ought to put on a stronger face, not admit to weakness or failure.  Maybe they’ve just pre-forgiven me for whatever it was I did (or, more usually, failed to do) and don’t feel a need for me to do my bit….

But you know what? I’m not going to stop.

I’m also not going to stop, because while I am profoundly grateful for the people who forgive me for the same things again and again and again, the moment I take their forgiveness for granted, I’ve started to take them for granted too.  My missed deadlines mean someone else has to work later, or longer, or has to do their bit at the last minute when they (unlike me) are not natural last-minute people. My ‘sorry’ is an acknowledgement that my failure hurts other people, even if only in minor ways.   It’s an act of empathy, and I don’t ever want to lose that.

I’m not going to stop, because as long as I’m in the habit of being apologetic, then hopefully when it comes to the big things –  you know, the things that are actually really really hard to own up to, the things I want to hide, and hope nobody ever finds out about – I’ll be all nicely warmed up and the repentance will flow easily from my heart right out of my mouth.

I’m not going to stop, because although sometimes I repent and repent and the bridge remains broken, other times, by the grace of God, the person I realise ages ago that I’d hurt and finally pluck up courage to visit not only accepts my apology,  but also sits down with me over a pot of tea and a plate of biscuits, and shows me that I can be promoted to the rank of ‘friend’.  Real forgiveness is too wonderful an experience  to risk missing out on.

And I’m not going to stop, because saying sorry and meaning it is a way of  just starting the process of cleaning out the dark and dirty corners of the soul.  If my soul is a dark and cluttered cupboard, the ‘Sorry’ is that moment when I have the courage to open the cupboard door, with God standing next to me, so that he can turn to me and say, ‘Can I give you a hand clearing this lot up?’

Love Life Live Lent: have a pancake party

Love Life Live Lent, random thoughts

When I was at theological college, we had a workshop on personality type, based not on Myers-Briggs or enneagrams (though we did that, too), but on recipes for Pumpkin soup.  It was very revealing.  The handout we were given provided four sets of instructions for pumpkin soup: at one end of the spectrum was a highly scientific method, with every ingredient specified, weighed and measured, and each part of the process timed to the second; at the other end of the spectrum was a vague description including the line “don’t worry if you don’t have any pumpkins, you can use pretty much any vegetable….  throw it all in the pan….  etc”.  We were told to go and stand in groups, based on which version of the instructions most appealed to us.  Those of us in the ‘vague and improvisatory’ corner looked with horror at those in the ‘scientific and precise’ corner (and they looked back at us with equal horror), and the other two groups simply laughed at both of us!  It was a quite wonderful illustration of the reality that we may think we’re looking at something in a completely ‘normal’ way, but that doesn’t mean we’re seeing the same thing as the person next to us, and we may think that our way of doing things is perfectly good, but that doesn’t mean that others will be able to work with us in the same way.

So, why the sudden interest in Pumpkin soup?  Because one can approach pancake batter in a similar way.  I once read a recipe for pancake batter, and the first time I made it, I even used my kitchen scales.  Thereafter, I’ve reverted to type and estimated everything (and no, I don’t even consistently use the same flour each time – sometimes it’s self-raising, sometimes plain, and sometimes I put butter in the batter and sometimes I don’t – on a whim – and yes, that would drive some of you mad….).  To be honest, I make a pretty good pancake – my children have endorsed my skills in this area, and they don’t really care about the method as long as the end result tastes good with honey, or chocolate sauce.

Reflecting on the pumpkin soup and pancake batter, though, is a great way of reminding ourselves that just as we each have a slightly different ‘default’ setting when it comes to cooking, we also have our own comfort zone when it comes to our spirituality, our prayer life, our style of worship, the way that we express our lives as followers of Jesus, and the way that we approach the season of Lent. There are those who have a set discipline and follow it every year, and there are those who pick something different each time and explore new things; there are those who give things up and those who take things on; there are those whose Lenten journey is reflective and those for whom an active approach is more fruitful.  There is no single right or wrong answer for how to keep Lent, because we are each unique.

Lent can be a time to get out of our comfort zone, especially if we’ve got stuck in a rut in our spiritual lives.  But it can also be a time for finding what’s at the heart of our real comfort zone, and learning to root ourselves in God, becoming more truly who we are.

Remember that when Jesus went out into the wilderness to be tempted for 40 days and nights, he went out with the sound of encouragement and love and affirmation ringing in his ears from the day of his baptism: “You are my son, I love you, and I am pleased with you.”  Jesus was able to take that ‘comfort zone’ with him into the discomfort of hunger, loneliness and temptation.

May this Lent be a time for all of us to work out what is at the heart of us. A time for becoming more and more who we are, and finding that when our roots are deep, the walls that prevent us seeing things from others’ points of view will crumble and fall.

 

The thing about Advent is….

church resources, random thoughts, sermons

Jesus is coming - look busy

The thing about Advent is…

…that the readings tend to make it feel rather more about the second coming of Jesus than the first coming; there is more apocalypse than incarnation.  Great! At least all the judgement and warnings are a useful antidote to the Christmas Cheer that seems to begin as soon as Remembrance is over.  But how many of us are sufficiently self-controlled and self-motivated that we can do without any kind of oversight and accountability? Many of us need the promise of reward or the threat of punishment if we are give of our best, and I know that I’m among those who have signed off from twitter for a couple of hours in order to get something important done, by telling all my twitter followers to check up on me and ask me when I come back online whether I actually finished what I was supposed to have done.  The Holman Hunt painting of Jesus, standing at the door and knocking, can feel like both a promise and a threat, and the caption that many have added (as I have) may be more of a realistic statement about our own inability to motivate ourselves than we’d like to think.  The question, ‘if Jesus were to come again right now, would he be delighted with how I am spending my time and energy and gifts?’ will always be an interesting and challenging one. What we do during Advent, and Christmas that matter, although it may be different from usual, must still keep the integrity of who we are and not be at odds with what we do the rest of the time.

The thing about Advent is…

…that we still live in a state of longing and yearning; the old access card adverts encouraged us to ‘take the waiting out of wanting’ and countless sermons since have encouraged us to put it back again. But the truth is that the world is very, very aware of the fact that we are waiting, and yearning and wanting in so very many ways.  Those who sit in darkness long for light, those who are hungry long to be fed, many who are struggling financially long for the security of paid employment.  And those who are in debt long for a day – which must seem as if it will never come – when their debts will be cleared, when all payments have been made, when they finally own the things they’ve bought.  There is a lot of waiting and a lot of wanting, and a lot of yearning around. And that’s even before you factor in the years of faithful prayer for peace, for justice, for our common humanity and accountability to one another to win in the eternal battle with greed, self-centredness, and fear.  We are living in a world that longs for things to be renewed, healed, and transformed, and no amount of credit and quick fixes replace the hard work of striving, praying, urging, speaking out, and doing the work of renewal that God desires for us.

The thing about Advent is…

…that at the start of the church’s year we look back as well as forward. We remember with thanksgiving, with repentance, with awe and respect, with questions and doubt and with diligence on all the time before the incarnation: the prophets, the kings and queens, and the patriarchs and matriarchs all have their own place within the huge, overarching story of salvation, and our own place in that story is but a tiny  moment: our own stories are part-written, part-unknown, just as the world’s story is part-written, part-unknown.  We can look at the stories of the past and see in them – even the awful bits and the ugly bits – the patient purposes of God unfolding. We may look at our own lives and see no such pattern, yet we must continue to grasp the truth that we are part of God’s plan for the salvation of the world just as are any of the people we celebrate and revere from our faith’s heritage.

The thing about Advent is…

…that it only makes sense as a season of preparation for something more. Advent is always under threat from an early Christmas, but it is also under threat from a Christmas that has become less than it should be.  The momentous prophetic words that we’ll hear over the next few weeks only make sense if we celebrate Christmas in a way that honours their hope for the breadth and depth and height and scope of God’s love in Christ – and that’s whether we’re anticipating the annual celebration of his incarnation or the promise of his final coming among us to renew the earth at the end of all things.

 

The Kingdom of heaven is like this: a chocolatier created a box of chocolates…

children's ministry, church resources, random thoughts, sermons

A random thought on Luke 14.7-14

And Jesus told this parable. The Kingdom of Heaven is like this: A chocolatier invented a variety of chocolates, and made them in his factory, and he called the collection, “Roses”.  He invited his friends round to try his creation, and offered them the box of delicious treats – but they did not know that he himself was the chocolatier. His friends all chose the strawberry cremes and the purple ones with the caramel and the hazelnut, and when they were gone they chose the tangy orange creme and the golden barrel.

Eventually all that was left were the plain country fudges. The man kept offering the box of chocolates to his friends, but they declined, saying, “Country fudge is not interesting, I don’t know why they bother putting them in the box, because nobody likes them.”

So the man said goodbye to his friends, for it was late.  He then gathered up the country fudges that had been rejected, and put them in a special bowl reserved for only the finest chocolates, and poured himself a glass of Bailey’s, and settled down on his comfy sofa to read his favourite book.  And as he read, he ate every single country fudge, and found them all to be delightful – and he would know, because, after all, he was the master chocolatier.

For surely the first shall be last, and the last shall be first. But it is when the first and last come together in a box that the true breadth and depth and height of the Kingdom of God and Love of God are made known – for in transit to the eternal feast the contents may settle, and one never knows when the box is opened on the latter day which of the many and delicious flavours will have risen to the top.

Amen.

A fun game to while away those summer holiday afternoons…

Other cool stuff, random thoughts

To play this game you will need:

  • A paved area of garden, patio or path
  • some chalk
  • some bored children (you need at least two to play the game – the more you have the bigger your play area needs to be)

DSC_1143

Here’s how to play:

When you’ve chosen your play area, draw a symbol, letter, number or other simple picture on each paving stone.  Symbols we have used include:

  • House, tent etc
  • Initial letter of each person’s name
  • Numbers (especially ages of participants)
  • stars, moon, sunshine
  • rocket, aircraft, van, car, lorry
  • shapes (square, triangle, circle)
  • maths symbols (infinity, =, +, x etc)
  • stripes, tick, cross, squiggle, heart, question mark
  • emoticons
  • anything else you like!
  • arrows

Take it in turns to shout out a move, indicating what kind of image the participants need to jump to next.  Some moves we have done include:

  • Jump to a face (or body part, if you included hands)
  • Jump to something in maths (could be a number or a symbol)
  • Jump to a vehicle
  • Jump to something you might see in the sky
  • Jump to something with only straight lines
  • Jump to something with only curved lines
  • Jump to something to do with you
  • Jump to something to do with the number three
  • Jump like a chess piece (specify which piece!)
  • Jump at random until the person says ‘now’
  • Jump to your favourite picture
  • Jump to one you’ve not jumped on before
  • Jump as far as you can (or hop as far as you can!)
  • Jump to an arrow
  • Jump in the direction of your arrow (for one, two or three spaces!)
  • Anything else you can think of!

This is a really fun game, and it can last as long as you want!  The summer rain will wash the pictures off every so often so you can draw a new play area next time.