I love it when I come cross news of other peoples creativity helping people connect with God in some way. I used to work in a church down the road from Tina (aka Portishead Pilgrim) and so I have been keenly watching with interest to see what God does here.
Tina writes here about using cocktails to introduce people to the life of faith. Read both articles here and here …. well worth it … go read and be inspired.
Yesterday saw the last boot fair in Gillingham (it now moves across the river to Wainscott where we will continue to work) which marks a kind of goal post in my mind.
Some things that I thought would happen did not happen. The boot fair is walking distance for most people I see during the week and so I thought there would be people I would see at both the boot fair and in the High Street. There were a few, but not as many as I thought there would be. The boot fair community is almost another separate group of people that we have started to get to know.
Interestingly we have seen ‘regulars’ over the 7 weeks who come to say hello, take a Psalm or tell us a joke. These individuals have valued having someone to come and see. I don’t think we expected that to happen in such a short space of time. It’s illustrative of a lonely society, which we were aware of, but usually people are more suspicious.
I have also been surprised at what has worked on the stand and what has not. Prayer for healing and hand massage, which based on other events I thought would be popular, have not really featured at all at the boot fair. I think in the 7 weeks we have run so far that 3 people have asked for prayer for healing and one person has had a hand massage.
Psalm readings, which I must admit I thought was a bit ‘twee’ have been incredibly successful. People have come back each week for a Psalm. Universally across all age ranges the Psalm Readings have been a real way that people have connected with God. Jesus Deck Readings have also been very popular, but I was not surprised by that.
I wonder if people like to engage with something from a little distance. I think this could be why Psalm Readings have been so popular. I wonder for next year whether we need to think about some experiential stuff for each week that people can connect with. Something that asks them a question, or involves taking something away with them. In my mind this makes sense to come together wrapped in some way with a celebration of eucharist. Now there’s a challenge!
The pilot continues for 5 more weeks and we will learn more stuff from that as well, but it does already seem from doing this for a few months that there is a clear role for us here. We are unique in that we sell nothing. We are unique in that we are there for the wellbeing of others rather than the wellbeing (or profit) of ourselves. We have flatly refused to take donations form people when they have wanted to after we have done a reading or prayed with them. I think those two values have both surprised and challenged people ….. Christians, and the church, have been very good at ‘selling’ our charity and need fr finance and personnel …. possibly a bit more than our gospel message.
Most of the people that visit a boot fair would never dream of visiting a church, or even that the God who created them would be interested in them at all. Dekhomai has, over the last few weeks, though, caused some people to re-examinine their view of a God. Maybe some have even started to realise their is a God who is interested in them. I pray that is the case!
Each week I receive the ‘Friday Night Theology‘ from the EA.
Often it makes me think, sometimes it has added to my sermon when preaching. The short article is always contemporary, in an attempt to respond meaningfully to the headlines we read. You can subscribe to Friday Night Theology here.
Today I wish to to quote it here in its entirety. If we had pub theology this month (we never do in August!), I’m sure we would pull something from this topic
Today Jonty Langley (Baptist Times) writes under the title ‘Murder and the Value of Truth’:
I just watched 12 people get murdered on YouTube. I’ve watched them die before, but today I watched it happen again. It felt important. It felt like the least I could do. Because I’ve watched the video, a brave man is likely to go to jail. The murderers will not.
I hope it’s obvious to you that the video I’m talking about was leaked by an American soldier called Bradley Manning. It shows a group of unarmed men being killed by American forces in Iraq. Let’s remember what happens. As I say, it is the least we can do.
The men are unarmed, standing on a corner. The viewer watches from the point of view of an attack helicopter as it fires its unimaginably powerful machine guns at the men, who try to run or take shelter, but there is really nowhere they can hide from bullets of this size and velocity. Those who aren’t killed immediately, who cower behind a wall, are fired on again. As the smoke clears a man (a journalist, it turns out) is moving. He’s crawling onto a pavement. The recorded voices of the American helicopter crew dare him to pick up a weapon.
A moment later, a van drives along the street and, as any human being would expect, it stops. People get out. They start carrying bodies, dead or wounded, to the van, and they too are fired on. The force of the bullets spins the vehicle around, explodes the street in clouds of dust and kills almost everyone. At least one child is left alive but badly wounded. A foot-soldier who arrives on the scene asks for one of the helicopters to airlift her to hospital. His request is denied. “It’s their fault,” says one of the voices on the military radio. “For bringing their kids into a battle.”
This week, Bradley Manning was found guilty of five counts of espionage in a military court because he leaked that video and a number of other classified documents. I think he’s a hero. I can’t understand why the Church, which calls itself pro-life, which preaches bringing into the light the things done in darkness, which tells its children that the Ten Commandments, are the cornerstone of good living, is not shouting from the rooftops that he is, too.
The people who killed 12 unarmed men, who grumbled “Come on, let us shoot!” and who laughed as a tank drove over one of the bodies, are free. They are our allies. This is our war, being prosecuted in our name. And I am not going to lecture you about the prophetic tradition of justice in the Bible. And I’m not going to tell you what to believe about Thou Shalt Not Kill in the context of war. I will tell you that the people involved in this killing are not heroes, they are murderers. And blaming them is pointless.
Trained, indoctrinated and ordered to murder, who of us would have the courage or the freedom of mind not to? The soldiers who did this, the people who trained them, the men and women who gave them their orders are a symptom of a larger problem. The empire at the centre of our world is sick. It is misguided. It has categorised people into those who deserve protection by virtue of their nationality or the things that they believe, and those who do not matter.
And perhaps, as Christians, we must simply render unto Caesar what the empire demands. Perhaps fighting back on the same terms as the rulers of this dark world just makes us like them. But, if that is true, the least we can do is reveal the truth. The least we can do is encourage the likes of Bradley Manning. The least we can do, in the face of evil we cannot on our own defeat, is shine a light in its face.
Jonty Langley is a writer and works for a Christian mission agency.
I think it’s a thought provoking read. I’d be interested too in whether there is a difference in perception and reaction here between my British and American friends?
Yesterday I shared some stuff about the stranger and being open to change. Change through encounters with other people and other ideas which require a certain level of both vulnerability and humility.
Today’s Rohr meditation has caused me to think further:
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Rohr, correctly I think, suggests that life (discipleship?) is a lot more about discovering who we already are which can only come through unlearning stuff we have wrongly taken on. One way of unlearning, and rediscovering who we are, can be through interaction with others. It is in this interaction with other people, with exposure to other methods and ways of thinking, that we can discover our need to change, or to turn …. not once … but over and over again.
We know that we are already created in the image of God. So it makes a lot of sense to say that the Christian life is about discovering, or is that re-discovering, who we are … and unlearning the unhelpful stuff …. so to uncover the original that is already there, but has become hidden.
If we are created in the image of God then we can rightly view ourselves as masterpieces, the creation. As I’ve thought about this today I have thought about an art restorer restoring a masterpiece. As he or she gently cleans off the grime, more and more of the original masterpiece is seen. Parts of the image are ‘rediscovered’ and become noticeable for the first time in many years. In many cases the masterpiece takes on a whole new meaning and certain things that were puzzling become more understandable.
As we interact, listen, learn, become aware is it possible for us, also, to uncover parts of God’s masterpiece we call ourselves that we had forgotten were there, or have simply been blind to for many years? I believe we can.
To be authentically human is to change … and to be whole human is to change many times.
There’s a challenge!
I stumbled upon this quote the other day (thanks Graham):
‘Welcoming the stranger puts oneself and one’s community at risk. At best, the stranger is disruptive, bringing strange ideas and new, even wrong, ways of doing things. At worst, the stranger is dangerous, bringing disease, dishonor or violence. Welcoming the stranger is risky: everyone will be changed, host and guest alike…. And we cannot know ahead of time what the changes will be’(Amy Oden ‘God’s Welcome: Hospitality for a Gospel- Hungry world’)
One of our values / aspirations that came clearly and strongly from our away day as the gathering was something to do with relationship, family, hospitality, welcoming … and other such terms. As a community we believe that this risky welcoming, although difficult and maybe even messy or, as Oden says ‘dangerous’, is vitally central to all that we do and all that we are. The fact that a strong message received when talking about what we valued in the gathering was the openness and welcome to all to be participative on any level, along with the freedom to just be, leads me to believe that this is a pretty important value to us. I look forward to the discussions as we try to sum that up in one word!
It has always struck me as ‘interesting’ that to join many Christian groups today, whether that be church or whatever, their seems to be an unwritten rule to conform to what the group is already doing, saying or believing. In some that even goes as far as wearing the same clothes, reading the same books, and going to the same events with the added inference that some Christian events are good while others are not. To suggest that the group might change to accommodate or welcome what a new person brings can often bring a look of terrified shock to those in ‘authority’, or others who are established, within the group.
But surely … if we are searching for truth together, and working out how to live as Christians in this world, we need to listen to how God is working in each of us, and listen to how God is talking to us through each other …. unless of course the group we are in has already sussed it out totally and has 100% certainty that their group and ideas is the one God given right true and correct way. But then, maybe some really do believe that they have discerned everything and have ‘arrived’. The gathering has not ‘arrived’ and we don’t believe we ever will as there will always somewhere further to go.
Welcoming the stranger is also very counter cultural, and possibly seen as a sign of madness, in a society that tells us from an early age to ‘beware of the stranger’ and realise that the stranger might be dangerous as a person who wishes to take something from you. In reality there is a safety issue that we need to consider as a community. But …. I believe we must avoid being directed too much by our fear, and be open to what the stranger may bring. If we ask God to direct our day … then we need to listen to the people God brings across our paths.
Today I had a long conversation with an older guy from India who has lived in Gillingham since the early 1950’s. We talked about the changes he has experienced and in individual beliefs. I think we both left the conversation enriched in some way, learning something new from each other, discovering more about our creator and ourselves together. That would not have happened if we viewed each other with stranger suspicion.
I love that final thought from Oden, that ‘everyone will be changed …. ‘host and guest alike’. The alternative is a kind of static nothingness where nothing changes. I don’t want to look at myself in 5 years, or even a year, or even a month … heck I don’t really want to look at myself next week and think ‘nothings changed’. We are called to follow Christ and be transformed to be more like Christ … and it seems to be that allowing the the stranger in can be on way of allowing that Christ-likeness to happen.
After all … it is in entertaining strangers that we may actually encounter angels!
I can’t help but think, it’s worth the risk!
A question we received from a number of people today after not holding the stall at the boot fair last week was ‘where have you been?’ or ‘Were you here last week as I couldn’t find you?’. It seems we were missed and today lots of people returned to take Psalm readings away with them for the week.
I don’t know how many people we spoke to and prayed with today, but it was a lot! In particular two people who were friends who wanted Jesus Deck readings stick in my mind. For each of them the ‘reading’ or ‘interpretation’ of the card they had chosen really seemed to resonate with them in a very powerful way to the extent that the second person said ‘are you sure you don’t kno us?’ The cards they chose and word they received from God fitted perfectly with the ‘stuff’ that was sharpening in their lives at that every moment. They went away amazed at the thought that God could be speaking to them.
I saw other members of the team today talking and engaging and praying with lots of people around the dekhomai tent and we remarked that the 6 hours simply flew by today.
Today though we did continue the conversation for the future after the end of this trial. What about communion? What name should we use as we think ‘dekhomai’ does not really working a Gillingham boot fair setting. What about our practice? Do we keep hand massage and healing prayer as this is requested very rarely? Do you bring in more experiential question type stuff? If we do the whole 3/4 months next summer, should we then do something in the non boot fair months? This is a journey with a lot of questions!
But for now … back to today! Today was encouraging on many levels. It’s amazing to see how the team have grown in confidence. It’s mind blowing to reflect on how people trust us with the ‘stuff’ that’s going on in their lives. It’s flipping awesome to see that still God uses a field and a few shattered people!
Yesterday the gathering had an amazing day.
This was a day many of us have been waiting to embark upon for a year or two. I think for myself it concludes the first part a journey that started long before ordination when I clearly heard God’s challenge to join him and find others create something new which was open and inclusive for any wishing to explore more of God but who felt, for one reason or another, that they could not do this within the then existing church structures.
Well .. that journey started with the gathering’s first get together back in April 2009. I’ve linked to my post which I wrote the afternoon after our first gathering, and I smile at the language of journey. That sense of journey was still very strong yesterday … and I think I can safely say a prayer for the community would be ‘Lord, deliver us from ever thinking we have arrived!’
It has taken 4 years from those humble beginnings in a room in our house to get to the stage we were ready for yesterday. In that time people have joined and found it not for them. Others have travelled with us for a while as they re-asses and have then been attracted back to established/inherited church. Others have joined and stayed. I think this is probably the 3rd ‘incarnation’ of the gathering and to me it seems the most stable we have had. That word, stable, worries me as it suggests a static-ness … but that is definitely not a word to describe us.
Yesterday we met for our aspirations day. This came out of our day together in April and is the start of us developing our Rhythm of Life.
We gathered at West Malling Abbey with Lynne Norman, our excellent facilitator, who kicked the day off by getting us to think about what we valued about the gathering. I was close to tears on a few points as we heard from each other how important the gathering had become … and not just to us. Some of the deepest stuff yesterday came from our children as they articulated how they put great value on what we did together.
After looking at what we valued, we were then asked what we were passionate about, then different activities to talk about our dreams and hopes as well as our fears. All the time this was going on Lynne was writing our words and statements on post it notes and sticking them to the wall. You can see the result in the picture which is high res enough to be able to read the post its if you click on it.
The fnext stage was to look at this mass pof words and draw out common themes and put the words into groups. The words grouped natural into 6 areas and then after some discussion we realised that they really came under four main themes.
The last part of this day was to look at each of the four lists and come up with a word or statement that summed them and our thinking up. This became an aspiring statement … as in this is something that we as individuals and the gathering aspire to do.
So today we have reached a milestone. The next stage for us as a community is over the next four months to take each statement in turn and explore this as a gathering in our monthly worship get together. two weeks after that some of the gathering will get together and will write a paragraph or chapter or something that will help us put our aspirations into practice. At the end of this particular process we hope that we will have been developing a Rhythm of Life out of the identified key areas to answer the question about what God is calling your community to be, and to answer the question, How should we live in but not of the contemporary world?
As a gathering I think we were pretty excited by the end of the day. I felt completely privileged to be part of such an amazing group of people … so thank you.
One of my roles on the MACE team for Rochester Diocese is to teach on the MSM course. We have recently completed the last course and publicity is now available for the next course that starts in late September. I’ve linked below to the official video from the MSM site …. take 7 minutes to listen before reading on ….
I know you will think I am slightly biased, but this course really is what is says it is …. ‘a one year part time learning journey in a supportive community’ that will ‘equip you for a lifetime of good practice and learning in planting and sustaining fresh expressions of church’ …. there may be other courses out there …. but this is a great course and is well worth considering.
Whether you are exploring how to start off, or are an experienced pioneer; whether you are wanting to learn qualities of ministry, or a person who really wants your church to be more effective in mission ….. then why not consider enrolling on MSM. There are 6 or more different teachers on the course, all coming with loads of different experience of mission in varying local contexts.
Individuals are welcome … but i think it is definitely of more benefit if 2 or 3 people from a church or fresh expression come together and discuss the issues together both on the course and in their local context.
Intrigued ….. then look at the course flyer here ….. and if you would like an informal/non committal chat please get in touch … oh and did I say this is a great course?
I hope to hear from some of you ….
I have been wondering what I love so much about the boot fair and the ministry that we are developing there week by week. Is it the way we engage with people? Is it the excitement and anticipation of who we will talk with and what God will do? Is it something about the way I can see the team developing and growing in confidence as they allow God to work through them? Is it because we actually have to depend on God and ask God to intervene as it is difficult to plan for who will come and what they will come with?
Well I think it is possibly part of all of those and maybe more. But a friend summed it up in a short inspired sentence: ‘I like the fact that God is there with absolutely no religion to ‘help him out’..if you get me – just a field, and a few shattered people.‘
That says it all. The team are shattered after 6 hours of being ‘on duty’, but i think some of us arrive shattered after waking up at 5am! But …. the real exciting thing here is that God is simply there and waiting to meet with people. Ok we are using ‘tools’ to help us, but there is no dressing up or a drawing message. The one thing that unites all of the people we have engaged with is that God has been drawing them, speaking to them, connecting with them is some way that they have not really recognised or been aware of until they have stumbled upon us in an open field.
Yesterday we were busy …. we engaged with 4 people before 645am which felt manic as I think the week before it took nearly 2 hours before we spoke to anyone. I lost count yesterday of how many people we prayed with or listened to or answered questions from.
One particular story from yesterday was a man in his mid 20’s who chose a Psalm Reading (explained in last weeks report). He said he was looking for guidance and randomly chose Psalm 27:1:
‘The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?
With a smile on his face mixed with a little confusion he remarked ‘this is for me; this is what I have been looking for!’
One of the team then prayed with that young man.
Stories like that amaze me.
How can God use a scrappy bit of a card in the middle of a hot field with some shattered but willing people?
I don’t know … and I know that I feel inadequate at the start of each Sunday morning, but God seems to take that inadequacy in all of the team and transform it into something that he can use.
So …. just a field and a few shattered people …. why not come see what we do at the boot fair in two weeks … we are net there on Sunday 28th July from 6am until 12 noon.
… you bring up gluttony, greed, gossip, slavery, divorce, …..
sadly i think Rachel nails this subject pretty much … and she both challenges and saddens me.
Challenges as it causes me to ask ‘what can I personally do to be part of the answer?’ and saddens me as I believe the truth of what she writes is simply and plainly sad ….
read her blog post here
The Shiny Headed Prophet 