This weekend was packed with fun and was just a good time with friends and family from St Marks.

This morning we commissioned our second team going to Uganda for 3 weeks and then we commissioned the youth and children’s leaders team. Afterwards we had a lunch at the Church hall before waving off the 8 people flying off to Uganda.

There was a great feel to today, possible helped by the sense of excitement and the start of a new term after people being all over the place over the summer. Each month St Mark’s prays particularly for one of our mission partners … weird to see that this month that happens to be me!

After the church stuff we then celebrated Sarah’s mum’s birthday with most of the family together (those missing are still on honeymoon so I guess have a good excuse!)

Anyway … all change and back into normal time tomorrow!

Received this while on holiday. I hope to go -anyone else like to come along?

The Burma Campaign UK will be holding a very special event at the Old Vic theatre on November 12th entitled ‘The Lady of Burma’.

The event is a powerfully moving play about Aung San Suu Kyi¹s life written by playwright and theatre Director Richard Shannon. Maureen Lipman has kindly offered to be our host for the evening and we¹re honoured that Juliet Stevenson, Sinead Cusack, John Pilger, Glenys Kinnock, Richard Wilson and Prunella Scales have all agreed to contribute to the second half of the evening. The entire event looks set to be an inspirational occasion.

We’d very much like as many of our members and supporters as possible to be able to join us for this unique evening, which is likely to sell out extremely quickly. Tickets have just gone on sale but to ensure availability to our members and supporters we have arranged a priority booking period for you before we advertise the event to the general public in early September.

Tickets are available through the Old Vic Box Office on 0870 0606628 and range in price from £20-£150. Do try and book as soon as possible to guarantee availability and best seats.

£150 – Golden Ticket – includes best-in-house seat, pre-show and interval drink, exclusive access to the VIP and cast area, credit as a Golden Supporter of The Lady of Burma in the Gala programme, and one year¹s honorary membership of the Burma Campaign UK.

£60 – Silver Ticket – includes best seat for the performance and credit as a Supporter of The Lady of Burma in the Gala programme.

We very much hope to be able to welcome you to the ‘The Lady of Burma’ evening on November 12th.

Next year, 25 March (which is also our wedding anniversary), is planned to be a day when we mark the bicentenary of the abolition of slavery. The act of parliament abolishing slavery became law at noon on March 25th 1806.

March 25th 2007 will be Freedom Day.

I remember becoming infuriated as a teenager when I learned of some of the atrocities that had been committed to other human beings. I also remember crying during Roots which was run on TV, to the disdain and laughter of my parents who were fairly racist in their opinions. I clearly remember at the time that I was glad I lived in a country that had wiped out this vile and inhuman business.

But that is no longer true. Whether this is a new phenomena or not I am unsure but, in reality, I don’t care. The fact is in the UK, in our country, we are seeing slavery again. We are again a country which turns a blind eye to enforced labour. Sometimes it hits the news as with the drowning if the Chinese cockle farmers, but usually it carries on un-noticed, or we try to pretend.

What is our main response? If we go back to the cockle farmers, then one could believe our Great British response is to joke. The jokes about the death of these people were quick and sick! Does that mean as a nation we de-value lives, deny the humanity of others because they are ‘illegals’, or tell ourselves they are not human?

As christians, do we try to pretend that they are not part of the image of God?

If we pretend these people, many of whom have been tricked or dragged here, are in someway sub-human then we do not have to do anything.

But we now know the truth, we know what is going on, and we need to shout about it. This is a rare occasion where we could be proud of our evangelical heritage and join with the great past examples like Wilberforce.

There are new banners on the right of this blog. Stop the Traffick has been there a while, The Truth is not Sexy was added yesterday and Protest 4 I have blogged about before.

None of these sites make nice reading. None of these sites is here to entertain or make us feel good.

Ellen was abducted from Albania and sold to a brothel in London’s west end where she was forced to have sex with up to forty men a day. She was beaten, raped and threatened with death if she tried to refuse. Ellen was 15.
The truth isn’t sexy.

These sites tell the sickening truth, so that we are more aware, so that we can join together, so that we can shout, so that we can not only make a difference … but bring this to an end again.

Ellen is someone’s daughter.
There are countless other sons and daughters enslaved in our country.

Go to the sites, and do what we know we need to do: read, write, campaign, tell others … do something!

We are back from holiday and I feel particularly relaxed and rested.
highlights of the holiday are too many to record but include:

just laughing with Sarah and the children.

walking around Warwick Castle. This was a great day – don’t think we have ever been anywhere with the children where we have turned up at the opening time and not left until closing. It was also interesting to see the changes made since we were last here when we studied at Warwick university nearly 20 years ago!

seeing the children giggle and laugh as they paddled in the (ice cold) stream running through the middle of Bourton on Water.

traveling to Cheltenham and having lunch, playing games, then having diner with Paul, Nia, Jessica and Timothy – good friends and Paul happens to direct Cheltenham YFC.

BBq’s on our new ‘dinky’ fold up barbie than looks like an alien space ship

seeing the Labyrinth and walking the Harry Potter tour, in Gloucester Cathedral – a great haven of peace and art.

reading most of The New Testament and the People of God and all of Incredible Bodies which is a very funny, if somewhat ‘sad’, read.

Lowlights
the unpredictable and changeable weather. We were fairly close to Greenbelt, and a number of people who went speak of the change from heat, to cold, to wet, to heat which meant you never knew what to wear or take with you. It really was quite bizarre and although a lowlight did not spoil the holiday at all.

It’s strange being back. I feel like I am doing things very slowly and getting back into work mode seems to be a challenge. Or is it just the reluctance to plough through the pile of mail now that I have replied, filed or deleted the numerous emails? There’s always a downside to a good holiday.

Well not quite!
Why do ‘things’ always happen at really inconvenient times such as before you go away!

Joe was sick last night and has laid on the sofa most of the day feeling poorly. He is usually the brave one who sticks things out, so to see him unwell was quite a rare and sad occasion.

It seems the washing machine has been leaking for a while. Today it decided to leak massively and is currently lying on its back in the kitchen. I’ve ordered a new ‘detergent recovery hose’ over the web and it will be here for me to fit when we return from holiday (are you impressed?). In addition the fact it has been leaking, un-noticed, for a while means the flooring has fallen apart in places, but I do think that may be covered on insurance, so I’ll be ringing them in the morning.

My new faster wireless router, however, is working great and the speed I can connect to around the house is excellent. It took a little while to install for some strange reason, but now it’s working I’m connecting at 4 times the speed I was yesterday!

Anyway, tomorrow its all in the car, hitch up the caravan and disappear to Moreton in the Marsh. We are looking forward to a great relaxing time!

See ya!

At last we have a ceasefire thanks to the gentle persistence of Kofi Annan with very little help from Blair or Bush sadly, who should have called for a ceasefire long ago. I feel slightly sick to think that Parliament has remained on holiday rather than discuss whether we need reforms in our foreign policy. Not so long ago, when in opposition, MP’s in the Labour Party would have been outraged and shouting for a calling back from the recess. How times change, or is this an illustration of how power corrupts?

The ceasefire holds, and yet there are still strong words of defiance being used on both sides.

The cost of this tragedy is enormous as shown from this table on the BBC website:

IMPACT: 34 DAYS OF FIGHTING
Lebanon deaths:
About 1,000 – mostly civilians
No precise data on Hezbollah dead
Israeli deaths:
Soldiers: 114 (IDF)
Civilians: 43 (IDF)
Lebanon displaced:
700,000 – 900,000 (UNHCR; Lebanese govt)
Israeli displaced:
500,000 (Human Rights Watch)
Lebanon damage:
$2.5bn (Lebanese govt)
Israel damage:
$1.1bn (Israeli govt)

Despite what Israel says, I fail to see how this has been a measured response to Hezbollah’s crimes. The numbers say it all: over 1000 Lebanese dead to 150 Israelis.
1150 lives and the western world stood and watched.
Stood and watched when it could have intervened and appealed for calm.
People are crying all over the region, lets be praying that this ceasefire holds.

Sarah arrived back from Soul Survivor at 2.30 this morning.
Everything is now back to normal and the children have enjoyed having mum around.
I’ve enjoyed having Sarah back too!
It’s now a mad rush to get the caravan ready and disappear of on holiday for 2 weeks in the Cotswolds.
I’m really looking forward to just being away with Sarah and the children!

The Miracles of Jesus series by the BBC is proving to be an excellent investigation throwing up good questions and opportunity for healthy and open dialogue.

If you have not managed to catch any of these yet then try and catch the third and final one of the series next Sunday on BBC1.

The Bible Society are going to release as episode on DVD as part of a school resource in November, and you can register your interest here.

You can also red more about the miracles of Jesus at Re:Jesus and Life4seekers.

The trip to Weymouth went quite smoothly, and I was amazed at how good the children were. The journey down took near;y 5 hours and yet they were patient and played or chatted and laughed, sometimes the conversations degenerated into schoolboy humour but I’m still sad enough to find that quite funny.

The picture was taken by Beth at around 9 am on Saturday morning when we went for a short walk to the sea before joining Steve and Kim. It’s a special picture as this is th view that I saw most mornings when running before school or walking into town. It’s amazing what memories one image can bring flooding back.

It was great to be able to see how Kim was doing. All I can say is please keep praying. I think she is incredibly courageous and puts on a brave face, but knowing she needs to take 30 tablets a day, 27 of them for pain relief, kind of sums this up. She does, though, look loads better than when I saw her in hospital a few weeks back and there is definite progress. I am praying that this will continue and ask you to join me in that prayer.

Steve pulled a great birthday surprise last week for Kim’s 29th. Kim is a Cher fan and Cher phoned her while she was in hospital an they had a 20 minute conversation. She was still buzzing about it when we saw her, and that was great to see.

We seemed to cram a lot into a visit of just a day and a half. In the morning we visited a little beach I used to call my own, 5 minutes away from the house, for stone skimming. We met Steve and Kim to watch them move Kim’s horse, Bramble, to another stable. We ate chips. We bought Weymouth rock. We walked along the harbour side. We crabbed in the harbour and nearly caught a massive the size of both my hands stretched out!

The journey back was the normal 3 and a bit hours and we arrived back at home at about 11.00 pm.

In all a good trip and a good primer for our holiday which starts on Wednesday.