Work

Work offends me...

Stained Glass Windows

... are only as amazing as they are because of the light that comes into the church from the outside, so for us as church when it comes to being church in the community and being missional what does that mean?

Is there something about the natural order of things and the way that God has made the world that tells us something of we should live life? That the beauty that we see inside of church is related to our lives 'outside of church'. That church is 'illuminated' by us being 'out there' (physically/metaphysically - you decide)

Times Vs The Sun

The Times reported on the recent 'controversy' generated by a speech given by the Arch Bishop of Canterbury to a bunch of lawyers, but however I think it demonstrates a noticeable difference in writing styles...

The Times writes:
The tabloid newspapers were unforgiving. On Friday, under the front-page headline “What a burkha”, The Sun claimed Williams had “handed Al-Qaeda a victory”. Yesterday it followed up with an entreaty to “Bash the bishop”.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article3342059.ece

Definitions # 1

Adjective: civilised

1. Having a high state of culture and development both social and technological "terrorist acts that shocked the civilised world"


2. Marked by refinement in taste and manners

Verb: civilise

1. Teach or refine to be discriminative in taste or judgment
 

2. Raise from a barbaric to a civilized state

I don't get it... seriously I don't get it.

Its Monday afternoon, round about 4pm-ish and I have just returned from a little errand run on the local high street (Gloucester Road). On my travels, I stopped at the post office to post a birthday card - the ordinary nature of which was disrupted by a loud voice singing in the distance. Now that in itself isn't really that unusual these days - you'd expect to come across a busker or some sort of singing troop cluttering up the pavement (only joking).

What wasn't unusual even was the fact that it came from a late-twenties-man ('Lee?') listening and dancing to music, obviously 'high' on life ('conversing' with him a little later, he definitely wasn't in his right mind - the random nature of his words was like throwing a dictionary into a shredder and watching all the words being spat out of their own volition at the other end). Incidentally, Lee was doing all of this in the middle of Gloucester Road and I do actually mean in the middle of Gloucester Road between the coming AND the oncoming traffic.

What struck me, and caused me to act after what seemed like ages but was probably only about 30 seconds, was the fact that people passed by on both sides, cars & buses passed by on both sides, maybe apathy passed by on both sides... no one did anything!!

After talking to him in the middle of the road, persuading him to go back to the pavement and convincing him that actually there are a lot of other places where he could engage in expressing himself, most of which didn't involve any traffic at all I started to think...

I thought we lived in a fairly civilised society.

Yes we are all very civil and polite when we need to be, whether that at someone's house, down the pub or at some sort of social function; serving the social etiquette is never really a problem.

However in a day and age where we are always willing to point out the inadequacies elsewhere of someone else or someone else's culture we need to carefully examine our own.

Why did no one go? Was it because Lee was off his head? Was it because he was a scary-yob-type-person? Would there have been a different reaction if it was an old lady instead ? Or a child even?

Human beings have dignity. People have dignity. But people don't always live in it. WE ALL don't always live in it.


Here's another definition for you.

Grace

–noun

1. elegance or beauty of form, manner, motion, or action


2. a pleasing or attractive quality or endowment


3. favour or good will


4. a manifestation of favour, esp. by a superior: It was only through the dean's grace that I wasn't expelled from school


5. mercy; clemency; pardon: an act of grace


6. favour shown in granting a delay or temporary immunity


7. an allowance of time after a debt or bill has become payable granted to the debtor before suit can be brought against him or her or a penalty applied: The life insurance premium is due today, but we have 31 days' grace before the policy lapses. Compare grace period


8. Theology




• a. the freely given, unmerited favor and love of God


• b. the influence or spirit of God operating in humans to regenerate or strengthen them


• c. a virtue or excellence of divine origin: the Christian graces


• d. Also called state of grace. the condition of being in God's favor or one of the elect




9. 9. moral strength: the grace to perform a duty

Christmas/Meat

... Mum would be so proud of you guys...

music for shopping

was in somerfield yesterday and they were playing "don't fear the reaper"... hmmm festive...

Wednesday

Well today was WARK Wednesday, so inspired by a friend I decided to go to the local Sainsbury's, purchase a tin of chocolates and proceeded to give them away just outside Clifton Down Shopping Centre. Which was surprisingly difficult really...

One woman responded with "What's the catch?", most responses were "No thank you" but a good few seemed to be able to get past any suspicions and take the free chocolate.

Even the security guard, who came and asked me "Do have permission to give away free chocolate?" to which I surprisingly answered "No", seemed most amiable and even accepted a chocolate after I had moved away from the entrance and onto the pavement area. Hurrah!

Tuesday

- had fun last night at fireworks thing last night
- actually slept in (a whole 8 hours!, thats a Colse Record!!)
- almost everything is in its new place, in a new room
- bought a new coat
- had a nice little chat with a friend on the street

Monday

- car broke down, AA came to tow me to garage. possibly expensive
- walked home with guiutar in hand before realising i had left my house keys with the mechanic, so had to go get them.


- met my new neighhbours

Bounty from a visit from my parents

Which includes:
- chinese procured sausage
- wontons
- moon cake
- blackbeans
- oyster sauce
- sesame oil
- cleaver
- small knife
- replacement power cord for a rice cooker
- cough medicine
- dumplings
- lots of dried things that I couldn't really describe but it was stuff that we ate as kids
- oh and a small weekend away/laptop bag thing on wheels

Do something nice today!

Everyone needs a little encouragement from time to time, so maybe today as you read this you could think about doing something nice for somebody.

It doesn't have to be a big thing, it could be something seemlingly insignificant but enough to make somebody's day... it doesn't take much to...

- hold a door open for somebody
- make a donation to charity
- take the time to take to somebody and actually listen to them
- make someone a cup of tea and deliver it to them with a smile


So go, go, go...

Trust me I know what I'm doing...

Number of screws left after 'fixing' my ibook... hmmm

I survived!!

This morning I preached at the 10.30am service at Woodlands - good, scary, fun, exciting, difficult, easy, wonderful, all of the above and more! Yowsers. It went reasonably well and no rotten vegetables or fruit appeared during amy point of the service!! Hurrah!!

Getting ready to be that guy...

Yikes...

Concerns that 'in-person' social-networking could corrupt children

"A controversial new teenage social-networking trend is emerging across the country, causing alarm amongst parents and community leaders. Rather than using the safety of computers or mobile phones to talk to each other, young people have started meeting up in person to chat, listen to music, share photographs and even form relationships"

Read the Full article

Thanks to Big Brother K for pointing this out... he knows where its at with the kids!

Ultimate insult or compliment?

Well make of it what you will but someone who has EVEN MORE FREE TIME than me has created a duplicate Facebook account of me!

My doppelganger has recently appeared and apparently is a she!!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=757171413

So if you get any spurious or weird messages from 'me' - just double check them as someone may be being mischievous (and hopefully not malicious).

Please also note that sometimes I get messages via Facebook about some of my volunteering work (which may be sensitive and personal) but also I have a few freelancing contacts on Facebook as well, so if you have created this fake profile please could you remove it ASAP.

Don't bother asking them to be a friend or anything as they have been reported and if it continues, I will have no other choice but to challenge Evil-She-Colse to a 'pistols at dawn'/Arnie-Jet LI showdown kind of thing and it will probably end up being quite messy.

Ozomatli Gig

Went to see Ozomatli last night... and I gotta be honest the sound was OK, a bit of a let down for me though. With Latin music there are certain things you want to hear and that (for me at least) didn't really come through in the mix.

The Academy is a slightly unusual venue in some ways (and probably a bit weird to mix in). Its kind of wide and has three levels. Which really made me think about the balcony situation at Woodies and the implications for sound and the clarity of the sound you will hear depending on where you are in a building... as ever no real conclusions!

07/07/07 07:07:07

Today... this morning... this month... this year...

Lucky...

Sorry its just wrong...

Last night

Went to the Louisana last night to see a few friends at an acoustic gig... little bit of advice though. The gents is not immediately by the stairs and apparently this sign does not mean one legged blokes with long tee shirts...