Jim Dewar's blog

Risk Taking?

2012-02-03T09:58:00.004Z

Risk is part and parcel of life. For some of us, the biggest risk we take is getting out of bed in the morning!

Statistics suggest that being a cyclist in the city is a risky business!

The FA has decided not to take the risk of John Terry being captain of the football team at Euro 2012 with a court case hanging over him.

I am a part of some of the biggest risk-averse organisations in Scotland: the Church is not renowned for being quick on its feet and willing to take risks; we feel the need to know the answers to all of the questions before we take any kind of decision!

I'm chairing a meeting this afternoon in Glasgow as part of Scripture Union to consider a proposal for a piece of work in the city under a multi-faith banner. Will SU take, what is a huge risk and dip our toe into the water? Or will we consider the risks too great? Time will tell.

This morning, our Bible reading passage was in Joshua 3, the story of God leading the people of Israel into the Promised Land. They had to cross the Jordan - in spate! How? Well, God said, put your feet in the river and it will stop flowing! Risk: trust God's promises, or get swept away in the flood if it didn't work! Well, God kept His promises (of course, He did; He is a promise-keeping God), the risk paid off and the rest is history.

The promise God makes to us is to be with us in every day and every circumstance of our lives and that He will guide us, lead us, strengthen and help us. Dare we take the risk of taking Him at His word? At face value?

Do we consider prayer a risk? Here are some words I found recently.
"Why is there so little anxiety to get time to pray?
Why is the so little forethought in the laying out of time and employments so as to secure a large portion of each day for prayer?
Why is there so much speaking, yet so little prayer? Why is there so much running to and fro, yet so little prayer? Why so much hustle and business, yet so little prayer? Why so many meetings with our fellow-men, yet so few meetings with God?
Why so little being alone, so little thirsting of the soul for the calm, sweet hours of unbroken solitude, when God and His child hold fellowship together as if they could never part?
It is the want of these solitary hours that not only injures our own growth in grace but makes us such unprofitable members of the Church of Christ, and that renders our lives useless. "
(Horatious Bonar)

Who else...?

2011-12-29T13:30:00.002Z

Who else will tell the community of the love of God?
Who else will tell the world that it is good to take time out to be quiet at Christmas time in the midst of so much busy-ness?
Who else will let people see that words can be full of grace and kindness, even when we are harassed?
Who else can show the world that faith brings strength, help, a rock-like solidity to life when life is at its hardest?
Who else will tell the world that the Bible is full of wisdom and insight, a treasure beyond price?
Who else will try to persuade the world that prayer is an entirely natural conversation with God?
Who else will take the kingship of Jesus seriously enough to live life in a way that is distinctive from the world's attitudes and values?
Who else will know that everywhere we go the presence of God is with us?

Each of these lines is prompted by a conversation I've had over the last two weeks.
Each of these presents a challenge for us as part of the Church of Jesus Christ.
Each of these is a responsibility that falls upon us, and we fulfil these responsibilities by our words, by our individual attitudes, and by our actions as a congregation.

No-one else will do this for our community. If we don't do all of these, our community will be the poorer for it! The community may not recognise its need of these and may not want them, but it is for us to recognise spiritual values and see what it good and keep what it good and godly before the eyes of others.

As the year changes, take time to reflect:

What has God given to me in the year that is past?

What do I hope God will give me in 2012?

What can I give to God in the next 12 months?

How can I serve others more effectively in 2012?

Happy New Year! May the blessing of God rest upon you and those whom you love.

A Christmas mission statement

2011-12-20T10:16:00.004Z

There's a great deal of publicity today about the death of Kim-Jong Il, the North Korean dictator, as his people shed tears "especially if the cameras are on them!", as one reporter put it. Less publicly, Vaclev Havel died at the weekend and he is mourned by Czechs. I loved some of the descriptions of his manner and life: apparently the presidential palace is so big that he went from one meeting to another, either on roller skates or a child's scooter, depending on which report you hear. John Simpson, the BBC's World Editor described him as a quiet, reluctant leader, who didn't even like wearing a suit, but who had an edge to him that challenged the concept of power. That's the kind of leadership, I aspire to!

On Saturday, the Juniper Green Farmers' Market went Christmassy. The Round Table was there with Santa and Rudolph (aka Ron Grigor - I have the photos to prove it!), having spent last week taking their Santa buggy round the streets. Their aim - to take Santa to every home in the area! They have raised a significant sum of money for local charities and organisations.

It was that mission statement that stuck in my mind. Our aim and mission statement - to take Christ to every home in the community?

In Acts 27 I've been reading about Paul's trip to Rome. He's caught a winter Mediterranean storm. 2 things are fascinating: first of all, God is there with him and his companions, helping them survive the storm; secondly, Paul and the others use their skills and wisdom to make landfall. It is not a case of either/or; it is a case of "both/and". God helps them through the decisions they make and by their skills. God is with us to save us and we have to work out our salvation day by day in the way that we live.

Jesus challenges the concept of power in our world. Read the Magnificat, Mary's song in Luke 1:46-55 again; see the qualities that she identifies in the ministry of her son. William Temple described it - "It's a most revolutionary canticle!" Little wonder that the Magnificat has inspired Christians across the world to challenge the concepts of power and wealth and to honour the humble.

How do we allow the world to hear this Jesus, to find this Jesus at Christmas time? He brings comfort and grace, but there is also an edge to Him, that challenges us, that questions our priorities and that wants us to be humble and gracious in the way that we live.

Have a happy Christmas!

Christmas, the Church and Scotland

2011-12-13T09:41:00.002Z

Today, Christmas begins! I'm off to the Open Door Cafe Christmas party, to be Santa's little helper (no, not the dog from The Simpsons!) to hand out presents to the children. I'm too young to be Santa! I'll have a cup of coffee with the parents first. Later this week, there will be carols at St Margaret's Court and the Guild of Friendship, a school nativity play, a school assembly at Currie High School and one at Juniper Green Primary School, and then Christmas things on Sunday - communion, Kids' Church Nativity Play, carols at Lorimer House and the service of Lessons and Carols on Sunday evening for which the choir has been practising hard, so come and support them.

For many of these services and events, there is some preparation needed, some way of telling people the story of Christmas in the coming of Jesus. It gets harder and harder to see Jesus through the welter of other things that happen in these few weeks, yet we still tell the story and hope and pray that people believe it.

Today I have been reading the story in Acts 23 of Paul's life being threatened by his enemies. The comment I read reminded me that this is the reality every day for Christians in some parts of the world, that their life is in danger simply because of their allegiance to Jesus. "For many of us, however, used to years of cultural dominance or at least privilege, and at the most non-violent opposition, it would be a shock as well as a challenge." (WordLive) This set me thinking about the Church in Scotland.

For generations, the Christian church has been the dominant force in Scottish society, shaping culture and society in ways that have left us with a legacy of education, the legal system etc. However, the Church is no longer the dominant force in Scottish society and we struggle to make our voice heard in amongst all the other voices. We are being forced to see ourselves more and more as the early Christians saw themselves, a missionary movement with a story to tell. We can no longer assume that people will want to hear the story or will want our services; we have to earn the right to be heard and listened to; we will need to focus more clearly on what really matters about Church.

Christmas is about God coming to live in our world in all its uncertainties and frailties, as well as its hopes and possibilities. Enjoy the week. Let the grace and peace of Jesus sustain you.

How others see us?

2011-11-29T12:08:00.003Z

I started this working week with a visit to the Open Door Cafe for my coffee. I was putting up posters for Messy Church on Saturday (the banner will go up later when the wind dies down!) and stayed for coffee. I met a few people that I didn't know: a guy called Scott who's taking some Tuesdays off work to look after his son because his wife has gone back to work yesterday and their son doesn't start nursery till January. I had an interrupted conversation with a mum who thought that on the last occasion she came to a church service, the people there were all very old! She said that there was a young minister there - in 2006! Have I aged? Someone asked me recently if I was about to retire!

How others see us? Perceptions that people have of Church will shape the decisions they make - will I go to Church or not? How do we change these perceptions? Meeting people, listening to people, talking to people - it's a start!

Some of you have children who grew up in the life of the Church, but now don't attend. Why did they leave? What was it about the church that meant so much to their parents that they rejected? What would it take for your adult children to want to come back?

This link is to a video about Advent: it is a trailer for a website called busted halo that my browser complained about, but the You Tube trailer is well worth watching! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S02KOlw7dlA

The on-line Bible readings on SU's Wordlive site this morning are all about the forces that shape our lives. Isaiah 47 is a reflection on what shapes our lives: pleasure, superstition, self - or God. "I am, and there is none besides me" - these are words we declare about God, but Isaiah uses them to show that people in our world say them about themselves; atheism will declare that it is the force in Western civilization.

The challenge for Christians is to know that these words are only true of Jesus and that we live as if Jesus is the only 'I am' who shapes the way we think, speak and act.

The ties that bind...

2011-11-22T10:12:00.002Z

Folks, it has been a while since my last blog. What moved me to write today?

We're seeing new riots in Cairo, with Tahrir Square full of protesters all over again. Nothing has changed, as far as they are concerned, with the Generals in full control and not about to give it up. There is a news story today that 3 leaders of the Khmer Rouge are facing trial at the United Nations-backed tribunal in Cambodia; Cambodians hope that they will be able to understand why one Khmer could attack another, something that has bemused them ever since Pol Pot's uprising in 1975.

How are we connected to these stories and to the people of Egypt and Cambodia?

We are connected by our common humanity; we see people like us (and they are people like us, with their hopes and aspirations, dreams and disappointments) suffer in ways that concern us, or make us angry.

There are Christians in both Egypt and Cambodia and we share a family bond with them; the Christians of Cairo who are facing persecution, and the Christians of Cambodia, some of whom we know well, are our brothers and sisters in Christ.

So we pray for them and long that God will bring peace and stability to these two places along with other parts of the world.

This morning, I have been reading Acts 20:17-38, Paul's farewell speech to the elders of the Church in Ephesus. He describes his Christian service and how he has served the Lord with his life that he feels is now in danger and perhaps nearly over. He has been faithful; those listening would be able to verify his claim. This is not pride and arrogance, but a deep awareness of God's grace enabling Paul to be the servant of God in his situation.

Faithfulness: that's the challenge of this Bible passage. We are not called to be superstars of the Church or the Christian faith; we are called to be faithful. Faithfulness is about holding on to the things that matter and living them out. Faithfulness does not mean everything stays the same (that's the mistake the Egyptian generals are making because they want to hold on to power!), but that we share the gospel with others, including the next generation, so that they can follow Jesus and serve Him too.

I'm spending 2 days this week carrying out interviews for new Trustees of the Church of Scotland; pray for us that we find the correct people to serve Christ and the Church well in that setting.

What happened at the General Assembly?

2011-05-24T13:23:00.003+01:00

Yesterday, the General Assembly met to discuss the report of the Special Commission on Same-Sex Relationships and the Ministry. We contributed to their deliberations last year by answering their questionnaire.

There were 2 key decisions that the Assembly was being asked to make. First of all, it was asked to allow ministers ordained before 2009 and living in same-sex relationships to be inducted into charges within the Church. The Assembly voted by 393 to 252 to allow that to happen. The second choice before the commissioners was whether to stand with the traditional position of the Church to say that people in same-sex relationships should not be ministers of the church or to allow in principle people in same-sex relationships to be eligible for selection and training as ministers; the Assembly voted by 351 to 294 for the second option. The Church is now in the process of setting up a Theological Commission to begin to make it possible for people in same-sex relationships to become ministers and deacons in the Church of Scotland and to examine the implications of that decision, reporting to the General Assembly of 2013.

These are the facts; what they mean is much harder to understand and describe. For the first time, the Church of Scotland has taken a decision that seems to me to be a direct departure from the teaching of the Bible. Others will argue with that statement and will interpret the Bible in different ways, but that is my personal view. I am disappointed by the Assembly decision, but not necessarily surprised.

There is talk of people leaving the Church over this. I know of one Church that has recently removed any mention of the Church of Scotland from its noticeboard. However, I do not anticipate a great exodus of people from the Church over this; some congregations will leave, some individuals might leave. I am going nowhere. Part of me refuses to be defined simply by my attitude to homosexuality; I still love the Church and honestly believe that God has a plan and a place for me in its ministry.

The Spirit of God is still at work in our community; He is still at work in and through our Church; I hope and pray that the Spirit will continue to sustain my ministry and bless our worship and mission. We have work to do and I plan to be getting on with it, although today I do that with a heavier heart.

Sometimes God has allowed His people to make bad choices to teach them important lessons. In the Old Testament, the people wanted a king "to be like everyone else"; reluctantly God gave them what they wanted. (1 Samuel 8) While there were good moments, by and large the kings that followed led the people astray. Maybe this is God's painful way of showing the Church that "to be like everyone else" doesn't work, or that a radical, liberal agenda will kill the Church.

Presumptions

2011-04-06T10:27:00.006+01:00

The news item this week about paternity leave and the possibily of fathers taking on the care of their child while the mother goes back to work led to a discussion in our house about the presumption that still exists in our society that mothers are the people who care for children. Indeed there is a deeper presumption that mothers are better-equipped than fathers to care for their children.

That led me to think about other presumptions, especially those that operate in Churches: There is a presumption that if the minister is a good preacher he or she will be good at other things too: that he or she will be a good people-person, able to listen and counsel people in need; that he or she will be a good manager of the structures of the Church and be good at change-management. When a nominating committee sets out to choose a new candidate to become minister of a church, they have a list of qualities and skills for which they are looking, but that 'ideal minister' doesn't exist; so they have to pick and choose on some kind of priority scale; let's face it, all they really see of their new minister before their candidate beceoms their minister is how that person conducts a service and preaches; they don't see his or her people skills; they don't see his or her ability to chair a Kirk Session meeting; so the presumption is there - if he can do one, he will be able to do the others!

In fact, in my little example alone there are at least 3 different skill-sets, that are quite distinct. The abililty to preach is a totally different skill-set from that of being a counsellor, or a manager of change. Why do we presume that these skills will all abide in the one person? Then when our expectations of that one person are not met, that one person has to carry the blame for the failure of things that he or she is not very good at anyway!

Here are some other presumptions: We presume that older people hate new songs and that young people love every one of the new songs that are out there. We presume that the people who have been doing jobs in the Church for years are good at them! We presume that people who are the silent majority in a church have no views on any matter or have no skills and gifts to offer. We presume that people who don't express their faith in the language that we use don't have a faith at all. We presume that people who express no desire to come to Bible Study or the prayer time don't read the Bible and don't pray.

These are huge, sweeping generalisations, but....

I'm sure you can think of other presumptions that we make in the life of Churches. Let's challenge these presumptions. Let's build an effective Church for the future.

Life is a peach

2011-04-01T12:09:00.006+01:00

The Church is facing a pandemic, a virus. According to Mark Greene is it called SSD. He says "Globally, 98% of Christians are neither envisioned nor equipped for mission in 95% of their waking lives. BUT just imagine if they were..." What is SSD? "The Sacred-secular divide". The Church, he says, is guilty of dividing life into the 'sacred, religious bit' and the rest. We're good at recognising the sacred bit, but not so good at helping people deal with the rest of life. How does the Bible relate to the world of work? How can we help young people develop a Christian view of the maths or the physics they study at school or the books they read for English? How can we help the parents who are bringing up their children and trying to work at the same time?

SSD has limited mission in 4 ways:

geographically - usually to within a few miles of the church building and/or far, far away

personnel - mission is seen as the province of church-paid people

time - SSD tends to confine most people's mission activity to their leisure time, evenings and weekends

Scope of the gospel - and the message we share with others, that is no longer about all our life and all our being.

"we have a small percentage of the Church taking a partial gospel to far, far fewer people than are actually known by the Christians in our congregations." "Churches have to realise that the core of their calling is to be disciple-making communities whatever else they do." (Bishop Graham Cray) So why is life a peach and not an orange? Because an orange is made up of segments that you can pull apart and we have been taught to think that God is more interested in the religious segments - prayer, church, worship - and is not interested in work, sport, school, hobbies. The peach is a whole fruit, all together. God is interested in all of our being, all of our life, all of our community. Overcoming SSD can: expand our vision, inspire our mission. release our churches, broaden our minds, enlarge our hearts. nourish our souls, thrill our spirits, free our imagination for faithful following and fruitful living in all of life. I'll lend you the whole essay if you like; it is called The Great Divide by Mark Greene.

It could never happen here?

2011-03-18T15:43:00.002Z

My blog today is 2 very simple weblinks:

the first is to a news story that was in the press this week and the second is to a group that campaigns to do something about it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-12712569

http://www.stopthetraffik.org/

In 2005 the Church of Scotland Guild produced some very good material on this subject and of course, CHO is working along the Cambodia/Thailand border to try to interrupt the trade; talk about putting your life on the line!

BBC2 and the Bible

2011-03-16T09:54:00.002Z

Last night (15th March 2011) BBC2 broadcast a programme called Bible's Buried Secrets: Did King David's Empire Exist? This is how the website describes the programme: "Dr Francesca Stavrakopoulou goes on the trail of King David and his fabled empire. Did he really rule over a vast Israelite kingdom? Did he even exist? She examines evidence for and against the Biblical account." I have to say it made me angry, so I thought I'd take a few minutes this morning to counter some of what she said, just in case you watched it too!

The programme was based on a premise described as 'Empire'; "The Bible says that David had a great Empire" she kept saying. In fact, the word empire is never used in the Bible during the reign of King David. He ruled over Israel and Judah and subdued a few neighbours, but "empire" is not a Biblical notion. Worse, she then imported her notions of empire, so that there was an assumption that because David had an empire, he must have had all kinds of trapping of power, such as a huge standing army, fortresses and the buildings in his capital city that went with power. She even went as far as to say that if we are to accept the notion that God called David to be King, we needed to see evidence of power, wealth and glory (or words to that effect).

She met several archaeologists during the course of filming the programme. As you can imagine, there were conflicting views based on findings that are 3000 years old. Some were arguing that the evidence begged questions of the Biblical account of David, whilst others were arguing on the basis of other evidence that the Biblical account is accurate. I've never seen a more prejudiced summing up: the sceptics were allowed to comment on those supporting the Bible, but there was no right of reply; her conclusions supported one view because that was the view with which she started.

The Bible story was constantly quoted, but I have to say not often in a way that I recognised.

It is quite right and in order for questions to be asked of the Bible in the light of archaeological evidence. But listen to all of the evidence and give the Bible due place as part of that evidence. Anyone can make the Bible say what we want it to say; the far bigger challenge for us is to listen to what the Bible really says and see what life is like then.

We can't make David (or any other Bible character) fit the mould of our 21st century world-view (of "Empire" or any other notion!); it just doesn't work that way. The call of God on David's life was not about power and splendour; it was about faith and obedience; David wanted to built grand buildings, but God wouldn't let him!

Bad show, BBC. A more one-sided piece of television I've not seen since September when BBC Scotland broadcast a programme telling us that the Church of Scotland is dead.

The doorkeeper - part 2

2011-03-02T13:44:00.003Z

Following on from Friday's blog here are some thoughts as to what might be doors into the blessing of God for people in our community:

Messy Church might be a door for some
The Green Strollers might be a door for some
a course, such as Stepping Stones or Christianity Explored might be a door for some
The Open Door cafe might be a door for some
The Sunday morning service, with Kids' Church, creche and youth group might be a door for some
The Summer mission might be a door for some
The Girlguiding service might be a door for some
A bereavement and a funeral might be a door for some
A Christmas or Easter card might be a door for some
The Guild of Friendship might be a door for some
The gift of flowers from the Church might be a door for some.

Actually, given a good heart in us, most of what we do can be a door for some to come into the blessing of God, into faith and into Church. Don't just sit back and expect it to happen; as the doorkeepers, we have to reach out our hands to help people through these doors.

But we can do exactly the opposite. On Sunday morning, a lady (a visitor, the grandmother of a Brownie) was in Church early; she sat at the end of a pew. Then someone else came in and wanted to sit in the same pew, so she went past the first to sit further in. Then 2 more people came and wanted to sit beside their friend, the second lady to hit the pew. The first lady let them past and stood waiting to resume her seat. Sadly, they didn't move far enough into the seat, so our first lady was left standing in the ailse for some time, till finally she moved to sit in the seat in front. People have stormed out of Churches for this kind of thing; fortunately she was fine about it. This was not done deliberately to push someone out; it was simply careless and thoughtless, but it could be the kind of experience which turns a door into a brick wall for someone.

Is there someone for whom you are a doorkeeper? Is there someone that you can help through the door into the joy of Christ?

A doorkeeper?

2011-02-25T16:06:00.003Z

"I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God..." - these are some words from Psalm 84, as the writer pictures himself standing at the door of the temple, welcoming people to worship. Some of us still do that; we welcome people to worship as part of a welcome team.

Some Cambodian communities have people called "doorkeepers". This is no longer physical, but their job is to look after the best interests of the community. If you want to run a project in their village, you need the permission of the doorkeepers; they will let you in, but also keep you out.

There is a great deal of door-imagery in the Bible. Jesus calls Himself the gate; He stands at the door and knocks; John saw a door open in heaven. (John 10; Revelation 3,4) Here's a Celtic prayer:
God the Lord has opened a door
Christ of hope, Door of joy!
Son of Mary, hasten Thou to help me:
in me, Lord Christ, let there be joy.

How do people find the door into God's blessing and the joy of Christ? There are lots of people who would love to find the door into faith, but are not sure where the door is. Some would even like to begin to be part of a Church, but they don't know how to begin.

We should be keepers of the door and that should mean creating opportunities, creating ways for people to find their way. Maybe we even need to be the doors, so that by and through us, others find their way to faith, to Christ, to Church. How does the Church create these opportunties?

Do people feel for the door, but all they find is a wall? The door ought to be there, and they feel for it and grope along the wall, but they find no doorway, no opening, just a solid wall stopping them from getting in.

2 things: are we blocking the door? Is there something in us or in our Church or in the way we do things that creates a brick wall rather than a door?
Secondly, "the most important thing anyone can do is to take hold of one of these blind, groping hands, and put it on the latch... and open it, and walk in, and find Him... So I stand by the door. (Samuel Shoemaker)

Telling our story!

2011-02-18T15:40:00.003Z

Have a look at this link to the Tearfund website; you might see someone you recognise!

http://connected.tearfund.org/en/how_project_link_works/

I was asked to be involved in this DVD project (there is a longer version, with some other people as well!) to tell other Church leaders about our connection with Cambodia. I went to Manchester for a Saturday last year to take part in the filming; it was a long day and there were a few retakes; apparently some bits of the interview appear in another Tearfund DVD, but none have appeared on You've been Framed! yet.

It is good to tell our story, not so that we can boast about ourselves, but to share with others some of the ways in which God has been moving us and prompting us. We have to tell our story in such a way that it is clear that we give glory and honour to God. By telling the story of our involvement with Tearfund and Cambodia, I understand that some other churches have begun to show an interest in this kind of Connected Church project.

This DVD tells part of a story about a particular thing we do and others have responded. As Christians we can tell the story of Jesus, or the personal story of our own faith, whenever the opportunity arises, and tell people a little about the love and faithfulness of God. Perhaps they'll respond positively to that too.

a selfless act?

2011-02-10T11:58:00.002Z

Have a look at this; it is excellent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66wF9prwKoA

Last night at Bible study we were thinking about Matthew 5:38-48 and the challenges presented to us by Jesus to be different and to learn to copy the love of God.

Huge!

Meeting places

2011-01-21T16:25:00.003Z

Where do you go to meet your friends? The answer to that may depend on to which generation you belong: 50 years ago, it was to the dancing that people would go to meet their friends; now it is Starbucks that for many people is the place where friends meet.

Or is it a virtual meeting place? Do you meet your friends on Facebook? The meeting may not be physical, but an enormous amount of information is shared every day across cyberspace.

Will I see you tomorrow at the Juniper Green Farmers' Market? That has become a bit of a social focus for the community because people meet there and chat. Some Saturdays it has taken us ages to get home because we keep meeting people to talk to; it's great.

In the communities of Juniper Green and Baberton Mains, the snow did us a bit of a favour. Ok, it brought a lot of disruption, caused some to fall and hurt themselves, but there was another side. People were out clearing snow from their paths, or from the roads themselves. Guess what, they began to talk to one another in a way that during 'normal times' just doesn't happen. There is no meeting place in Baberton Mains, other than for parents at the school gate, or if you go to visit a friend.

Church as a meeting place? Here are two thoughts from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's little book Life Together which is all about community, one a positive comment and the other a little bit of a challenge. Positively he says about us as Christians: "Our community with one another consists solely in what Christ has done to both of us." We share so much in common by virtue of the work God has done for and in both of us.

Secondly:"If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty; if, on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ."

See you tomorrow?

australian floods - another angle

2011-01-14T09:48:00.002Z

You will have seen this video clip on the News perhaps; watch it again on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYUpkPTcqPY

This is Toowoomba, Queensland and the video was shot by the Scripture Union worker from the SU office in the town. It now has more that 3 million hits on Youtube!

Emlyn Williams is the Director of SU England and Wales and yesterday I heard him speak about this disaster in Australia as well as other places across the world. Cote D'Ivoire is facing political upheaval and an uncertain future; Myanmar is a country whose future is also uncertain, given the recent release of Aung San Suu Kyi. SU is involved in work in all of these places: there are 500 school chaplains in Queensland, employed by SU Australia, people who will have a significant role in the aftermath of these horrific floods; SU has good people working in Cote D'ivoire as in most African nations and there is even a piece of work being done in Myanmar.

Emlyn's point was to challenge us to think of the news through SU's eyes and remember that there is an SU presence in most countries of the world. Let me broaden that challenge: when we pray for disaster areas, remember that there will probably be Christians there, praying for their own situation, trying to help others, looking to solve the problems they face. They are people just like us; pray for them.

Thorns in the straw

2011-01-07T16:13:00.002Z

Thorns in the straw is the title of a song by Graham Kendrick. It is about the birth of Jesus and has the picture of the manger at its heart. But there is a twist: Mary sees a thorn in the straw by her baby's head and smells myrrh in the air, the fragrance of suffering.

I have been at Crieff Hydro this week for a minsters' conference. We meet every year just after New Year, a gathering of friends more than anything else. We always have a speaker and this year Sinclair Ferguson, one-time minister of St George's Tron in Glasgow and now living and working in the USA, came to speak. He taught us Philippians in 4 sessions and it was very good.

Philippians chapter 2, Sinclair says, is all about the gospel mindset, how we think as a result of the gospel. Paul tells us about the mind of Christ and how Jesus obeyed His Father by going to the cross. Our view of life, the way we think about God, other people and ourselves, has to be shaped by the cross-centred gospel. But that's not terribly popular, even in Churches.

It never has been. He quoted the great Roman orator Cicero: "Not only let the cross be absent from the person of Roman citizens, but its very name from their thoughts, eyes and ears." Phillipi was "Rome in miniature", a Roman colony; what Roman society liked today Philippi would like tomorrow; what Roman society hated, Philippi would despise. So the cross was abhorrent to Roman citizens.

Yet, says Paul, the Christians are to have their whole way of thinking shaped by the cross.

People love Christmas; but Easter... not so easy to love! Yet, Graham Kendrick sees something important: they are totally and completely connected. And, our view of life is to be shaped by the cross. We love the God who sent His Son; we trust a Saviour who was crucified for us; we rejoice in the love of God, demonstrated on the cross; we count others as more important than ourselves because that's what Jesus did.

Our society doesn't get the cross very easily; neither sometimes does the Church. We have to get the cross; otherwise we have nothing.

Christmas feels good!

2010-12-18T22:11:00.003Z

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXh7JR9oKVE
www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkHNNPM7pJA

Have a look at these two links; they are a little Christmas something to cheer you up.

Light of the world!

2010-12-10T16:19:00.003Z

Last Saturday, we went to an excellent event in the Usher Hall - Light of the World run by Origin Scotland, featuring the Exile orchestra and singers and the children of St Peter's Primary School. The music was superb, the singing excellent. The children sang a fantastic song - 'the hippo song' - all about wanting a hippopotamus for Christmas! It was a real uplift to the soul to be there and celebrate Christmas early and well.

Dominic Smart, from Aberdeen, did the epilogue. He took the theme of Light of the World and helped us to think about light and darkness as the Bible understands these concepts, reminding us that the darkness is not only in the world around us but is also inside us; we are the darkness at times, by our faults and misdeeds.

From all of this, one simple thought. The light of the world is not a philosophical concept. The light of the world is not a code of behaviour. The light of the world is not a book to read. The light of the world is a person - Jesus Christ. Jesus is the Light of the world. He came to deal with the sin of the world and the sin inside us. Christmas is not about concepts; Christmas is about welcoming a person into the world.

Reflect on the words of the song we will sing on Sunday as our gathering song and sing it well when you come to Church:
Light of the world,
You step down into darkness.
Opened my eyes let me see.
Beauty that made this heart adore you
Hope of a life spent with you.

And here I am to worship,
Here I am to bow down,
Here I am to say that you're my God,
You're altogether lovely,
Altogether worthy,
Altogether wonderful to me.

King of all days,
Oh so highly exalted
Glorious in heaven above.
Humbly you came to the earth you created.
All for love's sake became poor.

Here I am to worship,
Here I am to bow down,
Here I am to say that you're my God,
You're altogether lovely,
Altogether worthy,
Altogether wonderful to me.

I'll never know how much it cost to see my sin upon that cross.
I'll never know how much it cost to see my sin upon that cross.

Here I am to worship,
Here I am to bow down,
Here I am to say that you're my God,
You're altogether lovely,
Altogether worthy,
Altogether wonderful to me.

Tim Hughes; ©2001 Thankyou Music; CCL Licence no 1287

The Samoan Circle

2010-11-26T14:15:00.002Z

Let me tell you how I spent much of Thursday.

I had been invited to Carberry Tower by the Ministries Council of the Church of Scotland to be part of a group discussing the issue of same-sex relationships and the ministry. I had not a clue about what I was going to take part in, other than the banner for the meeting was A Place for Hope the Church's conflict resolution project.

There were about 30 of us there, all wondering why we had been invited. We were meant to represent a range of views and opinions on the issue and I suppose we did. I planned simply to listen. The day was facilitated by an American, David Brubecker, a man very skilled in his job of facilitation and resolution as we were to find out!

The Samoan Circle was 6 chairs forming an inner circle, a group within the group, as it were. Anyone who wanted to speak had to take one of the speaking chairs and the others were to listen. We were to answer a question about our opinions on this issue and then later a question about the future of the Church. I had no plan to speak.

However, in the afternoon I did speak. This is the gist of my contribution.

I have been in ministry for 28 years and in that time have grown well-used to being in a minority because of the views I hold. Until now, I have been able to live happily in that minority with no feeling of threat. This time it is different; this time, being in the minority feels being threatened! It feels, from where I sit, that those who appear to hold the majority view on this issue keep telling me what to do and what to believe and that the future of the church is down to me giving up my minority view. We are a broad Church, we are told and when I hear people say that, it is as if they are telling me I have to accommodate myself to them! My views are not about hating anyone, but are genuinely formed and sincerely held from my reading of the Bible. I tried to persuade the group that when we talk about the Church we need to be careful in how we speak: is it 'you' or is it 'we'? Is there a mutual responsibility for the Church or are you telling me what to do and what I should believe?

Having done this job for a while now, I hope I am still willing to listen to advice, but I also hope that those with whom I may disagree will treat me well and respect that there is a certain amount of experience and professional expertise behind the things I believe and the way in which I conduct my ministry. It is a delicate balance to hold.

The outcome of the Samoan Circle? A realisation that we all love the Church, but we still wait for the outcome of the General Assembly 2011.

Pray that we discern the will of God for His Church!

water, water everywhere!

2010-11-05T15:21:00.003Z

As some of you know, I managed to knock a glass of water over my laptop, quite by accident during the Sunday@Seven service last week; the laptop was not only knocked out for the rest of the service, it has been permanently damaged beyond economic repair; I'm now in discussions with the insurance company about a replacement!

The same glass of water enables me to preach by quenching my thirst and lubricating my voice.

Last week, we heard that some parts of Poipet, Cambodia, were under water. Some of the villages we had visited in July were badly affected and Chomno sent us some photos and one is opposite. What looks like a river, is in fact a road; this is the road that leads to Safe Haven centre for rescued children. This flooding has had an impact on the local area: some rice fields have been ruined, meaning that some people will have no food next year and also no seed to plant in their fields next year; there is an increase in some water-borne diseases and some people suffering from HIV are made homeless.

This is the same water that the people of Poipet rely on to replenish their supplies; the wet season provides them with water to last all the way through the year till the next dry season because there is very little piped water and very few taps.

“Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” (John 7:37,38)

These words of Jesus mean two things according to Leon Morris:

1)"the thirsty soul will find supplied in Jesus that need which could not be supplied elsewhere"; faith refreshes and gives life.

2)"faith has its results. When the believer comes to Christ and drinks he not only slakes his thirst but receives such an abundant supply that veritable rivers flow from him... As he receives the gift of God, he passes it on to others... God uses him to be the means of bringing blessing to others."

Food for thought! (the next time it rains!!)

When will we learn?

2010-10-29T16:09:00.003+01:00

I came across these 4 qualities of the Church, qualities which I suppose are really hopes and aspirations. When I read them again today, I'll sign up to a Church that is determined to have these 4 qualities at its heart.
•A Church restructured for mission - mission is so important for the future of the Church and the church of the future; when will we rediscover the notion of evangelism, simply telling our friends about Jesus? Will we shape the structures of the Church, the way we do things, with mission in mind?
•A Church recalled to worship - how important is worship? This puts God at the centre of Church life, where He should be! Church is not a business to be managed; Church is not a social group to rival the bowling club. Church is the people who belong to God, with God at our heart.
•A Church still being reformed - so many of our practices were born a long time ago; we say that we're always reforming, but in fact, we do things in the same way as we did them 30, 40, 50 years ago.
•A Church unafraid of change - we are afraid to take risks and change. I hope that by the time the Church in Scotland wakes up to the need for big changes, it is not too late! It may already be too late for some.

Where do these 4 qualities come from? A report to the General Assembly by a group called The Committee of Forty, in 1978!

It also says that: “the whole witness of the Bible points to a God who calls His people out & on from where they are, not knowing where they are to go, and the true image of the Church is the community of the future and not of the past.”

The blog is back! The long view?

2010-10-21T09:40:00.004+01:00

It's taken me longer than I thought, but the blog is back! It has a new look and will have a new way of making you think. There might not be so many longer pieces, but more short nuggets that I find on my way through ministry. I have also taken away the ability to comment on the blog.

The map background is not random; I love maps, always have done; I have a new book called Map Addict which is not about me, but... Maps show us how to get to places, how to travel. I wish that the Church had a real, detailed map for the future, for the next few years in particular, but it doesn't and we have to travel by faith, trusting that God knows what He is doing.

Here's today's thought: Lucy Moore is the author of two books about Messy Church. In the second volume, she discusses the question of discipleship at home and in families. One of her challenges for us is this: "Work for your children's grandchildren: we're in this, whatever form it changes into, for the long haul." (Messy Church 2 p.34)

Most church members have a good idea of what they want from their Church and what suits them. Can we develop this long view? What difference would it make to our attitudes? Many people are concerned that there will be no church for our children's grandchildren, but God is at work here! What work do we need to do now to pave the way?

au revoir for now

2010-06-26T14:48:00.003+01:00

This is the last posting on my blog till September. It will be back in the autumn with a new look and a new and more varied kind of input.

In particular, I am removing the ability to comment on the blog. This was meant as an opportunity for on-line discussion of the issues raised in the blog, but that has not happened in the way that I had wanted. Indeed, it has become the vehicle for some thinly-veiled personal criticism of me and my church and I will not provide the platform for that kind of attack. The cloak of anonymity has not helped.

I hope you have enjoyed at least some of what I have written and I hope you will enjoy it again.

the trip to Cambodia

2010-06-25T15:51:00.002+01:00

2 weeks from now, nine people from the Church will be packing our bags ready to catch a flight to Bangkok at the beginning of our trip to Cambodia. We are going to meet up with our friends and partners at CHO, to see their work at first hand and to take part in it in some way or another. Nearly all of the arrangements are in place; in the Church service on Sunday, we will be prayed for by the congregation; the money that people have raised will 'go with us' electronically; we're set to go, with a mixture of excitement and apprehension.

You can learn more about CHO through the link on the Church website.

While we're away, you can follow our progress by our new blogsite http://junipergreenincambodia.blogspot.com/ on which we plan to post something every day that we're away.

Why are we going? 3 reasons:
1. we are partners in the gospel with CHO; they seek to serve Christ in their community and we seek to serve Christ in our community and we both do so because we know the love and grace of God for us in Jesus Christ. We are going to strengthen that partnership. So we will run a pastors' conference for 3 days, with 70 people coming to learn Ephesians.
2. the work which CHO does amongst the poorest people of the world is vitally important in the mind of God and we are looking to take part in that work, even in a very small way. So we will be making bricks, planting crops, teaching children.
3. justice for all is such a huge part of God's kingdom; by visiting Cambodia we can learn a little of what justice means and what justice looks like when Christians get to work to rescue people from violence and oppression.

Desmond Tutu: "Christians shouldn't just be pulling people out of the river. We should be going upstream to find out who's pushing them in." For a long time, we've given money to good causes and that has been a good thing to do; but we also have to learn about what causes people to be in need and change the world. If we can do that even a little, our 2 weeks in Cambodia will have been well worth while.

catalyst for change?

2010-06-11T16:21:00.003+01:00

This morning I took part in a discussion about a service to support some candidates for ministry in the Church. Every year in June, the Presbytery of Edinburgh has held a service to allow the group of candidates completing their academic courses to say 'thank you' to those who have supported them - family, friends, home church, placement churches - and to ask people to pray for them as they move to work full-time in ministry through their probationary placements.

For a number of reasons, the previous practice of holding a service on a Sunday evening, seemed not to work this year. We have decided to change it and the same kind of service, which before had a small congregation, will now take place at the beginning of the next presbytery meeting, guaranteeing an audience of between 200 and 300. More people will be aware of our candidates and will pray for them. Seems to me a better option.

But what was the catalyst for change? We didn't decide to do it differently because we wanted to do it differently. We decided to do it differently because it appears that the previous practice wasn't working!

It happens all the time. The rules governing MP's expenses were changed, not because someone said 'let's change these rules' but because the consensus in the country was 'this is not working!' That became the catalyst for change.

There are a number of changes that we might make to the way we do things in our Church, but is that change for the sake of it? Or is it because something is not working? We need to be wise!

What changes do you think we need to make? What might be the catalyst for these changes?

the confident Christian?

2010-05-28T15:56:00.003+01:00

I was at the Scottish launch of Biblefresh on Monday evening. The event took place in Carrubers Christian Centre on the High Street. 2011 is the 400th anniversary of the publication of the Authorised Version of the bible and a group of organisations including the Scottish Bible Society plan to make the most of that by reminding people of the value of Bible reading. Check it out at www.biblefresh.com

One of the people speaking at the event was Elaine Storkey, a quite remarkable woman. She is the President of Tearfund and at present is involved in training evangelists for the Church Army in the Church of England. She gave a quite fascinating presentation on the culture that we live in and the culture, against which we are trying to present the gospel.

In the question time that followed, she was asked a question about how we can have a Christian influence in our society. She said: "begin where you are!" Then she proceeded to tell us something of her story. Elaine is a 'public Christian' (her words) and so she is invited to take part in radio and other public discussions about faith and culture and moral issues. She described some of these discussions with some very big name controversialists and simply said that she brings the Bible into these public discussions quite unashamedly. Her confidence is something to admire.

Then she said: "You can do the same where you are?" Gulp!

Be confident in your faith; don't be ashamed!

Sneezing the gospel!

2010-05-14T15:42:00.002+01:00

Every winter, on TV there is a particularly disgusting advert that warns us about colds and other viruses. It shows someone on a bus, sneezing, and then how all of the virus germs fly about on the bus infecting all of the other passengers. "Sneeze into your hankie" is the message; don't spread your germs about; we don;'t want to pass on the virus.

Do you remember swine flu? Whatever happened to it? It was bad for the people who caught it and tragic for the families of people who died as a result of swine flu. We shake out heads now, knowingly, thinking that it was all such a fuss over very little, but like every virus it had the capacity to run riot through the population if conditions were right. Thankfully, that didn't happen, but that doesn't mean we will ignore it the next time it happens.

Ideas spread in something of the same way. I came across this notion in a book called Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch. He calls them ideaviruses - "a big idea that runs amok across the target audience". Ideas grow by people passing them on to other people. How many of you have Hotmail addresses? Why did you start using Hotmail? It was not because they ran lots of expensive advertising campaigns, but because the thought of free e-mail was an appealing idea to lots of people and your friends told you about it. So the number of people using Hotmail grew because the idea caught on.

See how this works: as a reward for his invention the inventor of the game of chess was offered one wish by the emperor of India. He wished for 1 kernel of rice on the first square of the chess board, to be squared for every section of the board; there are 64 squares. The king thought he had got off lightly and agreed. so there were 2 kernels on the second square, 4 of the third, 16 on the fourth and so on; by the time he got to square 64 he would have had to produce 153 billion tons of rice, 2 to the power of 63! How things grow.

Sneezing the gospel is about sharing an idea with people we know so that they come to understand it and believe it too. "If it is a particularly compelling idea, we pass it on to other people. In some way that is exactly the way we all got caught up in the gospel... an idea can become contagious!" (Hirsch)

Do you find the gospel compelling?
Do you wish that other people, your family or friends also found it compelling?
How can you pass on this compelling idea to 2 or 3 people you know in the next month?

This is the way in which churches mainly grow. Why do some churches have large numbers of students? Because one student tells another that the church they go to is great! Share the compelling idea of the gospel with someone and see what happens.

The present uncertainty!

2010-05-07T14:50:00.002+01:00

How does David Dimbleby do it? I went to bed last night at 11.30pm and he was there on television introducing the election night coverage on BBC. I woke this morning and put it on again at 7am and there he was, still in his chair, still presiding over the election events. I've just been watching the BBC News Channel for the last 15 minutes on the web and there was David Dimbleby again, introducing David Cameron and Nick Robinson and all the other people around his huge table. I suspect, he won't be up early on Saturday morning!

One thing is clear: nothing is clear! we know the election results, but we still don't quite know what they mean for the country. Even what that becomes clear in the next few days, we still don't know what the next few months will hold for us. There are huge political and economic questions facing whoever forms the next government and while we know the questions, we may not be entirely sure what the answers will be, could be or should be.

There are other uncertainties that simply refuse to go away; three of them hang over our proposed trip to Cambodia in July. The unpronounceable volcano in Iceland continues to erupt and volcanic ash continues to, literally, hang over the prospect or air travel in and out of Scotland. Then, their cabin crew have again voted to reject an improved offer from BA and are threatening strike action once more; our tickets are with BA! Thirdly, there continues to be difficulties in Bangkok and we are flying there because it is the easiest way into Poipet, the city in Cambodia to which we are going.

The General Assembly meets in 2 weeks time. I got my Blue Book last week, the book of reports which forms the basis of the Assembly debates. There are some proposals for reform and change, but perhaps the most alarming piece is contained in the Ministries Council report when it describes the financial situation in which the Church will find itself over the next few years. Reserves are being eaten up at such a rate that they will run dry by 2017 if nothing is done. So the plan is to reduce the number of people in paid ministry posts over the next 4 years. At present, in Edinburgh there are 88 such posts; the plan is to reduce that number by 14. Which ministers will not be replaced? Will congregations die as a result? Where will these cuts take place? What will be the impact on the mission of God in the city?

Uncertainty creates one of two reactions:
either:
some people find uncertainty enormously energising; they live on it; they fly by the seats of their pants all of the time and they love it. Uncertainty becomes the catalyst and opportunity for creative thinking, for new ideas and new ways of doing things. I don't see many people like that around, either politically or in Church, but there is a space for them now.
Or:
we find uncertainty paralysing. This would be the tortoise school of management, taking refuge in one's shell and hiding because the world is just too frightening. It's almost as if the problems don't exist and if we ignore them, they will go away and when we emerge in our new world, it will all be sorted and we'll have avoided the pain.

I feel as if we're going to have to bite the bullet and face up to change in ways that we never have before; I don't know what the future will hold for the Church or for the country; all I can do is walk into the future, trusting the God who sees me and who walks with me, the God who knows the end from the beginning and let Him work His purpose out in me, in Church, in the world.

Personality or statesmanship? Style or substance?

2010-04-30T15:54:00.004+01:00

I went to the Election hustings on Wednesday night in our Church. It was a good event; there were between 350 and 400 people there, all to hear the seven candidates standing for election in Edinburgh South West. It was organised by the Juniper Green, Currie and Balerno Community Councils and held in the Church as the only venue big enough for that size of audience. Cliff Beevers was in the chair.

Each candidate was given the opportunity to make an opening and closing statement to persuade us that we should give them our vote and there were questions. Some of the questions were probing, some were too big for people to answer in one minute; some were capable of being answered in a number of different ways and allowed the candidates not to answer at all if they were so minded. Questions about immigration, Trident, the Scottish budget, pensions and energy prices, Afghanistan, climate change and the way we elect our government were all asked and answered by each candidate in turn. There was even some heckling from the floor.

To keep interested, I started giving people marks out of 3. (I got this from a friend of mine who used to do it for speakers at our Christian Union group, except that Peter gave marks for content, style, illustrations, humour etc.) My marking had nothing to do with the content of what the candidates said, but was merely a style mark. I won't tell you how they all scored; for some it would be embarrassing, but I was impressed by some and very unimpressed by others. I was impressed by some in some of their contributions, but not in other ways.

The personality vote had to go to Colin Fox, the Scottish Socialist Party candidate. Of all of them, he was the most relaxed and offered the most humour; I've little doubt that he will have won himself some votes after that performance.

On the other hand, the statesman vote has to go to Alistair Darling. He was composed throughout and his answers were very professionally given; nothing seemed to throw him off track, unlike some of the others.

Please don't think there are clues here to my voting intentions next Thursday - there may be, but there may not be!

Which is more important - style or substance? Personality or statesmanship? You have to decide on that for yourself.

So much of what we debate in Churches is about style, about the way we do things. There is a pressure to adopt a particular style of music and worship, or we complain about the style (or lack of it) of the minister's preaching, or the way someone goes about things. Often, churches fall out over the question of style and personality, when in fact substance matters far more!

it would be good to have both substance and style, so that we offer the words of eternal life in a really attractive way; now, how do we do that?

Better together!

2010-04-16T15:22:00.002+01:00

This blog is the product of a number of events that have taken place this week and have caused me to reflect on the real nature of the Church. Two families have been bereaved this week, one with a lady of 76 who had lived life to the full, the other a 3-year old girl who was full of enthusiasm for life; watching the families react and the Church react to these situations is part of my reflection. In our Church Wednesday Bible Study we looked at Acts 18 and the ministry of Priscilla and Aquila, a couple who were Paul's friends and who worked alongside him, looking after him, helping others quietly.

We are Church who:

worship together
pray together
laugh together
cry together
learn together
make decisions together
have cups of tea together
walk together
play together
discuss the Bible together
look after our buildings together
do the garden together
clean the halls together
care for and look after one another together
serve the community together
have conversations about all sorts of things together
support one another when life is hard
celebrate together
travel to Cambodia together

So often, people see Church as 'what I can get' and it is an individual thing; if Church doesn't satisfy me I either stop coming or move on to a new one that will give me what I want. Yes, it is true that each one of us has our own individual relationship with God for which we alone are responsible; but the most important word in that list is 'together'. We are brought together by Christ and by the faith we share, and we then have to give that bond some flesh and bones in the way that we live and behave. Sadly Christians also have a name for falling out together and fighting and being in conflict together.

How do we get this right? What do we have to do to nurture this life together? Surely it is better together, even if more difficult. How do we make it work?

When we stop listening...?

2010-03-26T15:58:00.002Z

Does the Bible frighten you? It frightens me at times! Some people are frightened by the Bible and reading it and studying it with other people because they think they'll show how little they understand it. I'm not frightened by the bits I don't understand; I'm frightened (at times!) by the bits I do understand. Maybe 'frightened' isn't the right word, but disturbed certainly is, and challenged!

At Church Wednesday this week, we were looking at Acts 15, the story of the Council of Jerusalem, when the apostles and others had a bit issue to resolve - how does someone become a Christian and become part of the Church? For faith in Jesus, by the grace of God, on the one hand or by being circumcised? They had to resolve this conflict, these two views, because the Church couldn't have both. In the end, they decided that by for faith, by grace, was enough and that has been the good news ever since.

It was the process by which they arrived at that decision that fascinated me. The Church listened to one another, to those who had one opinion and to those who had the other opinion. Then they listened to the Bible and what it had to say. Then they made their wise decision.

One question that we had no time to tackle, but is fascinating, is 'what happens when Christians stop listening to one another?' I've seen it happen: there are people in Edinburgh Presbytery, who when they stand up to speak, you can see others switch off; on principle they will not listen to this person because 'he has nothing good to say'. I've detected at times elsewhere too, when someone is speaking, others are not listening and they betray that by either repeating almost word for word what has just been said, or by totally ignoring the previous contribution to the discussion.

The result is that we adopt 'positions'; we think we know what others have said, but in fact we've got it wrong. It's more of a recipe for conflict than for conciliation.

I have a colleague who, when he was Moderator of Caithness Presbytery, used to make a great show of consulting the Clerk about something in the middle of someone else's speech. I'm convinced it was all show, but it used to annoy me intensely because it was obvious that he wasn't listening to the debate. If nothing else, it was totally impolite.

I don't have a worked-out answer to this issue, but it really is very simple. We need to listen to one another properly; no 'bull-in-the-chinashop' kinds of behaviour.

We've not even begun to talk about reading body language....

Here's another question - what happens when we stop listening to God?

Creativity, Energy, Achievement

2010-03-12T16:00:00.002Z

On last Sunday afternoon, I was standing at the corner of Belmont Road and Baberton Avenue at 2pm. My wife and I, along with a good number of other people, had gone to the unveiling of the new Juniper Green standing stone. It was unveiled by the two youngest primary 1 pupils from Juniper Green School and two slightly older former pupils of the school. Alison Sheridan from the National Museum of Scotland spoke and the whole event was conducted by Cliff Beevers. If you've not seen the stone yet, it is well worth a look.

http://news.scotsman.com/education/Monument-to-4000-years-of.6134749.jp for more details!

The monument is a legacy of the very successful Juniper Green 300 project that happened in 2007. This year-long project told so much of the history of Juniper Green over the last 300 years, drawing people from all over the world to participate. At the end of 2007, a lasting memorial to the village was suggested and last Sunday was the climax of that whole process.

I occasionally attended the meetings of the steering group. I don't think I've ever come across a group of people with more ideas; they sat round the table simply being creative, imagining ideas and suggesting activities by the barrow-load. Remarkably, most of these ideas were done. not only was this group creative in generating ideas, but they also followed them through and achieved a significant number of them. "Can't do that" didn't often appear in their discussions. I don't think I've ever come across such a "can-do" attitude anywhere else. It was time-limited, only for one year, but nevertheless...

In a similar vein, Girlguiding celebrates 100 years this year. Here's another group of people with huge ideas and putting so many into practice: the launch at the Scottish Parliament, having walked down the Royal Mile in procession; a giant Hoe-down at Ingliston a couple of weeks ago with girls from all over Scotland; the Brownies are taking over Edinburgh Castle in May; some leaders are taking part in the Caledonian Challenge on the West Highland Way; etc; etc; etc. Again, here is a group of people with lots of creativity and energy, who will achieve so much for the girls and their organisation in 2010. It all finishes at 2010 on October 20th this year.

Churches need people with creative new ideas; society needs leaders who are creative and full of energy. They need to be applauded and encouraged; without creative people, full of energy, our lives would be poorer and we would achieve far less!

Aren't Snowdrops wonderful?!

2010-03-05T15:59:00.003Z

We have some snowdrops in the garden and, to be honest, they are just about the only colour there is other than brown and a sort of washed-out green! They came up and out just before the last lump of snow and are growing through ground that is almost rock-hard! Yet there they are, year after year, in the same place; they're almost impossible to kill! Snowdrops are even a tourist attraction: there is a snowdrop trail, gardens that you can visit at this time of year to admire the snowdrops; Cambo, near St Andrews even has the snowdrops lit up at night so that you can keep visiting after dark.

I think I admire the resilience of the snowdrop. It is such a small flower, but it comes up through frozen ground, at a time of year when every other plant wants to hibernate, in weather conditions that make me want to hibernate! They are battered by the wind, squashed by the snow, attacked by the frost and the rain. Yet they still survive to flower and grow. Remarkable resilience for such a small and delicate-looking flower.

Jesus might have said "the kingdom of heaven is like the snowdrop which, though battered and bruised, still stands, grows and develops." If he had said that, then we'd be trying to understand the parable. People of faith need to be resilient! That would be the very simple message of that parable. People of faith need to stand strong and true under some very difficult circumstances. Some of the most resilient people look frail and have the most difficult lives, but they remain unmoved. Inspirational!

Where does our resilience come from?

Some are by nature people who just take everything in their stride; we might describe them as phlegmatic, or laid-back, but nothing seems to bother them, or shake them. They are just like that.

Others have learned to be resilient from experience. Life has dealt them so many blows that they have learned how to handle them; it's tough going, but they have learned to survive and remain strong.

Some take their resilience from other people, being part of a family, or a community of faith in the Church, or from friends that they meet in other places. By being loved and supported by others, they become resilient.

Ultimately, our resilience comes from Jesus. This works in 2 ways: first of all, we have the example of His own life, His resilience in enduring suffering and death for the cause of our salvation, so we see that he endured and take inspiration from that; secondly, because he endured, He is able to help us endure and the power that was at work in Him in also at work in us.

"Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." (Hebrews 12:2)

Why Mark McGhee is just SO wrong!

2010-02-19T15:47:00.002Z

For those of you who are not football fans, Mark McGhee is the manager of Aberdeen FC. On Tuesday evening, Aberdeen were beaten 1-0 by Raith Rovers, a team from the lower division, and so were knocked out of the Scottish Cup. The game took place in Aberdeen. After the match, the Aberdeen fans were so angry with their team and the manager that, as he walked from the dugout at the side of the pitch to the dressing room, he had scarves thrown at him in disgust and worst of all, he was spat on by some of the fans.

On Wednesday morning, he was quoted in the newspapers saying that the fans were quite right to spit on him and that he and his team deserved all that they got from the fans. I can only imagine that he was trying to prove to the fans that he was on their side, or that he shared their dismay at the performance of the team. I think he is SO wrong to say such a thing.

Why do I think he was wrong? Supporting a football team is a traumatic business and every fan has a view on the way in which the team should play. Every fan has favourite players and thinks the manager should pick these players for every match. Every fan has a view on the way in which the club they support should be run. There are times when every fan thinks that he or she could do a better job than the present manager.

But here's 2 things. First of all, while every fan might have a view, not every fan has the ability to be the manager of a football team; not every fan has the relevant coaching badges and certificates, nor the requisite skills and experience to manage a football club. Secondly, when pushed and in a calmer moment, none of these fans would want the job; they know that it is a thankless task; they know you'll never please everyone; so while they will voice their opinion, they would not wish themselves in the manager's chair.

This is probably the only thing that I share with Mark McGhee. Everyone has a view on how I should do my job. Let me give two examples, one from my previous charge and one from my present one, but a few years ago. A situation had arisen that the Kirk Session needed to deal with urgently; I had been on holiday and a proposed course of action had begun to be pursued in my absence. It was the only practical course of action open to us, but at the Session meeting called to discuss the issue, I was told that if I pursued this course of action (and for some reason it was my course of action and the consequences would be my fault), then people would leave the Church and others would be seriously offended. We took the course of action, no-one was offended, nobody left the Church; but did anyone come to apologise for their accusations and insinuations?

One Sunday, during coffee at Church, I was almost literally pinned to the wall by someone who thought I was doing my job in quite the wrong way. I was told that people were going to leave the Church unless we did this, that and the other and it was terrible that I was not doing things in the way that I should. I was left speechless. People have not left Juniper Green Church in droves, as was prophesied; (a few have and that is always a source of dismay) but indeed people have come to join Juniper Green Church because they like what they find here.

Mark McGhee is a genuine man who is trying to do his best for Aberdeen FC and for that he should be treated with respect; no-one deserved to be spat upon, no matter how vigorously you disagree with him. I wouldn't want his job!

Everyone has an opinion about the way Church should be; I accept that. Someone said to me, nearly 30 years ago now, "Don't try to please everyone; Jesus couldn't do it, so you've no chance!" It's hard to live up to that at times, but...

It seemed a good idea at the time!

2010-02-12T16:28:00.003Z

I spent most of last Saturday in Hamilton. I know, not particularly attractive, but we went to Hamilton College for the Tearfund Transform's Orientation Day for our trip to Cambodia in the summer. It was staffed jointly by Joy James who came up from London specially and Fiona Morrison, one of the new Tearfund staff in Glasgow; they were excellent. There were lots of positive things to come from the day:

our team got to know each other just a little bit better, as you do when you have to build a tower from newspaper (and ours was still standing at the end of the day!);
we learned a bit more about the trip and what it will involve and the issues that we need to face (mind you, we have to balance all of that health information - these are all the things that you might catch - with the knowledge that 90% of it you will never need);
we all became just a little more excited about the prospect of the trip.

It was arranged for Hamilton College (an independent Christian school) because there is a larger group from the school doing a similar Transform trip in the summer; they are going to Burkina Faso. So, 8 of us arrived for the day, and 15 pupils from the 6th year in the school with 4 adults. Tearfund wanted us to share the day because it meant one day, presenting the same material to two groups; it would save time. Yes it would! Yes, it did!

Today, they sent an evaluation form to us; what did we think of the day? Good marks for the material and for the presenter. Best question on the form: "what would have made the day a 10?" (I rated it 8!) Our small group seemed to be swamped by the others, and the school pupils weren't really interested in listening to us when we were contributing to plenary discussion, talking over us and plainly being rude. So what had seemed a good idea at the time because it would be the more economical use of resources, actually didn't work for us for a number of reasons, in my view.

What do we do with that? I hope Transform will learn from that and do it differently the next time they have 2 groups like these.

In Church, we often do things that seem like a good idea at the time, but for some reason don't quite work in the way we had hoped. Or we start something off that is a good idea for a time, but after a number of years has lost its 'good-idea' status. What do we do? Churches are really not very good at evaluating honestly: we keep something going for sentimental reasons or because someone would be offended when the group or the activity has long lost it reason for being. We even, would you believe, keep doing things in a particular way when it has been proved time and again not to work - it might come right the next time!

Why do churches find it so difficult to do honest evaluation of groups and activities and if it doesn't work, either drop it or fix it? Does Jesus notion of shaking the dust from our feet have something to teach us?

PS, put March 10th in your diary; we are holding the Church AGM on that evening; it will have a new look to it, with a financial report delivered by the treasurer; a new beefed-up annual report by the minister; an open forum session when anyone can ask a question about any part of Church life and get an answer; and a time for some of the team going to Cambodia to speak about their hopes and aspirations and fears. Exciting! Do come!

Two simple thoughts

2010-01-29T15:49:00.002Z

I have no great wisdom to offer this week (some may say that I have no great wisdom to offer on any week, but that is a matter of opinion); just two simple bible verses that tell us something of God.

The first is this: "You are the God who sees me!" Hagar says this in Genesis 16:13. She is a slave-girl who is pregnant with her master's (Abram's) child and has been rounded ill-treated by his wife, her mistress, Sara. She runs away from home, is hiding in the desert and then becomes aware that God is with her in the black hole that is her life. He is the God who sees her and who, by implication, hears her cries and answers her.

The second comes from Psalm 3. The title at the head of the Psalm connects it to one of David's most difficult times, the fall-out with his son Absalom when he tried to make himself king in his father's place. David describes God as his shield and then: "you are my glory and the One who lifts my head" (Psalm 3:3) His head is down, his confidence shattered, his heart broken; God is the One who lifts his head and gives him back all that he has lost.

God sees our predicaments (do we think that He doesn't?) and comes to us to help and heal us. God is the One who lifts our heads by reminding us that we are His dearly loved children, who mean so much to Him. He sees us so much and He loves us so much that He gave Jesus; His love is profoundly cross-shaped.

Getting the message

2010-01-22T16:27:00.002Z

I had a curious experience yesterday, shared with others I later discovered. I had been out all morning and came back home in the middle of the afternoon. When I sat down at my computer, I found a list of e-mails from myself. It seemed a bit strange; I looked more closely. I had 63 e-mails, all from my own address, that had somehow come back home. Some of these dated back to 2005; the most recent was sent just before Christmas; there was no rhyme or reason to them; they were all to different people, different addresses, different providers.

I've since spoken to two other people who have blueyonder addresses and they had the same thing happen to them, one with fewer, the other with three times as many as me.

It was something that I'd never come across before and I don;'t really understand why it should have happened now; we wondered whether Virgin are clearing out some cyber-filing cabinet and getting rid of 'stuff' or what; any ideas?

What it did set me wondering was this: did these e-mails ever arrive at their destination? Have they been sitting in cyber-space for years waiting to go home, trying to get to their destination, but going nowhere? If you expected an e-mail from me sometime in the last 5 years and didn't get it, I now have an excuse! As Elvis said: they've been returned to sender.

We tell people things, but do they actually get the message. Over the years, we have made changes to some quite fundamental parts of Church life and as far as I'm concerned, these changes have been explained over and over again, clearly and simply, and people have 'got the message'. Then someone will say something that reveals that evidently they have not got the message at all.

We have two responsibilities: the first is to communicate, to speak, to tell people what we think, what we need, to0 tell people the gospel and to speak clearly and humbly, with words full of grace and love.

The second is to listen, to engage properly with what other people are saying so that we hear what they say. Sometimes we don't want to hear and so we don't listen at all and we pretend we've got the message or complain that we were never told. It seems that listening is harder than speaking, but its the only way we'll get the message.

Beginning as we mean to go on!

2010-01-08T16:11:00.002Z

Happy New Year to all our readers! I hope that 2010 is a year full of God's grace and peace in your lives, full of God's blessing for you, for Church, for the world.

This week, I have been at Crieff. Every January there is a conference in Crieff Hydro, a fellowship of ministers who meet to listen to a couple of speakers and to share and pray together. There were 5 set-piece sessions, talks from our two speakers, Ted Donnelly a Professor of New Testament studies in Northern Ireland, and Dick Dowsett who works with the Overseas Missionary Fellowship.

But it's actually a comment from someone else that sticks in my mind. In the evenings, we hear from people in Christian ministry across the world and one of those contributions came from Lindsay Ferguson, a geologist by training who now works in the administration of Perth Bible College (Australia). She was describing a Church that she went to in Liverpool, when she first left Scotland; she became part of that Church because "they love me well" she said. That phrase stuck in my mind - "they loved me well". She described how they cared for her, made her feel welcome, accepted her as she was, and so on.

There are certain individuals who stick in my mind from our Church over Christmas:

the little girl who took part in the nativity play with great gusto (they all did, but she did so perhaps more than the rest)
the teenager who decided to come to Church for the first time in years on the Sunday between Christmas and New Year
the man and woman who came (individually and separately) to Church for a couple of the services as a result of the Christmas cards we delivered
the gang of people who came into Church all together last Sunday, having ploughed their way through the snow.

What do we do with these first 3 examples? There is a great temptation in Churches to make them conform to our patterns, inherited and traditional, and to love and accept them only and when they conform. Much better to "love them well" for who they are and accept them for who they are and make them feel part of our Church family.

PS: Church Wednesday is planned to begin again this Wednesday at 7pm with the Prayer Time and Bible Study at 7.30pm. The weather may change that plan, but I'll circulate an e-mail if it is cancelled.

A Merry Christmas to all our readers!

2009-12-18T16:09:00.002Z

I've spent the week doing Christmas things; here are some highlights.

Monday night was spent at Currie High School watching Ebenezer, a musical version of the story of Scrooge. It was an excellent production, with lots of children taking part, lots of enthusiasm and talent and a very good story. You know the end of the story in the original Dickens "it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well..."

On Tuesday morning, I had my annual visit to the Open Door Cafe, the Church mother and toddler group. I'm too young to be Santa, so I go to be his little helper and hand out the presents which the mums put in the sack for their children. It's great to be there and chat over a cup of coffee. One little girl, when it was her turn to come for her present, just stood there, not sure what to make of the man in the strange tie and bright red hat!

Wednesday was nativity day, 2 of them in the Primary school. The first was acted out by the Nursery and the lead part was delivered with great energy by the little girl playing the Whoops-a-daisy angel. The second was performed by primaries 1-3 and was fantastically well put together and acted out. My toes were under threat, sitting in the front row, from a very enthusiastic lamb, hopping about and we took our hats off to the P1 boy who just sang his heart out, even if completely out of tune!

Thursday was the Guild of Friendship Lessons and Carols service, with carols to sing (though I had no singing voice on Thursday!) and Bible readings and a little poetry. The ladies thoroughly enjoyed their afternoon and each brought a present for the sack so that everyone had something to take home with them; what a great way of showing a sense of belonging together and support for one another.

In the midst of all of this, I was sharing the lead in an assembly at Currie High School for the whole of first and second years, some 360 children, hearing what Christmas is all about; they might not all understand and fewer will believe, perhaps, but they have all heard the gospel.

This is just fantastic; and there's more to come; Church nativity play on Sunday morning; lessons and carols in the evening, with a little bit of a surprise that I've prepared; and on it goes. What a great chance to meet and talk to people and build relationships; what a great opportunity to tell lots of people the story of Jesus.

Just make sure that you find some space to remember Jesus: "To us a child is born..."

I wouldn't start from here!

2009-12-04T13:06:00.002Z

You know the old joke: the visitor to Dublin is lost. He is trying to find his way to Croke Park for the rugby match, but can't see it anywhere. So he stops someone in the street and says "can you tell me how to find Croke Park?" Famously, the local worthy replies "Oh, if I was going to Croke Park, I wouldn't start from here!"

What are your hopes and aspirations for life? We all have them and some are more ambitious than others; some of us perhaps long to have a particular job, all we've ever really wanted to do, but have not achieved that yet. Others' ambitions are for your family or for other personal goals and targets that you want achieve in life. Some have hopes and aspirations for Church life and anyone who is in Church leadership of any kind should have hopes and aspirations for Church life.

No matter how high and grand your ambitions are for yourself, for others, for Church, here is the very simple thought behind this blog today. We have to start where we are. That might be stating the obvious and if you're going away shaking your head, disappointed that there's nothing more profound than that, sorry! But the truth is, we need to start where we are. It's no use wishing that we could start somewhere else; it's no use wishing that somehow we could turn the clock back to the way life was before, or turn the clock forward a few months to have another starting place because we are faced with some hard choices now.

We have to start where we are. That means we start to fulfil our ambitions in the circumstances in which we find ourselves today; that we make choices and decisions in these present circumstances; that we work with the skills and talents and abilities that we now have, even if we want to learn new ones in the future; that we make the best use of our present resources rather than wishing we were millionaires!

In developing Church life, we have to fulfil our hopes and aspirations from where we are on Dec 4th 2009. The challenge for us is to make the best use of the resources (people, finance and building) that we have and make choices and decisions based on this starting point.

Where these choices and decisions will lead you, will lead us as Church, I don't know, but God will guide you and will honour these steps we make in faith.

what would you miss?

2009-11-27T15:15:00.002Z

It's strange, having been writing this blog now for over a year, to see what makes you comment. There are some subjects that I tackle that I think are bound to arouse comment from you, dear readers, but then there's nothing; not a squeak; silence! Other times, I think that what I've written might be fairly ordinary and bland and, lo and behold, you are roused to take to the computer keyboard. What will today be like?

A few weeks ago I went to Perth to meet a consultant (no, nothing medical). He is a business consultant who has been employed by the Church's Mission and Discipleship Council to do a stringent review of their work. I was identified as a 'non-user', someone who had never used the services of the regional development team, or any of their material. They wanted to know why!

The consultant had a whole list of questions to ask; there were two of us in the room with him and we tried to answer his questions as well as we could. His last question sticks in my mind: 'If the Mission and Discipleship Council disappeared tomorrow, would you notice?' Sadly for them, the answer we both gave was a resounding 'No!'

That set me thinking: in Church, what would you miss if it wasn't there?

the building? we're very attached to our church buildings; this is the place where we meet God, where we've worshipped for generations, our parents and grandparents before us; we can't worship God without a building, surely!
the minister? we know he's not perfect; his sermons are far too long; we sometimes don't understand what he's on about; why does he have to initiate so many changes? But we can't do without him or someone like him.
the organ? the organist? what an instrument! It gives a great sound, especially when so well played! How can we sing properly without an organ; it's been there for generations.
the hymnbook? Singing has to be done to the book, surely! How can we worship without a hymnbook; it just won't work!
Something else?

What would you miss? Use your imagination; what, if it disappeared tomorrow, would you really miss about Church life?

Community rules OK!

2009-11-13T15:56:00.002Z

This week coming up sees the first meeting of the new Juniper Green Community Council, some 302 years to the day after the first record of Juniper Green in the records of Colinton Kirk Session. The new council will deal with the communities of Juniper Green and Baberton Mains and will provide a forum for issues affecting our communities to be aired and dealt with. Enough people volunteered their time and energy to make the Council viable, though not enough to make an election necessary. The Council needs the support of all who live in the area; its greatest challenge might be to inspire people to be interested and involved.

I had a conversation yesterday with a couple who live in another part of the city, nearer the centre, in one of these new developments full of flats. They have friends who live here and often come out to walk on the Water of Leith walkway. Their impression of Juniper Green is of a place that has a sense of community, much more so than the place where they stay. They are impressed by that.

Our parish includes two communities, the village of Juniper Green and the housing estate of Baberton Mains; these are two very different kinds of community; as Church for these communities, we need to understand each of them, respect each and work hard to be church for each of them.

By no means the only measure of a community, but one of the most obvious differences between Juniper Green and Baberton Mains, is meeting places. Juniper Green is full of meeting places: people meet in the shops, the hairdressers, even the pubs and in these meeting places relationships are formed or nurtured and fostered. The Church and the village hall would fall into these categories as well, as meeting places for people to talk and interact. Community needs meeting places!

By contrast, Baberton Mains has no meeting places; well, perhaps not strictly true, since the school probably bridges the two communities and has one foot in Baberton Mains. That apart, there are no shops, no pubs, no meeting places of any kind for chance, casual encounters. Two weeks ago, I had someone to visit at the bottom of the estate and walked down; it was mid-morning and in a 12-minute walk I met 4 people, 2 of whom were postmen! Most people had gone to work, perhaps or the shops; there are not many casual encounters. This is not the fault of the people who live in Baberton Mains; blame the people who planned and built the estate.

However, if community is important for people, how do we create these meeting places? How do we create them within the Church, for the benefit of the people of the Church? How do we tap into them in our community? How do we help create them when none exist?

A fine line!

2009-10-16T12:05:00.004+01:00

I had the curious experience last week of a title for a sermon that confused people! For the evening service I gave my sermon the title "Just relax! It's fine!" I did it deliberately. I wanted to find something that summed up Amos 6, but that also made people think! It was quoted back to me before the morning service as apiece of advice when I was feeling nervous, being taken at face value. Someone else came along wondering what it was all about, intrigued by the title.

"Just relax. It's fine!" On the face of it, this is an expression of peace and confidence. "Everything will turn out well; God is in His heaven and all's well with the world. Don't worry!" How good it is to have that kind of confidence in God, to be able to trust Him implicitly with every aspect of life and faith, to trust Him to be at work in His Church and for Him to have His people in His hands for our safety and well-being. I know lots of people for whom that kind of confidence is a pipe-dream, but were they to find it, what peace it would bring to their lives!

In fact, that's not what Amos 6 is about; so that's not what the sermon was about. Amos 6 is all about complacency; it is about a people who were relaxed and living a life of luxury for themselves while the poor are being down-trodden; their worship is a cause of sin; their attitudes are full of injustice; God has sent His prophet to call them to repentance and they are ignoring him, because everything is fine! Just relax; there's no need to repent! That's quite a different attitude. This is no longer a trusting confidence in God, but a blind ignoring of God and His Word.

How fine is the line between these two very different attitudes. There is not a million miles between these two contrasting views of life and faith; yet in reality they are poles apart.

When I came to Juniper Green some nine years ago, lots of people told me how great this congregation is. Despite all the history of conflict, there were people who recognised that the congregation had achieved a lot and had an enormous amount going for it. Last week , at the Kirk Session meeting, the elders heard from a number of groups doing children's work and other kids of service and they were all saying the same thing - we need more people to help with our work, new people who are willing to take on new responsibilities. There is a fine line between celebrating good things with glad confidence and then finding ourselves in a pickle of bother.

As a church, we can't sit back and bask in past glories; we have to keep pressing on for the future, so that the light of Christ continues to burn. I met someone at a wedding recently who is an elder in a Church in the city whose minister has just retired. She felt this was the death knell for their church because they would never find another minister in the current climate. She's not altogether right, but for the first time, she and her fellow-elders in a big, prosperous, comfortable Church had been shaken out of, perhaps, a sense of complacency.

"One thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 3:13,14)

Apply that to your life; apply that to your Church.

Be kinder than necessary!

2009-10-09T15:44:00.002+01:00

The title of today's blog comes from Scripture Union's Word Live website; I use this website for my daily Bible reading at the moment; there are some written pieces, as you might expect, but also some pictures and audio clips, as well as worship songs to help us reflect on the bible passage that we've read. (http://www.scriptureunion.org.uk/2981.id)

Over the last three weeks, the main UK political parties have held their party conferences, all of them aware that before the next one there will be a General Election. (The SNP conference will be held in the next two weeks, I would imagine!) So, if you've been paying attention, you might have formed an opinion, or judgement, on the relative merits of each party leader, the three main candidates for the job of Prime Minister; they are all hoping that you and I will be kind to them and vote for their party when the General Election comes around. They expect that people will make judgements about them and that they will even feature on the front pages of the newspapers and the editorial columns; indeed there are some politicians, you feel, would be disappointed not to be on the front pages.

We also make similar judgements about other people, one another. I'm constantly amazed at how scathing Christians can be of one another and how disbelieving. We form judgements of one another without really knowing all of the facts. So this quote: "Be kinder than necessary" and it goes on "for everyone is fighting some kind of battle!"

We can be very critical of people who don't come to Church as often as they once did, but do we know the struggles of their lives? Or of people who drift away from the faith and blame them for their backsliding, but do we ever stop to try to find out the reason for their drift? What struggles are they facing? You might take time to look at the comments on my last blog and see one reaction to what I said then; it might be sad and depressing to think that Christians behave in that way, but it is surely true. The General Assembly of 2008 commended a huge report on Conflict in the Church; some scoffed and said surely that's not real; but it is all too real, I'm sad to say.

The natural human instinct in our relationships with other people is the Old Testament version: "an eye for an eye" - getting our own back! Again the Word Live website: "an eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind!"

"Be kinder than necessary" is not the way any bible text expresses our relationships with other people, but it surely captures the essence of the command to "love your neighbour as yourself". We're very good doing what is just necessary and no more.

So next time you are about to be critical of someone:

a politician, a city councillor, a member of the proposed new community council - an ordinary person like you trying to do their job to the best of their ability.
a leader of the Church, minister or elder - an ordinary person, whom God has called to be your leader and who is trying be what God wants him or her to be, to the best of his or her ability.
a Church court (Kirk Session, presbytery, General Assembly) - made up of ordinary people like you and me, wrestling with big issues, trying to decide to the best of their ability.

Then "be kinder than necessary for everyone is fighting some kind of battle" of which you probably know nothing!

The spider's web - your network?

2009-09-25T15:43:00.003+01:00

Saturday morning two weeks ago, I took the photo that is here. It was just inside my gate, attached to the gate and the hedge. The sun was shining through it and, well, we cheated a little by spraying it with water to make it more photogenic; you can see it better. What I hadn't realised till I started snapping away, was that the spider was in the middle of the web, having its breakfast. It's a very clever piece of construction, a spider's web; it looks so fine and fragile, as if it would be blown away by the softest zephyr, but its actually tough stuff; how many connections are there on this web? I haven't counted them, but it must be a big number. Every joint is a connection that goes in 4 directions and the joint at the bottom left of the web is connected, even remotely, to the joint at the top right.

There are all kinds of ways in which we could develop this idea, but here are 2 thoughts. First of all, we are all part of a network of other people; in fact there is a network of which we are at the centre. There are people that we know from a whole lot of different contexts: family members, friends, people at work, former school mates, people we know from Church, the people we live beside, people we meet at the school gate when collecting our children or grandchildren; and others. These people form the spider's web of which we are the centre and every person we know forms a connecting point; they may not know each other, but they connect through you. The mission challenge we face as Christians is to allow the gospel to flow along these connections, so that the people we know, from wherever we know them, find out something of Jesus from us. So often, Christians have kept their Christian network separate from all the other parts of the web, for fear that these others would contaminate our faith, but by being separate, we have prevented the flow of the gospel outwards along these connections to the other parts of our network of connections.

Secondly, I have been challenged of late to see Church more like this. People often say to me that my life must be an endless round of meetings and to some extent it is. The word 'meeting' has got so much baggage associated with it, as if these are events we have to attend and they are boring! In actual fact, a meeting is just that, a coming together of people, meeting in one place for a purpose. Church Wednesday has been running now for 3 weeks (see the website http://www.jgpc.org.uk/ for details) and we now have a meeting for prayer and another for Bible Study; using the same idea, but twisting it slightly, we have had 15 or 16 people coming together in one place to pray together and slightly more coming to meet together to study the Bible together. These are opportunities for people to meet in the same place at the same time, to do the same thing and I hope that you can see how different my second description of these events is from simply describing it as a 'meeting' that I have to attend.

Every time the Church meets, we are a network of people coming together for a common purpose. Some examples:

A Kirk Session meeting - a group of people who come together to exercise leadership on behalf of the whole Church.

A service of worship - the place where the Church of all ages comes together to worship God by singing together, praying together, listening together for God's word.

A meeting of the Guild of Friendship (or any other group within the Church) - a coming together of a particular network of people who share a common interest and who want to spend time together.

Our task is to strengthen the networks of which we are a part, to treat other people (the connections) with respect and love, and to let the gospel of God's grace in Jesus flow along these connections to encourage the Christians and to expose our non-Christian friends to Jesus.

I have found this notion has almost transformed the way that I view my diary; I'm trying to remember that every entry there is an encounter in which God can be at work and in which His grace can touch me or someone else. Try it; see how you get on with your network.

We have a choice!

2009-09-04T15:04:00.002+01:00

Have you been following the controversy created by STV? I know, there are probably several controversies created by STV, but the one I mean is this: Scottish Television has chosen to opt out of ITV1 schedules for lots of popular drama programmes. Are you a fan of The Bill? You now have to watch it on ITV4 at 11pm on Monday night because STV refuses to show it at its normal broadcast slot on ITV1. We are denied Lewis, Midsomer Murders, Kingdom and any number of other drama programmes in favour of ... Well, they say, in favour of new Scottish drama, but the reality is, in favour of old repeats and well-worn movies and documentaries. We are denied the choice!

The residents of Juniper Green and Baberton Mains are about to be given the choice - who will represent us on a brand new Community Council. There is a process already in motion to find names and nominations of people who would be willing to stand for election to the Community Council, so that we can take more of an interest our community affairs. I, for one, would hope that this new initiative will not founder for lack of support! You have the choice, now; don't lose it.

Over the next year we will be able to listen to our eminent parliamentarians at Holyrood discussing whether we should be given the choice in a referendum about independence. There are options: will it be a straight 'yes' or 'no' to independence; or will it be a multi-option vote and you can tick your preference; or will the question be so obscure that you're not entirely sure what you're voting for? Knowing government, the last is the most likely. You will be given a choice of some description.

We make choices every day: will I use the bus or the car today? Which will be more convenient? Will we have sausages or mince for tea? Most of the choices we make are not life-changing choices; they merely affect how our life will be today. Yet, we exercise choices time and time again.

Church is full of choices. Look at the comments made on my blog a couple of weeks ago and you will see that some people prefer one kind of option in worship and someone else says something else. It's not always possible to accommodate both options in one event. So we try to provide options, choices. The evening service provides an opportunity for worship that is different from the morning service; some like it, others don't; most have never tried it! Church Wednesday is an opportunity for people to pray together and study the Bible together - this is not about ticking a box to say 'we have this in our programme', but is about giving people a significant opportunity to grow in faith and to get to know other people better. Some will love it and enjoy it; others will not, I suspect; but it will be a shame if you write it off without trying it!

Moses once faced his people with a huge choice: would they love God and follow His ways, or would they ignore God and go their own way? This is a life-changing choice.

"Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life." (Deuteronomy 30:19,20)

They, you or we?

2009-08-28T13:32:00.004+01:00

Hands up those who're glad they were not in Kenny MacAskill's shoes last week? I'm certainly glad that I didn't have to make the decision about Abdel Basset al-Megrahi and Gordon Brown demonstrated his desire to keep the decision at arm's length from his desk. 'They' made that decision; it was someone else's responsibility.

Who decided that trams would be a good idea for Edinburgh? Again, we pass the buck; it was 'their' decisions and we're not even sure at times who 'they' are. All we know is that it was not our decision and is we had been in charge it would have been done differently!

Who got us into the financial mess that the world is in? We point the finger at some faceless group of individuals and blame them for the choices they made that put us into the situation in which we now find ourselves.

The people of Kilmarnock are pointing the finger at the moment at the management of Diageo for 'their' decision to remove funding from the Johnnie Walker plant in the town, except they know where to go to stick the blame.

But this becomes personal - it is 'your' decision. If you were given the chance to talk to Kenny MacAskill about his last week, we would talk to him about 'your' decision and if we think he was wrong, that becomes an accusation. "Why did you make your decision?" We know where the blame/responsibility lies and we make it obvious. It is not our responsibility, but we blame you for the way in which you exercised yours!

"We" is a group word. It says something about shared responsibility. The people of Juniper Green and Baberton Mains will have the opportunity, in the next few weeks, to exercise something of that shared responsibility for our community with the proposal to form a community council. It would be a real shame if this were to founder for a lack of support, that we are not prepared to take on some responsibility for our community.

"They", "You" or "we"? All of these are found in Church. There are lots of people who blame 'the Church' for things they don't like in the Church - it is 'their' fault, but they are never quite sure who 'they' are. I've had people talk to me about things in church and say 'you' did this or that and for them it is my responsibility or fault. The Church is meant to be a community of people who belong together and who share some sense of responsibility for the health and well-being of the Church - for church like that, the best word to use is "we".

"We" is a word that suggests we are in this together, that we share the responsibility for Church or the community, or the world. 'They' passes the buck; 'you' makes it an accusation; 'we' speaks of community and togetherness and shared responsibility. I know which I prefer!

Showstoppers - the blog!

2009-08-14T16:18:00.002+01:00

Ooh! Ouch! It's Friday afternoon at the end of mission week. My legs are just about giving up after running about all week.

We've had a great week; here are some of the highlights:

48 children altogether have passed through our doors, most of them with us every day of the week.
30 children came to the parents' night and brought their parents along to watch and take part.
A team of 3o people from the Church, some of them teenagers, some slightly older, have been in the hall from 9am till 12 noon every day, Monday to Friday, to make Showstoppers work. Some are old hands at this, having been part of the team for a few years now, but for others this was an entirely new experience and they have all been brilliant.
We have told the children the stories of creation, David and Goliath, Daniel, the birth of Jesus and His death and resurrection: they have watched the stories on DVD and have taken home something each day to work on as a reminder of the story.
We did some new things this year: the children had to build a tower with 20 plastic cups - how high could they go and still have a structure that stood up and 13 was the record; as a team challenge, we had each team draw a cartoon story-board of the story of Daniel and some of the art-work was first class - there were some brilliant lions.
We learned some new songs that will become part of our repertoire for future use.

All in all it was a high-energy week and one that everyone thoroughly enjoyed.

We will never really know the impact of something like this. Immediately, the children had a fun week and so they go away seeing that Church is fun! They heard some fantastic Bible stories and we hope they remember them. But beyond that, we will never know what impact our work has had; we sow seeds in the hope and confidence that God will make these seeds grow into lasting fruit of faith and Christian character. Continue to water these seeds with your praying.

Here's my hope: "As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. " (Isaiah 55:10,11)

Power and responsibility

2009-08-14T15:51:00.003+01:00

Tram alert!! I'm going back to the trams for a moment. There's a newspaper report today that hints at the possibility of yet more delays because one of the companies wants to renegotiate their deal. The track-laying company seems to want more money to finish the job because they think they have the Council over a barrel. It may or may not be the case, but here is a business trying to use its muscle to get its own way at the expense of others, trying to use the power it thinks it has to its own advantage.

I heard a story recently (a true story) of a minister new to his or her charge, a first charge, and at some point in the first couple of weeks there was a conversation with the Session Clerk which went something like this. Session Clerk: "as long as you do what you are told, you'll be fine; but step out of line ...." The rest is not recorded and neither is the minister's reply, but the impression is clear. "Do what I tell you and you'll be fine; cross me and I'll make your life a misery!" Needless to say, the minister was advised to resist such an abuse of power.

On another scale altogether, the world has had to sit back and watch as Robert Mugabe has abused his political power time and time again. He has amassed a huge personal fortune that is probably squirrelled away in a Swiss bank while his people in Zimbabwe have grown poorer and poorer; inflation reached a massive 2 million per cent at some point last year; the people were suffering from a cholera epidemic because the water supply is needing huge investment; the elections were far from fairly conducted so that Mugabe could hold on to power.

These are obvious abuses of power; there are far more subtle ways of abusing power, either at home or in church or in other groups. we co-operate only as long as we get our own way; we make it clear what we want and will find only that option acceptable.

The other side of power is responsibility. None of the people in these examples would seem to have any sense of responsibility for their situations. Christians should live with a sense of responsibility:

for the world, to pray and work for its salvation and for the growth of God's kingdom,
for other people, to love and care for others,
for the Church, to seek its best rather than simply to get our own way,
for our family and people we love the best, people whom so often we take for granted,
for our own sense of well-being.

We have to work out for ourselves in which order we put these responsibilities; Jesus lived with all of these and more; He is our model-citizen!

We have no time to stand and stare!

2009-07-31T16:07:00.003+01:00

"What is this life if full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?"

The opening lines of a poem called Leisure by William Henry Davies. It is a bit of the idyllic rural life; the reader is urged to stand and stare at the countryside to appreciate its beauty and that's not always easy for the confirmed city-dweller. Walk along the Water of Leith and appreciate the beauty of the green space!

But there are other ways of standing and staring at important things that we tend to forget.

What about the quality of our relationships? We all meet so many people who are rushing from one thing to the next that we forget to develop and nurture the quality of our relationships with other people. The activities in which we are engaged are all probably good and laudable, but where is the time to stop and appreciate the people closest too us, rather than take them for granted.

What about our faith? When do we take time to stand and stare at God, if you see what I mean. Bible reading and prayer (if we do them at all) are often rushed, a minute before hurrying out of the door to work. Church is, even for committed Christians, sidelined in the midst of a whole range of other activities. How do we create space in a Church service simply to 'stand and stare', to be quiet and take time to be amazed all over again at God?

Jesus told us that there are two important principles never to be lost: love God and love other people. Take time this weekend to foster both of these; it will be up to you how you do it; ideas on a postcard... or the comments page...

Bibles, Bibles, Bibles!

2009-07-24T13:38:00.002+01:00

The Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow has an exhibition running that invites people to scrawl messages on the pages of the Bible. It is an exhibition about injustice and exclusion and encourages people who consider themselves excluded by the Churches or by Bible teaching to get their own back by writing angry and anti-Christian messages on the open pages of a bible. Needless to say, Christian groups are outraged. The reporter from Reporting Scotland last night asked the director of the gallery if they would have done this to the Koran; his answer was less than direct!

Over the weekend, we have also witnessed the first ferry to sail to and from Stornoway on a Sunday. For some, this was a great victory over the power of the Church to subdue the people and so Sunday is liberated from the constraints of Christian teaching. For others, this is the end of a honourable tradition of obedience to the commands of God and the Sabbath will never be the same again. Jean and I spent a Sunday in Lewis when we were on holiday: on a sunny summer Sunday, there was just nobody about; there were no children playing in the garden; the swings were padlocked and the play-areas closed for the day. I leave you to decide which of the two 'victories' you might support.

These two stories are linked in my mind because they make me think about my attitude to the bible. I love it; its teaching has changed my life; its teaching should shape my life more than it does, but that's my fault, not the fault of the Bible. I love to preach its 'unsearchable riches' because the message of the Bible brings freedom and salvation, brings liberty and fullness of life to human hearts. It bothers me that only 1 in 10 Christians in Scotland can make the time to read the Bible on a regular basis. How can we be the people God wants us to be unless we read our Bible?

But, the bible also bothers me. It bothers me because it is always asking me questions that I don't find easy to answer. It tells me that there are certain ways of living that are good and right and I would agree with that, but then it challenges me to consider those who are excluded and who are victims of injustice in the society of which I am a part. It tells me, that as a Christian, there are certain things I should hold dear and should be priorities, such as worship on Sunday, but then it shows me the figure of Jesus challenging the rules and regulations of the Pharisees, telling me that "the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath." (Mark 2:27,28)

A wise professor was addressing a group of students who were keen to have him get involved in this kind of debate about the Bible. One of the students said to him, "tell us, professor; where do you stand on the Bible?" He looked at the group and said, quite quietly, "I do not stand on the Bible; I sit under it!" That's not just a seat for theology professors; that's a seat for every Christian, to sit under the teaching of the Bible.

This year sees the bicentenary of the Scottish Bible Society. As part of their celebrations, there is a special appeal to raise money for Bibles for Brazil. Some of what we hear and read in Scotland might make us cynical about the Bible, because of the tensions and debates it causes. Yet, let's never forget, this is the book that contains the words of life for us; this is the book, whose messages changes people's lives; this is the book that shows us what God is like and what he has done for us in Jesus.

If it is not your regular habit to read the Bible, I urge you to begin; if it is your regular habit already, then I urge you to make sure that you take to heart what you read. 1 in 10 Christians in Scotland read the bible regularly; the other 9 have a Bible on the shelf gathering dust. What is your Bible doing?

Risk Taking

2009-06-12T15:40:00.003+01:00

In 2007, Simon Hoggart and Emily Marks wrote a book called Don't tell Mum - Hair-raising messages from Gap-year travellers. Amazon's website describes it thus: "where once the news of narrowly surviving a bus crash on the dirt-roads of India, waking up to gunfire in Honduras or fending off marriage proposals from complete strangers would have made it home only on the back of a slow-moving battered postcard, these days those tantalising details and terrible mistakes are now recorded immediately and distributed liberally for every friend and family member to wince at." Isn't e-mail wonderful! Are text messages grand!

This is simply the 20-something version of the child climbing a tree. What does a parent do? On the one hand, climbing a tree is an exciting thing to do when you're 5 or 6 or 7 years of age. But, parents also know that children can fall out of trees and seriously damage themselves. So do you stop the child climbing the tree and deny them a new, exciting experience of life? or do you let them climb the tree, running the risk that they might fall and hurt themselves? Of such dilemmas is parenthood made!

Don't Tell Mum is made up of messages from people travelling the world and contacting people at home. "I'm just about to go bungee-jumping off the highest bridge I've ever seen, but don't tell mum because she'll worry!" And dad won't!!!

Some people are averse to taking risks; they simply want life to be safe and predictable because they take some peace and security from that. We live in a culture that tries to avoid risk as much as possible; before teachers can take their class on a trip they have to complete a risk assessment to make sure that this trip is as safe as it can be and that any risk to the children is minimal and manageable. There is a whole industry set up now to work with businesses to help them analyse the risk of certain actions or the risk of failing to do certain things. We try to manage risk as much as we can.

One thing is true: we will never avoid taking risks. Crossing the street is taking a risk! Tony Blair, as he was coming to the end of his time as Prime Minister, said that as he looked back over his occupation of Number 10, that he wished he had taken more risks because then he might have achieved more.

Last week, we were told that the Church census that we did in March revealed that an average of just over 9,000 people in Edinburgh were in Church of Scotland congregations for worship. That is 2% of the city's population. We have been watching these statistics decline for 10 years and have done nothing about them. Now, it is time to waken up. We no lonoger have 20 years to turn the Church aorund; if we don't take some risks now, at least half of the congregations in the city won't be here in 20 years time!
I am part of an on-going discussion about the future mission of the Church in Scotland and how we continue to provide ministry for every community in the country at at time when the financial resources available are diminishing.
The same survey in March told us that 50% of our membership in Juniper Green in over 60 years of age.

It seems to me that we have two choices: we can sit back and watch as the Church fades away into the distance and dies; or we can take some risks.

What risks must we take that will allow us to build a healthy and strong church for the future? I seriously hope that we will not be looking back in 10 years time saying, 'if only we had taken the risk in 2009... but we were too scared!'

What constitutes the "tree-climbing school" of church leadership?

Inertia rules OK?

2009-06-05T15:19:00.002+01:00

Inertia - Why is it that things don't move?! We see it everywhere.

In Parliament there is widespread agreement that the expenses structure has to change. Gordon Brown even appeared on YouTube to tell us that things must change (Do you think he has ever watched anything on YouTube?) All of the parties agree that things can't go on as they are; the way in which MP's claim expenses has to change and they have told us that over and over again in the last three months. Now, having such a consensus, why has nothing been done? Why has it not changed yet? I accept that they need to get it right and to make the wrong changes could leave us with a damaging legacy, but it appears that nothing is happening at all to change things now.

I am Interim Moderator at St John's Oxgangs; Gillean Maclean left to go to become minister of a charge in Arran last September and I conducted my first Kirk Session meeting there 2 days after her induction. Presbytery then decided that the congregation had no independent future and the Deployment of resources committee was set to examine all of the other options. From that day (September 22nd) to this, we are no nearer a solution. Inertia is not quite the right word here, because there has been some action, but not much and very little of it has been productive or quick! The congregation is hurting and is left wondering what will happen next and, most of all, why no-one is coming to tell them anything.

I found this clipping a long time ago in Minister's Forum a Church of Scotland publication for ministers:
A Mission station in Central Africa had suffered from a native uprising. Buildings were destroyed and school and church were burned. The missionaries felt that they ought to inform headquarters as soon as possible, so a telegram was sent to "121." (shows the age of the story!) It read "Native rebellion. Church destroyed. School destroyed. Work at a standstill." However being good Presbyterians they thought the should add a word to show that they were not totally down-hearted. So they added two words: "God reigns." However, in the course of transmission an extra "s" crept into the last word and when the telegram arrived in Edinburgh it read "God resigns" The good folk in Edinburgh took it at its face value and decided to make an appropriate reply, and did so in the following words: "Our thoughts and prayers are with you. We regret the decision of God. However, committee will carry on."

God has not resigned or gone away; God is still at work in people's lives. That is why we have seen, over the last few months, a steady stream of new people appearing in our morning services. God is not a God of inertia but a God who is constantly doing new things. Our lives are changed, our needs are met, other people see Jesus in us and hear about Jesus from us - so God is at work in our world.

Sadly, His people are not always the same. So often, in Church, inertia sets in! There are all sorts of plans we make and promises, but nothing happens. Someone suggested to me that there is an attitude in Churches that thinks "We've had a meeting about this; we've decided to do x,y and z; that's it dealt with" without realising that we then need to go away to do x,y and z. Deciding to do it is not enough; we actually need to achieve it!

Rant over, I'm just off to do x,y and z!

Gagged?

2009-05-29T14:39:00.003+01:00

On the big issue of the week for the Church of Scotland? I can say nothing here because this is a public site and someone might read it!!! The General Assembly has issued a decree banning any comment on the big issue of the week and if anyone does make public comment, we are open to discipline by the courts of the Church. It seems like a huge own goal - the atheists are free to lay into the Church and tell the world what a shower of numpties we are and no-one can reply. The papers are free to scare-monger and tell the world that a whole pile of people are about to leave to join the Free Church and we can't reply! So if you're expecting me to make some comment about this big issue, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed. It will take 2 years!

What will the Church be like in 2 years time?

Here's a more serious question and much more positive and perhaps even more important one: what would you like Church to be in ten years time? Don't tell me that you don't have a view; I won't believe you. Everyone involved with Church at some level or another will have some kind of view, even if it is a quite simple one. What would you like Church to be in ten years time? Click on the 'comment' at the bottom of the page, write your comment in the box and then choose one of the four options under the box to identify yourself; the third or fourth are the easiest. Tell me what you would like Church to be in 2019.

Here's the thing: what decisions do we need to make now to make your hope or dream come true? Whatever you would like Church to be in ten years, there are decisions and choices that we need to make now in order for that to come true. That question is not so easy to answer, is it! Good leadership is about asking these questions and helping us to find an answer to them. It will be no use in ten years' time, when Church has not developed in the way we had hoped, then saying 'if only in 2009 we had...'. It will be too late by then.

'If only...' - I came across these words the other day in another context. Some young people were reacting to a particularly traumatic situation about which I can't really be specific here, but they were saying 'if only we had done... if only we had said....' then the situation might never have developed in the tragic way that it did. It is so easy to carry these words around in your heart for the rest of your life, and lots of people do; we call it guilt! The glory of the gospel is that at its heart is talk of forgiveness and not just talk, but reality. God forgives us our sins, our faults, our 'if only's' and He does so because His Son died on a cross 2000 years ago.

I hope that the General Assembly of 2011 does not begin by saying 'if only we had... in 2009!' I hope that in 2019 we are not sayiong 'if only we had... in 2009!' I hope you are not going through life saying 'if only I had....' or 'if only I hadn't...'

I can say nothing now about the first.
I can urge you to pray and work to make the second happen.
I can tell you about the forgiveness of God for all of us in Christ in the gospel.

Aspirations!

2009-05-22T15:26:00.002+01:00

The word that has been rolling around in my mind this week is 'aspire' (& not 'aspire' on top of the Church roof - sorry, bad joke; think about it!!) We have hopes and aspirations of all kinds, but let me tell you about one story of aspiring that bothers me; I don't know the answer.

I was approached a while ago by a young couple who had just had their first baby. They want the baby baptised. I spoke to them about what baptism meant and told them that they needed to think about Church membership because the Church says that one parent must be a member of the Church so that a child can be baptised. They are happy to engage with that discussion; they have been reading Luke's gospel and have been working their way through the basic Christian material that I give to all new members, showing real signs of engaging with all of this. They aspire to become part of the Church for themselves and to have their child baptised and I want to do all that I can to help them meet that aspiration.

But there is a barrier. One of these two young adults tells me that working life makes Sunday worship difficult. Regular days off are Monday and Wednesday. Sunday is usually a working day. How do we as Church help this family to fulfil their aspirations? They know that they have a responsibility to do what they can, but what should Church do to meet people like this? The people about whom I write are not alone in this dilemma.

Do we as Church simply say "we meet on Sundays; there is no other option!" Or do we work out some way of allowing people to worship and nurture faith at other times?

Our midweek activities at the moment tend to be discussion groups or prayer times, or directed at specific age or gender groups like the Guild of Friendship or Rock Solid.

There are clear signs that the Spirit is at work in our community, creating these aspirations and desires among a number of people, including young adults. Church must never become the barrier, preventing these young people from fulfilling their aspirations, but the answers and solutions might well be very different from traditional Church.

What is more important? Do we think that people should have the chance to nurture faith and discover Jesus and worship and pray at some time and in some way? Or do we think that if people can't do Sundays, they can't be involved?

I'm not suggesting that we reduce the standards, if that is the way to put it. There are people who think that we should baptise babies regardless of their parents' profession of faith and commitment; I don't think like that, but I do see the logic behind asking parents to make a commitment to Church of their own when they are aspiring to make that commitment for their children.

I don't know what you aspire to be or to do; I hope that if you have spiritual aspirations that the Church is helping you to fulfil them; how can we do that for this young couple and others like them?

Expenses and other issues

2009-05-15T15:34:00.002+01:00

Sorry, no matter how much I want to avoid it, I can't. The whole week has been dominated by the row over MPs' expenses. What a mess! Mind you, the one word we can't use to describe their behaviour is 'illegal' - there has been (it would seem) no law broken! What we can say is that the laws and rules need changing. I've heard so many sensible ideas and some stupid ones - the latest stupid idea at lunchtime was to send in the army, some kind of military coup! Someone else suggested we have MPs stay in some kind of super apartment block, guarded by the army, presumably to make sure they stayed in at night!

We live in a culture where these issues are coming under much more scrutiny. I was introducing an item as Edinburgh Presbytery last week that will instruct ministers to submit our car log books for inspection. I have kept a log book for years, but it has never been looked at until now. Last year's General Assembly instructed Presbyteries to do this piece of work, for fear of the more rigorous scrutiny of the Revenue! We are more likely to discover ministers who have not claimed as much as they were entitled to, but there are some already in a flap because their log book is not up-to-date enough.

Most of you will have worked with some kind of appraisal system. You will have had someone to whom you are (or will have been) answerable and your performance in a task will have been appraised and you will have had to read the report. That may have influenced the prospects of promotion or even finding a job, or keeping your job. I don't. No-one comes to me to appraise my performance in any of the tasks of ministry in which I am engaged. The Church has toyed with some kind of appraisal, but until now it has always been self-appraisal or self-reflection rather than being done by a third party. This has meant that some congregations have suffered for years under people who really were not up to the job.

There are some Churches that make their members accountable to one another and do this in a big way. They structure themselves in such a way as to give their leadership a very real and direct oversight of the quality of Christian life and discipleship of their members. Our Church culture or our national culture hasn't warmed to that idea very much and so people are often allowed to drift with no mechanism to help them and in the end the only action we take is to remove them from membership because they have drifted so far away from Church that we have lost track of them altogether. That can't be the best way, surely!

I have a friend who, when he went to be the minister of his present charge, arranged interviews with all of the members in his vestry. He asked them 3 questions: How did you become a Christian? What has God been teaching you recently? What gifts do you have to give to the life of the congregation? It was not universally popular in Glasgow; it would not always be popular in Edinburgh either, but why should we be afraid of these questions and someone asking these questions of us?

Presbytery is inspecting log books so that ministers will be better prepared if the Revenue comes calling; perhaps if the Church asked these questions of us, we would be better prepared when our non-Christian friends asked us to give a reason for the hope that is in us!

How many names do you know?

2009-05-08T14:30:00.002+01:00

Last week, I had a conversation which began: "how is your daughter?" Two things happened: first of all, I said "Which one? I have two dauighters?" and at the same time, my second reaction was to think "I don't remember having aconversation with you about my family!" The reply to my question came: "the daughter who has a boyfriend called..." It all fell into place: I had not had a conversation with Robin about my family; he has two brothers who had met my daughter and who know her boyfriend's family. Scotland, and especially the church community in Scotland, is just like a small village.

But, let me ask you this, and I'll come back to it in a moment - how many names of people who go to your church do you know?

Last year, I came across the original version of six degrees of separation. Let me quote it:
"American sociologist Stanley Milgram devised a way to test the theory (that any one person is connected to any other person on the planet through a chain of acquaintances)... He randomly selected people in the mid-West (of the USA) to send packages to a stranger located in Massachusetts. The senders knew the recipient's name, occupation, and general location but not the specific address. They were instructed to send the package to a person they knew on a first-name basis who they thought was most likely, out of all their friends, to know the target personally. That person would do the same, and so on, until the package was personally delivered to its target recipient. Although the participants expected the chain to include at least a hundred intermediaries" to get the package delivered, it averaged only six. Hence the popular phrase "Six degrees of separation"." (Quoted in The Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch p.212)

This suggests a kind of interconnectedness. Certainly, you don't need to be involved in Church for very long to meet people who know people whom you know!

However, I come back to my question - how many people do you know by name in your Church? On average, on a Sunday morning we in Junipe Green have about 180 people in our building for worship. We all have our own little group of friends and we sit beside them and talk to them and have coffee with them afterwards. But there are people we never meet; we may see them, but we don't even know their name. There are people who come to our church at the moment and I feel as if I'm the only person who knows their name!

In January 2001, we had our first Open House at the Manse on the first Sunday in the year. I can't remember now who told me this, but that became the occasion for 2 people who had both been members of Juniper Green Church for 25 years to talk to each other for the first time!

Knowing people by name means that they matter to us. If they are just 'the young people' or 'the old people' we do them a huge disservice, but in a group our size it takes a deliberate effort to make these connections. This is becoming more and more important, since the kind of community we live in sees people less and less connected with their neighbours. Church may soon be one of the few places where people meet with one another in a face-to-face way.

Church needs to be a community in which:

we meet together for worship
we know each other by name
we know each other's stories of life and faith
we eat together and meet for social events
we learn together from the bible
we pray together
we care for each other when people are in need.

What do we need to do to become a community like that?

How many people do you know by name? The answer to that question will show you just how far we have to go!

Looking back?

2009-05-01T14:32:00.003+01:00

On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week I was in Sutherland and Caithness. I am a member of a Special Commission set up by the 2008 General Assembly to consider the Third Declaratory Article. This is the part of the Church of Scotland's constitution which commits the Church to deliver the ordinances of religion and carry out ministry in every part of the country. The Commission is set up to see if we can still make that commitment and what it means to the Church if we say that we can.

Anyway, we decided to make some field visits and in March we visited Glasgow and this week we visited Sutherland and Caithness, 2 counties on the geographical fringes of Scotland where the Church is struggling to find ministers willing to serve. Caithness has 11 charges, where ministers can serve, plus a community minister post; there are 3 of these charges filled. Has God stopped calling people to these places and communities? Or are people deaf to His call?

Wednesday was a strange morning! I spent 17 years as a minister in Caithness; our children were all born there and grew up there. We left in July 2000 to come to Juniper Green. I've only been back in the county a couple of times since we left, this being the third. I met some people that I've not seen since I left and I was visiting places I knew well, though not the part of Caithness in which I was the minister. It felt strange to be back. I have no desire to go back; the road north hasn't changed very much; it still takes 6 hours to drive; I was glad to be back home on Wednesday evening.

We have a funny attitude to the past at times. I know people, even Christians, who want to live in the past. Their past experience of Church was very positive so they want to keep hold of that for as long as possible and live in that past experience; so Churches are not allowed to change anything. We have all heard the cry 'It's aye been done that way! Let's live in the past.' There are others who want to write off the past: it's old, so it must be got rid of! There are churches who refuse to sing anything that is older than 6 months; every hymn or song has to be new & constantly changing; the past is a real foreign country.

I enjoyed much of my ministry in Caithness, although I came to the point where I was glad to leave behind the stresses and strains it caused me. I'm glad when the people I knew there come to visit us here. But I won't live in the past and pretend it was some rural idyll to be hankered after. Some commission members thought that going to rural Scotland would be wonderful and quiet; they left with a different view, now aware of the distances involved in travelling between Churches and the huge areas to be covered by one person.

As Christians we honour the past: our faith is based on historic events that took place once for all time in a specific historical time and place; our churches today are what they are because of previous generations faithful witness. But we press on to the future, to grow as Christians and to build the Church today that will leave a legacy for tomorrow. It seems to me that is a biblical way of looking at time, history, our past, present and future.

What is the big issue?

2009-04-24T13:57:00.002+01:00

I had an e-mail yesterday from a journalist working for The Sunday Times. She was doing a confidential poll of Church of Scotland ministers asking if I support the appointment of Scott Rennie as minister of Queen's Cross Church in Aberdeen. I've never met Scott Rennie, as far as I know, but his story hit the headlines in January when Aberdeen Presbytery agreed to his appointment, knowing that he will live with his male partner in the Manse. Others objected to the appointment of an openly homosexual minister and the matter will be resolved at the General Assembly in May. I said that I did not support the appointment. Her reply asked 'Will you leave the Church if he is appointed?' to which I said 'No; there is more to the Christian faith, more to my ministry and the mission of the Church that sexual ethics!' Am I right?

Today's newspapers tell the story of Carrie Prejean; she is Miss California who was taking part in the Miss USA beauty contest. (Please don't attack me for beauty contests; I'm only telling you the story; it doesn't mean I support them!) She was asked, by the host of the show, whether she supported the state of Vermont's move to legalise same-sex marriage. She is reported to have said: "in my country, and in my family, I think I believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offence to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised." She came second in the contest and afterwards said "after I'd answered the question, I knew that I was not going to win because of my answer. I don't take back what I said." She said she "had spoken from my heart, from my beliefs and for my God. It's not about being politically correct. For me, it's about being biblically correct."

There is no doubt that this issue makes great newspaper headlines. No matter the outcome of the debate at the General Assembly, the newspapers and other media will make great play of the Church's decision. It will be splashed all over front pages, no matter the way in which commissioners vote. Our Session Clerk will be among them. Pray for him and the 800 others as they try to make up their minds on the basis of what they hear.

If you want to discuss and debate the issue, we will be looking at same-sex relationships in our Issues series on June 10th.

My reaction: this is not the biggest issue facing the Church today. Am I right? What do you think is the biggest issue?

It seems to me much more important for us to be telling people in our community about Jesus Christ. I spent the first part of this morning in Currie High School with 360 first and second year pupils; I was leading an Assembly on Easter. I told them about Jesus, His cross and resurrection and that Jesus said "This is the very best way to love. Put your life on the line for your friends." (John 15:13 The Message) They listened avidly; you could hear a pin drop for 15 minutes as they simply listened to the gospel and me telling them what I believe.

I won't leave the Church of Scotland if Scott Rennie's appointment is upheld. I will be sad because I think that goes against the Bible's view of humanity. Jim Philip used to say, about issues such as these, that he would only leave the Church of Scotland if the Church pushed him out. Wise words.

God has called me to tell people about Jesus, to persuade them to believe; for me that is the biggest issue!

Special people and Holy Week

2009-04-08T09:42:00.006+01:00

I want to tell you about Sharon. I've never met her, but I heard a little about her last week when I was in Glasgow. Sharon grew up in Ruchazie, one of Glasgow's Priority Areas on the periphery of the city. She has been through all kinds of experiences in her life that most of us can only imagine. Sharon came into contact with the Church in Ruchazie and then later when they were looking for someone to take on a little bit of work with some children's groups and young people, Sharon got the job. It was 5 hours per week, and it was paid. When Sharon got her first pay packet she left the building dancing; she was walking taller; she went to get her hair done; she felt a thousand times better about herself because of what she now had - a sense of worth and value.

What her pay-packet did for Sharon, the gospel can do for everyone.

There is another view. Lots of groups will tell us that feeling and being special is all about asserting ourselves. People have to empower themselves in order to achieve something and so find their self-esteem and specialness by their achievements. Much of this is tied up with our human rights and standing up for ourselves. We have to kick off the oppression of those who would bully us and tread us down. That's one model!

Here's another model. We are special for 2 reasons according to the Bible. First of all, we are special simply because we are human; human beings are made with the image of God as part of who and what we are; so we have a unique dignity and meaning and purpose that is inherent and is God-given; nothing can take that away from us; it is ours; it is who we are. (Have a look at Psalm 8!) Secondly, Christians are described as God's children, His sons and daughters, and there is no greater privilege than that; again this is part of the package of being Christian; it is who we are as Christians and because we are children, we are loved by our Father (God) and our elder brother (Jesus).

Being special people is not something that we assert for ourselves or achieve at the expense of others; this comes as God's gift to us by grace. Grace is a strange word: it is a girl's name; it is a prayer we sometimes say at mealtimes; but most of all, it describes the way in which we are loved. Grace tells us that we are loved when we don't deserve to be loved; grace tells us that God loves us, even when we have not loved Him; grace tells us that God gives us great riches not because we have earned them, but simply because He wants to give them.

Holy Week is a bit of a roller-coaster of emotions for the Christian. It begins with the exuberance of Palm Sunday, the reflection and anticipation of the Last Supper, the blackness of the cross and Jesus God-forsakenness there, and then, finally, the joy of Easter Sunday when we celebrate the risen, alive Christ! Easter should give us a spring in our step (sorry, bad pun!); it is Easter that makes us special people; Easter shows us just how much God really loves us, you, even me! He loves us enough to give us His Son.

I found this 30 years ago in a book called Knowing God by Jim Packer: "Do I know my own real identity? My own real destiny? I am a child of God. God is my Father; heaven is my home; every day is one day nearer. My Saviour is my brother; every Christian is my brother and sister too. Say it over and over to yourself first thing in the morning, last thing at night, as you wait for the bus, any time when your mind is free..." (page 256)

This is who we are. We are special people. Walk with a spring in your step; dance if you like; get your hair done too! Here is our sense of worth and value

Shredding

2009-03-25T16:12:00.003Z

Today I'm using the shredder. In fact, I'm writing the blog while the machine is recovering so that I can fill yet another bag with shredded paper. There is something therapeutic about shredding things, getting rid of rubbish and tidying up! It's a bit like pruning bushes in the garden - there is a sense of satisfaction! What does that say about my character? Don't answer that! Annie Lennox and Eva Cassidy playing on the PC in the background - what a way to spend an afternoon!

Maybe Lent is a good time to shred!

There has been a sort of corporate shredding going on in our society of late. The whole economic crisis has challenged our sense of value. As a culture, we have valued wealth, possessions and prosperity. These have been our gods, the values we have idolised. Those who are wealthy and prosperous - these are the people to whom we have looked up; we have wanted them to be our leaders and role models. But a bubble has burst! Mind, we have gone too far in some respects - no matter how foolish he has been, we go too far when Fred Goodwin's children are not safe at school and his house is vandalised.

Shredding is a very negative action. All I'm doing is getting rid of stuff. All I'm doing is emptying a box so that it can get filled up with the next lot of stuff to be shredded.

Maybe Lent is a good time to shred! In the time before Easter, some Christian traditions have taken time to contemplate their weaknesses and sins, so that we have a better appreciation of what Jesus did on the cross. "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." (Psalm 51:17) One thing is certainly true of all of us: we have things about us as people, attitudes, habits, actions that need to be shredded, put off, consigned to the bin. These are the attitudes of which we are not proud, the words we regret, the actions we wish we had never done, the things over which we wish we could turn the clock back! We all have them. Shred them.

What to put in their place? Learn to be like Christ! "Clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ." (Romans 13:14) Jesus teaches us a whole new world-view, a positive set of values and attitudes; copy Him! Don't let people persuade you that Christianity is simply about what you're not allowed to do! Jesus gives us a whole new set of values and a whole new way to live.

Happy shredding!

An atmosphere of fear

2009-02-27T16:28:00.002Z

On Wednesday I was at a credit-crunch seminar. No, it was nothing to do with my copious investments (aye, right! as they say), but was designed to help ministers understand the present world of banks and redundancy. We were told how things are in the financial world and how things are likely to be in the near future; not pleasant listening. How can we help? That is the question. People are afraid for their jobs -how many will be made redundant next week? How many businesses will simply disappear because they can no longer keep going? How much further will our investments drop and if we depend on this for our pension, how will we pay the bills?

I was reading a Bible study note this morning on the story of Jesus walking on the water, the version in John's gospel. Elaine Storkey was reflecting on the feelings of the disciples as they struggled across the Sea of Galilee in the boat before Jesus arrived walking on the water. She coined the phrase 'the atmosphere of fear' to describe the way in which they must have felt. Perhaps there was nothing specific on which to put their finger; perhaps they were just uneasy about what would happen next; perhaps they were really terrified that they were about to drown. She even suggested that Jesus' appearing out of the darkness would add to that atmosphere of fear to begin with; was this a ghost?

There are all kinds of things that can create that atmosphere of fear around our lives:

the present job situation is a clear example of something that makes people afraid, even if there is no direct threat. No-one is immune. Solicitors, estate-agents, people who work in banks and other financial institutions are the most obvious jobs under threat, but they are not the only ones; how many teachers will the local authorities be able to employ? how do young people, school-leavers and graduates, get a foothold on the job ladder?
You don't need to be around Churches for very long to realise that lots of Churches in Scotland are living in fear of their future. I was speaking to someone who is a member of a Methodist Church in Edinburgh; their congregation is about to disappear, merged into one big city congregation based in Central Halls at Tollcross and afraid of what that will mean; he is very unhappy at the prospect. I will spend next Saturday in Fort William, helping a set of Churches in Lochaber face up to the uncertainties and fears of their future.
there must be an atmosphere or uncertainty around the City Council in Edinburgh at the moment. Will the trams ever be finished? (Incidentally, who thought it was funny to suggest that we need to keep the tram project 'on track'? Ha, ha!) Some people are finding it hard not to smile from ear to ear, with a sort of 'I-told-you-so' face.
Life!

Into that atmosphere of fear, comes what Tom Wright, Bishop of Durham calls the most common command in the bible: "Don't be afraid" How can we not be afraid? Life creates fear in our minds! Jesus tells His disciples not to be afraid, but He gives them one very good reason why they should not be afraid - "I am with you; it's me!" This is not a pious platitude, but for people of faith, this is the other reality of life. Jesus is with us in all our fears, and in all our joys. Jesus' presence helps dispel that atmosphere of fear; His power to sustain, His love to support us - these qualities are at work in us and in our world today.

The winter of our discontent

2009-02-13T16:00:00.005Z

Winter: you love it and you hate it. The first snowfall of winter has children out sledging and building snowmen, but it tends to bring disruption to roads, airports and train services. The camera comes out to take pictures of the snow because it has a beauty to it, but this week I have also been the target for snowballs as some children waited for the school bus. On Tuesday, I went to Lendrick Muir to lead a seminar on mission with some of the Regional Staff teams and on the way I stopped at Loch Leven to take photos because the loch was frozen over; it was quite a sight to behold, the first time it had been like this since the 1950's apparently; but also this week there were reports of at least one child dying after falling through thin ice on his local pond.

Winter: you love it and you hate it. It is nice to look at, but it can be dark and depressing; if you are old and frail when you can become isolated for the duration of the snow and ice because the wise thing to do is to stay indoors. The sledging and snowballs are fun, but there are people caught on the mountains who die in the cold. Why do Councils grit roads that are dry and on which there is no snow and ice, only later to run out of grit and salt when it really matters?

Lest this become a complaint about the weather (Victor Meldrew, eat your heart out!) let me turn this into a reflection on another idea. I once had a conversation with Jim Graham, who for many years was the pastor of Gold Hill Baptist Church in Chalfont St Peter's and a renowned speaker (and I was at university with his daughter and shared a flat with his son-in-law), in which he introduced me to the notion that Churches go through seasons. There are times when Churches are strong and enthusiastic and everything is growing well (as in summer), and lots of new initiatives are put into place, but there are also times when Churches find life hard, when people grow tired and weary, when they want to shed responsibilities rather than take on new things, when it is time to stop certain activities and when it seems to be enough to keep the ordinary things going.

I wrote something of this in an article in Church News last year, in which I said that I could see signs of this in our Church at that time. Some people wanted to give up doing the jobs they were doing; in Church we're not very good at allowing people to give up without a sense of guilt and failure, but we should be better at it. Why can we not simply let a person retire in peace and with our thanks, without making them feel guilty because we will find it hard to get someone else to do the job? All is not gloom and doom; it wasn't then, it isn't now; there are people taking on new responsibilities and new ideas are being pursued in order to build the Church for the future.

Here are some thoughts:

at the St Margaret's Court service on Thursday, the visitors from outside the complex outnumbered the residents by a ratio of 4:1. Is it time to draw a graceful line under this event because it is no longer meeting a need for the place and its people? It worked for a time, but is that time past?

Last year, Colin Anderson gave up as our Christian Aid organiser. In the 6 months since then, no-one has volunteered to take it on. Does that mean that we should stop the door-to-door collection? The sponsored walk hasn't happened now for at least 2 years. There is anecdotal evidence to suggest that door-to-door collections for Christian Aid are actually becoming more and more difficult, if not even dangerous! Should we focus our efforts on other things?

Here's a quote from a booklet by Robert Warren, now retired, but once the Church of England's national Officer for Evangelism. The first of his writings that I read was a booklet called Building Missionary Congregations published in 1995 and now out of print. In that booklet he writes: "Such a challenge calls the Church to move out of the guard's van, where we are looking back over the distant and disappearing peaks we have passed (or desperately clutching the brake to slow down the pace of change at every point). We are to get out of the guard's van, recover our nerve and re-discover our true role in the vanguard of society, shaping the new world order in and after the likeness of Christ... through incarnate exposition - both of our words and our lives."

We are meant to be a pilgrim people, but we keep parking up, saying 'here will do just fine!'

Polish graffiti

2009-02-04T14:20:00.005Z

When I was on the 44 bus the other day, I saw some graffiti in Polish on a wall in Dalry Road. At least I took it to be Polish; it was certainly in some East European language. It caught my eye and I reacted in two different ways. My first reaction was horror that this new blank wall had been spoiled by graffiti and that always makes me recoil. The second reaction was different: I was completely taken aback by the fact that it was in Polish. I've known there were Polish people in Edinburgh for ages; you'd need to have been on a desert island for years not to know that, but till now they have not taken to spoiling Edinburgh with graffiti. Mind you, Prague (which I know is not in Poland, but there is an East European connection in my mind!) is one of the places I've visited that is most spoiled by graffiti.

Today, I heard about the extensive vandalism to the new Primary School in Juniper Green. If you haven't heard, you'll find a report in the Evening News of 4th Feb 2009. The school was broken into sometime on Thursday night/Friday morning of last week and an estimated £10,000 worth of damage was done to worktops and sinks, with paint sprayed over the walls. Nothing was stolen, it appears, but this is just another example of wanton damage.

In Hall 2 of the Church buildings, we have on display a set of photographs from last year's summer mission. There is a long, yellow piece of paper with photos on it and captions describing the action. This display always attracts the attention of the children who come into the hall; they see themselves and remember the good times they had during the summer, or they see their friends. Yet, there are people who deliberately pull photos off; the pictures cannot come off on their own, but there are now four missing because someone has picked them off the display. We have them and will replace them, but that is not my point.

How do I react when I see these things?

I have to admit that I'm angry. It seems to me that people behave unjustly when they do things like this; some people spoil things for others and have no sense of responsibility or respect. So I am angry when people behave like this. I think I'm justified in being angry because I see that kind of reaction in Jesus when he saw people behave in a similar way in the temple and threw them out.
At the same time, I am sad to see such things happen. Graffiti, vandalism, damage are so pointless. They achieve nothing other than spoiling things for others. It saddens me that people think this is a good idea.
When people behave in these ways, I am convinced all over again of the need for people to hear the gospel and come to faith in Jesus Christ. Only Jesus can heal people on the inside. We need to tell our grandparents, our parents, our children, our grandchildren, our great grandchildren, our friends the good news of Jesus Christ.

The first lot of Polish graffiti has been cleaned off. They say that the new school will open on time. We have the photos to put back on our display. However, I'd hope and pray that people will learn to behave responsibly, with care and concern for the needs of others, with respect.

Amos, the prophet, saw a great deal of injustice in his world. His hope, prayer, even his dream was put into words: "Let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like an ever-flowing stream!" (Amos 5:24) Perhaps that's not a bad dream for us.

An Obama free zone? Change is coming!

2009-01-23T11:21:00.005Z

I did think about trying to make this an Obama-free zone; but I couldn't resist! I found the whole inauguration event on Tuesday quite magnetic, as did millions of other people across the world. The hope and expectation on his shoulders is quite astonishing, something that I have never come across before in any politician. One only hopes that there is no backlash of disappointment when he doesn't quite match up to these expectations and doesn't quite achieve all that he sets out to achieve.

Abraham Lincoln's name has cropped up a few times this week. Every leaders should remember one famous saying attributed to him, but often mis-quoted, even by me! He is quoted as saying: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time." Most people quote that by replacing 'fool' with 'please'. Good leaders are not trying to fool anyone, but many leaders go about their business, especially those who are elected, knowing that they need to please the people who voted them into office.

Leaders need to go about their business, openly, honestly and humbly, trying to be themselves and to make decisions by the principles that had them elected in the first place; the people who are looking for leadership need to be willing to let their leaders be themselves and accept that they are making decisions and choices in the best way they see fit, as well as playing their part in making the changes work.

Change is inevitable. Already President Obama has made changes to the way in which the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are treated and to the way the government goes about its business in Washington. One thing is certain: more change is on the way.

I could say the same about the Church. Peter Macdonald is the minister of St George's West Church in Shandwick Place and is also the convener of Edinburgh Presbytery's Deployment of Resources Committee, the group tasked with planning for the Church of the future in the city. Peter spoke to Presbytery in November about the state of the Church in the city; you can find the whole text of his speech on the Edinburgh Presbytery Website, follow the link below: http://www.edinburghpresbytery.org.uk/documents/reports/deployment_of_resources.pdf

The main implication of what Peter said that change is inevitable and that no congregation is immune for the wind of change. At present, the future of St John's Oxgangs, where I am Interim Moderator, is being debated and there is no guarantee that this congregation will be allowed to call a new minister of their own in the current climate.

We can have one of two attitudes to change: we can fear it and run from it as far and as fast as we can and for a long time that has been the church's first reaction; 'let's leave things the way they are and have always been'. Or we can embrace change positively, recognizing that it can be good when done properly, seeing change as an opportunity to plan for the future and to shape the future of the Church and the church of the future.

There will be some who will not like the changes President Obama makes, but I think he will only make changes when they are necessary and when they make life better. That has to be the way in which we look to the future.

What's in a name?

2009-01-16T19:08:00.003Z

I spent most of Wednesday as part of a group called the Nomination Committee. This is a Church of Scotland Committee that recommends appointments to the other Councils and Committees of the Church. There are two good things about being part of the Nomination Committee: 1)it only meets once in the year, for one day; 2)if I am a member of this committee then I can't be a member of any other Church committee.

The preparation work for the committee is a list of names. Each year, a certain number of people retire from membership of the Church Councils and need to be replaced. It is our task to find these replacements and to do so in a way that is balanced and fair, so you can't just nominate all your friends (actually they wouldn't be your friends for very long if you kept adding their names to these lists!!)

I know some of the names; in fact some of the people whose names were on my lists I have known for a long time; that may or may not count in their favour. Many of the names, I had heard, but have never met the people, so couldn't tell you anything about them; that means I have to rely on other people's judgement as to their suitability for the jobs we were considering.

The great thing about names is that each one represents a story. I am constantly meeting people who introduce themselves to me on the phone or who come to something I'm arranging, to a church service or children's club and they tell me their name (then I have to work hard to remember the name) and then begin to tell me their story. It will be a unique story, full of joys and delights perhaps, and also full of pressures and difficulties; sometimes it is a story that leaves me humble as I begin to see some of the hardships people, even children, have to overcome in order to make their way in the world.

Colin Sinclair, the minister of Palmerston Place is the convener of the Nomination Committee and in beginning the meeting, Colin joked about reading all of the 9 chapters at the beginning of 1 Chronicles. For those of you who don't know, these chapters are a series of lists of names, family trees, generation after generation, with nothing to break the pattern. You won't have heard these chapters read very often in Church. Eric Alexander, sometime minister of St George's Tron Church in Glasgow, once said of these chapters that "every name is a footstep in God's plan" and, of course, he is absolutely right.

When you meet someone for the first time, and they introduce themselves to you, how well do you listen? Can you remember the name they tell you? Or does it just go in one ear and out the other? I have been in conversations lately where the person speaking to me has been looking through me and past me to see who else is in the room, who might be more worthy of his time, who might be more important for him to talk to. You can imagine how that made me feel, that although I was in conversation, I was clearly being ignored.

If every name in the people of God is a footstep in God's plan to bless the world, then we should make sure that we treat our fellow-Christians as if they are the most important person in the world while we converse. If every name in the people of God is a footstep in God's plan to bless the world, then we should make every effort to get to know these names. There are new people who have come to our Church in the last few weeks: have you noticed? Have you made the effort to speak to them? Have you asked them their names? Do it soon!

Merry Christmas Everyone

2008-12-24T09:51:00.002Z

It's Christmas Eve in the manse. That usually means frantic activity, but this week has actually been quite calm and composed. I still have one sermon to write (Sunday comes along in a few days!), and some presents to wrap, but that apart, the preparation is done. All that remains is to conduct the services that are to come.

There have been lots of highlights already in Christmas events:

I was invited to the School nativity plays, one done by primary 2 children and the other by the Nursery; both were brilliantly done, both told the story and both had songs in them that also told us what the story meant and who Jesus was and is; they were made for me by the King in the nursery event who left wearing his crown upside down, the innkeepeer turning his lamp upside down to see how it worked and Mary and Joseph putting the presents in the manger, suffocating Jesus under the weight of the gold!!!
The Primary School Service was held in the Church last Friday - it was packed; there were no seats left with the number of parents and others who came to join us.
Our Kids Church and Youth Group Nativity play on Sunday - "We were young once" was fantastic; we have a small number of children around on Sundays, but they were brilliant in all that they did. Equally brilliant was the fact that we had so many families in Church with young children; we even had two 2-year old boys running up and down the aisle during the service. That hasn't happened for a while; are we seeing a new generation of families coming to be part of our Church? We really hope so!
Finally, on Sunday evening we had a very different event, our lessons and carols service. The Choir had 5 pieces to sing for us, as well as the usual list of readings and an odd sketch that lifted the lid on Christmas in a different way. The Choir sang beautifully; the power and harmony of their singing was a joy to hear, even for my untrained ear.

In the few weeks before Christmas, I sit down with my calendar and plan out all of the services, which carols we will sing, which readings we will have, so that there is some kind of balance across the whole season. I try to find themes for these services that will all reflect the nature of the event as well as something insightful to say. Jim Philip, once minister of Holyrood Abbey Church in the city used to say that it was much more important to find something true to say rather than to find something new; of course, he is absolutely right. Mind you, I love trying to find ways that are both new and true!

This morning, we were trying to imagine what it would be like for someone to hear these stories and readings for the first time, but we couldn't do it; these things have been so much part of our lives since we were young. Nonetheless, it is my prayer that there will be people hearing these things for the first time and that as they hear these stories, the God of whom the stories speak will be at work in their hearts and minds to persuade them of something true about Jesus.

The eternal God who stands at the beginning of history, who stands at the root of the universe, once came into our world to save us. Jesus came into our world to be the light of the world, to give us life in all its fullnes, to take away our sins and bring us to God. At Christmas we celebrate the coming of Jesus into the world. Don't lose sight of that truth today.

Hark! the herald angels sing,
‘Glory to the new-born King,
Peace on earth, and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled!’
Joyful, all ye nations, rise,
Join the triumph of the skies,
With the angelic host proclaim,
‘Christ is born in Bethlehem’.
Hark! the herald angels sing,
‘Glory to the new-born King.’

Watch your tongue!

2008-12-12T15:35:00.002Z

It's a stupid thing to say! Watch your tongue? You need to be a contortionist or look in the mirror to watch your tongue! Bite your tongue? Ouch!

I was at Currie High School on Monday evening. We had tickets for Back to the Eighties, this year's school Christmas show. The story line wasn't the most complicated plot ever to be devised, but more of an excuse to join up as many Eighties' songs as you could fit into 2 hours and a bit. It was performed with great enthusiasm and gusto. More than 50 pupils, ably aided and abetted by a few teachers, performed the show, ran the sound and lighting, sold the programmes and so on.

Thursday and Friday saw me visit the Primary School and the School Nursery for Nativity Plays. The Primary 2 classes performed Born in the Barn with a wonderful enthusiasm and sense of fun and the Nursery were just themselves, charming the socks off their parents. One of the kings left with his crown upside down; the innkeeper was trying to take the lantern to bits to see how it worked; and Mary and Joseph put the presents from the wise men into the manger and crushed the Baby!

All credit to two groups of people who are much-maligned at times - young people and school teachers. We write off our young people so easily, effectively tarring everyone with the brush of bad publicity that comes from the small minority of young people whose stories hit the news headlines for all the wrong reasons. We criticise our school teachers for producing the same young people! Yet, every time I visit school, which is always for an hour at the most, I'm glad that I can leave after an hour. I could not do their job and I have enormous respect for those who do what I know I could not do.

There is a prayer that comes from Native American culture that goes something like this: "Do not criticise your brother till you have walked a mile in his moccasins." It is easy to have a view or an opinion about all kinds of things without really knowing what we're talking about and once it has been said, it cannot be unsaid. Little wonder James describes the tongue as "a fire" and "a restless evil." No wonder we were advised to watch it or bite it!

A dying man invited his friend to come to visit him. He knew that he was dying, but he had something that he needed to say. When his friend came to the house, he gave him a feather pillow and asked him to empty it all over the floor. His friend thought this a very strange request, but to honour the dying man's wish he complied. Once the feathers were all over the floor, his friend said "now pick up all these feathers for me!" His friend said "That's not possible; I can't pick them all up; there are too many and they are well-scattered." The man said "But that's what you did to me; you criticised me needlessly to my friends when you spoke things about me that were not true; you took away my good name and reputation and once you did that it could not be given back to me."

Christians are supposed to be caring people, but I am constantly amazed at the thoughtless and hurtful things that Christians will say to one another and to other people. It can never be unsaid; once it is out, it out for good. You may have an opinion, but think carefully before you express it and to whom you express it. You may criticise if you are so moved, but before you criticise someone, walk a mile in their moccasins; look at life from where they sit.

Watch your tongue and bite it - you can't do them both at the same time, can you?

Just People

2008-11-28T11:45:00.002Z

Just People - that's the title of a course that has been co-produced by Tearfund and a group called Livability , a Christian social care group based in England. Together they have produced this course to help Churches discover what their community needs and how to go about meeting these needs. It might be something we will have a closer look at in 2009.

I love the title because it can be taken in 2 ways. First of all, it can be taken to mean the kind of people that we are, that we are just people. It comes from a key verse in the Old Testament book of the prophet Micah: the prophet sees the people being very good at worship, thousands of services are being held in their 'Church' every year and lots of sacrifices and offerings are being made; but something is still not quite right. He tells the people that there are three qualities that God wants to see in His people: "To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." (Micah 6:8)

If the Six O'Clock News or The Scotsman are to be believed we are all very concerned about our savings, our pensions and how much difference a reduction of 2½% in VAT will make to our lives. Did you know that 10 days ago we 'celebrated' World Toilet Day? No, it wasn't an excuse to spend the day on the toilet and stay at home from work, though judging by the bugs going around some of you may have done just that. No, this was a day created to raise awareness across the world that some 2.5 billion people don't have a proper toilet. For some, that means they are more prone to disease and some 5000 people a day die because of water-borne diseases; for others, especially women, they have to use places that expose them to great danger. For Christians to act justly is to be concerned for people like these, not to neglect our own financial perils, but to put them into some kind of world-wide context.

There are people nearer to home who are treated unfairly, who are victims of discrimination, who are abused and oppressed. Do we give any impression of being concerned for these people or do we leave it simply to 'political types' to get involved in STOPTHETRAFFIK campaigns and the like?

The second way of reading 'Just People' is that this is just about people. I wonder how much paper is produced by our congregation that is designed to keep the structures of Church alive. I know that we need structures and committees; we can't do without them. I know we have traditions and ways of doing things that go back a long while, but in the end the Church is people and is about people loving God and loving one another.

We have had, in Church over the last few weeks, a few young families, people who are new to the community and who have come to our Church for the first time. How well are our Church services geared for them? Do we expect a young mother to hold her child and a hymn-book at the same time, or do we simply expect that she takes the child to creche? What happens if the child won;'t settle on his own with strangers? Do we simply expect a young mum to sit in the creche with her son till the end of the service and hear very little of it? Or do we think seriously about extending the sound system into the creche room and projecting hymn words on the screens so that she can hold her child and sing at the same time? On the other hand, do we expect an elderly person who has poor eyesight simply to see something on the screen a long way off? Church is about people of all kinds and all stages and making life easier for all of these will mean different things; there is no one way that will answer this question for everyone.

If we are a Church that is centred on Christ and on people then, our concern must never be 'it's always been done that way' at all costs. Our concern must be 'how can we help all of the people to love God and walk humbly with God?

Just people - there are two huge challenges in these 2 simple words. The first is about the kind of person I am and the second is in the kind of Church we are. What does it mean for you to be a just person? How can we be a Church that focuses on helping people love God?

Answers on a postcard please...

All about Children

2008-11-14T15:43:00.005Z

It's Children in Need day. I'm sure lots of people think that, in a civilised and sophisticated society like ours the need for a charity fundraising event for children should be a thing of the past. Then we read about Baby P, in Haringey, a 17 month old child who died after the most horrific abuse by those who were supposed to be looking after him. Then we read the court account of the ordeal of Shannon Matthews went missing in February as a ruse by her mother to make money; the 9-year old was found hidden in the base of the bed and by all accounts spent the time chained up.

Imagine a child...
􀂄 who knows and cares that Jesus is present with him/her and will never forsake him/her – even when the pain of life never fully goes away
􀂄 who finds that hope and the kingdom of God are not mere concepts but acts of love by those who gather her into a place of protection away from fear, war, exploitation and abuse
􀂄 with special educational needs who encounters Jesus’ unconditional love and responds with smiles and noises of joy - and becomes a worship-leader in a church
􀂄 who in spite of being mutilated by culture, religion or neglect realises that she, a girl child, has been created in the image of God – and gains hope
􀂄 who shunned by school and community because of HIV/AIDS finds Jesus’ love through the pastor walking him safely to school each day
􀂄 who has something of the Scriptures in a format that will assist her to encounter Jesus
􀂄 who although half-naked and very hungry, sleeps peacefully and safely in the shelter provided by the church
􀂄 whose regular prayer partners include adults and together they share their concerns
􀂄 who finds that Jesus can help him/her understand the difference between sinning and being sinned against, and that both of these are wrapped with healing grace and constant love
􀂄 who finds a home with God’s people: a place where (s)he wants to be and a people (s)he trusts
􀂄 who is sharing this relationship with Jesus with his/her peers and family
􀂄 whose parents are the first to introduce Jesus to her and accompany her on a journey of discovering Jesus
􀂄 who experiences with the Church what it means to know Jesus and have life in all its fullness.

These words come from a paper produced in 2004 by the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization. I find them an enormous challenge, but I want to say a huge 'Amen' to all of these aspirations. Here are three more sets of hopes and aspirations:

Imagine a church that …
􀂄 commits the necessary resources to reach children, 30 percent of the world’s population
􀂄 builds a ‘good news’ relationship with every child in their community
􀂄 believes that, like the biblical child Samuel, children can have a voice in their congregation
􀂄 allows children to be in the midst of its teaching, worship, evangelism and discipleship.

Imagine a world where children are …
􀂄 able to be safe, be cared for and live in hope
􀂄 given many opportunities to know and respond to the love of Jesus Christ
􀂄 encouraged to bring hope, healing, comfort and Jesus to one another
􀂄 able to be discipled no matter how diverse their family or faith background.

Imagine families that …
􀂄 move beyond healthy nurture into their God-ordained role as spiritual caregivers
􀂄 are empowered to be the models of Christian values in their communities
􀂄 are equipped to create spiritual traditions in the home.

The Bible and Christian tradition gives children a value; they are part of the kingdom of God, they are to be loved and cared for. However, that same bible and tradition has taught that they are not always to be pandered to and allowed to rule the lives of adults every moment of every day, but we also need to have our children grow up with a respect for others, for other children and for the adults who also inhabit their world.

As in so many things, there is a balance to be found; this week's stories show what happens when the balance tilts in the wrong direction.

Confront your prejudices

2008-10-31T13:54:00.002Z

On Tuesday, I spent 2 hours at Heriot-Watt University, and on Friday, another hour and a half. The University is looking for a new chaplain and as part of the Chaplaincy Council, I have a place in the group given the task of considering the applications and then, later, conducting the interviews. A lot of people applied for the job! It took a while to sift through these applications. I came to that task, as anyone would, with a notion of what I think the chaplain should look like, but there were all sorts of applications that challenged these preconceived ideas and made me question whether these preconceived ideas were more than that. Was I prejudiced in favour of certain kinds of people or against others? I can't tell you what these were in detail because the process is still on going, but suffice so say there were questions about gender, nationality, and religious affiliation.

Then along came the debate about Jonathon Ross and Russell Brand. Now, I admit a prejudice - I find it very hard to be in the presence of arrogant people! They make me feel as if I'm small and don't count and I find that hard to take. I have been 'in conversation' with people who are looking round the room to see who else they can talk to; who might be more important for them to speak to and their eyes are not on me, but their attention is elsewhere. To me that smacks of arrogance. I might be well out of order, but Ross and Brand strike me as being arrogant men, who think that they are untouchable and who, for that moment at least, thought they could get away with the most outrageous abuse of a young woman. Part of me smiles, because they have been humbled!

Prejudices are attitudes that make us treat certain kinds of people differently just because they are a certain kind of person. Women have been on the receiving end of so much prejudice and we like to think that it has gone, but has it really? There are still places where women are treated as second-class citizens. There are still people who subscribe to the 'children should be seen and not heard' school of thought; there are people who say that 'we want children to be part of Church, but we don't want the disruption they bring with them!'

At the Kirk Session conference at the beginning of October, we discussed the 7 marks of the healthy Church, as described by Robert Warren. One of these marks is 'makes room for all', an inclusive Church. One group of elders, discussing this, made a very perceptive comment: 'although we are good at welcoming people, we need to learn how to accept people who are different.'

Prejudices are shaped by all kinds of forces: by our upbringing, by our circumstances and so on. Yet, every person you will ever meet, no matter who that person is, no matter what that person is, has been created by God, equally and without distinction, having the same dignity, in the same image of God. The Bible challenges us to treat every person that we meet in exactly the same way, with the same love and acceptance. (James 2:1-13)

A man sat under a tree. His name was Nathaniel. He said to Philip: "Nazareth! Can anything good come from Nazareth?" Some people say the same today about the Church of Scotland, or about people aged 12-16, or about old people, or about Glasgow!

What are your prejudices? How will you change?

The road to Corrie Fee

2008-10-24T16:14:00.003+01:00

We went to visit that well-known Scotsman, Angus Glen! Well, Glendoll, actually! We were on holiday in Kirriemuir for a few days last week and on Tuesday decided to go exploring! There is a car park at the end of the road; you have to pay £1.50 to help pay for its upkeep. It was a sunny day, if breezy and bitterly cold in the wind. There are 5 tracks to walk from the Glendoll car park and we chose the green track - it leads to the Corrie Fee Nature reserve and 'breathtaking views' of the Corrie.

The road was a forest track. Almost all of the time, we were walking through the forest. (How many trees have been planted in Scotland in the last 50 years - answers on a postcard please!) It was quite gentle to begin with and gradually got steeper. Then we had another choice: the blue route had been the same as the green route, till about two-thirds of the way up, then it went off to the right and along the side of the river. We decided to stick with the green route and keep going up. Then the road became a narrow path through the trees, still climbing up into the hills; was there no end to these trees?

Finally, we came to the fence; there was a gate and a stile; on the other side of the fence, no more trees and we could see Corrie Fee. It is indeed a breathtaking view. It would have been even more breathtaking if the sun had shone constantly and not been clouded over, but you can't have it all ways in Scotland in October! We sat for a while and admired the view; we took some photographs to celebrate our achievement. (OK, it is not Everest, but you don't have to climb Everest to be an achiever!)

Then we turned to come back down the hill. All of a sudden walking became easy. We could stride out confidently and strongly because now we were going downhill; what had seemed to take hours (it didn't really; it just seemed that way) on the way up, took a matter of minutes on the way down. Perhaps it was the thought of a Forfar bridie for lunch at the bottom that spurred us on. We enjoyed our walk on Tuesday; it was cold, but we left Glendoll with a sense of achievement and a need for a hot cup of coffee at the Glen Clova Hotel.

Why am I telling you this story? Our perspective on life changes with our circumstances, but God surrounds us everywhere. Go to read Psalm 139, especially verses 7-12. Michael Wilcock in his book gives this section of the psalm the title How God surrounds me. The answer? Everywhere! No matter our circumstances, no matter our perspective on life, God is with us.

Happy climbing!

Reference Points

2008-10-17T13:05:00.003+01:00

A small coffee table sat just inside the door. There is a flower arrangement on the table, yellow, red, blue flowers. Around the flowers sat 4 police helmets and a white police hat; on the floor, 3 more helmets. This is the picture that sticks in my mind from Kevin's funeral yesterday, a 45-year old policeman who died in a car accident last week. The helmets belonged to the policemen who carried his coffin.

These are the hardest events of all in which to be a minister. There are no words to say that can change the circumstances for his family, or his friends. Their sadness was tangible. The Superintendent who paid tribute to Kevin was in tears as he spoke.

The notion that seemed to me helpful and useful for the occasion was that of 'reference points'. We need to have some fixed points on our horizon that enable us to deal with situations like these; points of faith or understanding that don't change, but that help us put our situations into a bigger perspective. There were two reference points for me yesterday: the first is that Jesus died and rose again, a young man who died before His time in some people's eyes, but in His own eyes the time was just right. His death and resurrection throws a different light onto our notion of death. The second reference point was the endless love of God for us, a love that never ends and from which nothing can separate us; just in case that sounds trite and easy, we also remembered that this love was tested in the white heat of the cross!

There are other reference points:

when thinking about Church, the key reference point for me is that Church has to be for everyone, accessible for everyone, of all ages and stages in our community.
the credit crunch and all this talk about money that we've lost as share prices have crashed has to be seen in the light of the strong things that Jesus said about money and its hold over us.
some of us work long hours and inevitably other parts of life are affected by that; family, church, leisure - it is important to have some kind of reference point that makes us consider, over and over again, where our priorities lie and what is ultimately important.

Every map has a North point on it somewhere. You may not be heading north; you may be heading in a totally different direction, but North is (almost) always at the top. You may, of course, be one of these people who needs to turn the map around so that the map is facing in the same direction as you are heading. Nonetheless, the North point is always there and everything else takes its direction from it. A reference point is like the North point on a map. You don't always refer to it, but everything else is measured by it.

We may not talk about our reference points very much, but our whole life is measured from them. Our whole life is shaped by our own personal reference points: our faith, our family, our job, our attitudes - they are all in there somewhere; these are the points by which we have to measure all that we are and do.

By the way, the two reference points from yesterday - that Jesus died and rose again and the endless love of God - are for every life at every stage on the journey.

Trams, Trams, Trams

2008-10-03T15:38:00.003+01:00

I'm really glad that I wasn't in Princes St on Wednesday! I'm even more grateful that I was not on a bus trying to get somewhere on the other side of Princes St. By all accounts, it was mayhem, chaos, gridlock! The question I keep hearing people ask is this: will it be worth it? Will the trams be worth all the chaos that we're having to endure?

Then yesterday, something else new was announced: all children aged 5-7 will be given free school meals. This is the latest initiative of the Scottish Government to try to improve the health of the Scottish people. It all sounds grand and I'm not getting involved in party politics here, but it was also said that there will be no new money to meet this initiative, but councils will have to implement it out of their existing money.

Today, I read the first newsletter from the Church of Scotland's Church and Society Council. They want to hear the views of people like you and me on 4 issues that will be debated at the 2009 General Assembly. I have a problem - the questions! On Alcohol, drugs and addiction the first question is this "Should people in Scotland drink less?" and the second one is no better "Should alcohol cost more?" There are simple answers to these questions and it would be easy to answer them in that way; they are open to a straightforward 'yes' or 'no' - end of story!

There is a section entitled Ethics of Defence and the second question there is "Are we justified in spending the equivalent of building and running 1000 schools for the next 20 years on Trident nuclear weapons, which will probably never be used?" That question has the expected answer written all the way through it! That's not my point, though!

My point is this: it is easy to make pronouncement and even decisions without have thought the consequences through. It is easy to say 'every child should have a free meal at school' and very few people will quibble with that; most people see the value in giving children good, nutritious food; most people will not disagree with getting something for nothing! But someone has to pay for it; education budgets across the country are cash-strapped at present; young teachers are finding it hard to get jobs because Councils have no money to employ them and this will surely only make matters worse. Free school meals makes a good political headline, but what will the reality be?

The Trams make a good headline and look attractive in the video that I've seen several times on television. They seem a good way of getting quickly from one side of the city to another when they are up and running. However, did we expect the degree of disruption that the work is causing? Were we warned? Will it be worth it?

It is easy for people to tell me 'The Church should be doing...' and run off a long list of new initiatives that Juniper Green Church should be pursuing; the list of new initiatives is presented as being the way forward and without these, the Church will not be here in the future. It's so easy to make these grand pronouncements but implementing them can be a whole different matter. Time, energy, people are all required for new things; the willingness to change is a big ask for some people because they just don't like it.

What new thing would you like us to do? What will it cost in money, time, energy, people? Then tell me!

Don't stop generating new ideas! Then we really are dead! But consider this - will you be prepared to be the answer to your own prayers?

Kingdom people!

2008-09-26T16:06:00.004+01:00

I've just spent the afternoon with 25 very noisy children. They are full of energy, full of fun, but sometimes they go just a bit too far, as children are wont to do. It was a Rock Solid afternoon. We played football; we tried to play Chinese whispers; we got them to draw a self-portrait; we are teaching them about prayer. The focus of the afternoon was a DVD story about David and how he was chosen to be king, that God looked at his heart rather than the outside. (You can read the story for yourself in 1 Samuel 16; it is a fascinating story!) We talked about being special in God's eyes and that it is important to be the right kind of people on the inside.

Some of these children come to our Church on a Sunday as well. Some go to other Churches in the city. Some don't go to any Church at all. Very few people have started coming to our Church as a result of Rock Solid. So what are we achieving?

At the very least, we are giving these children a positive memory of Church. That might seem to be a very low aim, but in today's Scotland, that in itself is important. So many people have a very low opinion of the Church, a poor view, that to give a new generation of Scots a positive memory of Church is a good thing.

We are also introducing the children to people of faith. We have told them stories of Jesus in the past and this term it is the story of David and his faith that they are hearing. For some of them, this is the only place where that will happen. They also rub up against people of faith when they meet us; something of who and what we are will inevitably rub off on them, though how that works is impossible to analyse.

Rock Solid is exciting for all kinds of reasons. It is good fun (most of the time) to have these energetic, enthusiastic children around. God is at work in the lives of these children in ways that we cannot yet see and can only begin to imagine. It is a new kind of Church for children, allowing them to discover for themselves something of God in a different kind of setting.

Here's the crunch though and this is the huge challenge for us, of which Rock Solid is but one example. Are we people whose values are centred on Church and its success or are we people who see kingdom values? As Church people, we will measure success by the number of people who come to our church as a result of our activities; as kingdom people, we will rejoice that God is at work and His grace is touching people's lives.

Howard Snyder is an American theologian working in Canada; he wrote this in 1983: "Kingdom people seek first the Kingdom of God and its justice; church people often put church work above concerns of justice, mercy and truth. Church people think about how to get people into the church; Kingdom people think about how to get the church into the world. Church people worry that the world might change the church; Kingdom people work to see the Church change the world."

Are you a church person or a kingdom person? I want to be a kingdom person and am getting there, but it is very hard to shake off the church person in me! And I wish I had the energy of the children...!

Where's the good news?

2008-09-19T15:38:00.004+01:00

I've been longing for some good news this week. My laptop crashed on Sunday afternoon and refused to start up again - had to go and buy a new one! The village shop announced that it will close after the papers are sold on Sunday afternoon - I will have to walk further for my paper in the morning, or worse take the car to Colinton!! There is a rat in our garden and the family of, what we thought were mice, now appear to be baby rats! Then, there's HBOS & there would have been a time when that just passed my by since I'm not a shareholder; my money's there, but safe; but now I have a family member whose job is on a shaky nail! And so it goes on...

What have you had to deal with this week? Come back and tell me that some of these concerns are trivial (I will insist that you exclude Sara's job from that; that's far from a trivial thing for anyone!) because you are facing bigger issues: someone has died, someone is in hospital, someone is in need; someone has moved into care; someone has other needs. I will agree with you.

My point is this: how do we deal with bad news? Have you noticed that it is like Lothian Buses at the moment; bad news never comes alone; there always seems to be 3 or 4 of them at a time. There are several reactions:

we can pretend it hasn't happened and avoid talking about it - that's never a very good strategy; it didn't seem to do the ostrich very much good to sink its head in the sand;
we can blame God for it all, as if it is all His fault - there is a Gary Larson cartoon from the Far Side books that shows God's finger over the smite button as a man walks under the piano; I find it funny because I don't believe God is like that.
we can become depressed and angry as if we are being singled out for bad treatment from the 'source of all bad news' whatever that may be, taking it all personally; that is an understandable reaction when there are 3 or 4 bits at a time; we can deal with these things much more easily if there were only 1 of them.

Sometimes, however, the deep theological perspective on life is that 'life stinks'. God is not to blame; we are not the target, but life just stinks. We can become angry about it; not a bad thing at times just to vent your anger and let off steam as long as you don't become violent.

I was at a meeting in the Church Offices this morning and the convenor of the group read from the prologue to John's gospel in the version called The Message. It says there, of Jesus, that "the Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighbourhood." (John 1:14) OK, it is a bit American, but I think that brings something to this debate. When Jesus came, God moved into my neighbourhood! If that means anything, it means this: God knows the bad news as well as the good; God knows our frustrations and anger and understands our feelings and sympathises with us; God understands when we vent that anger at Him and doesn't condemn us for it; God knows our fears and anxieties and offers us grace to help us.

Good news: there were visitors in Church last Sunday who thought the experience was great; someone offered to change their diary to accommodate a meeting I was trying to organise!!

Being comfortable!

2008-09-12T15:43:00.003+01:00

On Tuesday evening I was in Greenside Church. I was there for a meeting of Edinburgh Presbytery because Andrew Anderson, the most gracious minister of Greenside is Moderator of Presbytery for this year. The building is on Royal Terrace and the congregation is based in and around the top of Leith Walk and the Calton Hill area of town. Andrew told us a little of Greenside's past, especially its connection with the Stevenson family who built lighthouses and Robert Louis who wrote books.

The building is different from ours in a host of ways: the pews are laid out differently, the gallery is probably bigger, the halls are downstairs. The way they do things is different: part of the meeting was a communion service and it was done differently from the way we celebrate communion in Juniper Green. Andrew's style of ministry, whilst holding to many of the principles I hold dear, is different from mine.

Do you go to Church when you're on holiday? You should, because it does you good. Variety is the spice of life, after all.

Visiting other Churches can do one of two things: either, it will convince you that the way your own church does things is far better than anything you see anywhere else, or you will leave thinking 'why can we not do that too?' There are dangers in both attitudes: if we are convinced that we are the best, there is a huge risk of becoming complacent, thinking that we have nothing to learn from anyone, and that we have no room for improvement! Simply not true! On the other hand, there is an equally huge risk that we become dissatisfied and disillusioned with our Church because we are not doing things in the way we see other churches do them.

We can be like that as individuals as well. The whole advertising industry is built around making us feel dissatisfied with the way we look or the things we possess. Being dissatisfied, we want to look like the model and the clothes she wears, or we want to have the newest car or latest gadget to keep up to date.

A few years ago, I developed the phrase with one of our students on a training placement: 'be comfortable in your own skin'. In other words, be yourself, but be the best that you can be. Ministry students don't come to Juniper Green to be made into clones of Jim Dewar, but to learn to be the best they can be for themselves. Every Church has its own unique history that has shaped it into the church it now is; every church has its own unique community to serve, its unique opportunities and challenges. Every one of us is unique, with a unique experience of life and faith, with our own skills and abilities, with our individual phobias and anxieties.

We cannot wish that our Church were like the other church we have just visited; we cannot go through life wishing that we were George Clooney or Gwynneth Paltrow. We have to learn from other churches and other people, taking some of the best from other places and people and learning from them, but not then going through life permanently disillusioned with Church or permanently dissatisfied with yourself.

What we can do is make sure that our Church is the best that we can be, in our place, meeting our challenges in the best way, and most of all in the way that God wants. We can make sure that we are the best people that we can be, not longing to be someone else, but the best 'me' I can be as a disciple of Jesus Christ.

That's enough to be going on with!

The Glue that holds us together

2008-08-29T15:14:00.005+01:00

My study leave has been fascinating; I have read so much that has stimulated my mind but I will not give it to you all at once! I have been working in the quiet studious atmosphere of the National Library of Scotland on George IV Bridge, a bit of a retreat into an ivory tower for two weeks. The 'glue-question' was prompted by something I read.

What is the glue that holds us together? 'Mothers' was the immediate answer that Jean gave me and I suppose for many families that is true! Mothers, so often, are the hub through whom the family news travels; mothers keep in contact when families are spread much more than anyone else.

We could ask that question about the community we live in: what holds our community together? A hundred years ago the glue holding the village of Juniper Green together would be the fact that everybody knew everybody else. Last year, the village came together around the JG300 celebrations. Is there any kind of glue holding the community together in Baberton Mains? Not living there, I'm not aware of anything, other than the little pockets of friendships and relationships between neighbours.

What about society in general? A hundred years ago, British society was held together by a common Christian story. Most people knew the Bible's story. There was a Christian heritage that the nation held as important and most people shared, even if they didn't profess a faith of their own. This heritage gave a set of values and standards that was almost universally accepted as good and as the basis and foundation of British society.

We now live in a pluralist society. That simply means that there is now a number of sets of values and standards, not just one. Different groups of people hold by different values. We can no longer argue that one set is right and wrong because we are told that 'what is good for you is not good for me'. As a result there is no glue holding society together and my fear for the future of Britain is that society continues to disintegrate in a welter of confusion, violence and fear.

What about Church? What is the glue that holds us together? We might see ourselves as a random collection of individuals who happen to believe similar things and who happen to live in the same place and so happen to worship together once a week, on a Sunday. That's not a very strong glue!

On the other hand, we could be a group of people who have a real sense of shared purpose. We could be a group of people who really do have a sense of shared faith, that we do believe the same things. We could be a people whose passion is to share our faith with others, to see other people come to believe these things too. I believe that the best thing the Church can do for the nation is make sure that our glue works.

What do we need to do to make that happen in a stronger and stronger way?

The Post-Office-less community

2008-08-07T15:49:00.003+01:00

The village Post Office is closed. It all happened last week. Juniper Green Post Office was open one day and the next there was a sign on the counter telling us that it was closed and we should go to Currie! Will the shop be next? Apparently it will close in 4 weeks time. There are plans afoot for the site. Where will I go for my morning paper when the shop closes? Will someone other bright entrepreneur begin to sell newspapers?

For me, this is not so much of a problem. I can climb into my car and go to Currie Post Office or Colinton or Wester Hailes. I can walk to Currie or Colinton for my paper (I might be exhausted at the end, but some might argue it would do me good!) but there are people in Juniper Green and Baberton who depend on the community having a Post Office and a shop nearby. They don't have a car; they can't get on the bus; they can make it to Juniper Green but they could not get to the more distant places!

I read somewhere that there are 2,500 Post Offices earmarked for closure (I assume that that is a UK-wide figure) and that in the last year some 1,400 pubs have also closed, largely due to the smoking ban. Many of these post offices and pubs would be in small communities, places where it is hard to make these enterprises succeed. What impact do these closures have om community life? There is something true about not knowing what you've got till its gone! Take away the Post Office and the pub as community meeting places and something is lost from the heart of the community. How many people are out and about in Juniper Green simply because they visit the Post Office and the shop (and the pub)? There are people whose only conversation is with someone they meet on the way to the shop for their paper; for people like that the danger is that they become more and more isolated at home.

What does Church do about this? We could complain about the loss of the Post Office but from what I understand that would be fruitless. There is another challenge here for Church - how do we make sure that Church is a meeting place for people in the community? The article I read about Post Offices and Pubs then lambasted the Church of Scotland for taking churches away from small rural communities too. How can we make sure Church is at the heart of community life? How can we persuade people that Church is at the heart of the life of our community? In some very obvious ways, Church can never replace the Post Office or the shop, or the pub, but how can we serve the community best? How can we be and remain a meeting place, a place at the heart of our community?

An Entertaining Church?

2008-07-31T16:40:00.002+01:00

It's Tuesday evening; the cinema is almost packed; most of the people there are women, with a few men. For some of those who are there, this is not their first time; they have been before and have come back for more! What is it? Mama Mia of course!

The critics slated the film and especially Meryl Streep for playing the lead. "What on earth was she doing in a film like this? Surely she would not like this in her portfolio of serious work!" But most of the critics missed the point: Mama Mia is simply good fun and the cast obviously had good fun making it; they are having a ball! If you can get past Pierce Brosnan's singing (and there were some audience members who didn't care about his singing; they just drooled over him every time he appeared on screen!) then this film is simply good fun. The only problem is - the songs get into your head and stay there for days!

"People today go to church to be entertained, and the cinema to be challenged." I found this quote a while back; it has been said by a number of people, in a variety of ways, this one attributed to Gerald Coates, a leader of the New Church movement in England and a regular radio contributor. No-one would be challenged by Mama Mia; it's just not that kind of film. There is, however, this criticism of Church. "Church services are boring!" is a criticism we hear so often. What does that ciriticism suggest? That Church should be entertaining? Someone came late to our Church one Sunday and was in the vestiuble during the children's address; it made him glad to hear people laughing in Church because he had been brought up to a very different attitude to Church!

Why do you come to Church? To be entertained by the fun part of the children's talk? To be entertained by the music, the singing of the choir or the music of our organist and young people? To be entertained by the visual images on the screen at the beginning of the sermon? Or do you come to Church to be challenged by the Word of God?

All that we do in Church - music, singing, verbal and visual presentation - should be first class, the very best. It often is! We should also be able to use humour as part of that; humour can help us understand and grasp a profound message. I spoke at the welcome social for Lezley Kennedy at Currie last week and tried to be light-hearted and funny then; I'm not sure that that would work on a Sunday morning; it might well detract from the thing of first importance which is the challenge of the Word.

I was spotted at Mama Mia! There was a whole row of people from Juniper Green sitting behind us. One suggested that Tuesday evening might have an impact on Sunday morning's service - what can she mean?

Who'd be a leader?

2008-07-25T13:32:00.000+01:00

How does Gordon Brown feel this morning? He's had this ambition for years to become Prime Minister because he wants to make a difference, yet in the year since he took office very little has gone right for him. Will Glasgow East be the last straw? Probably not, but he must see his world collapse around him.

What about Rowan Williams? Are Church leaders supposed to be ambitious? In some ways, it's OK; I've certainly known people in the Church of Scotland whose ambition to be in high Church circles has been obvious. I've no way of knowing whether Rowan Williams had ambitions to be Archbishop of Canterbury, but he's there; he's the leader of the Anglican Church across the world. How does he feel today with the prospect of the Anglican Church splitting massively? It's not his fault, but it is happening on his watch!

There are some people in the Church who think leadership is a great thing, because you get to be 'at the front'. That's where they want to be because people will look up to them and they want to be looked up to! That's their ambition! There is no doubt that being at the front is a great adrenalin rush - how must Barak Obama have loved being the centre of attention for 200,000 Germans in Berlin yesterday!

Christian leadership has another model, though. The model for Christian leaders has to be Jesus; the symbols of leadership as modelled by Jesus are the basin and the towel. Leadership modelled by Jesus is about service to others, caring for the needs of others. That service comes in all kinds of forms - for some it is a calling to be a preacher, a Church leader full-time; for others it is giving some of your time and energy to serve Christ and His Church in other ways.

It doesn't matter the way in which we lead, or the kind of leadeship we offer, it always costs. There is always a cost. Your great ideas are discarded by your group; the ideas you do put into practice don't work; you've done this for 30 years and struggle to find new energy to keep going; the people with whom you work are really awkward and hard to get on with. There is always a cost.

But, those whom God calls He also equips. We need to pray for Gordon Brown and Rowan Williams, for everyone you know who is a leader in Church or society; pray for energy, strength, wisdom, stickability. Good leaders are valuable beyond price; we need to value them, support them, above all pray for them.