Storm Coming

Good times, noodle salad.

Last day of work today. Hurrah? It seems strange to be leaving, especially leaving with nothing to go onto at the moment.

It did make me think though of what I have now decided was my best job ever. I only did it for three days so this might not be an entirely objective view but still... it was working in the post room of a large office. All I did all day was sort and deliver post, both internal and external. I got to go walking round the office with a trolley, and the best thing about it was that you knew exactly what you had to do, and exactly when you had to do it.

Good times, there was no noodle salad, that's a line from a film.

It's only been 3 months

It's only been three months, but since I had only logged in once previously using my new shiny google account I, of course, couldn't remember either my username or password.

There seems to be so much change at the moment, and I feel like I'm struggling to keep up. Getting married, moving to London, leaving a job in Liverpool, finding a job in Liverpool, finding a job in London, moving church for 3 or 4 months and then moving again.

This is not a complaint, it's an exciting time in my life and I am particularly looking forward to being married. Moving to London is a huge opportunity and a chance to find a job that will use the skills I have gained from Creative Training and hopefully be directed more towards my natural strengths. I'm looking forward to being closer to my family and being able to see them for a day, or even an evening rather than the current 200+ mile journey.

There is undeniable sadness involved as well. Pretty much everything that has been constant in my life over the past 8 years or so will change. Last week I left the Tab, my only real church family so far and I will miss being a part of that family. This week I finish at Creative Training, and though this year has been a lot harder than the first, it has been a good experience. It will be strange as well, moving from somewhere that I am blessed with having so many good friends to a new city to start again.

When I last posted, I wasn't engaged, wasn't planning to leave CT, still at the Tab, Beko hadn't been offered a job in London. Who knows what will have happened in another three?

Astrophysical Revolutions

I've recently taken up a couple of hours a week of physics tutoring. It has overall been really enjoyable and a great opportunity to brush off the mental cobwebs covering 4 years worth of university education. Unfortunately some bits seem to be completely missing, particularly anything relating to electronics. I don't know which is worse, the bits that I can't remember at all or the bits where the answer takes me so long to get to that I'm glad you can't lose degrees.

Like I said though it has been a generally enjoyable experience and it has reminded me of why I love physics and why I also enjoy teaching (where it's with people who want to learn). I've also learnt a few new things while I've been doing it, and discovered that the European Space Agency have made a revolutionary breakthrough in environmentally friendly telescope design... Genius really.

Dynamic Diversity - Bruce Milne

This is part of the preface of one of the best books I read recently, very helpful in terms of thinking about church and how we are called to be distinctive from the world through diversity. Well worth a read.

We are all familiar with a Mexican wave. A sports event is under way in a large stadium. The action on the field is rather boring, when suddenly the spectators in one section of the audience jump to their feet and throw their arms in the air. The next section follows on, and then the next, until the wave has travelled all around the stadium, and back to the beginning, where it may well set off all over again. It’s great fun, and often notably more memorable than what’s happening on the field of play.
Every Sunday of the year a ‘Mexican wave of worship’ travels all around the world. Let me tell you about it. It begins about the time many in the United Kingdom are heading off for bed on Saturday night (and not a few of its pastors are staggering wearily out of their studies). For many North Americans the wave is launched while we are fast asleep. But, just then, in some South Pacific islands, like the ancient Christian Kingdom of Tonga, it’s Sunday morning, and already Christians are up and heading for church, where they are called to worship. They get on their feet, many thousands of them, throwing their hands in the air, as it were, praising God, and crying, ‘Jesus is Lord!’ The wave has begun.
At the very same time, thousands of miles to the north, in the eastern reaches of the former Soviet empire, other groups of believers are doing the same – fewer in number but with no less zeal. Then the wave begins to spread westwards; into New Zealand, and across Australia, through time zone after time zone, millions are now on their feet and joining in. Meanwhile, the worship wave is sweeping down eastern Asia; reaching to the smaller churches of Japan, the teeming congregations of South Korea, the Philippines and Indonesia. The living God is being worshipped and his name exalted. Now the wave is into China – how many Christians in China? Only God knows; perhaps a hundred million, province after province, as the wave of worship sweeps on its way around the world.
Now the wave is into India and the great historic churches there, and then surging on through the other southern Asian nations. On and on it moves, across the vast territories of Central Asia and the former Soviet republics, into the Middle East, where little groups of believers are uniting in worship and bravely lifting heart and hand in praise. Now the wave has entered Africa; the ancient churches of Egypt and Ethiopia, and the massive, modern congregations of Uganda, Kenya and Zambia; on down into Southern Africa as millions more are on their feet and the Lord is being exalted. Now the wave is across central Africa and sweeping through the burgeoning congregations in Nigeria, Ghana and the adjoining nations. And all the while Europe has been caught up in it, through time zone after time zone – the Scandinavian lands to the north, the Balkans, Central Europe and the Mediterranean countries to the south, all with their long centuries of faith and tradition; then it’s into Spain and Portugal.
Meanwhile, the worship wave is moving through Britain, by way of congregations large and small, in city and countryside, as UK Christians in turn rise to their feet and join the global throng of worshippers, lifting high the name of Jesus. Now the wave is leaping across the sea to Ireland, Iceland and Greenland, finally arriving on North American soil in the maritime provinces of Canada; and, at the same moment, thousands of kilometres to the south, it is making its landfall in Latin America by way of the bulging projection of Brazil, where it is soon swelled by that nation’s thronging multitudes of exuberant worshippers.
Like an irresistible tide the wave sweeps on, gathering millions more in its train as our ever-blessed, triune God is exalted in praise. On and on it goes, as the sunny islands of the Caribbean get with the beat, down the east coast of the USA amid its teeming populations. Meanwhile, to the south, the wave envelops in turn all the nations of central and western Latin America, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Bolivia,
Mexico and the swelling churches of Central America. Across the Canadian prairies it moves, and the Midwest of the USA, and through the Deep South. Finally it arrives at the western states, California, Oregon, Washington, and, within that time zone, at our apparently ‘lazy lot’ in Vancouver, as we too get out of our beds, and assemble in worship, and lift Jesus’ name, and pour out our praises.
And then the wave of worship is on its way again, up to Alaska, and across the Pacific to Hawaii, and, in a final surge, back to the South Sea Islands – and it is over for another week: the worship wave!
It happens without fail every single Sunday, of every month of every year, and all I have done in these paragraphs is to draw attention to it – the international celebration of the global people of God. To be a Christian means to be part of that – somewhere between one and two billion men, women and children, from every nation under the sun, united in a worship experience that encircles the globe. How could anyone miss out on it by choosing to stay in bed?

Fern Seed and elephants

This is a story all about how my life got... never mind. All I really want to do is mention a CS Lewis essay that seems to deal well with some of the issues to do with liberal theology. It seemed particularly relevant at Christmas, with that random Channel 4 'documentary' about Jesus' secret family. Lewis writes:

All theology of the liberal type involves at some point - and often involves throughout - the claim that the real behaviour and purpose and teaching of Christ came very rapidly to be misunderstood and misrepresented by his followers, and has been recovered or exhumed only by modern scholars. ... The idea that any man or writer should be opaque to those who lived in the same culture, spoke the same language, shared the same habitual imagery and unconscious assumptions, and yet be transparent to those who have none of these advantages, is in my opinion preposterous. There is an a priori improbability in it which almost no argument and no evidence could counterbalance.

Smashing.

Why the Government doesn't like trees

It's true, if the government had it's way, this picture would look a lot more barren:



I find it slightly ironic that, as a person who detests paperwork, I've ended up doing a job that's full of it. For instance today I had to do a review thing that took up 3 pages but only contained about 10 words of relevant information.

This is entirely typical. Each client that we work with has a folder that can contain up to 30 pieces of paperwork, and that doesn't even include attendance records.

The only conclusion that I can draw from this is that the government is in the pay of..... the Beavers!!

Reflection

Ha, I'm so clever, I've managed to come up with a post title that includes both what I want to talk about and a picture I'd like to post. Marvellous.

I've been reflecting on something said at the UCCF Graduate Conference (a jolly good wheeze old boy). It was a quote from William Wilberforce:

I am not what I should be
I am not what I want to be
I am not what I will be
but I am not what I was
and by the grace of God I am what I am

I find that I get very focused on the first two ideas, conscious always of my sinfulness and allowing that to drive me away from God. However I have been reflecting on the other 3 ideas, and it has been an encouragement for me.

I am not what I will be. One day I will be presented without blemish, not through my own strength but the power of God working in me, it's a real encouragement when I am tempted to think that I'll never make it, and therefore might as well give up. But no, I am not what I will be, God has promised and he is faithful.

I am not what I was. When I continue to struggle with sin and I wonder initially whether I am really different to how I used to be it's hard for me to make sense of this. However, it makes much more sense when I consider what I was before I was a Christian. I was an enemy of God, an object of his wrath. Thank you Father for saving me.

By the grace of God I am what I am. I'm not the finished article, I won't be until the day I stand before him in heaven. I am mistaken though when I complain to God about who I am now, because it is only by his grace that I can stand at all.

And now, another kind of reflection.

I may be a geek, but I'm not a thief

I sometimes wonder what other people are thinking, and how they're reacting to the same events as me. Fireworks night provided me with an insight.

Now I'm the first to admit that I'm a geek, and there doesn't seem to be anything I can do about it. After watching the fireworks for about 5 minutes in Sefton Park I started to wonder how high the big rockets were in the air when they were exploding. Remembering that the speed of sound in air is approximately 340 metres per second, and guessing that I was about 100 m away from where they were being launched I came to a rough estimate that they were 200-250 metres in the air when they were exploding.

My mental thought process was then interrupted by one of the people behind me saying "wow, I wonder how much you could flog that lot for if you nicked them."