'church'

Strange how so often a common theme seems to run through a whole day!

Today that theme has been simply 'church'. Hardly surprising, I suppose, since in one way or another just about everything I do is capable of being related to 'church'!

But today most of the major activities in which I've been engaged have all had this as their focus. The reading and preparation I've been doing, the discussions I've been having, and even the meeting I was attending - all of them have concentrated my mind on 'church'.

The only aspect of my day that wasn't centred so much on 'church' was the work I was doing in preparation for tomorrow's session with the P5 classes at school. There's a lot of work involved in that: a powerpoint file (which has to be made compatible with their computer), exercise sheets, and a careful planning of how I'm going to maximise the time and fit everything in.

This next part of the 'crash course' on Christianity is all about the Bible. What it is. How it came into being. And the different sort of ways in which it's used.

I don't have an option about these things. That's what's in their syllabus. Which is fair enough: and I don't have any complaints! What a chance to give the Bible a plug! Dispel some negative notions.

But even that has got me thinking, too, about the church. The extent to which it's often not in fact the Bible that informs our whole perspective on God's church.

Take the Bible as it's told - and you wouldn't end up with 'church' the way it is today. That's for sure! There's surely something wrong!

This coming Sunday's services have been occupying some time and thought as well. Sunday morning is all about what 'church' is really meant to be. Already the message God seems to be feeding my soul feels pretty much like dynamite!

Meeting with the local ministers for lunch at least gave me a chance to toss around the sort of things the Lord's been making clear to me.

This 'fraternal' is good that way. It's rare for us to spend the time in superficialities. Generally we get our teeth into something more substantial than the soup and rolls.

Today it ended up being 'church'. What constitutes a body of believers being 'church'? How much of the formal sort of rigmarole do you need before it's seen as 'church? In fact, do you need any of all that rigmarole? Or is it just a hindrance?

Well, we didn't all agree about it all! But the chat was lively and we made each other think. And our hearts were fired and iron was certainly sharpening iron!

One of the guys at the end remarked - we should get our congregations doing this sort of thing! Sitting round a table (not in pews) and talking with one another. I thought, isn't this the way it used to be, the way it was with Jesus and his friends, the way it's meant to be?

All of that contrasted very markedly with the meeting at night of the 'Presbytery': ministers and leaders from the church throughout the city, gathering for their monthly meeting. And I thought again, throughout it all, is this really how it's meant to be?

The first meeting of the new session always starts with worship. It was (so far as I was concerned) a classic illustration of 'church' being done the way it's ... well, 'aye bin'. Very genuine stuff. No doubt of that. But it grated on my soul, the whole thing.

I wondered why, as I sat on through the night. Why? Well, here are some of the reasons, I figured.

It was very passive, for one thing. Very much spectator-sport-religion sort of thing. They even clapped the minister who'd conducted the worship, which I thought was a bit of a give-away. A performance sort of thing, that.

Not that there's anything wrong with expressing thanks to those whom God has given us to minister to our souls. It's just that it felt like an audience applauding the people out front.

It was extremely private as well (for all that it was very much an act of public worship). The hearts of each and every one may well have been wide open to the Lord (I don't doubt that), but it felt like they were closed to one another.

It was, moreover, also dreadfully polite. Kind of, I don't know, prim, proper, thoroughly respectable and formal, with, I suppose, really little room for anything that might in any way disturb the sanitised and rarified rituals of religion going on.

And in some ways, there's nothing wrong with that! It was just the whole thing stood in such a marked and heightened contrast to the full-blown sharing of the heart there'd been at lunch.

It was - I think this was why it grated so - it was, in fact, almost the complete opposite of all we'd known and shared at lunch: and the opposite, too, all that seems so striking and attractive in the life which those who were the early followers of Jesus gladly shared.

fire fighting

First up today was a meeting over what is really just a misunderstanding.

In fact, two misunderstandings, as it turned out: or maybe a whole load more. Where things get picked up wrongly - or at least in a way that's different from what was meant.

It seemed to me quite apt that the week should begin like this. This is so very much a feature of the world in which we live: it's where so many of the problems that there are - it's where they all begin.

Misunderstandings. And the trouble that they cause. The anguish they create. The divisions that they leave.

I felt like a fireman this morning I have to say.

Like the firemen out in Greece these past few weeks, who've had those dreadful forest fires to try and handle and control.

They may have been deliberate, these recent fires, I know. But often fires like that are mainly accidental. Someone acting carelessly, without sufficient thought for where their acts might lead. But when the ground's so dry, it doesn't take much more than just a spark to start a massive fire. The flames find fuel in almost anything and multiply with frightening speed.

Most times, too, the misunderstandings are pretty much like that. Little fires of hurt and indignation which were never meant that way. And they in turn feed other hurts and soon ... well, soon you've got a great, big, raging forest fire and it's sometimes hard to know just where to start in trying to tackle it and halt its huge destructiveness.

Quite a lot of the time it's like that. I'm fighting fires. Trying to stop them all from spreading.

Later on in the day, I was down at the shops at Craigleith and there, as if to underline the point, was a flashing fire appliance with its crew all hard at work. Fighting fires.

I think it was perhaps a false alarm, there didn't seem much action and certainly not a trace of any panic!

I smiled, I have to say! And I thought, yes, that's me a lot of the time. Fighting fires.

And like the fire brigade, there's a lot to be said for working on fire prevention.

That's what I'm seeking to do a fair bit of my time. Teaching people how to live in such a way that these things don't arise. How we best avoid misunderstandings. How to take precautions in the way we speak, the things we do. How to think the best of those around us and interpret what they say and do the best we can.

So today there's been some solid preparation for the coming days and all the different contexts where there'll be the chance to do some fire prevention. Teaching God's own truth.

It crossed my mind that one misunderstanding which must break the heart of God is simply how we view and understand his church.

I'm concerned in these days to tackle that. And Monday gives the chance again to get my head round all of that and figure out how best I can correct misunderstandings in relation to God's church.

Ironic, I suppose, that the Spirit who enlivens God's own church is pictured as .. well, fire!

window-cleaning

Much of today was spent around the house. Inside - and because it was such a lovely day, a fair bit of the time outside as well.

Not the least of the tasks I wanted to do was cleaning the outside window panes. We live beside a building site and so there's always a lot of dust. And, of course, although the actual process isn't really something you can see, the dust gets absolutely everywhere and has what seems a particular attachment to glass!

(This isn't where I live, by the way, in case you were wondering and thinking to yourself what a smart house I must live in! I just think it's just a nice picture of a striking window!)

It's strange, in some ways, that it's when the sun shines, the time you should see best, it's then you see most clearly that in fact you can't see all that well. The dust has made a sort of veil which hides the view on days when the sun shines brightest in the sky.

Today was a day for cleaning them up. There's always something satisfying in that. A sort of parable of healing, kind of helping people see.

So that in itself was good for my soul: it's like the Lord reminds me that it's just that sort of thing that's going on when everybody gathers for our worship here tomorrow.

We live on a spiritual building site. And the dust that's created by all that we're seeking to build, well, that can sometimes spread a sort of film across our eyes: we lose sight of important things and can't see quite so well.

Sundays are a window-cleaning day. A day for healing the blind, bathing eyes that have been clarted in dust and helping folk enjoy again the colour and the brightness and the warmth and all the hopefulness there always is in Jesus Christ, God's Son.

That's what I'm hoping tomorrow will be! And as always, I'm excited at the prospect!

landscaping lives

Every so often I reach the point when my hair begins to feel unkempt and in need of a trim. I've been feeling that these past few days, so today I returned to the barber.

Niko's not there these days, of course, the older Italian guy who started the business off who knows how long ago. He's not often there, at any rate - a bit of a shame in many ways, since he's always good for a laugh.

His son now runs the shop. And he does a good job, does Paul. I mean, he's good at cutting your hair and good with the staff and good at running the shop. I'm always glad when it's him I get. But today, I got someone else.

I hadn't seen the guy before, though he's been there, he said, for the past six months. Likes it there, he said, because the place is always busy and the chat is always good. I knew what he meant.

The guy was just out of school - or so it seemed. In fact, I think he'd maybe had as much as three years' worth of working life since leaving school. And in that time he'd moved from working as a landscape gardener on to this job, cutting people's hair.

They're not that very different, I guess, these two jobs that he's had. Landscaping gardens and then going on to be effectively 'landscaping' heads.

He asked me what I did. Now, I'm slowly learning not to respond to questions along those lines by saying what my job is called: I'm learning to answer the question and tell folk what I do. So I didn't say I'm a minister - that's a bit of a switch-off, apart from anything else.

So I told him what I do. Landscaping lives. And, down the line, I hope, landscaping whole communities.

He chatted a bit about how he'd got into the business of cutting hair. It came, he said, quite naturally to him. His pal had needed a haircut for an interview - and all the barber shops were closed. Would he do it?

The guy who needed the haircut had said to try things out on his younger brother first. Which he did. And then, I presume to make sure it wasn't a fluke (for the haircut had turned out quite well), he said to try it again on his next brother up. Which, once again, he did. Nothing like using your younger brothers as your guinea-pigs!

I guess there's a lesson in that for me as well. For I, too, am having to learn these days a rather different form of 'landscape gardening' in the cause of Jesus Christ. And I guess I also need to have a people who are willing to embrace the risks involved.

In some ways, I see, I've gone myself for just this 'younger-brother-first' approach. Trying things out and bit by bit establishing that, yes, there isn't going to be a huge disaster as I minister this way.

Landscaping lives. I rather like the phrase! Somewhat more suggestive than the bland and tired old title of 'a minister'!

joining the dots

What amazing lines of connection the Lord keeps drawing!

When I was in at the local primary school before the summer break I got chatting to one of the teachers there and said I'd get the folk back here to pray for him and for his wife and family as they looked for new accommodation.

Turns out that his wife teaches at a school in another part of town where one of the leaders here, Derek, is also on the teaching staff. They got chatting the other day and before too long it slowly dawned on Derek who this was - I think that we've been praying for you! he said: and once she got over her initial shock, she realised what was going on and said how grateful they had been for all our prayers.

So when I was in at the school again today, at coffee time, I sought the teacher out to say how glad I was that his wife and Derek had had the chance to meet. The conversation flowed and the end result was his enquiring if there'd ever been the like of an SU group in the school.

Sort of, I said: and sort of not (there hasn't been an SU group as such - there was at one point a group who were in doing a Bible club). But if he was keen to go ahead and think about it now, then I was with him all of the way!

This is something we've been waiting for and looking for and praying for for years! I jumped at the chance - another open door.

Well, an open door as long as the head agreed. I said I'd be willing to raise the matter with him.

I did. There and then. I mean, it was the good guy's version of an old-time Brian Rix farce. The teacher walked out to go back to his class - and in walked the head!

So I ran the notion past him and he seemed entirely happy and suggested that I try and see the depute head next week (she takes to do with lunchtime clubs).

Well, fair enough, I thought. If need be I can wait a week (I've waited more than nineteen years so far!). But walking down the corridor to leave (and it's sufficiently narrow you can barely have two people pass), who walks down but (well, you guessed it!) the depute head herself!

Like Balaam's donkey in the narrow lane: there was no way past! So I ran it past her and she herself had been at SU groups when she was still at school and thought that it would be just fine.

Talk about joining the dots! In a single, fleeting visit to the school, the Lord just drew a line between these countless dots which over months and years he's quietly put in place. And thereby starts to open up a door for more effective ministry among the children at the school.

A lot of the time, I've come to see, we're simply working away with the Lord in putting the dots in place. Little dots or markers, that in and of themselves have little obvious consequence: but once in place, they're there for when the Lord decides it's time to join them up.

There was a bit of that putting the dots in place today as well.

It was Donna's birthday. Donna helps with the cleaning here in our halls. Very much part of the team. A single Mum, she loves it here and does a brilliant job.

So we marked the day with a cake and some gifts, and a card and a plant and ... well, just making a fuss of the girl. In itself, just another little thing. Another dot.

Just like my calling by again tonight and spending time in touching base with the family who a week or two ago had been bereaved. Nothing consequential, though we touched on things like happiness and love. Just touching base. Another dot.

But all those dots are not a waste of time. For somewhere down the line there always comes a day when God begins to join the dots and opens up a door to something wonderfully new!

complicated

"It seems rather complicated."

And there was me having done my level best to make it simple!

I really enjoyed getting in to the P5 year class today and working through the first of the lessons on basic Christianity with them.

Maybe it was just the teacher who found it all rather complicated - the children themselves didn't say. I've been tossing the thing around my head throughout the rest of the day - where did it cease to be simple and how could it better be told?

I still don't have the answer! And it bugs me quite a bit. Because the message isn't meant to be a complicated thing. It's simple and clear and easily passed from a person to his friend.

I spoke about Jesus and the resurrection. It worked all right for Paul - and what's good enough for him is surely good enough for me: or so I thought. Even though Mars Hill in Athens isn't quite the same as a P5 class-room in Davidson's Mains.

The person: and the event. Jesus and the resurrection. Someone arrived who changed people's lives: something has happened which changed the world.

Hardly complicated stuff. Maybe I should just have stuck with that - and given it all in a simple three-word summary: Jesus is Lord. End of story.

Person (Jesus), event (resurrection - he's risen and so is still alive) and response (Lord).

Maybe, on reflection, it only gets complicated when we move from the message to the religion (which is what they wanted me to teach the children there).

Christianity. I tried to explain how people figured the only way to make sense of Jesus was to see that he was in fact the 'christ' (and hence 'Christianity').

I think that's where it got complicated! I mean, you then have to explain what 'christ' means and to what it refers. So I'm thinking, try and keep it simple: explain that it simply means the 'anointed' one.

But then, yeah, 'anointed'?? Explain, please!

So, OK, keeping it simple and all that: anointing involved pouring oil over someone's head. And I see them mentally scratching their heads, beginning to think, who is this loony and what sort of crazy religion sees folk pouring oil over the heads of others? And is this car oil? Vegetable oil? Olive oil? Doesn't sound too clever ... or that civilised at all, for that matter.

And I'm trying to help them see it was a picture of the help God gave to people who had a special job to do, and I'm explaining about prophets (and I'm thinking the only profits they know about are something rather different), priests (and I'm guessing they have pictures coming into their minds a million miles from what I want to convey) and kings (and I'm hoping that I'm not conjuring up pictures of Henry VIII, but I'm none too confident I'm not!).

And I'm beginning to think myself that it is getting pretty complicated! And why didn't I stop with the simple, straightforward message!

Well, today has brought a pretty sharp reminder of the need to have simplicity. A complicated message just won't get off the ground. The message really has to travel light.

But it was great being in at the school and the children were really good. Full of all sorts of pretty complicated questions, too, by the time we were done: well, the questions maybe weren't so complicated but the answers looked as though they might have been, if I'd had the time to stay and talk them through!

It was a relief to have the time at night, talking through the way we follow Christ.

We call that time on a Wednesday night the climate change chat room: which is confusing, I guess, for those that aren't in the know. One man had pitched up who hadn't been there before and wasn't entirely sure just what the time would be about.

But I explained. It's a 'chat room' because ... well, we chat: we talk the scriptures through. And 'the climate change' is not just about the Al Gore sort of climate change, but a recognition that the spiritual climate has changed as well - and we have to learn to adjust.

We got back to Elijah and the trip he made to the widow of Zarephath. The Lord simply said Go to Zarephath, and stay there. And in some ways that's all the guy did.

Just be there. And watch what happens: because when you go where God has said to go, then God goes too: and things always happen when he's around.

It isn't really complicated at all!

five-leaf clover soup

One of the soups today I called 'Five-Leaf Clover' Soup. Seemed reasonable to me since it included the 'leaves' of five green vegetables.

Sometimes we get feed-back from our customers. And today was one of those days. One lady took the soup and remarked simply - It looks a mess, but actually it tastes quite nice!

It crossed my mind that the process of change is a bit like that. It can seem very messy, but if we're prepared to swallow it, it's actually not that bad.

Some people are put off by the look of the thing.

We have that with the soup. I once made a soup called 'Purple Haze' (I make up the titles in much the same way as I make up the recipes!): red onion, red cabbage, red (obviously!) tomatoes, some blueberries and a few other ingredients - and it all came out ... well, purple.

It tasted good and was highly nutritional. But so far as a number of folk were concerned ... well, I mean, you don't get purple soup do you? (Despite the fact that you just did!).

Soup isn't purple: end of story. So they weren't prepared even to give it a try.

This doesn't look like church at all - so we won't even give it a shot. The same phenomenon. Same outlook on life.

It's been a bit of a 'five-leaf clover soup' sort of day. I spent quite a while in the morning talking through the processes of change with the lady who's committed to the vision God has given her of doing church a very different way.

It's not easy! All sorts of different obstacles to get around. A right old mess! And altogether easier just to keep things as they are.

The mess can put people off. They don't want to live with the mess inherent in change. But live with the mess and it actually tastes quite good!

And good on her, she's pressing on, dependent on the Lord to sort the problems out, to work out all the timing of the change and meet the different needs there'll be. It's his soup that we've got ourselves into, after all!

Much of the day was spent completing prepration for the P5 course I'm starting on tomorrow. The time got re-arranged: and, again, as I reflected on it all, it seemed to me that here again the 'normal', settled pattern of the minister's life (traditionally) was becoming more and more of a mess!

But it tastes pretty good!

The elders were meeting at night as well. There's always preparation for a meeting such as that which I'm to lead. And here as well I've felt that we needed to change, move on a bit.

If we are indeed a team of leaders then it's seemed to me we need to act as such. We need to talk, to share, to pray for one another: to teach, instruct, to listen and to learn.

Not what the meeting is usually like at all. In fact, probably a bit of a 'five-leaf clover' mess. But I wanted to give it a try: I wanted to help us move forward and learn to become the sort of team of leaders that God means us all to be.

I've yet to learn if people liked the taste - despite it being a mess!