Today I spoke for 20 minutes at The Bigger Picture which was a training day put on by Canterbury Diocese and Connexions, looking at Youth Work Strategy and Fundraising.

My ‘bit’ was to look at how Christian organisations can access government monies and yet keep their evangelistic identity and not have top compromise on what many of us would see to be our central calling – that of introducing others to Jesus. I think I was asked to cover this as I was fairly successful as Director of Gillingham YFC at accessing government and trust funds of one sort or another.

One thing I had picked up in the past was a real fear that Christians can have of accepting tax payers money and the hoops they might have to jump through and the identity shift that they may have to perform. My personal opinion is that this fear is pretty unfounded as funders like what Christian organisations do and tend to respect our integrity.

To add to this I think it is vital that, as Christian organisations, we network with government and local authority agencies. It is a great way of being ‘salt and light’ in the world. They need us and we need them, and to pretend otherwise is pretty foolish I think.

With this fear of being eaten up by the big nasty organisation’ in mind though, I started my little bit with this video. They enjoyed it as it summed up their real fears and I hope you do!

Some interesting questions and points were brought up tonight at Blah which I had not considered or thought about before and which I am going to give some thought to. I’m posting them here to see what comments of others might be.

What about theology and fashion?

Does film reflect or determine our culture?

If we really want to ‘read’ a culture we need to look at the everyday actions or stuff that people of that culture engage in.

Many of us think we have the right message and just need to contextualise it, whereas we have a message of a past age.

Why do actors thank their agents while musicians thank God?

It’s late and I’m tired so I’m going to sleep on them. Any answers though on a postcard …

Tonight, after meeting with the London YFC directors, I am going off to Blah.

‘Barry Taylor has recently co-authored the book A Matrix of Meanings: Finding God In Popular Culture. Rather than seeing adverts, music, film, celebrities, art, fashion, television and sport as ‘worldly’ Taylor suggests that they are all sites where we can join in the theologising already taking place, spot divine fingerprints, and uncover a surprising search for spiritual meaning’.

This is really down my street at the moment and I am looking forward to listening and entering into meaningful dialogue with others that are there.

If you are at a loose end tonight why not join us?

A few weeks ago The Guardian gave away a free DVD of Cinema Paradiso; tonight while Sarah was out (as subtitles films are not her thing) I got around to watching it.

I found myself captivated by the film which tells the story of Salvatore who just learns of the death of Alfredo, a close friend who became his father figure following the death of his father serving for the Italian army in Russia.

The story is told as Salvatore lies on his bed in the dark and reminisces about his boyhood growing up in Sicily, thinking back to the places and people that he has not seen in 30 years.

I found this movie touched me on a variety of planes. It caused me to think of boyhood memories, of things I used to be passionate about and also to think on why I lost those passions. The lack of father figure thing always provokes some sort of reaction within me, and I guess that it always will. I found myself starting to relive my childhood ideas through Salvatore; and I guess when you connect with a film in that way it just adds to the enjoyment.

The end of the film is very moving as Salvatore is able to watch cut bits of movies which are a gift without the oppressive censoring of the church. I can’t say too much in case you want to go and watch the film!

In some ways, as we move to the end of the film, there is a connection with the Prodigal Son. Despite 30 years of absence, Salvatore returns home to find there is still a place for him, there is still love for him, and even those outside his immediate family still remember him.

Doesn’t matter where I look at the moment, just seems that God is everywhere and using every means possible to communicate with his creation.

I have caught up on some reading today and found myself getting a little frustrated with my beloved Anglican church – and I mean Anglican rather than just the C of E bit of it which always frustrates me.

I can’t believe how some people are acting around the world at the moment. I have said nothing of the Windsor or the Rochester Report’s, but I am totally exasperated as to how people are reacting and the amount of effort and energy that is being devoted to homosexual priests and women bishops.

Why am I frustrated? I’m frustrated because as peoples efforts are concentrated on these topics they have forgotten what is centrally important. They have forgotten than in our communities that people are confused. They have forgotten that people in our communities are hurting. They have forgotten that people in our communities are crying out to be saved. They have forgotten what our central calling as a church, a group of believers, happens to be in this world.

In short – they have forgotten what is primarily important!

That is deliberately provocative and blunt. I am not saying the debate on sexuality and priesthood is not important. Neither am I saying whether we have woman bishops or not is a trivial matter. They are both important … but they are not primarily important!

I think it’s a scandal that while people in our communities are lost and in desperate need to know they are totally loved and accepted by God, that we are allowing our energies to be sapped by things of much lesser importance! If we can debate and continue with our missional calling, I could stomach what is happening. But it seems to me that we are sacrificing our primary missional calling to talk about secondary things.

I love my church. I am an Anglican by choice. One of the reasons for that is that in the Anglican church we are still able to dialogue. In the last 2 decades it seems we have debated too much, we have discussed things which, quite frankly, the outside world are bemused by, while our mission to show the love of God to the world has very clearly been put on the back burner.

My church frustrates me.

When are we going to wake up to what is important.

When are we going to break out of our walls and point people to God in the community?

Sunday morning .. picture the scene, the sun rising over the Thames as I cross the river on my way to Premier Radio. I forgot the camera again as the picture would have been so cool.

I don’t know if anyone heard me, I kind of kept it quiet as I felt a bit embarrassed to tell people. Along with 2 other ‘guests’ I joined the Rob Frost show at 8am to talk about YFC’s new initiatives and comment generally on what was happening in the news. As I’m getting all the embarrassing stuff out the way tonight I was sent a link to this press release.

This was a novel experience, but interestingly one I enjoyed quite a bit and hope I get the chance to go again sometime.

interestingly, on my way back as I drove past MI6 (or is it 5?) HQ, my GPS went dead for a minute doo doo doo (to the tune of the Twilight Zone!!!)

I’ve had a little blog holiday – but it is nice to be back! The holiday was enforced as a direct result of my poor diary management with me being in Bristol, Taunton, Luton and Cheltenham last week, leaving only Friday to catch up with paper and phonecalls.

On Thursday I was in Cheltenham to attend a Cheltenham YFC event. While there I had a wonderful time with Paul (director of CYFC)and Nia Bennett and their children. It was really nice to be with people who put ‘family’ at the centre of their priorities, but were also very heavily involved in mission. It really was a delight to be with such sorted and lovely people.

While spending the afternoon with Paul with Nia, we also had the pleasure of the company of Bishop Gavin Reid. Chatting in the afternoon and over a meal with Gavin was pure pleasure. Of all the things to speak of … we talked normal down to earth stuff, which was rather surprising as my experience of other bishops has been of quite academic and deep conversations.

All 4 of us chatted around the importance of family life and children being brought up in the church. Notably Gavin reminisces of a time when he, and most children of his era, went to Sunday School. Obviously this is no longer the case, but there is still a clear acknowledgment of God with most people (85% on the last census) calling themselves a Christian in this country.

Gavin suggested we could have this situation for the next 15 years at the most – if correct that should instill a sense of urgency into our mission.

I went to Luton today for meeting that was cancelled. Often when that happens the day and time is lost. Today, however, it was a bonus.

I met with Jon Burns, YFC’s Director of Evangelism, for a couple of hours over a late breakfast and we were able to chat through integrated mission ideas and mobilising christian young people in our schools. Revolutionary ideas needed for a revolution amonst our young people.

A lttle pocket of time which neither of us were expecting, but which I think God blessed and we were able to make more use of than we might otherwise have done.

I popped in on Trefor in Taunton YFC on Tuesday morning.

Leaving Nailsea was weird, and I had a little pang of ‘I wish we were still here’ as I left the quiet green area and joined the M5 at 9am which was a weird experience as there was very little traffic on the road … so unlike the south east.

Meeting the Taunton team was a pleasure and it was great to hear that things are moving right down in the south west of the country too. Too often I think the focus looks at the rest of the country and the SW is viewed differently and this has got to be wrong.

Trefor shared with me how schools work is progressing massively with schools requesting youth alpha as part of the curriculum which they are willing to pay Taunton YFC for. This is obviously quite an exciting development and could be repeated elsewhere. Alongside this, Powerpoint, their monthly event has seen a growth in numbers from 40 to 80 to 120 young people in just 6 months.

It seems God is on the move … as if we never knew!!

I left, again feeling it a privilege to be able to spend more time with another bunch of people so sold out on mission to young people – there is a common theme here!

When I left the office I called in to a local supermarket for petrol and lunch only to find that the Taunton branch stocked sushi to take away for lunch. I’ve never been able to find that in Kent!

I had a great time dropping in on friends in Nailsea. It’s cool that you can be apart from people for years and yet, when you get back together, it’s as if you were never apart. That’s what it was like when I got back together with Annie and Phil in Nailsea.

It was interesting to be able to catch up with each other and share how we had all journeyed with God over the past 5 or 6 years. It wass quite exiting to look back and acknowledge that all 4 of us would never have dreamt that God would take us to the places we are at at the moment. We are living ‘beyond our widest dreams’

Annie and Phil were full of what Christian Surfers UK were doing. I was really encouraged to hear some of the stories, such as being asked to open each days surfing at the Newquay Surf Classic with prayer. Sounds just a little thing maybe, until you realise that this prayer is broadcast over the PA on the beach to thousands of surfers and fans before everything starts.

I was partcularly excited to hear that Holy Trinity Nailsea was totally supporting Phil and Annie’s ministry despite the fact that they might not be surfers or sporty. They have armies of people who help scoring in contests, others that bake and serve cakes and teas. I thought this was just such a great example of a satsuma church. Annie and Phil are a part of the church that is reaching out to the surfing community which is not part of the Nailsea community. They are released and supported in doing so by the rest of the church with no one asking why they are not in church on a Sunday (especially during the summer when they are on the beach!!)

Phil and I chatted over loads of stuff and I am sure there is stuff we can work on together over the coming years. I’m looking forward to the possibility of that. We certainly are not waiting another 5 years before we get back together.