I’ve spent a little bit of time updating links and stuff – so you can now have a read of my latest prayer letter.
I’ve also updated the ‘my writings’ section which is mainly essays and stuff that I have had to do for SEITE. It makes life easier for me to store them online – but if they are of use to do, again please feel free to have a look.
People who are sad enough to read this regularly (you really need to get out more!) will know how regularly I comment on how much I love my current role with YFC. It really is the best job there is.
Well … I’ll be leaving in a few months so this could be your chance to grab this great role:
LOCAL MINISTRIES SENIOR MANAGER
We are looking for someone with good initiative, interpersonal and communication skills who have an active personal Christian faith with a heart for young people and the proclamation of the gospel. You should be a person of prayer who is in good standing with the local church and the wider community.Experience in leading, managing and directing people, setting up new projects and maintaining existing ones, budget control and knowledge of the issues faced by people in ministry and youth ministry would be helpful. An ability to analyse reports and take appropriate action is essential.
Salary in the range of £20,842 to £26,200 depending on experience
Closing date: 01 June 2008
Interview date to be arranged
You can more details from the jobs section on the YFC website
It’s been a mad few days which has left little time for blogging, or reflecting on what is going on around me at the moment. It’s also been an important few days.
On Tuesday I met with good friends. I met up with a friend for lunch, had a tutorial with another and then a couple of pints. As we sat and chatted I realised how disconnected I have felt recently being on placement and rushing from one task or meeting to another.
Last night I became chair of governors of a local school that, when I thought about it, realised I have been connected with since 1996 – it’s amazing how the time has flown! I’m looking forward to this new role and hoping I will be able to support and challenge well.
Today I met up with great people from the diocese 2 of who will be supervising me from September and 2 who are responsible fro my ongoing training. This was a good time as people were honest – I was told to get off my high horse which I need to hear sometimes! It was refreshing to hear as well! I’m excited about September (if a bit daunted still by the whole ordination thing) but I can see the diocese are really putting in masses of effort to gt this to work.
IN between those meetings and experiences I have manged to get loads of YFC admin tasks and phone calls done that have been hanging there and screaming for attention.
In all a mad few days but a good few days.
image from faceupstudio.com/blahg
On Saturday 15th March, YFC will be opening it’s doors and putting on a series of workshops with music, drama & sports content. The day is designed to give young people between the ages of 15 & 25 an insight into the missional opportunites YFC provide on both an international and national level.
So if you your are interested or know somebody who might be interested, you can download a planned outline of the day by or an A6 pdf flyer. Please see the links below:
download day outline
Download pdf flyer
For more information please get in touch with Beckie Allport by calling on 0121 502 9624
Yesterday morning I left the house just before 530am to be at head office in Halesowen as it was my turn as a senior manager to join the leadership team meeting which runs from 9 until 5. I quite like leaving this early, but on this occasion there was dense fog and it was difficult to see my car when I stepped out of my front door, let alone think of driving for 3 hours.
As I tentatively started out I was pleased to see that the fog was not uniform across my route. After about 20 mins looking hard for signs of were to go, the fog suddenly cleared, only to return later in the journey on a number of occasion.
It did cross my mind that driving through fog can be like trying to understand the journey of our lives if we choose to make that journey a journey with God. There are times when I find myself in situations where I am quite scared, and even worried for my safety as I gingerly move ahead in full concentration, knowing that the road is there somewhere but needing to look very carefully to be able to stay on that road. Yesterday this was helped my following others that were ahead of me, although that can have its risks too.
At other times, when the fog cleared, I was able to sit back and breathe a bit of a sigh of relief as I could see the road ahead quite clearly and put my foot down on the accelerator. I enjoyed this part of the journey, and the music was turned up as it is much easier to concentrate – but these are times as well that I work on automatic and miss the stuff that is rushing past me at 70 mph (officially!)
On refection I’m not sure if I prefer the harder part of the journey, where I am searching and noticing more and having to make a great effort, or whether its the sunnier parts of the journey which seem to cost me very little. I guess I like the variety of both!
The meeting itself was great. It’s always a pleasure to experience how honest our leadership team is with each other and how enabling and encouraging they can be in their outlook. It’s good to be part of something so special!
Its been a busy few days where I have met with lots of people; eaten good food, drunk coffee, win, beer, driven a few hundred miles (not after the beer and wine drinking!)and shared, listened, thought and laughed.
Highlights of the weekend
– lunch with Becky and Becky which they paid for – although it’s a highlight for the conversation, not just the food!
– facilitating a training session with trustees of Waltham Forest YFC
– chatting with Simon after years!
– Paul and Nia, good friends from Cheltenham YFC, joining us for dinner on Saturday night
– hearing peoples stories at harvest
There has been a good bit of chilling and chatting over food which s always a special thing to do, and I almost always think it’s quite a Godly thing to do as throughout the Gospels you can read about Jesus eating with people in different circumstances.
Lowlights of the weekend
Gillingham losing 4-0
Liverpool being knocked out of the FA Cup
Driving
so the weekends over … bring on the work – well 2 days of it until i take some holiday/TOIL
I went to a conference looking at Extended Schools today in London. It was a good event for networking with others in the south east and I was able to hand out a few cards to people who are interested in speaking with YFC more about youth mission in their areas – so it was a good use of time in this way but I did find the content quite basic and un-challenging.
As is always the case with such conferences I am amazed at the way money is used. We used a good hotel, with a unbelievably good lunch menu, cakes and pastries at every break – and they were all very very nice. I can’t help but think, however, that surely this money could have been put to better use; either with the number of speakers, workshops or for some good publicity material or ‘extended schools toolkit’ that we could use with others to encourage engagement with this. Maybe I’m getting to be a moany old man!
If you go to a church that would love to get involved in Extended schools YFC have produced an excellent resource called The Crux that gives you everything you need to get succesfully involved in supporting a school with this.
I have just returned from my 13th YFC staff conference which I think has been one of the best I’ve attended.
We were fortunate and blessed with some great teachers such as Ajith Fernando who has been national director of Sri Lanka YFC since 1976. Being a 42 year old who started secondary school in 1976, that level of faithfulness and commitment to a role struck me as being quite special.
Ajith was topped in my mind, however, by Paula Gooder who was only with us for 24 hours but had a refreshing way of unearthing greatt stuff from the bible. I could have listened to Paula for hours and was enthralled and challenged by what she brought out of the passage.
As always for me, though, Staff Conference is about the people. Conversations both with friends of long standing and new friends were great times and on one particular occasion while ‘sharing icons’ and chatting about ‘stuff’ that matters I lost track of time and did not get to bed until nearly 2am!
Highlights are too many to list (this entry would be very long!) but here is a feeble attempt:
chats in the sauna with various groups of people
drinking at the bar with the London possy and the South west crew
enjoying the company of the ‘Chislehurst massive’ and their sense of humour
that late night iconic conversation in the bar with Helen
coffee with Lucy
hearing dreams of others in their locations
various mealtime conversations with great people
the major highlight was simply spending time with so many wonderful YFC people who have become friends at some stage over the last 13/14 years.
For once there is a lowlight.
The 13th staff conference will be my last as I start a new ‘ordained’ role in September. As I even type those words of leaving YFC it produces tears in my eyes. It is not often that you get to live your dreams but that is what I have experienced over the last 14 years, and particularly in the last 3/4 years when I have quite seriously had the best job in the world working with ‘national’. I sit back and have an overwhelming feeling of gratitude with a strong sense of the sheer privilege it has been to be part of something so dynamic while serving very special people in their mission roles. I hope the next 6/7 months go quite slowly!
I shared on the last morning where ordination seems to be taking me in a pioneering/fresh expressions setting. It is an exciting opportunity on which I will write more later. For now, however, I need to get my head around leaving what I believe to be the best Christian youth agency in the country, probably the world. In many ways it is still a step that I don’t want to take, but I think (and hope) that I am right in believing that it’s a step that God wants me to take. My prayer is that this is a God idea and not simply a good idea.
So 14 years …. a large part of my life, and over half of my life in ‘ministry’ is all about to change. I look forward with a healthy and natural mix of fear, excitement and sadness with a hope that I will manage to stay close to at least some of those wonderful friends of the last 13 years.
This week I am at the annual YFC staff conference, being held again at Bodelwyddan Castle in North Wales.
Conference is a great time for us all to et together for some good training, worship, prayer, food and a chance to catch up properly. The programme is usually great, but the after-hours chats around the bar often take some of the subjects we have been considering during the day to a deeper level. Certainly, for me, it i true that some of my theology has been developed at these conversations which have gone into the early hours.
Conference can be hard work as well as I already have quite a few meetings booked in with people. That is not a complaint though, as it is such a real privilege to meet up with the rest of the YFC family. It only happens once a year!
If you have some time this week, please pray for the safety of the YFC family as we travel to North Wales from all over the country on Monday and as we return to our homes on Friday. Please also pray that we may hear God in a fresh way for both ourselves and the areas in which we are working. Finally, please pray for all the family members of YFC workers which will be left alone this week – for me personally I find I miss Sarah and the children increasingly more with each conference – and tis is the 12th or 13th (I lose count!)
We had a great night last night with some of our supporters – a collection of very generous people, good wine, excellent cheese and great conversation made for a good evening.
Thanks for coming – and if interested the photos are here.
The Shiny Headed Prophet 