Growing, being and dreaming

A couple of weeks ago I was on holiday. My holidays lately seem to involve visiting places that you wouldn't really think of for holidays - places with concrete buildings (and cows!) and roundabouts. The thing about those places though is they are places where friends live who are the kind of friends who you can meet irregularly but are the people who you feel like you see every day. 

Wherever I go on holiday, one part of holiday that has been something I have grown up with  is the trying of a new (and often very different) church. Going on holiday with my family we would always go and check times the night before and then turn up, to be then sometimes surprised, sometimes terribly bored, sometimes challenged and sometimes amused. It's not the same kind of experience when you go on holiday on your own, but there is still the chance to try something new and perhaps a little different. 

During my holiday I spent the day in London. I went on my own which meant I could do what I wanted when I wanted without worrying about anybody else. I acted like a tourist and late afternoon ended up in Westminster. The abbey was closed though, so I was disappointed, but then I noticed Evensong was due to start, so, for curiosities sake and to get out of the Arctic wind I decided to go. Not my normal type of worship. Good music (a bit of plainsong does you good) and slightly bemused by the man who had to lead the readers to the Bible to read. Nobody talked to me apart from the man who led me to my seat and the woman next to me who told me not to take my coat off because I'd freeze. I left relaxed and calm.....

Two days later I went with my friend to join a Vineyard congregation for their Sunday service. You couldn't get something much more different than the abbey. Food and very good coffee on arrival, lots of small talk, lots of chaos, loud worship band, children playing computer games, sharing of bread and wine with no formality at all, community being built in the offices of a charity in the middle of an industrial estate. I left feeling hyper (that's the coffee) and chaotic but welcomed....

In his book on Church Growth in Britain, David Goodhew describes how Cathedral congregations and new churches are among the growing churches, so what is it about these two seemingly polarised ways of being church that means they are growing? Both of them made me feel a little uncomfortable, yet both of them clearly have something to offer. 

I appreciated the anonymity of the abbey congregation. It was big. It was quiet. There was no need to get involved. I could just sit back and relax. I didn't have to listen to a sermon (there wasn't one) and as long as I stood and sat at the right time (guided by the lady in the hat next to me) it was all OK. I was on holiday so I didn't want to engage in conversation about what I do. I was able to leave the abbey shaking one persons hand and one person only and the gatekeepers were cheerful.The woman in the hat was giving out some kind of leaflet inviting people to an event where they could talk about faith but I managed to avoid the leaflet by walking behind her. The whole atmosphere inside the abbey gave me a sense of the awesomeness of God and made it possible just to be. 

If this was my every day congregation though? I'd miss the relationships. I'd miss the informality. I'd be frustrated by the sameness....... but perhaps some people appreciate that.... and perhaps by being in a place where you can just be you can build relationship with God on an individual basis. However, if we are meant to be a church that actively seeks to live out the Kingdom of God, the lack of community and commitment misses the point? Does being a follower of Jesus require more commitment?

The Vineyard congregation clearly had that community feel. Everyone knew one another. Someone new came in and a greeter introduced him to someone of a similar age who could sit with him during the service. The congregation heckled and discussed. The children could make as much noise as they wanted and nobody blinked (apart from me, who is not used to that!). There was not meant to be a sermon, but there was still a talk. 

If this was my every day congregation though? I'd miss the silence, the chance just to sit and be, the space. I think that the abbey congregation could teach the vineyard one a little bit about awe and wonder, just as the vineyard could teach the abbey about informality. (The informality clearly didn't spread to the music, though, which was perfected in similar detail to the abbey yet was very different). For this congregation belonging was vital and commitment was important. So very different, yet also growing. What I struggle with most about this church is that it felt like a pop up church - there today, gone tomorrow. Fragmented during the week as people travel in from far and wide and return to their local community. A different way of serving where perhaps people are invited into the church community rather than integrating into the community around the church. 

Whatever my struggles with these two ways of being church, the fact that they are growing cannot be denied. I wonder what I can learn from these places, but I also wonder if there is still space for something else. Something that embodies itself in local community, but learns a lot from the past. Something that is as messy as new church, but less controlled by leaders and as awe inspiring as cathedral church, but connects much more in community. 

I keep coming back to this though..... That the challenge is to be God's church embodying God's mission in the situation you are in, not necessarily in the situation where you strive to be. We can learn, we can theorize, but being God's called and sent people is where it is at. 

"A church which pitches its tents without constantly looking out for new horizons, which does not continually strike camp, is being untrue to its calling..... [We must] play down our longing for certainty, accept what is risky live by improvisation and experiment" - Hans Kung

My not so secret love of shoes

It's no secret that I love shoes and I have many pairs. You can tell that I do wear many of the pairs I have because of the number of pairs of shoes strewn around my shoe room (yes I have a shoe room, which other people would call a porch, however, for me it is the living place of my shoes that I walk through to get in and out the house). 

My favourite pair of shoes are my TUK shoes with stars on. They have something sophisticated about them (well, they have heels) and something a little bit woo about them (I love anything with stars on - reminds me to shine like a star in the universe - Phil 2:5). I don't wear them very often. They are my best shoes, so they are saved for those best occasions when I don't need to walk and I like to tower above people who are less than 5 foot 5 (rather than 5 foot 3). By putting on a different pair of shoes I feel different - tall, relaxed, warm, sophisticated, business like, like a hill walker... but inside I am always still me - the person who loves shoes. 

Today I was looking around the lecture room at college (I was concentrating, honest) and looking at peoples shoes. What did the different shoes say about them? I have to say that it was the Baptists that had the best shoes - I don't know why that was - perhaps we are more shoe focused - and of course it is all down to my own perception of.... well..... shoes.  

Was the person with bare feet a free spirit?

Is the one who takes his shoes off every lecture just too relaxed? 

Are the ones with the boring shoes..... well........ boring?

Were the ones with the trainers the most ready to run?

Does it matter what shoes you wear? I have to confess that I am judgemental about shoes. I once decided someone would not be a good youth worker because of his choice of footwear (I was a impressionable teenager at that point.... but....)

I think that shoes probably do say something about who you are. They are a floor level identification mark. If I saw shoes first I might be able to work out what kind of person someone might be.... and I am going to try it next time I meet someone new. If I look down first, it's because I'm working you out by your shoes. 

What struck me today (as we were talking about judgemental attitudes in our two days of racial justice training and I was judging people by their shoe choice) is that shoes might say something about our personality, but they don't express who we really are. It's where we go with those shoes that matters.

Those shoes that I keep for best.... perhaps I need to wear them more. In my journey I need to be prepared to squelch in the mud, walk so far my feet are covered in blisters, get wetter than I have ever been before, because where God has called me might mean that I could be taken to places that are not comfortable and are not easy. 

Shoes say something about who we are, but our true identity can only be found in Christ. My toes need to always point to him as I seek to follow his path. 




(The picture is my current shoe want, but in red. I go in the shop and I dream..... http://www.schuh.co.uk/red-or-dead/womens-silver-red-or-dead-shirley-glitter/1164527660/)

Horse meat, snow and what's really important

I'm quite glad that the trends on twitter and status changes on facebook have moved on from horse meat to snow. The idea of horse meat in burgers was little surprise to me, but the abundance of horse jokes and pictures of horses lying on tesco tills really freaked me out. I couldn't look. I'm a little sick of the snow statuses and pictures now though (although I do confess to posting one earlier this week - but I WAS first!). We've had snow lying on the ground all week. My road has been an ice rink for the last few days and every time I drive off the drive I hear the crunch and feel the slip.....

We get caught up in the hype. When we exclaim louder that the meat in our burgers is horse (which actually won't hurt you) than we exclaim about people who have to eat food out of the bins and gutters then we have got our priorities wrong. In being caught up in the hype we miss the other stuff that is going on, we miss the injustice, the human beings who are treated worse than we might treat a horse. The current government appears to use this as a diversion tactic.... bringing in the possibility of a referendum in Europe so we forget about the people who are being left destitute because of the welfare reforms..... blaming the European Union for immigrants who apparently cost lots of money so we forget that companies are dodging tax. 

Trouble is, is that we are mostly selfish. The content of our burgers is a lie to us - an infringement of our rights, whereas the content of the pay packets and the treatment of the people who make our chocolate doesn't matter, so long as we pay as little as possible. 

I was challenged last week that actually it is not about my life being comfortable first, but it is God first. In God's care for humanity I need to be prepared to step off what is normal and take risks to do things differently. I am not called to where I am because it's easy or because I am called to do nice things that are comfortable and make us happy, but I am called to where I am to live for God. The status quo is not the ultimate goal. If this means going to the uncomfortable places, doing the things that I find most difficult, not having something that I really really want, then that's the way it's got to be. Easy to say, hard to comprehend.

So this week I'm considering changing my bank. I cannot justify any more staying with a bank that supports the arms trade, that is reported consistently as being unethical. I've considered it before, but this time I'm going to go for it. I hope. Unless the comfort of being where I am familiar with yet again becomes the excuse for putting myself first. 

A time to say sorry (and a time to not....)

When I was a teenager I went through a stage of saying sorry too much. I would say sorry for existing if I could (and in a serious way rather than a soREEE sort of way). This wound other people up, and my vocabulary became less diverse (as it would if every other sentence contained the word sorry). I don't do that any more, perhaps I got bored with it. 

Or did I? Maybe now I do it more in my mind. I wonder if sometimes I am too apologetic for being me. Somebody is grumpy and I spend time wondering what it is that I have done to upset them (when I know when I am grumpy it is because I am - not always because of someone else). If I argue with someone I want to apologise, even if it is them who needs to apologise. I will leave a conversation with someone and worry that I might have said something I need to say sorry for. It's not a confidence issue, it's a keeping peace issue. I try not to break too many eggshells for fear of making too loud a noise. 

If this advent period is a time for reflection and confession (which I think it probably is) then I need to say sorry to God for being sorry too much. I need to say sorry for those times when I have not been bold in saying what I really think is right for fear of upsetting others. I need to say sorry for those times I have not confronted a wrong situation for fear of upsetting those who I am going to confront. 

I am me. I am not going to become one of those people who stands up and makes my opinions heard above everyone else, but I am trying to be one of those people who is honest about what I really think and believe. My ideas and thoughts may or may not be the same as others. They might irritate or challenge, affirm or placate, but this is me, and these are the things I want to say and feel right in saying. 

So, I am sorry if I say something to make you grumpy or say something really stupid when I am tired. I'm going to try not to dwell on it and I'm going to be the person who God has called me to be when he made me me. 

"Search me, God, and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting." 
                                                                                              Psalm 139:23-24 TNIV

That quiet moment of amazing change

Suddenly it's Advent. Suddenly I am able to stop, anticipate and look forward. Yesterday we lit our first advent candle reminding us that Jesus came to bring light in the darkness. We had a great church community morning where we talked about hope, inspired by the covenant promise signed with a rainbow by God after the great flood that brought hope to humanity. This hope is brought to a climax in the Christmas story as we anticipate the mystery of the incarnation - the Word made flesh - God with us. 

November has been a month of thinking, anticipating and actively being part of the creation of change. In Baptist Union Council and in college we have been thinking about big change - the future - where next, what next, where might God be taking us. When we think about the changes that happen we are constantly seeking the Holy Spirit... acknowledging the fact that we are holding very tightly to what we know and realising that sometimes we need to let go. I love change, but I also love hanging on. I'm inspired by change but sometimes change stresses me out! I look for signs to motivate change and walk past them when I see them, just as much as I notice them and recognise the way in which there are pointing. 

When we are busy, sometimes change just happens and we don't notice it until it has happened and we realise it was good. It comes in the little things and the unexpected. Sometimes it all happens at once, and seems like the highest mountain until we get to the other side and realise how far we've come. 

The anticipation of advent is the anticipation of that moment that quietly changed the world forever. I love this poem, written by U A Fanthorpe that speaks of the awesome quiet change that we anticipate at this time of year. 

BC:AD

This was the moment when Before
Turned into After, and the future's
Uninvented timekeepers presented arms. 

This was the moment when nothing
Happened. Only dull peace
Sprawled boringly over the earth.

This was the moment when even energetic Romans
Could find nothing better to do
Than counting heads in remote provinces.

And this was the moment
When a few farm workers and three
Members of the obscure Persian sect

Walked haphazard by starlight straight
Into the kingdom of heaven. 


U A Fanthorpe - from Selected Poems, 1986, Penguin Books

More equal than everyone else

I've been listening to Radio 4. Partly to learn how to listen better, partly because I am one of the over 30's who have 'shuffled away from radio 1' (when the news told me that was what they were expected us to do I put on my slippers and shuffled, mainly because I was so irritated by the notion of me being a shuffler that I decided to live up to expectations) and partly because my ace sister tells me it's great. 

I must be learning how to listen better because I actually remember some of what it said. I knew when my lecturer on Wednesday afternoon almost directly quoted what he had heard from radio 4 that afternoon..... and I keep wanting to tell people what I have heard. Maybe radio 4 is OK, and all my reluctance to listen was unfounded. Perhaps I was scared of the Archers. 

I drove down to the Midlands on Monday (it's when I drive to the Midlands I realise how far north I am) and listened to radio 4 all the way. I heard the story of Russia in the 19th Century (I think) where one of the leaders wanted to try and bring equality to Russia by making everyone equal..... apart from the peasants.

The thing is that 73% of Russia was made up of peasants. 

Sounds shocking that someone might say that. Sounds shocking, but then we remember that it was in the past..... no-one would think like that today would they? 

A while ago I read this tweet from Vinay Gupta (as in many tweets I like I have no idea who he is!):

"A fair world is one in which you live in the same conditions as the people who make your coffee and your jeans. How could it be otherwise?"

When we seek equality, where is our equality limit? Is equality everyone being treated with respect? Is equality making sure that there is space for people who are different to me in decision making? Is equality everyone having the chance to education so that they might bring themselves out of the situation they are in? Is equality as described in the tweet above?

If it is anywhere similar to the last it brings huge challenges to people like me. If I am really seeking equality and liberation for all, I need to give up much so that others can have more. 

All By Myself

There was a point, when I was 11 or 12, that I felt I did not belong anywhere. I had started secondary school, the only girl from my primary school, and was put in a form with people who knew each other, but with nobody who knew me. That wasn't a bad thing, because I didn't get on with those who went to secondary school with me and I needed a new start. I wasn't good at making friends and I was different - I was the daughter of a minister (that makes you weird) and I wanted to work hard. I loved learning and I was not cool. 

I was thrown into a world of established groups of friends, who despite falling out at times were fundamentally strong units that it was hard to break into. I was not always treated in a way that was great and it was easier to spend time on my own or in the library. In looking for friends I looked to those who I recognised as being able to deal with life and who did not need the intensity of 11 year old best friendship. The people of my age at school were not that bothered about me - those like me were trying to be like everyone else, and those unlike me appreciated me as someone to talk to when no-one else was around. 

That feeling did not last long, and I made friends as I grew up through school. Friendship groups evolved, people tried less hard to fit and I became less uptight. I remember those days of not belonging as difficult and sad though, and I never want to be there again. I've now learned to deal with the fact, that when I go to new places and meet new people that I am different and that is OK. I have learnt that there are times when I want to belong that I need to push myself into situations that aren't necessarily ones that I feel comfortable in - situations that challenge me and surprise me. Today, although finding it difficult and frustrating at times, relish those challenging and surprising times. When I was 11 I couldn't do that, but now I can, and I love being me. I'm not normal (what is normal?) and I am happy to be different. 

There is a need, though, in anyone to belong. Belonging helps create a sense of identity. Our identity is not only in ourselves alone, but in who we are when we are with others. Falseness should never come into it. When we truly belong we can expose our weaknesses without fear of breaking ties, we can be really stupid, yet still loved. This was modelled by Jesus - who loved the tax collectors and the prostitutes and the disciples who asked stupid questions......

Why is it then, when belonging is so important, that we make it so difficult for people to belong? We expect them to be like us, to change. We avoid difficult issues just in case they might come between us. When obvious differences are exposed we use them as an excuse to move away and try and belong somewhere else. For me, belonging has changed because I have learned to deal with the things that meant I didn't belong. Those things are still there though, they don't go away. The need to be the same, the need to conform.

It makes me sad, in particular, when people feel like they are not welcome to belong to a church community. They are 'not good enough' or they have 'issues'. They are too different to anything the church has seen before. If you are the only one of something then groups of people who are the same find it difficult to relate to you. Why should someone who has learning difficulties find there is no place for them in church to learn? Why should someone who is single find there is no place for them in church unless they can be paired up? Why can someone not be accepted with the health issues they have without people trying to fix them? We would like to say that we are an inclusive church - that anyone could come and be welcome, be treated equally, but is that what we really do? 

To become a person who was able to belong, I had to change the way I approached things, but not everyone is able to do that. Why should the one who wants to belong nearly always be the one who has to change? Surely the group of people the person wants to belong to need to change too? 

Jesus said 'love your neighbour as yourself' not 'love your neighbour as they change'.