Today I visited the team of Epping Forest YFC. Amazingly the traffic was non existent this morning so the extra 40 mins I had allowed enabled me to say Daily Office in Epping Forest. It’s amazing that such a ‘naturey’ place can be found in the wonderful city of London.

I joined the team for their prayer meeting and it was great to spend some quality time in prayer with others. I lead a brief meditation where we all met with Jesus on the beach. Simple but provocative in the thoughts and emotions it produced in us.

Epping Forest YFC have loads of exciting things happening and are actually holding back because they need more volunteers – so if you re in the area and have some time to offer please do look them up. They are an excellent team, and the love and respect that they have for each other was obvious and could almost be touched. Such a great legacy left, I think, by their previous director.

Talking of their past director (that link took me an age to work out!), afterwards I had lunch bought for me by my wonderful Jedi Knight friend, aka Leesa. Leesa is now the assistant minister at Buckhurst Hill Baptist Church and it is always excellent to catch up with her. Thanks Leesa for lunch – I guess it’s my shout next time!

The older brother is an interesting character and one, I guess that we can all relate to at certain points in our lives. He is not best pleased at the situation and he sulks, swears, kicks a few things around and is generally peeved at what is happening.

The most annoying thing in this story is that we are left hanging in mid air with what the older brother does. Does he join the party and welcome his brother back, or does he disappear off in a fit of rage. Certainly I can feel his anger as he looks around him.

He comes home, he’s worked hard for ages. He’s been fattening the calf for a special occasion. He’s done the ‘right thing’ all the time and how he is back! The best day of his life was when he disappeared!

I work harder than you. I do everything around here. How dare they do that. Who does she think she is coming here now and expecting this. How can they possibly take the credit for this when I have done the work. What right has he to say that. Why do they think like that about her – can’t they all see what she is really like? Well they needn’t ask me because I have better things to do! They won’t listen to me – but they’ll learn!

These, and attitudes like them, are all comments of the older son. The older son always has to be right. They know best. They are wrapped up in themselves and are more concerned for’justice’ rather than what is right and love.

During the times I concentrated on the older brother it was horrible to see some of the traits in my life. The characteristics of the older brother do us harm. They harm our relationship with others and our relationship with God.

If we start to think too much like the older brother we can become narrow minded. We can become cynical and we see hidden agendas from people where there are none. We stop trusting others and we become bitter, unattractive and forgettable people. Is that why the older brother was left in the field with no one remembering to go and call him back for the party.

The older brother feels he serves more, but actually he has it all and does not realise it. His father even reminds him of this:

‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.’

The older brother in us looks at others and wishes we have what they have. He judges others without looking at himself. He wants more but is blind to the fact that he has it all, always has and always will.

The older brother challenges me to be more grateful and gracious. What other reaction can there be if I have it all?

I said I would try and share some stuff from the retreat – so here goes.

This has got to be my favourite story in the Bible as it says to me that whatever I do, however badly I screw up, no matter what mess I make of things or how far away from God I run that no only can I have the confidence to return to God, but when I do I will find him running towards me. Running towards me because since I left he has been looking and waiting for my return. Running towards me because he wants me at home with him.

That side of the cosmic father just blows my mind away to be honest.

It is because I love this story so much that it has bred quite a familiarity within me. I was quite surprised to see and learn new stuff from such a familiar setting.

On retreat we were set the task of getting inside the character of the son and I was surprised at some of the emotions and thoughts this induced within me. I found myself wondering if there was more to the story than immediately meets the eye.

Wondering, for example, if the son’s predicament all came about through a bluff. I wondered if he really wanted to leave or if this was merely a ‘Hey Dad, you and big bro are smothering me – cut me some slack, let me try some stuff out’. I wondered if, as a young lad, he could not articulate that and so, as teenage sons tend to do, went straight for the jugular: ‘Dad … I wish you were dead!’ Make no mistake, in that culture asking for your inheritance was unheard of and amounted to wishing exactly that! How many teenage sons and daughters have said something similar to their parents just to wind them up r out of exasperation over they years?

I imagined the son walking away thinking ‘Flipping eck! What have I done!’ As he walked away with his thousands I could relate to a smug smile appearing on his face along with the ‘I will show them’ attitude. I could relate and visualise completely as I think I have been there with my parents. I could feel the elation of walking away from home, with the full intention of never having to return; along with fear and trepidation that I was refusing to admit to. The fear and excitement were all there and very real again. I was in the picture!

In some ways I can relate to this in my walk with God. Those times when I think I can run ahead without him and think he is holding me back are, I think, quite similar.

I tried to imagine how he felt when he realised everything had gone. Totally frustrated I thought. Not so much at screwing up, but knowing, deep down, that he was going to have to go back. He needed to admit his helplessness. He needed to admit he could not do it on his own. I would have hated to have to do that. I do hate doing that!

I thought what his journey back along the road would have been like. I used to think he was worrying about how dad would react. I wonder now whether he was thinking something completely different. Something like ‘well if I’m coming back, it can’t be like it was before! I’m not going to take all that crap again! If I’m coming back then things are going to have to be different!’

It struck me that the son was trying to come back on his terms. That is what I think all the ‘I am not worthy to be your son, let me do this job’ stuff is all about.

I then wondered if that is me. Do I try to return to God on my own terms? Do I say, well I will do this, I’m not worthy so let me do that. Yes is the simple answer. Its a great way of keeping control as to let God have control, who knows best, is just sometimes to scary to contemplate. In my case putting God in a box is nice and safe. The more control I have the better! Of course, it does not work.

I can relate to the sons thoughts as he trudges home along the road. I could see the excitement of the scene as dad rushes out to meet him. Here I start to lose the story and the connectedness with the son that I had earlier.

It is nearly impossible for me to imagine what the embrace of the father was like. I’m not alone in having an absent father figure, and with those thousands of other ‘fatherless’ people I have never felt the embrace of my real dad. It is something I used to long for as a child and as a teenager. As an adult the desire is still there, but with an honest and healthy realisation that it is never going to happen. That induces pain and regret which I can draw positives from.

10 years ago, when I was 30, I found out my natural father was alive. I found out my mum had been lying and had told me he had died. 10 years ago my whole identity came into question as I started to rediscover who I was. After a short while I realised my real dad was uninterested and did not want to know me or my family. I could excuse the rejection as a baby (actually I could not!)- after all he did not know what the baby had turned out like! To be rejected a second time, once he had got to know me was a little tougher.

I wanted to be accepted, to be hugged, to be loved. I guess I got the opposite of the prodigal – is there a term for that?

The positives, though, are good. I have said I do not know what the embrace of the father is like. But I do know the embrace of the son. I hugged my boys only this evening (as well as my daughter) and there is no feeling quite like it. AS I sat hugging them, my mind tried to imagine what it would be like from the other side. At least my boys know; and when they come to look at this fantastic story maybe they will have a more complete understanding than I have.

As I finished meditating on the character of the son I felt the father say ‘It does not matter; the important thing is that you are here, back with me.’

Clearly I am back from retreat. It was an excellent time – so excellent in fact that I do not know where to start in writing about it.

Over the three days we looked at the story of The Prodigal Son and used bits from Henri Nouwens ‘The return of the Prodigal’ which was written as he meditated on the painting of the same name by Rembrandt.

I gained so much from the three days which I think I am going to share over the next few days on this page. For today, though, I want to just give you a taster. The Marist Centre itself was set in really beautiful countryside. The village has a few houses, a school, the centre and a pub (which itself was a great place to be).

I love visiting catholic places as they always generate some form of reaction within me. Each room had a crucifix with Jesus on it. At one time I had a burning desire to sneak around at night and remove all the figurines and replace them with banners saying ‘He is Risen!’. Of course I didn’t!! Elsewhere there were lots of Mary ‘things’. The mission statement included the words ‘with Mary as our example’ which I wanted to change to Jesus.

All of this though, challenges my ‘evangelical-ness’ and that is why I love it so much. Places like this force me to consider the stuff that we have basically kicked aside in our churches for fear of being labeled ‘dodgy’. Take Mary for example; I do not believe we need to pray to her as some do, but we have certainly denied her the attention she surely deserves. Out of all the women in Nazareth, God chose her to be the mother of his son. That’s a pretty amazing thing and surely puts her up there with Moses, Isaiah and the rest of them. But although we would regularly look at those other characters we rarely look at Mary.

So – being at a catholic retreat centre really forces me to look at my faith afresh and, I think, in a more complete way.

The place itself was great too – I particularly loved the chapel which I hope you can experience just a little from the pic.

Last night we had a fantastic time as a church. We took over the Black Lion, the local sports centre, for the night and put on a free fun night for anyone that wanted come.

We made us of all the facilities such as the pool, the sports hall, bar, sauna and so on. The variety of activities, as you can see from the pics, was quite diverse. We had a bouncy castle, face painting, water polo, badminton, table tennis, craft stuff to name but a few. Oh yes! I must just mention we had football as well. That was cool – and I think I can claim the contest top scorer title as I scored 3 fantastic goals – my best against a team of young men who thought they would easily beat a team of old guys like us! (sorry Chris, Matt, Chris and Steve – when you are skilled enough call us up for a rematch!!!!)

The event saw about 350 people, which totally blew my mind as I was not expecting such a large number. This event was cool because barriers were broken down, stereotypes (of both Christians and not yet Christians)were challenged, church members worked together and we all met and were able to chat with people of our community. The best comment I heard all night from a guest was ‘All these people from the church are so friendly; are you going to do this again?’

I hope we will. But I hope we will with just the same aim; that being to have a good time with no strings attached. This was just such a great example of the church serving the community with no expectation of anything in return. A true and honest gift of Jesus for Christmas!

I will be away for the next 3 days until Thursday night.

The Senior Managers retreat for YFC is being held in the Marist Centre in Nympsfield. We will be spending time with the nuns and taking time to re-focus on God … I think!

I don’t really know what we are going to do, but no doubt I will find out pretty quickly from tomorrow onwards. All I know is that the village is small with a pub and the convent where we are staying across the road. To me that sounds like the ideal location for a retreat!

I quite like the chance to get away and spend quality time with God. Sometimes I get a little worried about what God is going to bring up and what I am going to have to do about it when I return.

mmm that’s the thing about God – I find he just won’t et me stay as I am! (I think I heard Sarah think ‘Thank God’)

I write more on my return.

I like blogging. Sometimes you meet up with old friends – and this weekend I got a email out of th blue from Dave, who used o work with YFC in Preston. Thanks Dave, I’ll enjoy reading what you have to say.

For a clear view on Fallujah which I am proud to be associated with check on Tom’s post on his blog.

Simple but true.

I’m proud to be his dad.

I was excited today to fall upon the Fresh Expressions website.

Fresh expressions has been set up by the Archbishop to:

The Church of England and the Methodist Church want to establish many different fresh expressions of church life in the next decade to carry the gospel to every part of our society.

Fresh Expressions is the new national initiative of the Archbishop of Canterbury and York supported by the Methodist Council. Our aim is to resource and encourage this major movement of mission and change across the churches.

At the Mission Shaped Church conference a few months back, Rowan Williams was obviously clear and keen that the church needed to take seriously fresh expressions of church and resource it.

I’m shocked that he has started the process so quickly. Shocked but very excited!

Today Jim preached on ‘Who is my neighbour’.

He challenged us to consider the command of Jesus to love others as we love ourselves.

It’s very easy to love those that are like us or those we like, but he pointed that anyone can do that. Jesus calls us to love those we find it hard to be with as well. He challenges us to see Jesus in all of his creation – which includes every person we come across.

Living in Medway I often hear people, even some from churches, talk of Chav scum. Other times at football I here people talk of Millwall (a rival local football team)fans as scum. In fact, not long ago a friend told Tom that a certain set of fans were all scum and Sarah and myself obviously had to challenge that immediately. You see, I think if we don’t, and we do believe God created all, in effect we are labeling God with whatever term we choose to label others.

Jesus was asked what was the most important commandment. He replied saying there were 2:

1. To love the lord your God with all your heart, mind and soul.

2. To love your neighbour as yourself.

This morning Jim suggested that 2 was a clear indication of the strength of 1. This is hard to stomach, but I think he might be right. The measure of how much we love God will show in the quality of relationships we have and how we treat others around us.

It’s kind of easy to love friends. It;’s often harder to love family. Its easy to give money. I think, though, Jesus demands a lot more.

Somewhere in the Bible Jesus says ‘Whatever you did for one of these, you did for me’. We cab read into that he was also meaning, ‘whatever you did not do for these, you did not do for me’. That’s quite a sobering thought.

I left church with some questions this morning:

How often have I ignored Jesus.

How often have I seen him and hidden in the shop doorway?

How often have I neglected to phone or visit him when I know he needed just that?

How often have I hurt him with thoughts or actual words?

How often have I talked about him behind his back?

Have I ever called Jesus scum?

The picture Berikan cinta pada sesama (Love your neighbour)is by an Indonesion artist Taring Padi