advent sign-up (updated 5|12)

via comments let me know the day/s you would like to do.

dec 1 - brodie mcgregor
2 - andy goodliff
3 - 1st sunday
4 - ashley beck
5 - andy goodliff
6 - stuart blythe
7
8 - barbara francis
9 - miriam pugh
10 - 2nd sunday
11 - andy scott
12 - barnabas
13 - brodie mcgregor
14 - marcus bull
15 - barbara francis
16 - miriam pugh
17 - 3rd sunday
18 - andy scott
19
20 - stuart blythe
21 - marcus bull
22
23 - andy goodliff
24 - christmas eve
25 - christmas day

advent blog 06

Advent is only a few weeks away and some people have expressed an interest in producing an advent blog through the days. So I am going to attempt to organise another community advent blog - if you're interested in taking part, let me know via comments.

PENTECOST: God's Jigsaw the Church

I like jigsaws. I hardly ever do a jigsaw, but when I do I like the challenge of trying to complete. But jigsaws are really annoying when a piece or pieces are missing. An incomplete jigsaw can make all the work of putting it together feel wasted. A jigsaw needs every piece to see the picture it is trying to show … and so it is with the church … the church needs every person to be the church.

God’s jigsaw the church needs every piece

Just as male needs female, rich needs poor, white needs black, so intellectuals need the simple ... The church is itself when it bridges all these gaps and tensions between people of different kinds (Frances Young, Face to Face)

Some of us think we not important – in a jigsaw every piece is important and no piece is more important than the other … every piece is required … the church is only itself when every piece is in the right place

These bridges are the interconnecting relationships and lives that join us and hold us together – like one jigsaw piece is linked to two or three other pieces. And it is the Holy Spirit who brings us together:

God’s jigsaw the church is a work of the Holy Spirit

the Spirit liberates us, that is to say, by bringing us into community: by enabling us to be with and for the brothers and sisters whom we ourselves do not choose (Colin Gunton, Theology Through the Theologians)

The Holy Spirit has placed you and me in this community – Bunyan Baptist Church – and this is sometimes hard because for all of us there are probably people here we would not choose and things about Bunyan we don’t like and the attraction of other jigsaws (meaning churches) becomes appealing. We want to be church shoppers, when God calls us to committed belonging (this is what church membership means in a Baptist church). The problem is that the church starts with God (at Pentecost), the church is held together by God (in Christ by the Holy Spirit) and the church continues in God to participate in his mission and witness to the world. God has called you to be part of his jigsaw here …

For some of us what we need to do is find where we fit in because not all jigsaw pieces join to each other and a jigsaw piece in the wrong place can distort the picture … some of us are trying to do or be too many things ... some of us are just doing the wrong thing ... and some of us are doing nothing ... when this happens the church struggles to be itself

God’s jigsaw the church is a jigsaw without edges

why might I want to say that? … because new members can always and are always being added and joined on … tiny Lucy Pellegrino this week has joined God’s jigsaw … and those of who have recently found a place to belong and believe are also part of our jigsaw. Pentecost reminds us that that in God’s jigsaw there are no finite number of pieces – 144,000 or the such like – but our task is bear witness to the wonder of God and his story that others may find a home and a family here.

God’s jigsaw the church is a picture of the face of Christ

we are the face of Christ to the world … in and through us people encounter and meet the risen Christ … the power and work of the Holy Spirit shapes and transforms us in the image and likeness of Christ … and as God in Christ is for us and the world, so God in his church, in us, calls us to always to be looking beyond our edges …

Gal 3.28

For it is no longer possible for you to be Jew or Greek, slave or free, 'male and female', for all are one and the same in Christ Jesus

I love this verse. It teaches that if we belong to Christ, everything is radically different. Everything has been transformed. Our identity is shaped by our belonging to Christ and anything else like race, nationality, economic status, gender, etc is nullified, its put to death through the cross. It's a verse that shapes and informs my understanding of what it means to be the church. Where we are tempted to describe who's in and who's out, who's important and who's unimportant, these words to the Galatians, say there are no boundaries in the church, apart from belonging to Christ. As Douglas Campbell says,

'... this is an undeniably radical approach. Everything that we might normally nominate as important to our identities, or even to our well-being, has been displaced in this account of the impact of Christ to the periphery: matters of ethnicity, language, land, geography, and race; of class, education, status, income, and occupation; of gender and family, male or female, and parent or child. All of these distinctions are no longer of central relevance to what we are. What matters is the new reality, sonship, which is obtained in Christ.'

I find myself returning again and again to this verse. It's written on my brain (and hopefully on my heart) as a reminder that belonging to Christ calls us out of and beyond those distinctions which (although in themselves are not negative) can so often divide and separate us from one another (and so also from God).

living out scripture

As a means to seeing this blog continue in some form, I've had an idea.

In The Shape of Living, David Ford writes

... be alert for some key passages of the bible to inhabit in a special way. Hans Urs von Balthasar has said that often a saint's whole life can be seen as living out just one verse of scripture. One rich verse or story can be essential to our vocation, as we come back to it year after year, and find further dimensions to it. The great words, verses and passages of scripture and the liturgy are like houses which, as we study, pray, suffer and love, are made habitable with our own furnishings, pictures, meals and children ...'

So I'd like to invite you to post that verse or story of scripture which is important to you, which you find yourself re-visiting time after time ... (you can make it two or three, if you can't reduce it to one!). If you put the scripture reference as the title, that would be cool.

imagination

imagination n the ability of the mind to be creative of resourceful; the process of imagining

"the key pathology of our time, which seduces us all, is the reduction of the imagination so that we are too numbed, satiated and co-opted to do serious imaginative work" (Brueggeman, Interpretation and Obedience)

This blog seeks to do imaginative work - to reflect upon the arts - music, film, drama, painting, poetry, fiction, essays - and attempt to transcend our unimaginative culture. Or to be readers of the arts, of culture - to think deeply or speak thoughtfully.

Palm Sunday Re-visited?

I preached on the so-called 'Triumphal Entry' on Sunday. I was particularly keen to try to find something 'new' in the story that a group of mature Christians had probably heard every year for longer than I've been alive.

It occurred to me: was it really a triumphal entry? Afterall, it seems that it can be interpreted not only as a 'processional praise party' cheering Jesus on the way to Jerusalem, but also as being a story of failure - the failure of the people to recognise Jesus as a non-violent messiah and also the failure of Jewish religion to provide honest worship to God. If there was a whiff of triumph on that first Palm Sunday it certainly wasn't the sort that would impress Rome or the kind that impressed the fickle crowds in Jerusalem for very long. In fact, some commentators believe that the 'Hosanna' cry was actually part of the usual Passover wish for the restoration of the Davidic monarchy rather than a direct affirmation of Jesus' messiahship. The people sing in honour of the coming King without fully realising that he is in their midst.

I'm left to wonder whether Jesus himself actually wanted a 'triumphal entry'. Perhaps it's possible to see it more as a 'lowly' entry - particularly seeing as he goes on, in Luke 19:41-44, to ruin any kind of praise-party atmosphere with his jugdgement of Israel when its enemies will come and 'dash them to the ground'.

The Judas I never knew

Our Lent blog has not gone as well as hoped. We haven't had as much response from people. Thanks to all of you have blogged, you've certainly got me thinking.

Today let me encourage you to read this blog by Kester Brewin called The Judas I never knew

Being in the kingdom is a bit like being on an escalator

I like the chandelier thing. It reminds me of something one of the YP said a few Sundays ago when we were looking at Psalm 107 (as part of the lectionary).

The Message translation repeats the phrase:

"Then you called out to God in your desperate condition;
he got you out in the nick of time."

He felt that life is like an escalator, and you're travelling along it, and as soon as you near the end of it (i.e. into danger) God snatches you out and puts you back at the beginning of the escalator - in the nick of time.

He also once said that Jesus was like a Hoover, but I'll leave that for another time.

the kingdom of heaven is like a chandelier

We've just been doing a Lent group at our church in Bristol and it's been great to share stories and have deeper spiritual discussions than the usual post-service 'coffee and fellowship' (?!) time allows. We spent some time talking about some of Luke's stories (prodigal son, great banquet, good samaritan) and we watched a clip from Only Fools and Horses when Rodney and Delboy offer to fix a chandelier. Naturally, all goes wrong and it ends up totally shattered on the floor. I was trying to point out that the kingdom is a restoration of our alienation from God, others and ourselves. Just as the crystal, glass and frame had to be re-connected to each other and then re-fitted to the ceiling in order to function, so the work of the kingdom is to reverses the effects of our alienation and restores us to God, others and ourselves.

You made find some flaws in my theory but I hope it is of some relevance!

We were also struck by a quote from David Thomson, author of 'Lent with Luke' who said: 'One of the saddest things is that one generation's prodigal sons so easily become the next generation's elder brothers.

Hows it going?

I was struggling this morning to think what to write for the blog today and then as they do a random thought popped into my head!

We are about half way through lent now (or there abouts) and I started to reflect on how it was going for me. For lent this year I have given up alcohol. Partly because I signed up to do the Thirst for Life campaign and secondly because some of the young people I work with were attempting to give up smoking (for health/finacial reasons) and I wanted to support them and journey with them through that.

Now on first look to ask myself how is it going I can say its going very well. I haven't drunk any alcohol since Lent began. However I have a feeling this random thought of how is it going has a deeper meaning.

The purpose of Lent should really be to deepen your relationship with God.

So today spend some time asking yourself how is it going with God? Are you closer to Him now than you were at the beginning of Lent? Has going without given you more time to spend with God? Have you been having a wilderness experience of God like so many of the Bible characters?

The bottom line is this. Has this time of going without made any difference at all to your relationship with God? And be really honest with yourself.

God bless.

Did you know that the poet George Herbert wrote a poem for every day of Lent? You can look at them here:

http://www.ccel.org/h/herbert/temple/LenTreeFrames.html

Today's poem is:

Nature

Full of rebellion, I would die
Or fight, or travel, or deny
That you had ought to do with me.
O tame my heart;
It is your highest art
To captivate strong holds to thee.

If you shall let this venom lurk,
And in suggestions fume and work,
My soul will turn to bubbles straight,
And then by kind
Vanish into a wind,
Making your workmanship deceit.

O smooth my rugged heart, and there
Engrave your rev'rend Law and fear;
Or make a new one, since the old
Is sapless grown,
And a much fitter stone
To hide my dust, than you to hold.

One more step

I don’t know about you but I love going on walks exploring new areas, and yes sometimes getting lost, very lost! I am not sure why it gives me such a buzz, I think it is got sometime to do with going form the familiar to the unfamiliar not being sure what is around the next bend!

I’m reminded of the hymn by Sidney Carter with the verse “It’s from the old I travel to the new keep me travelling along with you” The entire bible is about people of faith on a journey with God, God taking them from the familiar to the unfamiliar asking them to trust him, take a risk and believe.

It would be so easy to say NO to God and stay in the familiar surroundings, in what is known as the comfort zone of life. Yet I know in my own life saying NO to God or just putting it off because it’s too hard is not a good idea, God will keep on at you until you give in and say OK God not my will, but your will be done!

At this point, I should warn you that saying Yes to God is risky, as your life will NEVER be the same again! Look at the disciples somewhere fisher-men another tax collector all very ordinary jobs, all very ordinary men then they meet Jesus and everything changed for them there lives would never be the same again!

Lent is a time for us to journey on with God, taking us from the familiar, the safe confines of our lives and taking us to a new place, a place where we can grow as individuals as a worshipping community. I hope and pray that you will say yes to God and that your life will never be the same again, have a nice journey!

And they wondered the wilderness

Here, here, make way for the good ones.

Psalm 3

One of the Psalms from the Lectionary* today is Psalm 3:

Psalm 3

A psalm of David. When he fled from his son Absalom.

1 O LORD, how many are my foes!
How many rise up against me!

2 Many are saying of me,
"God will not deliver him."
Selah [a]

3 But you are a shield around me, O LORD;
you bestow glory on me and lift [b] up my head.

4 To the LORD I cry aloud,
and he answers me from his holy hill.
Selah

5 I lie down and sleep;
I wake again, because the LORD sustains me.

6 I will not fear the tens of thousands
drawn up against me on every side.

7 Arise, O LORD!
Deliver me, O my God!
Strike all my enemies on the jaw;
break the teeth of the wicked.

8 From the LORD comes deliverance.
May your blessing be on your people.
Selah

I think this can speak to us something about the meaning of lent. I think sometimes it can feel like the whole world is stacked up against us... and it is important we remember to turn to God in those times.

Footnotes:
* Common Worship Lectionary, Advent 2005-2006, Church House Publishing, 2005
1. Psalm 3:2 A word of uncertain meaning, occurring frequently in the Psalms; possibly a musical term
2. Psalm 3:3 Or LORD , / my Glorious One, who lifts

To know Jesus' story is to be in the story

"The form of the Gospels as stories of a life are meant not only to display that life, but to train us to situate our lives in relation to that life" says Stanley. It is interesting that the gospels, as part of what Andy calls 'God's Big Story', not only invite us to emulate them, but more to actually participate in them. To be a Christian is to be involved with them. In a world of stories that are about escapism, really, the story of Jesus is really the opposite.

There's a literary theory called 'Carnivalesque'. Apologees to real lierary theorists, it never was my strongpoint, but many stories invite you to participate in them. It came from medieval times when once a year one of the oiks of the village would dress up as the landowner, and the vice verse, and everyone would do lots of naughty things they never would normally get away with. They became part of the drama. However, in the end it wasn't real, it was only a story, one that ended. Other parts of this theory talk about the 'lack of footlights' when there is no boundary between say, actors or audience. Somewhere like Disneyland gives you the experience of being part of a story. But again, it's not really happening, it's a fantasy. It's escapism. The story of Easter is that Jesus knew he had to play his allotted part. And the Good News story is one that we can, and must, actually be a part of the story.

(Maybe someone with more insight might like to explain better)...

To Know Jesus is to Follow Him

The form of the Gospels as stories of a life are meant not only to display that life, but to train us to situate our lives in relation to that life. For it was assumed by the churches that gave us the Gospels that we cannot know who Jesus is and what he stands for without learning to be his followers. Hence the ironic form of Mark, which begins by announcing to the reader this is the "good news about Jesus, the anointed one, the son of God," but in depicting the disciples shows how difficult it is to understand the significance of the news. You cannot know who Jesus is after the resurrection unless you have learned to follow Jesus during his life. His life and crucifixion of necessary to purge us of false notions about what kind of kingdom Jesus brings ... Only by following him to Jerusalem, where he becomes subject to the powers of this world, do we learn what the kingdom entails, as well as what kind of messiah this Jesus is.

(Stanley Hauerwas, The Peaceable Kingdom, 1983)

Resurrection Blues

I'd just like to recommend a fabulous play I went to see last week at the Old Vic, (London) called 'Resurrection Blues'. It was the last play Arthur Miller wrote before he died: directed by Robert Altman (Gosford Park etc.) and starring the likes of James Fox and Neve Campbell.

It's about the impending televised crucifixion of a peasant who claims to be the Messiah. It's own blurb says it "brilliantly satirises misguided global politics and the predatory nature of a media-saturated culture" and that's true, but for Lent it really connects because it constantly refers back (how could it not) to the Easter story. The play is really watchable but also makes you think about all the ideas crammed in there. The most powerful scene for me was when the director of the TV show arrives, and no one has told her WHAT she is directing. Her total shock at the idea of crucifying someone really hits home.

There is so much in this play that I think I'd do it dis-service to try and explain any more. Go see.

Finding God in garages

Apologees to this lovely lady pictured - Councillor Lisa Spall (Islington). She's not the focus here. To see those beautifully painted garages, Andover Estate, Islington, 2 of each colour alternate, with no graffitti almost 2 years after they were painted like that, was, frankly, my dream come true when this picture leapt at me from the Islington Gazette this week. As part of the 'Soul in the City' project two summers ago, I helped to dust those garages, mask the locks, prime and paint them, pray over them and their owners. We hoped that they'd stay clean, untarnished. They hadn't been painted since they were put there. And their owners (when they noticed) said it was a waste of time and thought we were insane. To be honest, we all wondered what would happen. And fair enough, we didn't turn that estate into a bunch of Christians (and we didn't intend to). But to me, those garages are like finding Jesus in the wilderness.

Focus

A friend recently told the story of meeting a Black Pastor in one of the southern states of the USA. This Pastor said to him, “the problem with you white folk is that you focus on the one hour of Jesus’ die’n to the exclusion of his thirty years of living”.

I guess there’s some truth in this, especially during Lent and Easter time. There are probably many consequences for the death of Jesus becoming detached from his life but one is that we detach the humanity and divinity of Jesus. Our conception of who Jesus is becomes more rooted in our own preferences than in the narrative of the gospels, and our discipleship becomes shallow as if all we know of Jesus is that he died then there’s no journey to go on with him.

So during this period of lent, yes I want to think about why Jesus died, what his death has accomplished. But I also want to reflect upon the Word becoming flesh, his teaching and his life….his resurrection an it’s implications for our lives now.