On getting seriously wet...

At long last I am living up to the blog title, and undergoing baptism by total immersion. It may surprise some that one is able to be a leader in a baptist church without having had what is (incorrectly) known as a 'proper Baptist baptism'. Well, as far as I can gather, if you have the chutzpah to carry it off you do not need to have studied theology or even have a Baptist background to be a Baptist minister once you reach the hazier non-stipendary areas of Baptist ministry. Fortunately I am studying theology, and while I call myself 'non-denominational' when I'm feeling stroppy, I am happy to tick the Baptist boxes if it is deemed necessary.

Thus it was that over a year ago I put it to the church members that it would be nice if I could be baptised, and could it be at Easter, please. There was such a chorus of negativity about the complexity of the whole affair, and I was assured that the pool would be too cold for spring. By the time I was able to have further discussions it was getting towards summer 2014 and I lost the impetus, frankly.

So about January this year I resolved to have a second try. This time I took a different tack, and first contacted a local minister to do the deed, then arranged a date (June seemed safer, as less likely to be cold - or so I thought!).

Thus it was that a date was settled, invitations given out (which threatened to get seriously out of hand at one stage!) and plans for a meal were made.

It has all been a completely new journey for me; including the excitement of finding the only pool heater in the local Baptist cluster, finding an electrician to change the plug on it, and get it to church. Then the excitement of getting the pool opened up, and checking out how dirty it was - fortunately not as bad as I was promised. Since then the pool has been scrubbed, the hosepipe set up and a few extra chairs wedged into the church just in case.

I will probably be absolutely exhausted once the 'big day' is over!

Easter

 As Mary kneels to look into the tomb, the angels ask:

Woman, why do you weep?

Someone has taken away my master's body' she says.

In her grief, she does not recognise the man who asks her:

Woman, why do you weep?

Give me the body back, she says, let me do this one last task of love.

Mary!

She runs to tell the others, 'He is risen!'

On Good Friday the incredible tale emerged of a sailor who was rescued after spending two months lost at sea surviving on raw fish and rainwater. Louis Jordan, 37, said putting his clothes in the sea helped catch fish, and he thanked God for saving him when he was down to his last drops of water. It sounds too implausible to be true, but no-one seriously doubts him because it is the only explanation that fits the facts. Jordan could hardly have faked being found sitting on the upturned hull of his boat completely by chance, and he was reported missing in January! In the immortal words of Sherlock Holmes, When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. So many incredible things have happened throughout history but by far the most incredible, most controversial and disputed event in history, is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Sometimes you hear famous people say on the radio or TV what a wonderful ethical teacher Jesus was, and how great the Sermon on the Mount is as a set of moral values. At the moment many of the leaders of the political parties have been giving interviews or making declarations in which they declare how they endorse Christian moral values, even if they are not Christians. Yet what was at the heart of Christianity from its earliest days when Peter spoke to the crowds at Pentecost, through the book of Acts, the epistles of Paul and the whole of church history is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Resurrection is the reason the church is about more than a set of ethical standards, more than a social justice movement. 

Occasionally it is said that the New Testament was written hundreds of years after the events occured. However, in fact all biblical scholars believe that the earliest Christian documents, the epistles of Paul, were written only around 20 years after the death of Christ. And if you flick through them you will realise they are permeated by references to the resurrection.This is Paul's most detailed description of his beliefs. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,  that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. (1 Cor 15: 3 – 5, NIV) .Scholars believe this was an early form of creed, one that may have dates from very early in the history of Christianity. The resurrection accounts cannot be written off a a later invention. They were real events that happened to real people and we have two facts to explain: undoubtedly Jesus died, and undoubtedly he was seen by too many people to it to have been a hallucination.  To return to the Sherlock Holmes quote: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

This is the central core of our faith: our belief in the Resurrected Christ. And we believe this is not a one-off event either; it is Christ's resurrection that guarantees that we too have a future beyond the grave. This is the fact that turned around the lives of Paul and the other early disciples, that made them give up their lives for the resurrected Lord, that has brought new life to millions throughout the millennia, and continues to do so today.

On Palm Sunday hopes

Just under a year ago I visited Jerusalem, in slightly more luxurious circumstances than Jesus and his disciples did 2000 years ago. One thing I soon found out was it is a very crowded place. I have vivid memories of the Church of the Holy Sepulchure being packed with tourists and pilgrims.

In the story of the first Palm Sunday we read of Jesus being greeted by crowds carrying palm branches (John 12: 12 - 16). Why palm branches? Well, apparently they had become a nationalist symbol in the centuries preceding Christ. The words the crowds shouted 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!' and 'Blessed is the King of Israel' shows that the Jews greeted Jesus as the promised Messiah. 

The Messiah the Jews wanted and expected was a military leader, one who would free them from Roman domination. They wanted to be free from oppression. But Jesus subverted their expectations, and instead fulfilled another prophecy, by Zechariah, that told of a peaceful king who entered Jerusalem not on a war horse but on a donkey. This king, Zechariah tells us, does not intend to make war (Zechariah 9: 9 - 10) but 'will proclaim peace to the nations'.

 Jesus came to do God's will, not the Jews and not ours. Often God does not work as we want; he does not always answer the prayers as we expect, because he has a bigger and better plan. I wonder what would have happened if God had answered the Jews' prayer for a military Messiah? A free homeland for the Jews 20 centuries before it was meant to come about? That would have been great, but one thing is for sure: what happened at Easter was far, far greater than that! God's plans are far greater than our own. Maybe you feel God is not answering your prayers at the moment. If so just think: maybe he has a greater plan for you than you can ever imagine.

Joining in with the foolishness of God

When my husband was a young lad one day he was asked what he wanted to be. He replied, 'A smallholder'. His sister turned to him and said, 'You can't do that, it's not a proper job!'

Some years later, after we had been married two years we found a property with about two acres of land, and there we started our own smallholding. My husband kept the day job, while I stayed at home raising the children and caring for the animals. At weekends and during the holidays my husband did the heavy work on the smallholding. We had hens, goats, pigs and a house cow called Chloe. It was hard work, but satisfying.

Eventually we had to move because of work and had to leave the smallholding behind. My husband always hoped to have a small farm, and, when he retired because of ill health we found the perfect place, a small farm in the North York Moors.

Sadly he became seriously ill shortly after we moved there, and died within a year. After he died my mother-in-law wrote me a letter. It was so hurtful I destroyed it and tried to forget it, but it went something like this, '...you always supported Peter and his hare-brained schemes...' It was so hurtful the way she ran down my recently departed husband that it took a real effort of will to forgive her. What we had seen as a way to become self-sufficient and live in harmony with nature she saw as foolishness. To her way of thinking what you did was get a good, highly paid job and then take a mortgage out for the biggest house you could find. It was all based on worldly achievement. Now, over ten years later, I live in a modest house, and I own it entirely. My children are also owner occupiers, and this is largely due to our modest lifestyle years ago, and to a large extent also due to the 'hare-brained schemes' of my husband. What appeared to be foolishness now, especially in the light of climate change, looks like wisdom.

In the first letter to the Corinthians the apostle Paul says 'the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are perishing it is the power of God (1 Cor: 1: 18). To many people being a Christian looks like foolishness, a matter of denying yourself fun and pleasure in the hope of a better life when you die. The life of radical service and non-violence that Christ preached seems foolish in a world of violence and greed (there are even some Christians who are not at all sure about the non-violence!). But this is the life we are called to live when we sign up as followers of Jesus. We are called to join in with his 'hare brained schemes'. I think I will stick with the 'foolishness' of the cross, wherever it takes me, 'for the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength' (1 Cor 1: 25).

On Christian ministry

I have recently been accepted as a 'Probationary Regionally Recognised Minister' by the West of England Baptist Association. I wanted to share a little bit of my history that explains how I got to this point with my fellow believers in church and so this is a slightly edited version of something I wrote for our church magazine.

 About 5 or 6 years ago, while living in North Yorkshire, I felt a strong call from God into Christian ministry. At the time I did not know what form this would take. I wondered whether God wanted to use me in urban ministry, to reach out to people in a poor area. At the same time I decided I needed to move further south, so I could be closer to my parents in Cardiff.

As I prepared to move south and started to look for a new place to live some things happened. In the first place, I felt God telling me very clearly that he did not want me in urban ministry. Then as I started to house hunt I felt drawn firstly to the Forest of Dean and secondly to Lydbrook. So, to cut a long story short, I moved into Lydbrook in November 2010. It was great to find such a loving and caring church family here in Lydbrook, and after a while I felt myself drawn into preaching, and then into leadership. I have also been studying theology online with Spurgeons' College in London because it is very important to me that I am do this thing properly. I would hate my preaching or teaching to cause confusion.

About eighteen months ago I got in touch with WEBA about getting recognition for this calling. A Regionally Recognised Minister is someone seeking to serve in a ‘limited sphere’ within WEBA. I can only exercise ministry within our association, which is fine as I'm not thinking of going anywhere else. I want to help God lead this church forward, so we can become the community of faith He wants us to be. Praise God that WEBA has recognised my calling. I have to meet a Regional Minister in March to talk over all this entails, which is a little daunting, but I know that God will equip me to do whatever is in His will.

Talking about disability and healing

Here are a few thoughts that I put together for a sermon at another local church. The idea was to choose a current topic of interest and link it to the Bible. I possibly went a bit off-piste on that one, but here is where I ended up.

I decided at the beginning of the week that I would say something to you about one of the major news items this week, and there have certainly been a lot to choose from. But if you have watched the BBC at all this week, the most important news item seemed to be related to the live week on Eastenders, So today I will be talking about the death of Lucy. But this is not the death of Lucy Beale, it's someone you have probably never heard of. This was a very small news item that caught my eye. Lucy's death was not widely reported because it was not violent, but it was very sad because when she died last month she was only 29.

Lucy Glennon had a genetic disease called  epidermolysis bullosa  which causes the skin and internal body linings to blister at the slightest knock or rub. The effect is equivalent to a third-degree burn and Lucy lived a life of constant pain. The disease was also progressive, so got worse as she got older.

Read more about Lucy here.http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/feb/17/lucy-glennon-disability-activist-real-effects-of-cuts?CMP=fb_gu

You have to read the whole of the article to understand that this was someone who, despite all her problems, was witty and lived life to the full. Also, despite everything, she was a committed Christian. Her sister told of how Lucy was once asked how she could believe in God when she was in so much pain. “She stopped and thought about it,” says Sally, “then said that over the years she thought of all the people who looked after her, and nursed her, and she sees God and love in every one of those people.”

Lucy was someone who lived an almost disregarded life, despite her impressive qualities. I rather think she is with her Father now, healed at last. Jesus always had compassion on those in need of healing, even if they were people others ignored. Our Bible story is a case in point. It is one of the least quoted healing miracles and tells of a woman with a long term spinal condition. We are told she could not straighten herself up properly. Imagine what it was like living with that for 18 years. It was so long that probably people did not even notice this woman's problem any more. However Jesus noticed her. She may well have been elderly, and as a woman was not viewed as important, but we know Jesus always noticed the humble, the disregarded. She did not even seek healing – maybe she had given up hoping. But Jesus called her forward (as a woman she would have been at the back of the synagogue) and placed his hands on her and healed her. Sadly the synagogue ruler is more interested in upholding the letter of the law on the Sabbath than on rejoicing the fact that this woman is freed from her captivity to Satan. Jesus cared about everyone equally – think about the people he healed. He healed the son of a hated Roman centurion as readily as he healed Jairus's daughter. He healed Jews, Samaritans and Gentiles. Everyone is equal in the kingdom of God.

How did you feel about Lucy's story? It seemed a bit unfair that someone so obviously good and hardworking was afflicted with such a dire condition. Why wasn't she healed? We see people who get amazing healing – and we see people who do not get healed. In truth we all await the final healing in heaven. In a book I am reading called Becoming a true spiritual community By Larry Crabb the writer tells of how he shared with a group about he struggled with, his need for approval and to gain glory from his calling. But as he spoke he was worried that people would try to 'sort him out' whereas all he wanted was acceptance, because he believed that he would never be healed in this life, not because he did not believe in healing but because he knew it was too too deeply entrenched in his psyche to sort out in this life, and that also maybe because it was this sense of being a wounded person that kept him seeking after God.  

Sometimes people give us negative messages about healing; that God would heal us if only we believed, or confessed sin in our lives. But we're not put here to be turned into perfect beings in this life, rather to go on a journey with and to God. To do that involves being honest with God and with ourselves and acknowledging that we all have messy, unsatisfactory things in our lives because we live in a messy, unsatisfactory, broken, fallen, sinful world – call it what you will! And we know that we have a heavenly Father who loves us. We know this God loves the Coptic Christians who were murdered because of their faith. He also longs to reach out to their executioners. He cares equally for those on both sides in the conflict in Ukraine. God cares so much he sent his only Son into the world and Jesus says we can see him in everyone in this world who is in need. We can see him in the black man jostled off a train in Paris...and his Father seeks out the lost, including the Chelsea fans who abused him. God is alongside the Muslim parents desperately praying for their daughters to return home, and with Lucy's family as they mourn her loss. I hope you will take with you this knowledge that you are loved, and I pray that we can all take that love into the world either through our words or through our actions. And may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you always. Amen.

He is the image of the invisible God

If you were explaining your faith to someone who knew next to nothing about it they might ask you 'why do you worship Jesus? Who is he?' Imagine trying to answer that question, maybe to someone you had met briefly, trying to explain the importance of Jesus in one paragraph. Well, in his epistle to the Colossians St. Paul does a very good summary in verses 15 – 20.

The passage divides into three sections, and each one tells us a different thing about Christ, all of which add up to explain why He is at the centre of our faith.

Firstly we are told that Jesus is 'the image of the invisible God' - Jesus shows us what God is like, and more than that , he is so close to God that he was there when creation began (like wisdom, and you may recall John 1: Jesus is the word, and God's word is wise). Jesus has a unique role in creation: he helped create, he rules over it all and he holds it together. You may be reminded of John 1 as well as Proverbs 8:22, which tells us that the first thing God created was wisdom: so in that light, does that mean Jesus is Wisdom, and Proverbs, when it talks about 'wisdom' really speaks of Jesus? I don't think any commentators believe this: some believe that when New Testament writers wrote about Jesus they were influenced by the Old Testament – they wrote according to their faith tradition, and so they used the descriptions of wisdom to help them express the centrality of Jesus to God's plan. In Isaiah 11: 2 we are told that the Messiah will be the one on whom God's spirit of wisdom rests. So Jesus being equated with wisdom , and being someone who was known for his wisdom, shows that He is the Anointed One.

There is something else going on here. The fact that Jesus is so much part of the big picture reminds us that when he created the world God planned everything. For atheists the very existence of the world is random. Everything is because of chance. Despite evidence that our very existence, the size of our planet, its closeness to the sun, the presence of water, needed to exist within very narrow parameters, for many everything is a result of random mutations. But the Bible tells a very different message. This is not about evolution versus creationism, it is about plan and purpose versus accident and chance. As Christians we believe in a world that is here for a reason, where God has an overarching plan, and our lives have real meaning, and at the centre of that meaning is Jesus.

Then in verse 18 we have a shift in emphasis from the transcendent figure of Christ, the Messiah, Creator and Son of God, to Jesus the head of the church. What a difference. Suddenly we, as members of the church are connected to the creator of the universe. You may be feeling very very far away from Jesus at the moment. In body terms you might feel like the big toe: but we all know that if you stub your toe it has an impact on the head – the mouth usually says 'ow'! Toes might not feel very important or even very lovely at times, but we know they come in very handy when you need to walk anywhere. And even though it is a long way from the head the big toe is controlled by the head. Despite the times we feel distant from Jesus, we are connected to him: the same blood runs through the whole body. We have a relationship with Jesus, he walks alongside us.

The third thing I want to highlight is how Paul describes Jesus' role in life – his job description. It is not to do miracles, preach sermons or make disciples; it is to 'reconcile to himself all things.' And how does he do that? Through the cross. The problem with the wonderful relationship we should have with God is that too often we don't have it (remember Adam walking in the garden with God?). Our relationship gets spoiled. Sometimes we have distractions in our life, or we may have had life events that drove us away from God, but the root problem is sin. And sin is not just disobedience to God, it is also the breaking of a precious friendship. It was to restore that broken relationship that Christ gave his life. And what is truly mind-blowing is that it is not just to make us acceptable to God, to give us the confidence to stand in God's presence, that Christ died; he died to bring all things on earth and heaven – everything to that place of reconciliation. The cross is not just our place of reconciliation, it is also a reminder that the final goal of creation is reconciliation to Christ.

This passage is amazing, and beautiful, but it may seem remote from your daily life. I believe we may learn things that can help us today. Firstly we learn that we are created for a purpose. God's world is made for a purpose, and we were made for a purpose too. Our lives have real meaning. I want to ask you a question: do you truly believe your life has real meaning?

Secondly we realise that we are created to have a relationship with Jesus. We are part of his body. Do you know Jesus, do you sense him walking beside you in your daily life?

Thirdly, we may feel very distant from God because of life events, or because of sin. But we know that through Jesus' sacrifice we have the confidence to approach God's throne. The cross puts all things right – it gives us reconciliation with God. So, are you feeling at peace with God, or are there jagged edges in your life that are making you uncomfortable?

Compassion

Taken at the Benedictine foundation at the traditional site of the miracle of the feeding of the 4000

Mark 8: 1 - 5
The miracle of the feeding of the four thousand starts from the place of God's compassion. Jesus sees a crowd of hungry people and turns to his disciples and says 'I want to feed this rabble because I care so much about them'. The disciples are horrified: how can we do this, we do not have the resources, we have barely enough to feed ourselves. The story that unfolds tells of a miracle, of the multiplication of those scarce resources. It says to me that our response, as a small church, to the needs in our community is not good enough. We say 'we can't do it, we don't have the people or the money.'

My question is, where is the need in our community, who do you discern God has compassion for?

A while back a local pastor wrote these prophetic words for our church community, 'Guard yourselves well and make it your aim to be fruitful and feed others with the fruit you grow.'

I pray we can make headway with this task in the year to come.

New year reflections

At this time of year I am often reminded of the story behind King George VI's 1939 Christmas broadcast. Those of us who watched The King's Speech will remember seeing the dramatisation of his speech to the nation at the outbreak of World War II, but this broadcast is possibly better known, because it included some lines from a poem by Minnie Louise Haskins.

I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:

“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”
And he replied:
“Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.

That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.”
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.

And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.

The story is that Queen Elizabeth, later the Queen Mother, had seen the poem and brought it to the attention of the king, and after it was read out on air (much to the surprise of its author) it quickly caught on in popular imagination. The poem was later read at the Queen Mother's funeral in 2002. I used to have a copy of it that I kept as a bookmark for many years. Some believed Minnie Haskins was American or Canadian, but in fact she came from the Bristol area, and was a Congregationalist who studied and lectured at the London School of Economics, and published a few books of poetry as well.

Surprisingly, the poem was written many years previously, having been published in 1908,yet it captures perfectly the sense of dread that must have been felt by so many in the early days of the Second World War, when Britain and the Empire were isolated, and the fear of what could happen if Germany invaded our nation made the future seem very bleak.

The poem reminds us that when we are faced with an unknown future there is only one remedy, and that is to put our trust in God. Too often fear can be paralysing, and stop us moving forward, but we are told to go forward boldly into the darkness, because it is only there that we will find the guiding hand of our God. The rest of Minnie Haskin's poem is not well known, but is worth reading. I would like to quote one more verse, which includes the original title to the poem, God knows.

God knows. His will
Is best. The stretch of years
Which wind ahead, so dim
To our imperfect vision,
Are clear to God. Our fears
Are premature; In Him,
All time hath full provision.