Journal: There's always one!

Actually - there is, in my experience, often more than one!

It's amazing and sad in possibly unequal measure that the world contains some really sad people out there. The sadness is that they have to come and visit their sadness on me the amazing thing is their inability to extract their heads from their behindsides and yet can still talk out of it!

Every now and then I find myself doing something only to find that a Frank Sinatra imitator steps up and sings 'my way' as loudly as possible. Sometimes it's a moan over the fact that they didn't like a hymn or the way someone did, or didn't do, something. I had it once over a street theatre company who did came and made a decent fist of the passion - but they did it amongst the people (that's why it's called 'street' - if you want a show, go to a theatre!) and so some complained that they couldn't see the 'show'! The problem is that things we do and the way that we do them have the potential to overshadow the 'what' we are doing and we can soon follow this by losing the 'why' are we doing it too!

A simple idea to pay our respects to those who have fallen; those who have served (possibly with us); those who continue to serve - can be so very powerful. In fact the size and the manner in which it occurs can be a real bottom lip wobbler (I know, I've been there). A simple gathering of a few people in a place for the same reason - where service and sacrifice are held before them with a certain, grounded, awe and respect - this is the purest stuff of remembrance made real.

A coming together of people to mark something important in the Christian year - simple and honestly open - can there be anything more powerful?

Yet we strive to make things bigger or (put your word here) and before long the whole thing misses the point of the gathering, letting it become secondary as the event becomes the reason to gather, and so in perhaps achieving the success we crave, we find that we have in fact created a remarkable failure! What does it profit someone that they gain the world and in so doing forfeit their soul?

When does something special merely become a rally in a place where special things take place?

When does a service serve the people who attend rather than worship the one for whom respect, reverence and the gathering was intended?

Hard questions indeed.

I work hard to bring before people the focus of the reason we gather. Contained within this it is always Jesus, the Christ, that I seek to bring centre stage as we remember His life, message and sacrifice in our acts of worship: A true place to occupy whether we are doing Church, Remembrance or being a Chaplain. The ONLY place I can occupy as a Christian and a minister of God's grace.

So, if you are one of those who want everything done on your terms, your way, with the entertainers lined up - bringing something that rings your bell and gives you what you want. Here's a gentle recommendation:

Go buy yourself a ticket to the cinema or theatre!

But as for me (and my house) - we will serve the LORD

So from today - if you want a sideshow, some entertainment, something that tickles your fancy - if it ain't god Jesus up front and centre: go find yourself someone with an equity card not a dogcollar :-)

It's good to reflect on things. You find that the things that didn't make you angry make you think and the things (and people) that disappoint can actually encourage you and move you to be a better, more thoughtful, more focussed priest.

Now that's worthy of a 'Thanks be to God' innit?

When home and ministry and love collide

I was challenged today about where I, and the family, am and how long we see ourselves being there and this is perhaps the toughest part of 'being in ministry' because I don't have a job, I'm part of a family.

The problem is that as much as one might want it not to be so, the family has to undergo change, but as much as we might like to think we will always be family, leaving ends that situation. This first came home to me when we left our sending church and headed off to a strange place a (very) long way away from home. I didn't leave my church, I left my family and even though we all said differently, the reality was that our images began to fade from the family photograph that day.

The problem with becoming a minister in a place is that first we enter as a stranger and then come to love (and hopefully be loved) the people we are called to pastor. People come (bringing joy) and people go (and regardless of who they were or how they went - there has always been pain, tears and sadness) - the ebb and flow of life made all the more painful because often, even when we disagreed, church members can become more of a family to us than those who have the biological DNA of family within them.

I have been asked how much longer I might be with those around me and this, coupled with the myriad number of people who have asked whether I might be 'promoted' to a vacant post within the deanery, starts to make me think. The problem is that it's not a change of job - even though that appears to be how those outside of this body (and family) might view it - it is an offering up of one's family and an invitation to a bereavement of a very deep and painful kind.

I have come to love where I am and even though it's far from anything that looks like the Arsenal and boasts no magic shops and has a proliferation of odd accents and funny expressions, I have to say that the thought of leaving it brings a certain pain. My desire to see Christ offered up and made real to the people here is more passionately felt now than it was even a year ago.

My love for those who have come to faith and are growing and offering themselves in so many different ways; those who are truly seeking to deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Christ; my brothers and sisters in leadership who work so tirelessly to meet the many needs of this town and its inhabitants. My passion for a big building that has been a sacred space for so many years and the Church who throughout the ages has borne witness to the persistent love and commitment to Christ and from this ministered so wonderfully.

I see the faces of those who have gone before - those who I have wept over at the news of their death and have walked proudly from their graves and crematorium services - those saints who have made their mark and left a legacy of pride and love. Those saints to whom I can still minister, albeit now in their homes or places where they are cared for, and celebrate in the Eucharist a lifetime of Christian commitment.

So please, please, understand that when you ask me about 'moving on' you are not asking me about a new job somewhere - you are asking when I'm going to leave my family and set off to find another elsewhere (which I have before and will probably have to do again when that calls comes).

Please realise that it is about more than moving home (and I have done this in my service and submission to Christ and it holds no fears when the time is right).

Please realise that 'promotion' doesn't come into it - what is at the heart of our ministry is submission to Christ and the being in the right place - that place we're supposed to be in - rather than a 'good or better job'.

for those testing their callings to ministry, please understand that the journey is fraught with the pain of leaving and the joy of arriving home and understand the agony in between. In a brief flash of time it is like the agony of death and the joy of resurrection - a microcosmic flash of Christ on the death and that Easter morning in one. It is a place of sacrifice, cost and putting your ministry where your words are.

And as you do - please pray for all those in ministry.