I found a link to Yoofwork on Richard’s blog and I found myself chuckling. I really love the ready to use meeting guides and my favourite is for a meeting at a bus stop. I can see myself returning here when I could do with laff!

You can now hear Nelson Mandela’s speech for yourself via two links here

Well, what a weekend.

I listen to Gillingham lose to Watford.(last time was 1978!)

I watch England lose to Wales.

Two results that were, quite frankly, a bit of a surprise.

But to every situation there is a silver lining as it has given 2 Watford fans, in Andy and Steve, and a Welshman in Dave, something to sing about for a change. But how do these great gentlemen choose to their celebrate momentous surprising victories – in song, down the pub, party … no – they have to come and make comments here on my blog!!! (words like ‘life’ ‘a’ and ‘get’ come to mind – makes me happy to know you can celebrate in style)

Well done guys – I can go as far to say the Welsh deserved it – but the Hornets, lucky escape if you ask me!! I trust you will now be supporting your ‘blog friend’ in prayer as we looked to raise ourselves to 20th (my heart won’t cope with messing around in 21st!)

Today we were meant to be geting together with Dennis and Sharron but Den has been unwell this week and so that is not going to happen. It’s a shame as we were all looking forward to getting together and having some fun.

It now means we need to think about what we are going to do today – it would be so easy to ‘waste’ the day, especially with rugby on the telly.

I wonder what we will do today …

I really enjoyed tonight. Part of my responsibility now that I have joined Sarah’s youth team is to mentor/pastor/support/encourage/challenge a couple of cell group leaders. Tonight I met in the Noodle Bar with ‘my’ 2 cell group leaders, Amber and Jake.

I have known these 2 great young people for a couple of years and its particularly exciting for me personally as Amber became a Christian through the work of Gillingham YFC.

Tonight we sat and ate, they chatted and I listened. I listened to their dreams and their struggles. How they attempt to contextualise their thoughts for their cell group. They told me sometimes things just do not work. I asked what they did when things don’t work and they told me they pray and ask God. Young people see things so clearly and it was refreshing to hear such a clear, honest and quite obvious answer.

AS we chatted more I learned more of their dreams and was reminded that this is what youth work is all about; supporting and enabling young people to reach and achieve their dreams. Not that I think I need to ‘enable’ them, even if I could, as Amber and Jake know, at the moment, where they are going.

Tonight has kind of made me regret the move into the management side of things. I love what I do, and it is great to be able to encourage other youth workers and tackle issues with them, plant new works and all of that. Flipping heck – it’s a very exciting job to do.

Saying that, I do miss the close contact that matters with individual young people. I believe it is all about investment of time – and tonight I think I came close to achieving what I set out to do all those years ago when I became a youth worker. Not just me investing in young people, because tonight was a to way thing and clearly Amber and Jake have invested in me, and blessed me far more than I could ever dream of being able to bless them. Tonight I really feel that I have returned to my roots and in some ways it is shocking to see how quickly I can forget how youth work works (?!)

Thanks Amber and Jake for bringing me ‘alive’ for the weekend. Thanks Sarah for giving me the opportunity to come back to youth work.

I saw this months ago and was obviously very tempted – who would not be tempted by a salary of £40 000 fr 5 years to dream of a better, more just and peaceful world.

It’s reported on today in the Guardian

If you want to have a look at the ‘job’ itself you can find that here.

mandela 2

Originally uploaded by robryn65.

I am writing my reflections on the train journey home to be posted some time tonight when I get home.

It was a great experience to be part of thousands and a real honour and privilege to be able to listen to both Bob Geldof and Nelson Mandela. So much for the hoped for 10 000; I just read there were 22 000 of us there! Excellent!

They both spoke of the long wait of 30 years to see countries meet their promise of aid being 0.7% of GNP. As someone said it’s a long time to wait for less than 1%

Today there was passion for justice and respect for each other. The event had brought kids, teenagers. Parents and grandparents and everyone in between -you would not normally expect to see so many different people from different backgrounds together supporting the same one issue – it was a bit like the gathering of people that you would like to see in church

At the end Mandela aid not want to leave but Bob told him he had to because he was too old! Sadly, Mandela did look old and frail -physical movement was very slow, although it was clear that his mind is still fast and he can still deliver an excellent speech

I really hope this makes the politicians think again. Things have to change. Situations have to be made fair. It is time for justice.

Jamelia sang ‘Stop’. It was an appropriate song. We were told a story of Mary, a farmer in Gambia. She lives by selling chickens. The problem is at the moment she cannot sell her chickens due to the heavily subsidised chickens imported from the rich nations. The Gambian government is powerless, if it wants the aid is has to take the chickens. Mary has no income so that we in the west can stay rich. This is an injustice. This needs to stop.

Nelson Mandela ended his speech by saying that poverty was not a natural state. It is man made. I personally believe that in the west we have come to expect certain parts of the world to be poor. Mandela went on to say that we can eradicate poverty in our lifetime. You speech was excellent and you can read it in its entirety here.

Bob Geldof referred to Bono calling Mandela the President of Africa, and then laughed saying it was unlike him to understate facts. Geldof introduced Nelson Mandela as the president of the world. He is soon to be 88 – how fitting a mark of respect it would be if the G7 leaders tomorrow were to commit to eradicating poverty so that Mandela could see that before he dies.

crowd

Originally uploaded by robryn65.

It is that simple – it is not complicated. As Geldof said, lets cut the crap and stop worrying about what it will cost. We are talking here about a basic human right, not an act of charity.

A much better report of the day can be found on the Make Poverty History website.

For those interested I have put my photos of the day in my Flickr album which you can access on the right hand side of this blog.

It’s not too late – come and be one of 10 000 history makers.

I just finished reading The Shape of Things to Come. I like to finish books later than everyone else and listen to their comments as I read and take on board what is being said as I digest for myself the words and ideas coming off the page.

I am really excited and find myself resonating with a large chunk of what Frost and Hirsch say, and I think I will be blogging in installments over a few days maybe.

I particularly resonate with the view that ‘the medium is the message’. By this, they mean basically that WE are the message! Our very lives, our daily existence, is our message.

I guess this is the age old ‘your actions speaking louder than words’ stuff which we all know is true. Sometimes, though, we forget. I think it is more than actions, it is lifestyle and I have had a few chats with Sarah about this recently.

When someone says they are an athlete we have some idea of how they are different to us. If we think of Kelly Holmes, I know that while I am tucked up in bed she is training early in the morning. While I am eating curry and drinking Cobra on a Friday night, she is stocking up on carbohydrates for her Saturday race. What she is determines who she is and we all see the difference in her lifestyle to ours.

I was chatting to Sarah and asking whether our neighbours see us as being any

different to them. My neighbours know I am a Gillingham football fan as on a Saturday I leave, with Tom, kitted in a footie shirt waving my season ticket around. What I do stands out and is different. The observant ones would know I read the Guardian, and from particular posters at certain times of the year they know I vote Labour. What I do stands out and is different.

They see me go to church on Sunday – but I ask whether that is different enough. I have been challenged by this statement of message and medium.

The really exciting thing about us being the message is that God chooses to partner with us wherever we are and through whatever we do. Rather than a guilt trip that I may have put us all on a little while ago, the real question we should be asking ourselves is:

Can we join with God in his mission in whatever place we find ourselves?

I was brought up to believe that it was my task to take God to people, to my community. For a few years now I have felt this was actually wrong and quite unbiblical. I found myself thinking how bizarre it was to be actually thinking I could take God into a world which he, and she, (another blog post for another time when I feel in a particularly provoking mood!!)had created.

It was so good to see someone else thinking the same and drawing attention to the same. I agree with Frost and Hirsch, God is already there in the world. We do not need to lead people to God as such, God is already wooing them. What we need to do is join in that mission of wooing people to God.

This is where the exciting bit comes – to join this wooing we need to be joining God in the places where he is working. Places where the church would normally keep well away from, but places where we need to join with God to meet people.

In the relevant chapter, Hirsch and Frost give an example of John Smith, an Australian evangelist leading a stripper to Christ in her strip club. They then ask the question: was God in that strip club? There is, of course, only one answer. And if God is in that strip club was it right for John to be there? Again, there is only one answer!

Sometimes we think God is only in certain places, but he is everywhere and we need to have the courage to join him in mission were he leads us. I don’t think I could join God in a strip joint; I think I am weak enough to be distracted, but John wasn’t. Is that a mission field for others?

The important thing is, I think, that we have the courage to join God where he is, to look outside our boxes to see where we can join him. Is there some kind of precedent for this? – come to think of it, around 2000 years ago there was a bloke who hung around with drunkards, robbers, prostitutes and really offended the religious leaders of the day – he paid the price for it though!

Saw this on Maggi’s blog and it made me laugh.

How true some statements can be!