40 Acts - SENDING A BIGGER MESSAGE

"A person finds joy in giving an apt reply – and how good is a timely word!" Proverbs 15:23 (NIV)

I've written many passive-aggressive messages in my time, from scrawled notes to housemates pointing out how lovely it would be if we washed up occasionally to polite emails alluding to veiled displeasure at someone’s actions.

And I’ve received a fair number too. I can still conjure up the disproportionate rage evoked by seemingly insignificant Post-it notes or their technological equivalents, and cringe at time spent dreaming up witty come-backs to words which ruined my day.

Far better to dwell instead on messages which leave positivity in their wake.

I smile at the memory of my first job, single-handedly cooking for 40 students for weeks on end, and am so grateful to the person who arrived early to leave me encouraging little notes in the kitchen. I chuckle at the unexpected joy of finding funny pictures randomly stuck inside cupboards by a housemate.

I find pleasure in the pretty postcard received for no reason other than someone thought I’d like it, and in those ‘saw this and thought of you’ text messages. I appreciate photos of my new niece WhatsApped to me when her tired parents have every excuse not to be in touch, and remain thankful for that croissant on my desk in the run-up to Christmas from a colleague who knew me well enough to know that it would help.

How good, as the proverb goes, is a timely word!

Little communications, unnoticed by the majority, with surprising power to show their recipient that they are known, loved, and worth the effort. Timely Post-its, texts, cards and emails which – by choosing love, joy, kindness and the rest over criticism and passive-aggression – reflect in some small way the Word coming among us at just the right time and send a bigger message that another way is within our grasp.

Emily Bowerman

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40 Acts - SELFLESS COMMITMENT

“Give generously to them and do so without a grudging heart; then because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to.” Deuteronomy 15:10

While on patrol with a small four-man team from my SAS squadron, out in the deserts of North Africa, we were waiting for a delayed helicopter pickup. A delay like that, when you’re nearly out of water and in the roasting heat of the desert, can be life-threatening. We were all severely dehydrated and getting weaker fast.

Every hour we would sip another small capful from the one remaining water bottle we each carried, carefully and methodically rationing the little we had left. To make matters worse, I was sick.

The call came in; our extraction would come at dawn, some 20 miles away. We loaded up and began our slow and tortuous shuffle across the mountains, weighed down by kit and fatigue. I was soon struggling, with each footstep a monumental effort of will.

My sergeant, Chris Carter, could see this. He stopped the patrol, came to me, and insisted I drink the last remaining capful from his own bottle. No fuss, no show, he just made me drink it.

It was his kindness, that extreme of practical generosity that gave me the strength to keep going when I had nothing left inside me. No ego. No bravado or show.

Simple goodness.

The kind of goodness that Jesus talked about when he told us to love each other like ourselves; putting others needs above our own.

Mother Teresa said: ‘Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you.’ Carry that with you today and don’t underestimate the power you have to change lives, to show others a little glimpse of Jesus, as you give in practical and powerful ways.

Bear Grylls

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Bl**dy Bankers - deserve all they get

So went a conversation this morning as the news that almost 20,000 Barclays staff were to lose their jobs over the coming months - around half coming from the UK - hit the news.

I take a look at the news ticker and what do I see:

• Barclays cuts 14,000 jobs this year 
• Morrisons sales fall 8.2% 

So it's definitely not a rosy morning (actually it's raining as I type this) is it?

But of the 'bankers' - the reality is that when people want to lash out at the fat cats in the banking world, those people who drove the world's economies onto the rocks (with loads of help from the rest of the world who never stop to ask where profits, dividends and cheap prices on what should be more costly goods have their roots and realities) are cheering the wrong things. Those who lose their jobs will be the ordinary folk who live up your street and sit next to you on the train and shop at Aldi and Lidl rather than Fortnums and Horrids, drive flashy cars and live exorbitant lifestyles (thanks in some way - to us).

Not the most rational thought around!

Worse still those who claim to be Christian and are cheering are taking pleasure from the distress of others. The Bible tells us that love is what Christians are supposed to be about. That said, we do a great job of masking it behind our outrages and righteous indignation and our petty hatreds.

In 1 Corinthians 13 (RVV) the Apostle Paul tells us that:

Love never gives up, regardless.

Love is concerned with caring more for others than it does for ourselves.

Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have but takes joy in what it does!

Love doesn’t strut, posture, boast, brag or pose.

Love doesn’t force itself on others but respects private space and the dignity of of others.

Love isn’t concerned with a 'me first' culture or mindset but prefers and serves others.

Love doesn’t fly off the handle, or get the punch in first, even when we think it is justified.

Love doesn’t keep score of the sins of others but is concerned with our own sins first.

Love takes no pleasure when others are reduced to tears, pulled down or humiliated.

Love takes pleasure in truth, in all its aspects, regardless of how that might make us look or feel.

Love puts up with stuff because, all things considered, look at the model Jesus left us!

Love trusts God and always looks for the best in others.

Love is forward looking, it doesn't keep a record of what has been, only of what can be and it keeps on looking even when experience might lead others to stop.

So - pray and seek to help those who might just be losing their jobs (regardless of where they work).

Pax

Why 'Pastoral Care' can be a really bad idea ...

Yesterday I found this thoughtful and provocative piece from the Vicar of All Soul's, Whittington (Richard Franks) on 'Why “Pastoral Care” can be a really bad idea…'

'Seriously. Who wants to be an item on someone’s “to do” list?
It’s ok if it’s a professional carer - a doctor, home-help, therapist or nurse… perhaps even, on occasion, a vicar.
But in church life - and in life in general - that’s not something we long for when the road is difficult and we need some companionship and a helping hand along the way.
People don’t need ‘Pastoral Care’ - we need friends.
Church can’t magic up friends, enforce them through structures or events, or organise their care through rotas or paid staff.
We can - and must - provide a community where friendships can flourish and where we learn what true friendship (“going the extra mile”, “laying down our lives”) looks like.
Don’t let’s over-professionalise or over-rota that which should be relational and natural.'

I like what Richard has written for a number of reasons and yet I am aware of a small area of unease embedded somewhere within it too for other reasons. Let me attempt to explain:

Having lived for some considerable time in the past where my family was merely another of the cases on the case load of a social worker, the one thing I longed for was the putting aside of the ersatz friendship that our many encounters came wrapped in. The assignment of us to a 'care professional' was, or should have been in my view, an invitation to a developing relationship. The same is true of those in a Church setting when it comes to a 'Pastoral Care' scenario.

Having been put on a 'To do' list means that (I hope) a visit will be forthcoming and working on the assumption that strangers are merely friends I haven't yet met, this is the first step in the growing of a relationship. Even when they become friends, the visits to friends homes, or meeting in the local Costa (or our home?), still needs to be diarised (even if they occur outside of work time). Being put on 'a list' isn't any more of a problem than being placed on a diary as an entry. The attitude towards, and the development of the encounters, is the important thing.

If someone is a member of our church then hopefully they will find themselves passing from 'person on a pew' through to 'acquaintance' and, I hope, pass into that state which we call 'friend' and finally pass into being 'family'.

Where I am everyone who comes has friends and we are family - but like all families we have members of it who have closer relationships with some than others. And like families, those who are closer care for any who have a need as a natural expression of family. I, being on the 'friend - meaning acquaintance - level, visit as friend and yet realise this, and even visits from closer friends, still attracts the label 'Pastoral Care'.

Richard is spot on when he says that people want a friend when trouble comes a visiting and he makes a valid point when he says that the church (meaning all the members - not just the cleric) should be the source of relationship and support. This cannot, well should not, be regimented or restricted to rotas, care teams and the like - but we should remember that every first 'pastoral care' visit is an invitation to friendship (and I have many of these visits arise where there is no relationship before the first encounter).

Pastoral care is merely the label we affix to the care and concern that should naturally occur in Church - the 'to do' list adds weight to their presence in a sometimes heavy diary load and the rota prompts us to visit when other things would conspire to put our desires (and we do want to visit don't we?) onto the back burner until we realise they've never been met!

So I commend Richard's blog entry for it is a provocative and rightly-fixed piece. It asks the questions and, perhaps ironically, sets the parameters and voices the oft unspoken elements of the what and how Church as family should be. It is an invitation to dialogue that should not be passed by.

Church - like being family

Today I had one of the nicest compliments anyone could pay with regard to what being part of a church is all about. As they talked about the pressures and politics that sometimes occur when people get together (clubs, interest groups and church all fit here) they said those wonderful words, 'Not like your church which is more like a family!'

These words were a joy to hear for they offered an endorsement from someone who is outside of the membership but close enough to know us, our engagements with the community and the relationships between us. Not that this means we don't have our characters and struggles - for they exist in our little family just like every other family. The good thing is that even when those who might test and try us perform at their worst, they are still loved, tolerated and supported - because that's what families do.

So I move towards Sunday in the joyful knowledge that I exist with a bunch of people who are family because of the blood if Christ and we travel together on the same road, bearing each others trials and seeking to support one another when the bumps appear and the going is tough. Some are close family, some are more distant and others are rarely seen (or have removed themselves for a multitude of reasons) but the reality is that when hardship, trial or tragedy comes knocking - we are still there for one another.

Because we are family.

May tomorrow bring you blessing, joy and God's peace and may you never forget that being family means you are never forgotten or alone - the door (and the welcome) is always there.

So if you've left and wish you hadn't

If you've moved away and feel the pain of separation

If troubles are surrounding you and the pressures are mounting

Remember that Church is a place where you are, and always will be, welcomed.

Pax

God on the Waterways

Having just completed a couple of weeks on the inland waterways and found myself even more impressed than I was before with the early Victorian motorway system that is the British canal system (Spaghetti junction is nothing when you realise you're on a mainline relief canal or going over, and under, other canals in the same way that motorways do these days). The engineering, the brickwork and the toll houses and other industrial architecture all conspire to make for something that is in reality a national treasure.

Add to this the flora and fauna and you suddenly find yourself in incredibly urban and industrial settings with such a plethora of wildlife that you forget the locality and become lost in the immediate. The many Grey Heron that grace the banks and the blur of iridescent blue as a kingfisher hurtles by combined with the Canada Geese and Magpies (were we really worried about them both all those years back?).

I've found in the waterways, standing on the back of the boat (no it's not a barge - it's a narrowboat ;-) ) steering and praying, thinking and enjoying being family - playing card games, listening to the children play guitar and the odd pint of black sheep and the like (weight stalled just above the  90kg mark, wonder why?), to be one of the most relaxing things ever. The recharging of batteries and the seeking confirmation of current directions and hints of new has been wonderful and yet I've missed the church family and am chomping at the bit to get prayer, study and opportunities engaged with and can't wait to be back.

And so it strikes me as I think of the encounters I have had this holiday to talk with people, hear their stories and see needs unmet (like the people, largely ignored, begging on the streets) which spur me on to think about how we might act how fortunate we are in this nation of ours. How privileged we are to have the relative wealth and opportunities, the social welfare system (which we need to fight for) and the many blessings that surround us.

So, as Sunday beckons I am drawn to the call for us to be salt and light - that none will be in the darkness and that we will bring flavour and benefit the world we inhabit.

Please pray for your community this morning (and every morning) - resolving to be the difference in it and to make it a better place because you can (regardless of faith or lack of it).

Living the Word - Changing the world

Pax

Tamworth Street Angels

At eleven O'clock yesterday (2nd July 2013) the town of Tamworth gave birth to a new community project in the shape of Tamworth Street Angels.

For those of you who are asking the question, 'What?' Here's the answer:

The idea of the Street Angels is that they are a group of volunteers who give up their time between 9:30pm in the evening and 2am in the morning to ensure that those who come into our town to enjoy themselves do exactly that in a safe and secure environment. The Street Angels are there to offer support to those who have enjoyed themselves a little too much and offer water, tea and coffee, a listening ear to make sure that the laughter doesn't turn to tears.

When those high heels become a little too high for comfort, the Street Angels are there to offer flip flops and a less fashionable, but safer, choice of footwear and when emotions run high, they are there to defuse the situation and to bring dialogue (or perhaps stop it when it gets to rich) and help restore the conditions that make it all fun again.

In short - Street Angels are there to make sure that all those out on the town are as safe as we'd like to think our own children are!

They're not a group of vigilantes, 'Guardian Angels',  or people looking to get involved as police officers (after all we have a fine bunch of 'Specials' who do that for us) - They're just a bunch of people who want our town to be a safe and enjoyable place to be and what the people partying in it to be as safe as possible too.

Interested?

email: tamworthstreetangels-enquiries@yahoo.co.uk

We need people who willing to get involved and the bottom line is that they have to love people and be able to keep their cool when others aren't. We are not out there on the streets to judge or preach or be authoritarian - we are out there because we care enough to want to make a difference.

For those who are worried about, or think that, this as 'just about ministering to, working with or caring for drunks', you can rest easy for it isn't! This is about much more than alcohol - it's about engagement and being there for others.

For those who think that this might be, 'One of those Christian ghetto things;' again you can rest easy for although this initiative is Christian (that's what CNI is about) it's open to all and it's there for all. It's not about proselytising but about serving - and you don't need to be a person of faith to do good stuff now, do you?

So what are you waiting for?

Church: finding the focus

 Yesterday was one of those amazingly varied ministry days which began with the daily office, moved on through funeral conversations and planning to an amazingly well organised and challenging St George's Day lunch, complete with politicians of all colours and complexion from local, national and European settings. There were senior members of the military, those who employ many and engage in commerce, industry, private and private sectors and more besides.

Following on from this I found myself engaged with young men and women delivering some of their basic training values and standards syllabus. After the lessons some of us stayed on to share communion and this was one of the most energising sources of blessing I have available to me.

A really good meal with challenging, informative and engaging people,

or

A simple meal of bread and wine with brothers-in-arms bringing into focus the love, acceptance and enabling of Jesus, the Christ.

As we read the word and affirmed our faith I was reminded of another man who was, like us, a soldier too. He served with distinction, rose up the ranks and was destined for preferment (sounds like Richard Dannatt doesn't it?). But then he found himself in relationship with God through Jesus and put aside rank, privilege and status and took up his cross and followed Jesus; a journey which cost him his life!

The man was, of course, St George, and in a time when our nation needs a hero we give  thanks for this soldier, servant and champion.

May we copy him and his faithfulness and make our stand against the dragons that threaten to corrupt, oppress and overpower us, our communities and our nation in the name of the risen Christ.

May we see life clearly and in true focus; celebrating the simple meal that speaks of sacrifice and resurrection power; family and Christian fellowship.

Pax

Church - Bothered?

You'd better believe it!

Found myself in amongst the poo this morning and as the shovel was pulled out of the 'This Is Church' toolkit I find myself confronted with the reason for the owner of the poo being in such dire straits: 'They didn't want to bother anyone!'

God looked at the earth and the way people turned each other over, unfairly making money from others, lying, cheating, stealing, getting into wrong relationships and generally damaging one another and He said to Himself: 'Now that's a bothersome sight, I think I need to get involved - better get down and dirty!'

The result of this, as few appear to know, is that He decides that something has to be done and that someone needs to stand in the gap and get their hands dirty! Jesus never stood in a pulpit and, looking over his glasses, preached about the ways that were open to us to get us out of the poo - not at all; Jesus jumped into the poo and started swimming to the exit calling on those also inturd to 'follow Him'. 

If there's something wrong in the neighbourhood, who you gonna call?

The Church

The Holy Ghost Busters!

What causes me to feel most saddened by the number of people caught in their own, or worse still, the sin of others is that they don't realise just how near they are to finding love, support and relief from their situations.

What hurts me more is that we don't appear to be telling them - for we are great at stating positions, drawing lines and looking holy; excellent at flower shows with their clever, twee and pretty arrangements; seasonally valid with our Christmas trees and entertaining with our choral events, fetes (worse than death) and the like but we don't tell them the stark truth about Church, and that is:

WE ARE HERE TO BE BOTHERED

And of course that means we are out there doing something about it .

We are out there bringing the reality of God's love to those in need.

No mere words - only strong, firm and convicted actions.

We carry our cross - denying ourselves and being willing, like Simon of Cyrene, to help carry other's too!

Lent - more than giving up chocolate

Christian  - more than mere words alone

Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfil the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2

Alert, Loving and Reconciling Watchmen

All too often we find the Matthew passage used as an almost legalistic procedure for bringing a member of the community that is Church to book and yet it is not condemnation and expulsion (as we also find in 1 Corinthians 5) but reconciliation that is the focus. Why? The Ezekiel passage demonstrates the results of sin on person, community and nation. The call to repentance and the call to act as watchmen for one another, lest we all perish, is clear.

If we were to examine the Ezekiel we see it sandwiched between judgment (1) and restoration (34) calling us to look at our response rather than God’s, as is this whole book and these are to be watchmen for the whole and repentance in the individual 9and also of course, corporately, the whole).

So we are first to be WATCHMEN – a sentry or lookout to warn of approaching danger. For a watchman to miss the enemy was for people to perish – it might be one, it might be all – but their blood were on the sentry’s hands. So to is it if we permit others to act in such ways as they lose their lives through enemy action, and we know who the enemy is and what his weapons are, don’t we?

Of course, when we see it and we warn them, how do we convince them of the danger? Living in Libya and seeing a column of dust approaching makes it easy to warn people of approaching danger. But the app on your phone that calls you to gamble, the magazines on the top shelf that cause your eyes to wander, the many possessions calling out to possess you. Not such an easy task.

But God takes great pleasure in repentance and reconciliation, He’s not about punishing, but will if there is a need for this is justice. So we need to be ALERT – Romans calls us to wake from our slumbers and be alert to the fact that the day of judgement is nearer now than when you got out of bed and put our houses in order. To put aside those things that bring us to destruction and live our lives openly in the light – for it is only those things that are wrong that we choose to do under cover of darkness. But time is ever growing shorter and so the need surely becomes ever greater?

So we must work hard to RECONCILE ourselves to one another, for this is one of the ways that we demonstrate God’s love – see how these Christians LOVE one another – and must cry out our warnings to those who are under threat from the enemy.

We do this by the process in Mathew. Interestingly (well I think so) the passage is stuck between the shepherd who leaves his sheep to recover the lost member of the flock (parallels with Ezekiel and the shepherd prophecy perhaps) and the ‘unforgiving debtor’ (you know, the 70*70 forgiveness bit). Reconciliation is about dialogue, awareness, forgiveness and concern and some comments lead people to think it is OK to condemn ‘sinners’ and exclude them, for Jesus uses the examples ‘Tax Gatherers’ and ‘Gentiles’ but I have to ask how He treated these people? Is this not an example that we need to follow rather than stick with the crowd?

It is too easy to leave the lost ‘lost’ and remain in our holy huddles (in empty buildings). It is too easy to engage in righteous anger and conflict. We seek to bring a peace that is more than an absence of conflict – it is the Shalom of God.

May we, and those with whom we live with, worship with and proclaim Christ as Lord together always experience this shalomyness through the Grace of God and our humble desires to live the life that Christ has won for us through the Cross and lives in us by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Pax

Ezekiel 33: 7 - 11
“Now, son of man, I am making you a watchman for the people of Israel. Therefore, listen to what I say and warn them for me. If I announce that some wicked people are sure to die and you fail to tell them to change their ways, then they will die in their sins, and I will hold you responsible for their deaths. But if you warn them to repent and they don’t repent, they will die in their sins, but you will have saved yourself.
“Son of man, give the people of Israel this message: You are saying, ‘Our sins are heavy upon us; we are wasting away! How can we survive?’ As surely as I live, says the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of wicked people. I only want them to turn from their wicked ways so they can live. Turn! Turn from your wickedness, O people of Israel! Why should you die?

Romans 13: 8 - 14
Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armour of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarrelling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Matthew 18: 15 – 20
“If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Again I say to you:
If two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”