I had a flier about this a few months back, but there were exasperatingly few details on the website. No longer....
The conference is 13-14th September, so less than a month away now, and is being held in Leicestershire. It costs £85, and the parent website www.ruralmissions.org.uk tells you more about the folk who are organising it.
The website itself is a good idea - I found it a bit busy, and it's rather frustrating that you can't find out what free goodies are available to subscribers until you become a subscriber. There are, apparently, articles and resources which you can get, but until you sign up for a tenner they won't tell you what they are. I'm with the Anglican Church Planting website on this one - just put it all up for free. Or maybe I'm just a stingy northerner.....
In the meantime, if you want to think about rural fresh expressions of church but can't make the conference, the very good Expressions 2 DVD from the Church of England has a 20 minute section on rural fresh expressions, with 4 different examples of new forms of church in rural areas. The good thing is that little of it is rocket science, and there are some discussion notes available too, along with a full transcript of the DVD.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Mill House Retreats, Devon
Free plug for a very nice place just over the Devon border, if you want a retreat but haven’t fixed to go anywhere yet. Good rooms, lovely home cooking, lots of comfy chairs, books galore, very peaceful setting, had a very restoring 3 days there earlier this week.
Website is http://www.millhouseretreats.co.uk/, and it’s very easy to get to by public transport – Tiverton Parkway train station is just a couple of miles away, longer if you take the scenic route by the Great Western Canal.
Sunday, August 12, 2007
retreat
Off on retreat for 4 days from Monday, so probably no new posts here till next weekend. This mornings reading was 2 Kings 20, on Hezekiah, and I drew from some of the good things we were taught on the Arrow Leadership course about 'finishing well'.
So many OT leaders seem to fall away towards the end of their lives. I can only think of Daniel, Moses and Elisha who don't go noticeably downhill. Most of them manage to achieve something great, and then fall apart. Hezekiah doesn't fall apart in any spectacular fashion, but having achieved a lot in his first 14 years as king, he becomes vain, complacent and self-indulgent in the second half of his reign.
I'm well aware of the drop in adrenaline and energy levels after climbing some major work-related mountain. It's hard to press on, easier to stop and enjoy the view, or to live off the self-congratulation for as long as you're able.
The Arrow folks talked about various ways of losing the plot:
burn out: speaks for itself
level out: plateauing spiritually, rather than carrying on growing in grace and Christlikeness
spread out: losing focus and dabbling in things which are of secondary importance
drop out: falling into sin, or just forgetting why you're doing it in the first place, often with loss of faith thrown in.
It's easy as a young Christian to think, 'that'll never happen to me', but at roughly the age when Hezekiah started going downhill (though hopefully I'll not develop life-threatening boils, as he seems to have done), I can easily see all of these as potential dangers. Which makes it all the more important to go on retreats. TTFN.
So many OT leaders seem to fall away towards the end of their lives. I can only think of Daniel, Moses and Elisha who don't go noticeably downhill. Most of them manage to achieve something great, and then fall apart. Hezekiah doesn't fall apart in any spectacular fashion, but having achieved a lot in his first 14 years as king, he becomes vain, complacent and self-indulgent in the second half of his reign.
I'm well aware of the drop in adrenaline and energy levels after climbing some major work-related mountain. It's hard to press on, easier to stop and enjoy the view, or to live off the self-congratulation for as long as you're able.
The Arrow folks talked about various ways of losing the plot:
burn out: speaks for itself
level out: plateauing spiritually, rather than carrying on growing in grace and Christlikeness
spread out: losing focus and dabbling in things which are of secondary importance
drop out: falling into sin, or just forgetting why you're doing it in the first place, often with loss of faith thrown in.
It's easy as a young Christian to think, 'that'll never happen to me', but at roughly the age when Hezekiah started going downhill (though hopefully I'll not develop life-threatening boils, as he seems to have done), I can easily see all of these as potential dangers. Which makes it all the more important to go on retreats. TTFN.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Just finishing off a leaflet with some prayer suggestions for our beach worship this Sunday afternoon at Charmouth. If you're from the Yeovil area and see this in time, you're welcome to join us! Here's an extract from the leaflet, to give a flavour of it. Everyone will get this as they arrive, and then has the rest of the day (and any subsequent visits to the seaside!) to use it as they want to. There are other prayer exercises based on Sand, Stones and Air.
With Jesus on the Beach
Find a few minutes during the afternoon, and pick one of the exercises below to do. Feel free to express yourself in sand, stone and water, and let God express himself to you through them.
At tea time, there’ll be a chance to share with others anything God has said. If you want to ‘redeem’ what you find on the beach to make something for our tea time worship, please do!
At around 4.30-5pm, we’ll eat together, share bread and wine to remember Jesus, and beyond that there’s no plan! Our worship will be what we bring to it, in words, shapes, silences, and ourselves.
Sea
1. Tides, waves, undercurrents.
Beach warning signs say beware of rising tides, large waves, and unseen undercurrents.
In your life, including your spiritual life, what are the rising tides, big waves, and undercurrents? What is Jesus saying to you about these things?
2. Sea tides
Let the love tide swelling
Surround me and my dwelling
Let the power of the mighty sea
Flow in, Lord, and strengthen me.
Tide of Christ covering my shore
That I may live for evermore.
3. Waves
There is always another wave of grace coming from God. “From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace.” (John 1:16)
4. Swimming
Get in the sea and begin swimming breaststroke. (you can do this standing too!) As you push away imagine giving things to God. Decide on some appropriate words to repeat in your mind. As you bring your arms and legs back towards you imagine gathering God towards you and use words linked to asking and finding.
Float in the sea and meditate on God’s love lifting you up and supporting you.
5. Scriptures
“If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.” (Psalm 139: 9-10)
“Who is this, that even the wind and the waves obey him?” (Matthew 8:27)
“If you have faith, you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea’, and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.” (Mt 21:21). If you have a problem, go and find a landslip or some signs of the sea eroding the land, and meditate on these words of Jesus.
“Mightier than the thunder of the great waters, mightier than the breakers of the sea – the Lord on high is mighty.” (Psalm 93: 4)
Find a few minutes during the afternoon, and pick one of the exercises below to do. Feel free to express yourself in sand, stone and water, and let God express himself to you through them.
At tea time, there’ll be a chance to share with others anything God has said. If you want to ‘redeem’ what you find on the beach to make something for our tea time worship, please do!
At around 4.30-5pm, we’ll eat together, share bread and wine to remember Jesus, and beyond that there’s no plan! Our worship will be what we bring to it, in words, shapes, silences, and ourselves.
Sea
1. Tides, waves, undercurrents.
Beach warning signs say beware of rising tides, large waves, and unseen undercurrents.
In your life, including your spiritual life, what are the rising tides, big waves, and undercurrents? What is Jesus saying to you about these things?
2. Sea tides
Let the love tide swelling
Surround me and my dwelling
Let the power of the mighty sea
Flow in, Lord, and strengthen me.
Tide of Christ covering my shore
That I may live for evermore.
3. Waves
There is always another wave of grace coming from God. “From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace.” (John 1:16)
4. Swimming
Get in the sea and begin swimming breaststroke. (you can do this standing too!) As you push away imagine giving things to God. Decide on some appropriate words to repeat in your mind. As you bring your arms and legs back towards you imagine gathering God towards you and use words linked to asking and finding.
Float in the sea and meditate on God’s love lifting you up and supporting you.
5. Scriptures
“If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the farthest side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.” (Psalm 139: 9-10)
“Who is this, that even the wind and the waves obey him?” (Matthew 8:27)
“If you have faith, you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea’, and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.” (Mt 21:21). If you have a problem, go and find a landslip or some signs of the sea eroding the land, and meditate on these words of Jesus.
“Mightier than the thunder of the great waters, mightier than the breakers of the sea – the Lord on high is mighty.” (Psalm 93: 4)
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Prayer Exercises
We're having a beach service next week, so I did a 'beach prayers' search on google, and ran across the following excellent link, which has lots of great ideas for prayer....
It's a section entitled '25 safe experiential prayer exercises' and is exactly what it says on the tin. We'll probably use some of these on the beach next Sunday (weather permitting). The site itself looks intriguing - seems to be a Christian community in Bristol which offers Jesus-centred life coaching as its model of evangelism/discipleship, worth a closer look.
The frustrating thing about the search was that most churches which have beach services just seem to transpose a normal service to a seaside venue, with deckchairs and mats instead of pews. This just seems barmy to me. When you've got sand, sea, rocks, shells, sky, all the smells and sounds and textures of the seaside, to then ignore all of that and incorporate none of it into your act of worship just feels wrong.
Vision for Mission evenings
Had an email flier through about some talks happening near Yeovil, which are worth publicising:
Vision for Mission: Resourcing leaders
(Three Wednesday Evenings)
September 12: Lucy Moore “Reflecting on Messy Church”
September 19: Martin Cavender “The Holy Spirit and Mission”
September 26: Steven Croft “Fresh Expressions and the Local Church: The National picture”
HOSTED BY THE OPEN DOOR
(a Fresh Expressions church plant)
at Fynamore School,
School Road, Calne, Wiltshire, SN11 9UG
Beginning at 7.30pm
Details and maps available from
John Keller Tel. 01249 816314 or
Rachel DickinsonTel.01249 817060 rm.dickinson@btinternet.com
Vision for Mission: Resourcing leaders
(Three Wednesday Evenings)
September 12: Lucy Moore “Reflecting on Messy Church”
September 19: Martin Cavender “The Holy Spirit and Mission”
September 26: Steven Croft “Fresh Expressions and the Local Church: The National picture”
HOSTED BY THE OPEN DOOR
(a Fresh Expressions church plant)
at Fynamore School,
School Road, Calne, Wiltshire, SN11 9UG
Beginning at 7.30pm
Details and maps available from
John Keller Tel. 01249 816314 or
Rachel DickinsonTel.01249 817060 rm.dickinson@btinternet.com
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Pit Stops
A talk at New Wine North a couple of years ago cited a US leader who argued that to be fully effective he needed to spend 50% of his time on personal renewal - time to reflect, read, research, pray etc., so that in the time when he was engaged in ministry he could give of his best. Don't you love stats like that? August is normally the time when I try to do a bit of my own renewal time, as it's quieter in church life, evening meetings dry up, and people are away on hols.
Not sure how I'll cope next year, as we'll have to start keeping to school hols for our own holidays, rather than going away in June and then having the full summer break available for pit stops. In the meantime the month ahead includes a couple of days at New Wine, a 4-day retreat, a couple of reading days, and some time hosting and visiting family. There's always a danger of compressing this sort of stuff into 1 month, thus making it busier than all the other 12!
My aim over the year is to have a quiet day every 2-3 months, a reading day every month, a reading week in Jan-Feb time, between 5 and 10 days at conferences or training events, and inbetween a regular rhythm of just meeting up for coffee/food and prayer with other people. (Speaking of which, very nice lunch at the Bird In Hand, North Curry with Steve Tilley today.) Church leaders get encouraged to do this sort of stuff, and it would be great if as a whole church we had an ethos of renewal which promoted people spending time training and praying and finding their own sources of new energy and ideas.
The other thing buzzing around is that even blogging about this might get people saying 'lazy vicars, all they do is swan around eating and putting their feet up'. Eugene Peterson (who Richard Frank is blogging about at the moment) has pertinent things to say about the 'Unbusy Pastor' and how busyness is a sin in those called to spiritual leadership. Without time to reflect, pray, seek God, we end up doing a job rather than offering a ministry, but in a culture which prizes busyness and 'results' it's often hard to give ourselves permission to be unbusy.
Not sure how I'll cope next year, as we'll have to start keeping to school hols for our own holidays, rather than going away in June and then having the full summer break available for pit stops. In the meantime the month ahead includes a couple of days at New Wine, a 4-day retreat, a couple of reading days, and some time hosting and visiting family. There's always a danger of compressing this sort of stuff into 1 month, thus making it busier than all the other 12!
My aim over the year is to have a quiet day every 2-3 months, a reading day every month, a reading week in Jan-Feb time, between 5 and 10 days at conferences or training events, and inbetween a regular rhythm of just meeting up for coffee/food and prayer with other people. (Speaking of which, very nice lunch at the Bird In Hand, North Curry with Steve Tilley today.) Church leaders get encouraged to do this sort of stuff, and it would be great if as a whole church we had an ethos of renewal which promoted people spending time training and praying and finding their own sources of new energy and ideas.
The other thing buzzing around is that even blogging about this might get people saying 'lazy vicars, all they do is swan around eating and putting their feet up'. Eugene Peterson (who Richard Frank is blogging about at the moment) has pertinent things to say about the 'Unbusy Pastor' and how busyness is a sin in those called to spiritual leadership. Without time to reflect, pray, seek God, we end up doing a job rather than offering a ministry, but in a culture which prizes busyness and 'results' it's often hard to give ourselves permission to be unbusy.
Marriage is good for you
Every month I get an email bulletin from the Christian Research Association, this was the top story in the latest one:
Marriage is good for your health! A study funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services has looked into a wide range of well-being measures such as the economic status, mental and physical health of adults and their children, and found married people to be healthier. For example, marriage has been shown to reduce alcoholic intake and marijuana use by both men and women. Those who are in stable marriages report having less depressive symptoms than long-term single or divorced people. However, marriage has also been shown to contribute to weight gain for both genders, and a decrease in physical activity. More details can be found here:
http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/PDFs/marriagehealthbrief.pdf
I can personally vouch for the weight gain, though my marijuana intake hasn't dropped at all.
Marriage is good for your health! A study funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services has looked into a wide range of well-being measures such as the economic status, mental and physical health of adults and their children, and found married people to be healthier. For example, marriage has been shown to reduce alcoholic intake and marijuana use by both men and women. Those who are in stable marriages report having less depressive symptoms than long-term single or divorced people. However, marriage has also been shown to contribute to weight gain for both genders, and a decrease in physical activity. More details can be found here:
http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/PDFs/marriagehealthbrief.pdf
I can personally vouch for the weight gain, though my marijuana intake hasn't dropped at all.
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