Old Family Photos
Everything is meaningless/futile/vanity. So says Ecclesiastes. Its enough to sober a chap. I spent last week scanning a vast number of slides and photos that I have inherited. They tell the story of my Mum before Dad, Dad before Mum and some very early me photos. I’ve used some as pics for recent blogs. The […]
The Chosen (TV)
“Get used to different” says Jesus in this TV version of the Gospels as the disciples gasp at Jesus’ choice of a tax collector to be one of the team. Most Jesus films are 90 minutes long and tell the whole story at a fast gallop whilst understandably missing out lots of bits. My favourite […]
Queer Holiness (a book review)
Book Review: Queer Holiness (and two others) Queer Holiness the gift of LGBTQI people to the Church by Charlie Bell. It’s a brilliant title for a book. This was a birthday present. I like Charlie. He was one of my students and I’ve marked a couple of his church history essays. He has a passionate […]
Jesus holds you
(There is no evidence that this sermon was preached on 16th August at Laugton Church) (Photo is of a sailing boat, taken from the ferry over to Mull on our way to Iona) Morning! I am Lucy’s husband. I’m also the Vicar of St Leonards and St Luke’s in Seaford and I’m also the Rural […]
Book Reviews: Church History – through the eyes of women, or buildings.
Book Review Feminine Threads (Women in the tapestry of Christian History) by Diana Lynn Severance. This is a brilliant book. You want to read this book because you want to learn a bit about a few of the vast number of wonderful women who have been shaping the church over the last two thousand years. […]
Disciples go shopping
It’s tucked away in a verse in John ch 4. Jesus is meeting the woman at the well and in brackets (to emphasise to the reader how irrelevant this is) we are told that the disciples have gone into the city to buy food. Lucy and I have come away to a lead retreat in […]
Recalibrate
Apparently in science and medicine and engineering, various tools and instruments need to be recalibrated. This means taking them to a safe space, perhaps dry, with low or normal pressure and temperature, and to spend some time alongside a known master so that adjustments can be made before then being put back on the shelf, […]
Kiss
Whenever we camp particularly at New Wine, Lucy and I find ourselves thinking about the baggage we carry. It is a long way from our tent back to the car. Could we travel with less? And we note that at home we have so much more and yet we have coped perfectly well without it. […]
Singing with the thousands
You really should try it sometime. Oh ‘Let the organ thunder’ and ‘Oh for a thousand tongues’. Get yourself into a worship space where there are a thousand tongues and get lost in wonder love and praise. I’ve worshipped in Jerusalem, St James’ Cathedral, where the clerical choir sang in armenian and I hadn’t a […]
Before the Lord
I had no idea that this phrase appears 245 times in the Old Testament, merely 6 in the NT. The first person is Nimrod (Gen 10v9) who was a mighty hunter before the Lord. It got me thinking about both the messy reality of and also the motivation behind what it is that you do, I […]