abbotsford.org.uk

Harvest

Harvest is coming up and I haven't had a single thought about it until tonight. This is unusual. We were just talking at Craft Daft tonight (brilliant banners by the way) that this time last year we were hanging all those fabulous photos of people's favourite scene. 360 of them.

But I haven't been anywhere near being so organised. CAOS has been busy with grant applications. It's taken it's toll but it will be utterly fantastic if it is succesful.

Anyway, I digress. I'm needing some help with harvest:

Colours of the season...?
Sounds...?
Words...?
Textures...?
Smells...?
Music...?

Please feel free to be imaginative, creative, unusual, silly, daft, foolish in answering any of the above. And also please feel equally as free to answer them without being too clever, spending a lot of time trying to think of stuff, just the first things that come into your mind.

Lots of answers too would be good. Saves me having to think them up. So answer any as much as you like. Looking forward to a busy week because I'm sure there will be other things we'll need to invent togetehr as the weekend gets closer...

The Story Teller

I was out for coffee today with a good friend and we had a moment of inspiration. The church is always going on about getting people to tell "Good News Stories". It's part of Church Without Walls. People don't talk up the church. Far too often they moan (remember the moaners don't get to the Promised Land, Numbers 14) and complain about the church.

And those who do have Good News stories are reluctant or shy to tell them because the church is not good at listening nor loving new ideas. We all feel so insecure that when soeone comes along with an story about an idea then we all go into defense mode, find the problem with it rather than the celebration. We've been trained to survive rather than blossom. The whole way we define the church is through statistics. that's the only formal way the church describes it's life.

So lets have a resident story teller. Schools are having them now, hospitals too, nations indeed. We should have one to two or three in Abbotsford, folk who listen and write the stories down, the ways people help and care and celebrate and get invovled and dream and think and what they like and what inspires them and how they inspire others. These are the Good News stories.

Someone ought to be given the means and support, training and time to listen in to the story of the congregation and then somehow given the space to tell it, let people catch up with the story so far.

What it isn't is a history book like one of those books published at a centenary whcih no one reads but everyone thinks it's something we ought to have. That's a dull idea and it surfaces because we have no imagination to think of anything else. It's the living story of now, of Mrs McGinty baking for the Youth Group, of Mr Smith and how he always leaves a sweet in the pew of an old friend, of Crafts daft and the conversations we have round making the art work, of CAOS an the thoughts of the volunteers, of Talk Back and how people engage with worship, of new folk and why tey chose to attend.

So I'm looking for a story teller in residence or people to flesh out the idea further. Any thoughts...

A (bad) taste of Sunday

Here's what will be the contemporary reading for Sunday. Needs a little more work and so I look to you. Any editing will be very welcome indeed. I've tried to put our present times into apocalyptic style. It has sort of worked but anyone who can attempt to make it better please jump in.

the idea is to give a flavous of apocalyptic style to show what it can do to people who are uncertain of the times. Three readers, one for each stanza plus a wee chant sung every three verses (itself symbolic). So see what you can do. Oh, and three readers would be helpful too if there are any other there... Looking for some images to go with it too...

When everything that was thought secure
now reveals it’s insecurity
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When the great riches of beast
are swallowed by it’s own greed
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When the leaders of the time
hide their uncertainty with false confidence
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

Chant

When black gold rises in the desert
and the mighty beast of many readies for battle
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When it’s terrible pride is dented
and its claws tighten round it’s prey
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When the sound of weeping fills the land
and nothing can silence it’s power
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

Chant

When humanity goes back
on it’s contract with creation
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When the northern lands retract
and the oceans starve
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

When the skies turn dark
and the air grows heavy with the dust of humanity
Behold, God will keep you forever and ever

Chant

Proof

I'm spending more time in bed than out of it due to the equinox being a few days ago. There are more hours of dark than light, which computes that you should be in bed longer than working.

However, as we all know eggs ought to stand on end on the day of equinox. And we offered you certain proof. Yet there were some skeptics (surely not, I hear you cry). Tom, however, has sent this absolute certain proof of the same egg unable to stand on end just two days after the equinox.

Who needs HADRON colliders when we have all the secrets of the universe here. Richard Dawkins eat your heart out.

Any other questions out there? (other than that one)

Chocolate Teapots for 28th Sept 08

Second half of Daniel. totally strange stuff going on here. If you're into appocalyptic then you've come home. If you're not into it then how do you read these passages. That's what Sunday is about. Dare you to read it.

Important News Flash

Michael D offers this:

Sorry to depress everyone, but the equinox is today at 16:44 – after that its nights-longer than-days for the next 6 months.

However, you can cheer yourselves up by trying your hand at  this very old legend which says the autumn equinox is the only day in the year that eggs can be made to stand on end, Give it a try and see how you get on!

So please do let us know. Photographs will be published here and it may even appear in some liturgical item on Sunday. So cameras, eggs, action...

News Update... News Update... News Update...

Hey, look what Tom discovered today. Scientific proof is every you need it.

Anyway, I'm off to bed early and not getting up till it's light. Tomorrow I'm going to bed when it gets dark and each night thereafter. See you next equinox.

A thought

Part of a prayer used today:

God who finds power in redeeming the times
hear us as we pray for these times
the fickleness of our economy
the uncertainty of markets
and the continual ignoring of what causes poverty
and a way of life that brings hunger

God redeem the times

As we watch amazed at the markets
because no one understands what’s happening
and as we’re told the landscape has changed
as we can spend inconceivable amounts of money
on something we cannot touch
and yet are unable to spend less than a fraction of that
on feeding the poor

God redeem the times
for the landscape has not changed

Step for a hint

As the money markets rise and fall
and Banks come and go
credit crunches crunch
and governments play at monopoly
it’s just another day at the office for the people of God
we’re called to do fiery furnaces and lion’s dens
every day of the week

You don’t need to bring anything here
success or excuses
just yourself and this week’s living
and dedicate it to the one
who risks everything
on the future
and calls it resurrection

Sign of the times

So where do you invest your money now? Never did like HBOS coffee shop style interior.

Maybe we need some light relief so I have a question: what Bible passages speak into all this financial turmoil. Any suggestions?

"You aren't born with it and you can't take it with you" Timothy somewhere if I remember correctly.

Anything else, serious or less serious....

Space & Worship

There is a very excellent workshop/conference on Wed 22nd Oct in Renfield St Stevens looking at how space is used in worship. This is the sort of stuff everyone ought to go o.

It's run by Soulmarks Trust and the fabulous Carol Marples along with Steve Butler equally fabulous musician and once rector of St James, Leith.

What makes space sacred?
Embodied worship - why bodies matter
Ritual architectural event - making worship inclusive
Seeing is believing - and having ears to hear
Touching the void - re-membering the body

It costs £40

Worth every penny.