The Gift of Time

In all this time you have why don't you take up a hobby? 

In all this time you have why don't you do a theological reflection?

In all this time you have why don't you contribute to my study on life in a time of more time?

In all this time you have why don't you spend hours creating a flashy video that knocks the socks off all the rest?

In all this time you have why don't you join my zoom support group to help with all this time you have?

In all this time you have why don't you get down on your knees and pray? 

In all this time you have can you find some time? 

No, no I can't. I'm not sure as I peruse facebook  groups how people are finding the time to do all the things they want others to find the time to make the time to do. I'm not sure how they fit it all in. I often wonder if I am lazy or just slow or just not committed enough to ensuring I get all the time to make the time to do all the things they want me to have the time to make the time to do. 

Then I remember......

There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven, and that doesn't mean I have to do everything at once.

There is a time to celebrate with someone their new baby, their new project, their newly discovered talent, and a time to walk with those who are sorrowful, who are mourning, who are walking with the dying and dealing with loss.

There is a time to tidy up the garden and make it more beautiful than ever before and also a time to clear up the mess you never had time for before. 

There is a time to tear down old structures and declare good riddance and there is a time to build up those who are mourning the loss of the old as we plan for new ways as yet unknown.

There is a time for fear and crying and despair, just as there is a time for joy to explode in uncontrollable laughter as we see new things amongst rubbish or maybe just need to laugh.

There is a time for mourning, a huge time for mourning - the effects of years of austerity and the catastrophic effects this is having on our response to this crisis, but there is a time also to dance and celebrate with those who are creating hope amongst - the fundraisers, the community groups, the NHS workers who we celebrate with joy and with thankfulness....

There is a time to scatter stones, to look outwards, to dream, and there is a time to gather our dreams and hold onto them waiting to see if they will be realised. 

There is a time to embrace - and that will come and a time to refrain from embracing and social distance like pros. 

There is a time to search for new ways and there is a time to give up and realise that we've done the best we can for now.

There is a time to keep what is normal and a time to throw away those things that used to hold us back and don't seem important anymore. 

There is a time to be still, to be silent (it's number 6 on my weekly list) and a time to speak and attend zoom calls, one must not be more than another. 

There is a time to love those around us deeply and a time to hate those things that mean that we cannot love

There is a time for fighting all this and a time to find deep peace that passes all understanding. 

There is a time for all of this, but now is not the time for it all. 

Be gentle, do what you can, not what you think you should be able to do. And be still, find rest, sit down - for God has time for all of this. 

Psalm 46 Reflection

God is there in the isolation with his arms wrapped around us
He is there in the challenges holding up our arms when they just want to fall
He is there in the all, in the everything, in all moments
With help facing devastation, and the troubles that lie ahead. 

And we’ll try not to fear, yet the fear overwhelms us
Though everything feels like it’s breaking up in pieces before us
Though all that was strong is torn down in the storm
Though the floods threat is to consume us and the barriers give way.....

There left behind is a river where life is lived in all fullness
God is here and he lives, Word made flesh dwells amongst us.
God is here, there is Hope, there is promise, there is future
A new dawn will rise, because the brokenness will not last forever. 

Nations run, nations swirl, nations crash to the floor
People seek self before all and leave others flailing behind them
But God the creator, he speaks, do not harm them and all wait..... 

God is here. God is here. God is here. 







Come and see because before you lies his story of healing
Of devastation overturned, re-restored, and unfaded
He ends the pain of this unknown, the enemy lying before us
And it changes, all changes as the attacker is left dormant

He breaks the chain, stops the spread, and destroys it completely 

Saying

Be still. Be still my child and know that I dwell among you
I hold your hand in your pain
I sit beside you in your loneliness
I bring my peace to your racing mind
I shut your eyes for a while so you can’t see

Rest in me and be still. Be still and know that in the darkness light will always shine. 

Give yourself a break

The way I am working at the moment goes against all my instincts. It's like circuit training - going from one task to the other, only pausing as the whistle blows to down tools and move onto the next. Some seasons are like that. Some seasons leave no space for breath, no space for dreaming. 

It's a season of change - of massive change in my own life as I deal with moving 252 miles south east and of trying to stay upright as those I lead now explore what that change means for them. It's a season of excitement and joy as I co-lead on #doyouknowHim? which is one of the most joyous and challenging things I've ever been involved in. It's a season of challenge as I have been facing some of the things that nearly broke me early on in my ministry and learn to walk on with grace and generosity. It's a season that involves a lot of goodbyes and it's well hard at times.  

Thankfully that season, I hope, is just beginning to open up a bit and provide me with space to draw breath, but as I sit here this afternoon and begin to write my sermon for tomorrow (too last minute for me to even contemplate) about Jesus taking time out in the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry I was challenged to pause and question this way of working that goes against my instincts and how I might deal with it better. 

At college I was taught to think of ministry and life as a sink that was sometimes full of water, but was emptied out by those things that pull the plug, but that after the plug is pulled, that you need to put it back in and fill the sink again with what is good and what is fulfilling, ready for when the plug puller returns. After I had gone through a challenging season (affectionately known as the 'summer from hell') a while ago, I developed ways of dealing with when that plug is pulled to fill up, bit by bit to take me to a better place. 

However, the sink that desperately needed filling up nearly broke it was so dry on Thursday afternoon.... and I was reminded that working myself into the ground does not make for the better side of me. 

So what do I do about it? Well two simple things to start......

In the next few weeks I am going to celebrate the joy with gusto - I will post on facebook (probably too much - but block me if you'd like), I will fulfil my 'leaving the enclave' bucket list to the best of my ability and declare each little win from the roof tops. 

I have turned the e-mail off on my phone and, while my addiction is making it hard to wean off, there will come a time when I will stop checking and stop answering straight away.... and what a joy that will be to those around me who get frustrated by e-mail efficiency and for me when I won't need to know everything in the world straight away. I may, just may, also just turn off my phone to find rest.....(perhaps a bit too radical). 

It is sad that so many of us have a habit of working ourselves into the ground before we stop and see, and my call, perhaps for lent, perhaps forever, is to not get to that point again, and to fill up more than leak out.... and it will make for a better me. 

The circuit training has to stop at some point, and while the achievement is great, when physical exercise tires you out, your body knows to rest.... and rest you must. 

"How do you do it said night
How do you wake up and shine?
I take it easy said light, 
One day at a time....."           Lemn Sissay 

"Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" - Jesus (Matt 11:28)

Now to get on and write that sermon.....

Welcome to Narnia

One of the key points for me in Narnia has always been the lampstand. It represents a world come from to a world revealed. It is a key signpost home and it has links with the past. 

I am blessed to live in a beautiful part of the country where we have our own hill. We don't actually own it, but if you live in Ramsbottom then Holcombe Hill is your hill. It rises above the town, marking a boundary point and an observation point. On top of the hill is Peel Tower that you can see for miles around. When you are coming home, the tower appears, so you know home is near. Living at the foot of the hill occasionally there is an urge to climb the hill. The last time that happened to me was on Easter Monday on 4 hours of sleep. This morning at 6am I had that urge again. 

The thing with climbing the hill is that it takes you above and outside of real life. You can look down, and this morning particularly clearly, even see as far as Manchester. You gradually remove yourself from the world of normality and get time to stop and think. At the top of the hill is a bench. That bench is one of the best placed benches I know with amazing views, yet rarely when I want to sit on it is there anyone else on it - there is always space to sit and be. 

When I go up the hill from my house I tend to go up a cobbled old road. On this road, about half way up, is a lamp post. It's a proper Narnia lamp stand. This morning it signified the removal of myself from all the agitation of everyday life. At that point on the walk I felt I was entering Narnia - an imaginary world detached from the mundane, the irritation, the problems. 

Narnia is not a place where problems disappear. When you think about Narnia it is not a fantasy world of perfection like many other children's books might portray as the problems of the world left are still there, but different. Edmund is still an idiot and makes the wrong choices, Lucy is still an annoying small child, but with great wisdom, Peter is still the annoying older brother, but who wants to look out for his siblings. Susan is still Susan (I never really liked Susan - don't know why). 

Going past the lampstand for me today was not a run away from the problems and difficulties and agitations of normal life but was a step aside from them. A chance to look down and across at them and to say 'God, here you go, help me with this, what's your perspective?'.

When you take some time and sit apart from the world that troubles you it is easier to get some God perspective.

We can't expect to take ourselves into a Narnia of oblivion where all our problems disappear - that place doesn't exist, but in Narnia we might expect to meet Aslan - who in the stories is symbolic of Jesus who takes all of our burdens, helps us to carry them and gives us peace. 

Jesus said this:

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”                                   Matthew 11:28-30 MSG