Normal Life Adventure

Obstacles to ordination

2011-09-13T11:57:00.002+01:00

Went to a diocesan ‘Vocations fair’ recently. Initially very encouraging, until I spoke to the DDO.

Obstacles to ordination:

Finance. I still need to clear the defaulted credit cards left over form my unemployment before they will consider me. They are sceptical even of my plan to change it to a structured loan – it would still be an unsecured debt.

I have recently (within the last year) left my old church, in hot anger and wanting to thump someone. Not metaphorically either. I have made massive progress towards forgiveness of some of the main players, but forgiveness is not complete without reconciliation, which I have not achieved. This is not what they are looking for in a priest.

They will, as part of their process, talk to those people about their perspective of the story, and since they still don’t accept their own faults in the matter they can only paint me in a bad light.

… not telling you about this one even on an anonymous blog …..

Added complications:

Mrs is now considering ordination as well, as a possible to solution to her current crisis which results form the things done to her at our old church (see above). She is considering adoption, and considering becoming much more involved in the children’s work at our new church (which is looking very encouraging at the moment, by the way), but (as a further string to her bow) would like to explore ordination.

I support her in this: I think she would be very good especially if ordained to a special children’s ministry. But she only wants to do the training if it results in a stipendiary position.

I am very keen on the scenario of us both being ordained, but can’t see a scenario where we would both be ordained to stipendiary ministries. We could try to sell it to them on the basis of only needing one vicarage between two priests, but I can’t see them buying that line.

So, should she become a stipendiary minister while I just go for LOM and carry on engineering? It would be rather galling for her to be my boss, and the LOM wouldn’t feel like a sufficient step up from the Readership. But she is often more spiritual than me, and I have to take this scenario as a possible and valid outcome. Maybe God wants me to swallow my pride and abandon my sense of superiority and my residual sexism (I don’t have a problem with women priests per se, only when it is my wife who gets into the job that I was applying for first with the effect of ruining my chances of fulfilling my dream). GRRR. But I do support her in it, and look forward to what the future might hold.

Sailing

2011-09-08T18:04:00.001+01:00

I've joined a sailing club. My son was keen to do something ative with water and boats, so I had made some initil enquiries with local clubs, but it seemed thta you needed to have your own boat. Out of the question! But then one of the clubs had an open day and we went along.

My son and I were given a taster session in a dinghy - i think it was an enterprise or something similar. I was skeptical - I dislike cold, wet adn wind. They put us to pulling the sheets for the foresail. It was quite a breezy day. I have heard people talking abot how the boat feels alive - and I really got that sensation. I got the bug.

It also turns out that THIS club has club boats available for its members. Also every saturday they do training sessions for the juniors in Optimists.

we joined. Now since he as a junior has to have an adult member with him, I had to join too. then my other son who needs adventure training for applications forms in his chose career asked if her could join too. Now the difference between our three memberships and a family membership was so small that I signed the whole family up - even those who have no interest in sailing.

Now my son has been in his trainng for about five weeks, and is already competently sailing his Optimist singlehandedly around a triangular course in moderate weather.

I missed the adult training course, for which I have to pay £100. They won't let me use the clubs boats till I have been on the course. I will go for it next April. And now I am also fantasining about buying my own second hadn dinghy - I've seen them for as alittle as £375 including the trailer. I'd have to put a towbar on the car. But then I can go and sail round any lake I want. More or less.

Visit to a Catholic Church

2011-09-05T18:04:00.002+01:00

My parents would turn in their graves.

I had to go - we were priviledged to be among the few invited to a Christening by some friends. We can't expect them to come to our church if we won't go to theirs.

My parents consider the Catholic gospel to be a demonic counterfeit of the real one. I'm not so harsh, but I do take issue with the suggestion I get from Catholic friends that doing the rituals and doing good will get you into heaven - salavation by works. I am staunchly 'salvation by faith', so long as the faith is proved genuine by fruit, ie good works. In between there is the grey area of faith that is genuine but is ot articulated in the vocabulary I have learned, instead it is articulated through rituals and good works.

So, there I was, having stepped across the threshold of 'Satans lair'.

It was chaos.

The service was just the christening, with five familes bringing their babies. I could say it was a good family atmosphere. They each had a large number of guests, small children everywhere, and nobody was paying much attention to the proceedings but chatting away and letting the kids run riot. The priest soldiered on bravely through the noise, even saying 'wonderful' appreciatively when no one uttered the respnses they were supposed to.

Of course I have to take issue with various things:

Biblical baptism is of hose who have come to faith and wish to sign up for the deal. There is no reference to infant baptism. (The family of the Phillipian jailor were all believers, if you read the whole story.)

Baptism does not get rid of original sin. (1) the catholic idea of original sin is that it is guilt form Adam's sin, passed down, rather than a sinful tendency inherited from him. (2) It is the death and resurrectionof Christ that deals with sin, not our rituals.

Why are they praying to Mary, when the Bible teaches that there is 'one mediator between God and Man, the man Christ Jesus'? No need for intercession by Mary or saints. In fact the Bible forbids attempts to contact the dead.

We'll leave it at that for now.

The creed

2011-09-05T18:03:00.002+01:00

My wife accused me of child abuse. Only because I made my son listen to the creed in Latin gregorian chant.

The creed

2011-08-02T18:02:00.002+01:00

I like this creed in latin gregorian chant.

But do I believe it?

I do, but probably not as originally intended.

... one holy catholic and apostolic church ...Well I think that is intended to mean the Roman Catholic (one excluding the others), and I feel Rome has lost the plot in key areas over the centuries. (One man's tradition being another man's chinese whispers)

... Filioque... I do believe this, but it's addition without the consent of the Orthodox churches casued the great schism, and it's not sufficiently important to impose its addition. I'd rather keep the Orthodox on board.

... One baptism ... yes, but not infant baptism - rather I believe in the baptism described in the Bible where people were baptised after coming to faith (yes, if you read the story of the Philipian jailor to the end they all believed, ie they were all old enough to believe, hence they were baptised. The story tells you there were no infants.)

... and not the sprinkle they have in mind either. It's immersion. Perferably in a flowig river.

... for the remission of sins... no. Baptims is a sign of our faith and more but not for the remission of sins, but the rituals we do don't proide remission from sins: it is faith in Christ's death on our behalf that takes hold of the free remission for sins that he offers.

And then there's the communion of saints. Evangelicals like me say this happily meaning that we (the living believers who are all saints) are a big happy christian family together. But I don't think that's what it means. What it was intended to mean is the surrounding presence of certain deceased individuals elevated by the institution to a non-biblical special status equivalent to that of a minor deity in a pagan pantheon, able to omnipresently hear prayers from all over the world and answer them when God is too busy, especially if you have a macabre bit of his/her body or failing that a picture or idol (I mean statue) with you. This breaches the first comandment.

What I am saying is this:

1) we rattle off the creed without thinking about it
2) It's not such a uniting document as was intended and really is quite specifically Roman Catholic.
3) I don't believe key parts of it (unless I twist its intended meaning which is how I get by each Sunday), but I am still fully confident that I am a true Christian.

Still called?

2011-08-02T14:53:00.002+01:00

I still feel a call to the ministry.

THis is not because I am suddenly feeling better having found a church to stay in, where I am not just an exile and a refugee, where I am not in a darkmplace making the best of it. the sense of call has never left me.

The only real obstacle is my finances. And, as per previous post, I don't see how this will ever be sorted.

After our recent sticky spot in our marriage, Mrs said she was not sure of my call. Am I?

It's what I dream of. I feel inferior as an engineer - there are so many younger men (and women) who are so much better. But as a priest, I would totally fail at politics and diplomacy, strategy and vision, and remembering people's names and ailments form one week to the next. ther's more to the ministry than doing a good sermon.

And even then - my trouble in engineering is in not being thorough enough. And this error can easily be transferred to theology, with serious consequences. I already regret some of the positions I have held passionately in the past, well meant but hurtful.

So please pray, that if I am genuinely called, the money may be sorted out soon so that I can send my application in.

two down, four to go

2011-08-02T14:51:00.002+01:00

Cleared another debt last night. That's the two smallest gone. Four more to go, but these are the big ones and it's hard to see how they will ever be paid.

Cat stories

2011-08-01T16:36:00.003+01:00

I spread the marmalade on my toast. Saw a bit of orange jelly spilled on the worktop. What? Marmalade going to waste? Scooped it up and put it in my mouth. AAARRRGGGHHH! Jelly from the cat food!!!!!!! Spit, spit spit! Groan, spit spit spit!

Tried to shut the back door. Wouldn't go. Pushed harder. Felt like something soft blocking it, like a cushion. Looked down. Cat half in and half out, the harder I pushed the less it could get away. Woops. Well it could have miaowed or something! Its still not talking to me.

Church again

2011-08-01T16:21:00.002+01:00

We went to that church again this Sunday.

I'll call it St P's.

It was very different to last week.

Mostly different people, nearly all well into their Saga holdiay eligibility, if you now what I mean.

The service was led by the LOM (locally ordained minister - ie a fully ordained minister supporting the Vicar like a curate but permanent), and the sermon was given by a Reader who I receognised. The service was much more liturgical than I am used to. The 'learning difficulties' group was absent. The hymns were not so modern. The minister and reader were both robed - the reader in an Alb. It was a communion service, said not sung, but was more high church tha I am used to, with water being mingled with the wine and the priest finishing the leftovers, but just supermarket sliced-white rather than wafers. The altar rail is arranged as a hexagon around the wooden table altar.

The Readers sermon was deadly dull, though it contained some good material and soundly explained the way of salvation in a way most satisfactory to an evangelical like me, though I was not expecting him to be that way inclined.

Basically, had this been our first visit, we would probably not have stayed.

But it was good. We had already been convinced that this was our calling.

Our toddler was still allowed to roam at the back, and her voice was just one among the general sussurus of children. except hers was the one that stood out when she announced 'I want a biscuit".

Afterwards the minister took a log time to talk to me, and will probably pop round to the hosue for a visit fairly soon. (panic - better get the hoover and the paintbrush out)

I also spoke to the Reader, who vaguely recognised me, and seemed warm to the idea of me joining the Readers team in due course.

During the peace, with it being a fairly small congregation, everybody spoke to everybody, and they amde ad eliberate attempt to speak to us as well. So we felt very welcomed, much more so than in the church in the next town.

So its looking good!

The evolving events (God’s plan?)

2011-07-25T12:01:00.001+01:00

My followers will be aware that for the last six months we have been going to a church in the next town. This is where we crash landed following the problems at our old church. This church has been very good to us, and has been a place of healing for us. We have been loved by strangers. It’s good.

But it has always been dubious as a long terms solution, owing to the impracticality of attending mid-week activities and feeling part of community based events.

Mrs has tried to become involved in the mid-week children’s activities, but being severely arthritic and not driving there have been too many obstacles. She was offered lifts, but she would have had to wait for them and she hates being reliant on other people particularly with a toddler in tow. Also, our toddler is starting a five-morning nursery, and so would be unable to attend and hence unable to justify Mrs.’ attendance as well. (You need to attend a group with your own child for some time before people have confidence in you as a leader in absence of your child)

She had recently been invited to join the crèche rota, and I invited her to see this as a beginning that would grow into bigger things. But because of the above transport and locality issues, we concluded that there was nothing for it to grow into.

We love the church, but its impractical in the long term.

We opened our eyes to this when Mrs had a chance encounter on the train to the local city. I say ‘chance’ but we know that with God there is no such thing as a ‘chance’ encounter. The woman she met has a child at the same primary school, but the stronger contact is that her husband is a former work colleague of mine. Both women have recently been ill, and had much in common. But the thing that caught Mrs’ ear was that this lady’s church had a new curate who was keen on starting up a new children’s work.

This church is almost in walking distance form our house. It is on the same bus route as the new nursery.

So we decided to give it a go. Bear in mind that I hate change. It’s easier to turn a supertanker at full speed than it is to make me change church. So I was really reluctant.

But I had written to my first church that I was taking my wife to a place where she would flourish. She could not flourish in the log term at the church in the next town, as described above. So the logic was inexorable: try this new place.

Reluctantly I looked into it. I have always perceived this place as dead and dusty. It has no vicar of its own but shares a vicar with the church that most refugees from our first church go to – people that I don’t like. Not a good start. Some people I know who have come from this church are surly unfriendly people. The website was useless – wouldn’t even open. Not promising!

But we attended.

Walking through the door, everything changed.

A bright room. Traditional, but well lit and recently decorated. Chairs not pews. Thick carpet. A large area at the back with toys and small children roaming freely.

The service was amateurish (run by a recently qualified lay reader) but the content was very good. All ages were actively involved in the service, including a large contingent of ‘special needs’ adults.

Our toddler became noisy at one point (someone had given her a balloon and she was running around shrieking). I went to shush her, but the sides person intercepted me and told me to let her be.

After the service various people we knew (including my former colleague) came and welcomed us and put cups of tea in our hands. The Reader recognised me and we had a good conversation.

And it turned out that that morning they were having their first meeting of those interested in children’s work, so I pushed Mrs into it. Had we gone last week or next week we would have missed it. And I feel it is important to be at the start of something rather than joining someone else’s work at a later stage.

Had we gone six months ago in the heat of our crisis, they would not have been ready for us or us for them.

I was quite emotional throughout, to the extent that I could barely sing some of the hymns. I had a real sense of homecoming.

We would rarely make a choice about a church based on one visit. But we feel this is it.

Of course I may post in the future about how wrong we were. But that’s it for now!

Forgiveness

2011-07-25T12:00:00.002+01:00

Mrs has been very helpful to me with this.

Her advice to me has been to see those who hurt her at our old church as Christ saw those who persecuted him, and said ‘Father, forgive the, for they know not what the do’

This work on two levels:

Firstly, it gives me her permission to forgive. She was the one hurt, and I could not insult her by smiling at those who hurt her while she was still in pain. But now I have her permission to forgive.

Secondly, it gives me a mechanism to forgive those who hurt her (and me by association) even though they have not shown any remorse or acknowledgment that they did her serious harm.

Even so it is hard to forgive. But the evolving context helps to see how those events, bad though they were, have been woven into the tapestry of God’s plan. (see following post.) Hence forgiveness is beginning to happen.

Wedding

2011-07-25T12:00:00.001+01:00

Neice’s wedding this weekend.

Excellent event. Good church, good speeches, good reception with fantastic food. Excellent weather. The only fly in the ointment being the presence of the bride’s evil stepmother (real Mum passed away). Evil stepmother’s treatment of the bride has often had us on the verge of calling in the authorities. But now she was there in her outfit masquerading as ‘mother of the bride’. Faugh! But apart form that it was a really really good wedding.

Birthday

2011-07-25T11:59:00.000+01:00

My toddler’s third birthday party was on Sunday. A really good event, bringing in many of my wife’s contacts from various churches and ministries that she was developing. Bodes well for the future of our play church initiative that we are trying to get off the ground.

Sailing

2011-07-19T14:00:00.001+01:00

Surprised myself by joining a yacht club on Sunday.

Sailing is not really my thing. I don’t get on well with cold, wet, or wind.

But my 11 year old has expressed an interest in sailing, and the opportunity is there, so it’s my parental duty to sign him up for it if I can. The only trouble is that they require adult supervision, so I have to join too.

Next my 17 year old, keen to join the RAF and needing every proof possible that he is THE BEST candidate, also wanted to join so he can demonstrate he has had adventure training. So by then it became cheaper to join as a family rather than as individuals.

I sent a text later to my other academic non-sporting son away on his summer job – “You are now a member of a sailing club”. He replied sarcastically “That’s convenient – just now I was thinking I really should get back into sailing!”

More church confusion

2011-07-19T12:09:00.002+01:00

Since our Church crisis around the turn of the year, we have been attending an Anglican church in the next town, about 10 miles away.

After a slow start, it has been very good, and we are beginning to start to feel that we belong. People have taken us into their hearts and been very supportive during my wife's illness.

But there is the rub of the problem. She is ill. Part of our intention for joining this church was that they have an excellent children's work both on Sunday and during the week. Mrs was planning to exercise her gifts in this children's work. In fact, in my resignation letter to the old church I said that I was going to put her somewhere where she would flourish.

It's not worked out that way. Her illness and her inability to drive mean that to go to the midweek activities she would be reliant on a bus and a long walk. And when she has tried it, especially with her illness, it has not been practical.

Furthermore, in a separate story, or young daughter is moving to a new nursery which meets on different days which means that Mrs is n longer available on the days she would be needed for the children's work at the church.

So she is not flourishing. My purpose in taking her there has been thwarted.

Meanwhile, in what she sees as a divine encounter (on a train to the city) she met an old friend who is from a different Anglican church within our own town. We had previously dismissed this church as not appropriate for us. But apparently they have a new curate, new plans, a new vision for children's work, etc.

So Mrs is now keen to at least visit, and see what it is like. Is it better to be a big cog in a small machine, rather than trying to get involved in a big church where they don't really need you?

Its a good plan. I hate change, but I can see the merits, and i see strongly the need (as promised) to put my wife somewhere where she will flourish.

The drawbacks:

This church shares a Vicar with another one where the Readers are all people who left our previous church, people that we don't particularly want to fellowship with, but if I were to act as a Reader in this church I would almost certainly have to go to team meetings with them.

Its a dead church in a dead suburb. (but God likes breathing life into dead bones)

The children's work is (apparently) dire. (but we want to be a part of the change)

And most importantly - our 11-year-old son is just moving up to the youth work at the church in the other town. This is an outstanding youth work, which he is very keen to continue with, and which we want to keep him in, and we have always said his needs are one of our priorities. we asked if he would be interested in joining his older brothers and sisters who remained at our old church, and he was strong in his reply that no, he wants to stay at the remote church.

Given this, we don't want to disturb him by experimenting with visits to this new church.

Also, it is now summer and everything is quiet and not a true picture, but we don't want to delay our experimental visits until September.

also, with the new church, we haven't even managed to find their service times yet because they have no Internet presence. We hope that we could somehow coordinate taking our son to the remote church while going to this one ourselves, but I can't see tat working in practice.

So. there is a need for my wife to find fulfillment. There is a need for my son to be enthused by the faith and not disrupted by frequent changes of church. there is a need for me also to be in place where my Readership will to go to waste.

Its a mess, and we don't know where to turn.

Better news

2011-07-19T12:04:00.002+01:00

It seems I may have been mistaken about the 5 points for failure to give details. I had wrongly got it into my head that it was a standard 5 points, and that their lack of mention of points was just that it was standard and that when they talked about endorsing the license, the 5 points were automatic.

I now realise that there is a rnage of 5 to 10 points for the offense. On my oter charge, where there was a range of 3 to 9 points, tey speciifed 3. So the absence of a specified number of points for failing to give details, together with their comment that since it ws a technicality they were only endorsing the license, more likely means they are not giving me any points for it at all.

I shall wait to see what they have put on my license when it comes back to me.

More pet hates

2011-07-19T12:01:00.002+01:00

People who tell me my shoe lace is undone. I know! I'll do it in MY time, thank you. I have bigger fish to fry at this precise moment. Yes you mean well, but actually you're just interfering in my already-stressed day.

Court case outcome lessons

2011-07-13T18:15:00.002+01:00

Aall this provides good fodder for sermons on the myths we hold about God and sin

Myth 1 Christians are exempt from the troubles of the world

Myth 2 So long as you mean well ....

Myth 3 I am a good person/I have only sinned a bit, so God will forgive me for the little things I do wrong ....

Myth 4 I do a lot of charity work which will balance out my sins ...

Myth 5 God won't hold you to account for breaking laws you didn't know about (you know, when people say 'what about those who have not heard the gospel?')

The truth is: in British law you are not judged for the good you do 99.99% of the time. It is the little things you do wrong that get you in court. I can tell the magistrate that yesterday I helped an old lady cross the road and put a tenner in the colection for Africa, but the magistrate will say 'I don't care - you were still driving carelesly on the day of then incident'. I can say (I did say) I didn't know about that law. The magistrate did not say 'Oh, thta's OK then, go away and don't do it again'. I was still found guilty, despite my ignorance of the law.

[I am talking about the verdict here - good character IS taken into account for sentancing]

This is British justice, which is generally held to be one of the best legal systems in the world.

Why do we think that God will have a lesser standard of justice than our own, bending the rules to suit us?

The Bible says 'without the law there is no transgression'. God wrote the law, not to trip us up, but to make it clear to us where we were going wrong. But now that the law has been written - "he who breaks one part of the law has become a law breaker'.

So we are stuffed. we have all broken one part or another of God's laws, through ignorance or through eliberate rebellion. And for that little sin, that 0.0001% of our allegedly saintly lives - the bible says 'The wages of sin is death'. Not the wages of a lot of sin is death! Just any sin is enough.

None of us have a leg to stand on.

Which all seems like a very negative message.

But this is only half the story.

The other half is about the love of God. he takes no pleasure in condemning us. He sticks to the rules and apllies justice - death for sin - but he does not enjoy it. (note that our 'little' sin has had consequences on other people who demand justice from God)

Therefore, God himslef came down to earth in the form of Jesus. He became man. He lived the perfect life satisfying every detail of the law. 100%. So he had no death of his own to die. Then he received on our behalf the wages of our sin - death. He took us into himself, so that we died with him. So that we came back to life with him.

The just requirements of the law have now been fulfilled - we died in Christ.

We are justified - in right standing in the eyes of the law.

No more death.

Instead - life with God.

A new life with new gifts and skills to live a life in harmony with our fellow humans and with God and with our envirnoment. A fresh start.

Halleujah!

Come and join in!

Court case outcome

2011-07-13T18:08:00.002+01:00

…guilty on both counts.

The breakdown of the fine is:

Failure to report: 5 points, (range 5 to 10 points), but they accept it was a technicality so no fine (range up to £2500)
Driving badly 3 points (range 3 to 9 points) and £300 fine (range £200 to £800 normal, but can go to £5000 – i.e. it was on the low end – it was not seen as a serious breach)
Costs £500
‘victim surcharge’ £15

Totals: 8 points and £815. Ouch. I’ll pass a hat round later. (No I won’t – I can pay from funds saved for this purpose in my limited company)

Annoying points:
Defending myself I was not permitted to cross examine my own witnesses, which meant I wasn’t able to draw out of Gracey some important points
The policeman who had originally grilled me, when it was his turn to answer my questions his only answers were ‘I don’t know [blank stare]’ and ‘I can’t remember [blank stare]’.

Lessons learned
Despite not being a legal document The highway code is treated as such anyway.
If the police ask you a question and you have even a small doubt about the answer, tell him you don’t know and stare blankly.
While driving carelessly always avoid cyclists
Not knowing about laws doesn’t exempt you from them

Predict sleepless night

2011-06-29T16:29:00.002+01:00

The office refeshment club has ru out of decaff coffee.

So I've been drinking the hard stuff.

Suddenly I've remembered why I drink decaff - I have very freqeunt top-ups. Now I feel full of caffeine-induced stress and tension. I suspect I won't be sleeping much tonight!

Disabled Parking

2011-06-29T16:22:00.003+01:00

Spot the well-designed disabled parking bay at Llanes on the north coast of Spain

Health update II

2011-06-24T17:12:00.003+01:00

Still improving - several long (approaching 1 mile) walks in the last few days

Health update

2011-06-20T14:14:00.003+01:00

Mrs has been on Humira for over a month now.

Overall, I wold say that she is slightly better (for which we praise God), though she still has a lot of pain. It's hard to tell because she changes form hour to hour, and also she is still phasing out the prednisolone steroid.

More pet hates

2011-06-20T14:09:00.002+01:00

my children's habit of leaving lolly sticks on the floor, on the sofa, anywhere except the bin

ditto wrappers thereof

people who put empty boxes (eg cereal) back in the cupboard.

ditto packets of biscuits

Similarly, people who don't put used envelopes in the bin.

generally, anyone who does mundane things differently form me.

Priest's poem

2011-06-16T13:03:00.002+01:00

I found a link to this brilliant poem about the stresses of the Vicar's job at elizaphanian:

http://lurchersontheedge.wordpress.com/2011/06/10/i-am-the-vicar-i-am/

Today’s pet hate

2011-06-16T12:33:00.002+01:00

Today’s pet hate is people who get to the office kitchen before me and have to meticulously clean things. It’s not good enough for them to give their cup or fork a quick swishle under the tap. No, they have to use detergent and a scourer. Then they have to dry everything with a paper towel. Now turn it round and dry the other end. No arrange everything in a neat row and wipe down all the bubbles left in the sink, and wipe the work surface. Now move their row of cutlery out of the way and wipe that bit too. And of course all of this is done slowly, while chatting to a friend, oblivious of me waiting to get to the tap. GET A LIFE!

Previous (ongoing) pet hates: (remembering of course that I am an empathetic, tolerant and loving Christian ????)

coat hangers - always tangled, always breeding in corners of the house, but never there when you need one.

cat food - the smell sticks to your hands to sniff for the rest of the day.

dog lovers - they all swear that they poop-a-scoop but the streets are still covered in poo.

people who drive at 40mph whether they are going round a hairpin bend next to a school or on the motorway

People in the UK who use the left hand lane to turn right out of a one way street

TV auditions that mock contestants

Police cars that park illegally and break speed limits while not on emergency calls

Things that fall out of cupboards no matter how carefully you stacked them last time.

People with big expensive cars but can't drive them, e.g. don't have the skill to park them between the white lines.

Gloom lifts

2011-06-15T17:56:00.002+01:00

Had a peace conferene on Monday. She s much better at initiating these things than I am.

Disussed our respective positions, and explained things that were expressed badly in the heat of the original argument. Cleared up some misunderstandings. I actually found I was able to say sorry for some things, and while 'sorry' is rarely in her vocabulary she did agree to note some 'lessons learned'.

So we are friends and kissy again.

ZZZZZZZZZ

2011-06-06T17:38:00.001+01:00

I keep falling asleep at my desk, following last night's failure to drift off.

Asked a colleague to slap me at intervals, but he has failed completely.

How am I going to drive home?

Gloom II

2011-06-06T11:13:00.002+01:00

I wrote some words in that card. Messed up - too many ambiguities - but I only had one card and it was too late. Gave it to her anyway, left on her pillow while she was in the shower. Came up to bed later (I sleep in a seperate room anyway - a nomad in my own house - because my snoring disturbs her) - she had switched the light off and shut the door, so no welcome there.

But Sunday seemed to go better. Apart from a row at lunch becasue I told the baby off for screaming at me and she took the baby's side. It was genuinely a better day: good church services am and pm and a good time at the 'newcomers' tea' at the vicarage. God was clearly speaking to me about my role in the new church.

Until evening, when she said 'About your card....'

She wants us to re-learn friendship. Sound good, but it basically means she doesn't consider us friends at the moment, let alone married, and any intimacy (even formal kissing) is off for the forseeable future. She wants to limit talk about issues to once a week, on Sunday evenings, becasue she can't cope with more than that. Well neither can I. I suppose its moving in the right direction, but its not right. I think I am more positive towards her than she is to me, even though I genuinely feel that I am the aggrieved party this time. But I'm not allowed to think that!

Only slept 10 minutes last night.

Forgiving others

2011-06-03T14:12:00.002+01:00

A collect that I need to take note of, copied brazenly from http://captainsacrament.blogspot.com/

Almighty God, in obedience to your command to forgive, I commend to you N. I forgive his sins against me, especially ______________. I acknowledge that you are the only one righteous, and that like N., I stand as a sinner in need of your grace. I know also that I have from time to time committed similar sins, and even worse. Please forgive N., and forgive me. Please bless and heal N., and help him to grow in relationship with you, that both he and I would come to delight in your will and walk in your ways, to the glory of your name. Amen.

Lord, help me to apply this, to my wife in my present hopefully temporary row, but more importantly to the conspirators at my old church. Amen.

Gloom

2011-06-03T13:06:00.002+01:00

So we had a row.

Very Abbreviated ...

You're judgemental!You can't handle criticism!You're worse!
Your're selfish!No I'm not, you are!
Shall we start writing divorce papers!?

Of course there was a lot of evidence supplied by both parties to supposedly back up those accusations.

That was last Saturday.

Since then;
We have gone through the SILENCE stage
We have gone through the GRUNTS stage
We have gone through the EXCHANGE ONLY ESSENTIAL IFORMATION stage
We are in the SMALL TALK AVOIDING ISSUES stage

I can't take back what I said - I still believe it.

Likewise I think she still believes what she said. I don't think she was serious about the divorce, but who knows? She has said things like that several times before, but you can take that either way.

On sunday she dodn't come to church. In the afetrnoon she took the kids for a walk, explicitly without me. She has now booked a summer holiday for herself and the kids to deliberately exclude me, but she still expects me to drive her there and back. And similar stuff.

I find it very hard to initiate a serious conversation with her, whether for confession of my faults or for helping her to see her own, or for starting a reconciliation. The time is never right. the mood is never right. I can't think what to say. I'm scared of her reaction. And I simply don't have the guts. So we stare blankly at the telly and pretend to be tired. The elephant fills the room.

I have bought a blank card in which to write some conciliatory words. But I can't think what to write. 'Conciliatory' words lie. But the truth fans the flames.

I find her instensly frustrating. I sometimes wish I was free of her. I have given myself to her so much I don't know who I am anymore. I feel drowned. I almost felt the rustle of threatened divorce papers was like the rustle of the first refreshing breeze on a hot stagnant day.

But fundamentally, I love her deeply.

Partly because this is my role. My function. My calling as a Christian; a sacrificial servant.

But in fact, I do actually love her anyway.

What's the next step?

General catch up

2011-05-27T17:31:00.002+01:00

Mrs has started her new rheumatoid arthritis drug - Humira. She has only had two injections so far- the first was administered by the nurse and hurt, the second she did herself and it was fine. Improvements should be seen between 2 weeks and three months of starting. In her first fortnight, there does seem to have been some inkling of improvement and she surprised herself with a longer walk than she has done for ages. But its hard to tell given the daily variation in the disease. However, we are hopeful.

She has had a number of encounters with people from our old church, all of which have helped convince us that moving was the right thing. Much of this centres around our toddler's current phase of biting children in nurseries and playgroups, and the negative attitude the self-proclaimed 'experts' at our old church have had towards her as a result. But we did have a nice letter from one of the wardens, who hit exactly the right note. If it was just her we would go back!

Despite the biting phase, which will end eventually, our daughter seems extraordinarily bright. I know all parents think this about their kids. But she's not three yet and already handling words like 'Pterodactyl' in day to day conversation and if you say a number she will point to the right one on the chart. And she's pretty.

Child 3 (17) passed his driving test. Great! Lowest insurance quote £6500. Bad!

Children 3 and 4 busy with GCSE's and AS level exams. I have been very proud of the way they work hard at revision. they deserve good marks.

My work is going well. early results form my reservoir spillway model indicate it works well.

We had great time at our church last week as the main service was closed and we were sent instead to the youth congregation in the ministry centre. Very good indeed. But there are real political difficulties in terms managing the relationship between the two congregations and persuading the older youth to transfer to the [boring] traditional Anglican main service.

Reading a great book at present "Blue Like Jazz" by Don Miller. Not everyone's cup of tea, but very honest, very deep, very refreshing. It is one of the factors in me starting to feel vaguely like a Christian again after the trauma of leaving our old church.

General catch up

2011-05-05T17:18:00.003+01:00

Far too long since I last blogged - still very busy - have to rush.

Holiday in Spain:

Outstanding - ticked all my boxes and many more that I didn't know I had. Reached 150% of the maximum value on the happiness scale. Saw the beaches, the camp sites, the mountains, the villages, most of the wildlife, the people, etc that I wanted to see. Really really good. Three flies in the ointment - (1) car got bent on the ferry by someone not putting his handbrake on and at the first wave .... (2) what I thought was going to be a buffet lunch with all my church friend staht I have not seen for 26 years turned out to be a private meal with one family. It was really nice, but meant I only had a brief handshae with all the others and tey never saw my family. So I'm dissapointed and they're offended. (3) ...i'm not telling you about that ....

Back home:

Nearly had a nervous breakdown dealing with stresses at home, no longer sustained by the adrenalin of upcoming holiday. Seriously - I was on the point of going to see a doctor. I am not using figures of speech, I really was worried. back on an even keel now.

Court:

Pleaded guilty to 'failing to report an accident' on a technicality, but the court pusuaded me to change my plea on the grounds of common sense. I think they are wrong and may change it back. On 'driving without due care and attention', they presumed I was guilty from the start because they hadn't read the documents and thought I had pulled out form a side road. Eventually pursuaded them that I had a reasonable view that the cyclist was overtaking dangerously. So now a new trail date has been set for 8th July, calling all witnesses including my 16 year old daughter. I need real guidance as to whether this is worth pursuing, or whether I should give up and plead guilty even though I don't feel that to be the case. It is of course a criminal case so the burden of proof is 'beyond reasonable doubt', and I should be able to win that. I would not win a civil case based on 'balance of probabilities'.

Church:

Still settling at the new place, 4 months into our 'Sabbatical'. Went to the Royal Wedding show there. Starting to make new friends. Maeanwhile Mrs wants me to write a final resignation to the old church, but she has been having more contact with her old friends there (some no longer friends) and I think it is premature to do the letter before the six months is up.

Work:

My spillway design is being sent off for physical modelling. I may stick some piccies on here in due course.

Church update, and theology of guidance

2011-04-07T17:54:00.000+01:00

We keep having contacts with the old church.

While going to meet my wife at Hospital I bumped into one of the ladies who used to be in her groups – one of the prime suspects for our troubles.

Same day saw the treasurer in Tesco – tried to pass discretely behind her but she started turning round just as I was passing. Fortunately eyes didn’t meet.

That afternoon the Vicar emailed me for a meeting at the mid-point of our ‘sabbatical’. This was at the height of my wife’s illness, so I had a good reason to decline. We were far too stressed already to be dealing with him.

Mrs met the church secretary in Neros. Polite but empty conversation ensued.

While Mrs was taking daughter to blood test, met Vicar in waiting room. Again, polite but empty conversation.

Now: if we were feeling positive about the old church, we would see all these co-incidences as God-incidences and go rushing back. But since we still loathe the leaders there, and none of those we met said how much they missed us and want us back, of course we interpret it as God showing us that we definitely can’t go back. Are we being consistent here? I think not. Not least; we haven’t given them a fair chance to say it. I declined the meeting. I avoided the treasurer. The other encounters were in public places where they probably felt it was not appropriate to risk talking about serious thing, knowing how sensitive we were and given to losing our tempers with them. So I think we should give them a chance to say more formally that they want us back and to make proposals for that return…. even if all it does is prove that they are not sorry for what they did and don’t really have any constructive proposals – it would be like last time when they asked us for our proposals, when really the onus was on them. They did the damage, it was for them to remedy it. I really struggle with forgiveness. I know the theory that we should take the initiative in these things, but I find I can’t forgive and work with people who don’t acknowledge their guilt and don’t show any signs of remorse or repentance. Well, God doesn’t forgive under these circumstances either. But I am stuck with unforgiveness and the heavy heart and sense of guilt that goes with it. And if I was on my own I could eat my own humble pie but I am with my wife who is the one who was really sinned against, so I can’t get all chummy with those who hurt her until she has forgiven them too. So we don’t feel the door is open to us to go back, and we have no desire to go back. And our lives have been marked with God’s blessing since we left so he’s clearly on our side …. Except that Mrs has been totally crippled with a massive flare up of arthritis that has stopped her going to the shop round the corner. What’s that all about? Is it some kind of punishment from God for leaving? Is it the devil trying to stop us doing a good thing in the new church? Or is it just a flare up that was due to happen anyway in the natural progression of the disease? Or was it caused (or aggravated) by the stress of it all? She’s on prednisolone tablets now and slowly improving – hopefully she will be reasonable mobile in time for our once-in-a-lifetime holiday next week.

Honesty box

2011-04-07T17:53:00.000+01:00

There’s an honesty box in the office kitchen for people to put money in. So they want honest people to put money in. Honest people to do the opposite of dishonest people. That’s what the ‘dis’ bit means. So, if they want honest people to put money in and they want them to do the opposite of dishonest people, this means that they must want dishonest people to take money out. After all, if dishonest people did leave the money there then the honest people, doing the opposite, would have to NOT leave it there (and take it out). So one way or another, they want either the honest people or the dishonest people to take money out. And if they want people to take money out, I’d better go for my share now before its too late.

Family news

2011-03-22T18:06:00.004Z

Full house Sunday night for the first time in ages: eldest back from college, second back on a surprise visit from his year in industry.

Evening service

2011-03-22T18:06:00.003Z

I tried the evening service at our new church this weekend. Only 20 people there, sitting in the choir stalls. But for many churches this would be a good number for their main service – so can’t complain.

The service was much more Anglican than at our old church, following the liturgy closely.

Apart form the curate, no one made any attempt to welcome me, though they were friendly enough when I spoke to them.

The sermon was good.

I was sitting right next to the organ, and in the smaller space the singing was much better than I feel it is in the morning service when there are about 200 present.

Despite it being in many ways not the deep arms-raising intimate worship I miss form the old church, it was very good as an oasis from my busy life – a time of enforced quiet. I will be going again!

Play church idea

2011-03-22T18:06:00.001Z

This has been very much on the back burner while Mrs. has been ill. But we did go there this Sunday to meet a potential couple who have been struggling recently. We recently dismissed the idea of having them as joint leaders, as they reported each other to be ‘out of faith’. But it turns out they have been attending a local Baptist church, and seemed to be in a better place. In fact they seemed to think they were pasturing us! They were formerly members of our old church, and now that we have the opportunity to compare stories it seems that their problems were very similar to ours, and involving the same problem people at the old church. So it was nice. But they also seemed to contradict themselves (and us!) so I don’t know where this will end up.

On one level it was the play church – families meeting for fellowship while the children play together – and though it was very informal it was probably close to our objective.

Church update

2011-03-22T18:05:00.001Z

It was hard work this week. We’ve recently stopped baby form having a dummy, so it was quite intensive for the first 15 mins. Then she went into crèche with Mrs, but by then my brain was fried and although the sermon was good, I can’t remember much.

I struggle with worship at this church. The organist and choir are all elderly ladies, pitching the songs very high, and I have no chance. I end up coughing with a sore throat. Some songs are band-led, which are better, but the band has no strong lead vocal and you feel lost.

Mrs says the crèche was a dead loss too, the lady doing a teaching session that was good but aimed at the older ones with insufficient recognition of the little ones. It was a baptism Sunday with several visitors, who clearly hadn’t felt the crèche met their needs. Its good in the sense that there is a clear need which Mrs can meet, but how to do so without causing offense to those that are already working hard with devotion, if limited skill?

Confirmations

2011-03-17T18:19:00.002Z

Mrs bumped into an former member of our old church at a another toddler group today. What do these ladies have in common?

Former childrens workers at our old church
Felt underappreciated
Tried to do something special with the kids work
Were told they were expecting too much
Treated very rudely by the same man, who is now the Sunday School Superintendent

How’s it going at our new church?

2011-03-16T12:07:00.001Z

We have noticed for the last two weeks that they have been appealing for help with the toddler group.

Even though I felt this was a perfect opportunity for her, Mrs has been reluctant to get involved. Having been hurt by the previous church, its once bitten twice shy. Also, it is very inconvenient to get there: being arthritic she’s not going to walk the 10 miles. She does not drive and there is no direct rail or bus route.

But eventually she agreed to go, just as one of the mums rather than as a helper, because she wanted to see what it is before committing herself too deeply to withdraw if she doesn’t like it.

So I took a detour on my usual commuting trip to drop her off. The car park was jammed full, and women with pushchairs were converging from all directions – a good sign!

She seemed quiet and tense when I got home, and wouldn’t say anything till the kids had gone to bed, so I feared the worst.

But she had had a fantastic time. The entire set up was exactly aligned with her own approach to running a children’s work. Bright colours, good quality toys laid out in planned areas. Refreshments provided for young and old, but children kept away from hot coffees. It was right up her street. Everything organised, but not rigid. It is a popular toddler group – apparently they had 90 children last week! The only thing was that she saw no craft activity, but that is one of her strong points where she can make a contribution. So she was very happy about it, and will certainly go again and see if she can make herself available as a helper in some capacity. It was a complete contrast to our old church, whose toddler group [which Mrs was not part of the team running it] charges twice as much but only has dingy second hand toys, no refreshments, etc etc, -and dwindling attendance.

Her tension arose from her return trip. She had to walk 20 minutes to the town centre, which was harder on her arthritis than she expected (There is no such thing as a folding push chair that is easy to push). She had lunch at MacDonald’s and took the baby to the toilet there, and then went to the bus station. There, the baby – who is very well toilet trained – grunted and filled her pants with poo. Mrs had to use the bus station toilet to clean her up. She would struggle with this kind of thing at home, but in a public toilet with a dirty floor and a struggling toddler – it was a complete nightmare. Stressed from that, she came out to find the bus about to go. And then she couldn’t get the pushchair to fold up and the bus driver was shouting at her to hurry up. In the end she carried it o unfolded and lifted it onto the luggage tray, overstressing her joints in the process. The bus lurched as it started before she had sat down. There were no seats together. The one good thing was a teenager who gave up his seat for her to sit with her baby – so credit to him. And of course we have recently stopped the toddler form having a dummy so it was “I want my dummy!” loudly up and down the bus for half the journey.

Conclusion:

God definitely wants us to go to this new church. He saw the way she was treated at the old church, and has taken her out of the place where her skills and philosophy are not wanted and put her in a place where she fits.

The devil does not want us at this church, and will do what he can to discourage and make it seem impractical.

Church update

2011-03-07T13:52:00.001Z

We actually made it there this week. Rather distracted – my daughter peed all over my lap just after we sat down. The Mrs ended up in crèche for the rest of the service. Our son still greatly enjoys the Sunday School.

And the weekly leaflet included an appeal for more helpers in the mid-week toddler group (since they are getting 90 kids there!), and although we didn’t think it was possible for her to go to this in fact its not so bad if I drop her off on the way to work. So Mrs is going to explore signing up as a helper, and this may be the beginning of the reason why God has [adjustment bureau style] moved us to this church.

So the clouds are lifting on her health, and the clouds are lifting on our church troubles.

The Adjustment Bureau (film review)

2011-03-07T13:50:00.000Z

It’s a very good film. Enjoyed it very much on three levels:

It a good thriller
It goes a bit deeper, asking questions about the interaction of free will and ‘fate’ (i.e. predestination but in secular language). It makes a premise and then examines how that premise might work. (But don’t get too deep – its just a movie)
It was just right for my wife and I in our present situation, wondering if we have gone ‘off the plan’ by leaving our old church, and being reassured by God through the movie that we are OK.

Rheumatoid arthitis flare-up

2011-03-07T13:49:00.000Z

I think it was back in Feb. that I reported my wife had had a steroid injection for her arthritis.

It didn’t work.

She went back a week later for another.

It didn’t work.

And another.

It didn’t work.

Finally, she went in again, and this time asked for the injections to be given straight into her knees. This time it does seem to have taken effect, although she is not back to what she was before the flare up. She is back on her feet, and can manage a more or less normal life. I am back at work, and back in the bedroom.

Today we went for the second required check up prior to starting her new drugs, and being trained in how to do the injections. They are going to try to get her started on it before our holiday in April.

Comfort in the Psalms

2011-02-23T12:02:00.001Z

I have been full of hatred and bitterness over the whole thing, really angry with the people at the old church. And feeling unhappy and sinful and ‘away from God’ because of those feelings. Not wanting to pray. Not wanting to read scripture.

I resolved I had to make steps back towards God.

I tried to pray, but my mind wandered and I found myself cursing the old church people again. So I picked up the Bible and said

“Lord, I’m not going to read this as a holy horoscope, sticking a pin in to find your word for today. I’m going to read it as normal day-to-day bread and butter, to nourish my soul and build my strength and faith”. I then found myself reading that psalm about the rivers of Babylon. It was good – about trying to worship God in exile. Just how I felt. But it ends with dashing your enemies children against the rocks – and even I don’t feel THAT angry!

I looked at the next page and read psalm 143. Which I can’t remember here (I’m at the office and I’m supposed to be writing a design statement – but since I’ve finished that I don’t feel too guilty this time) but the gist of it falls into three themes: (1) Worshipping God in difficult times (2) seeking guidance for the path ahead and (3) vengeance on enemies. These are the three areas where I am struggling at present, and I was reading in a different version from usual. And God really spoke to me through it. I was not looking for God’s word – as I have shown above. But it came.

He relates to me in my current wilderness. He knows I want to know the future. And he knows that while I am not seeking retributive vengeance I am angry, hurt, upset. It was as if he was saying “Yes, I know. You’re allowed to feel like that. I even wrote a psalm specially for times like this”

I’m not explaining this very well. But I was comforted. I was able to let go of some things. The guilt about my feelings in particular. But I was also able to let go of some of the issues, placing them in the hand of a God who knows, and who cares, and who is fair (ultimately if not in the short term).

So I feel I have turned a corner. It’s still cloudy but I can see blue sky on the horizon. I have started to listen to Christian CDs again. I may even reach a stage where I feel I can minister again – while I felt I was in sin I could not do this. Of course there are no current opportunities to minister, but I don’t feel excluded from ministry by sin anymore.

Where am I up to regarding church?

2011-02-23T12:01:00.002Z

We have continued attending the church in the next town, and have managed to have our meeting with the vicar there.

He seemed to understand where we were coming from, and seemed to be a very fatherly figure, which is what my wife needs and was sadly lacking at the old church.

I had to attend on my own last Sunday, as she was so ill. My son come out of the Sunday School buzzing again – “They didn’t do this at the old church!” he says. The crèche was abysmal. The lady on the rota had forgotten it was her turn, and had not prepared the usual talk and was doing it all off the cuff. The usual families were away, but there was an influx of visitors for a dedication. My daughter pushed one of their kids over and made a scene. I couldn’t leave her in there and go back to the service this time. The others were all locals who knew each other and left me out of the conversation. So I was wondering just why I had bothered coming at all. But it was worth it for the sake of my son. And also, the liturgy for the dedication was very good, and it seems that while they will do an infant baptism if required by the church rules, they will steer away form it if they can and go for a more scriptural believer’s baptism (which can of course still be administered to children and families). So it was worth noting that too.

It’s a good church. It’s just impractical, being in another town. Mrs could hardly be involved in the children’s work there as she was at the old church. There she used to just walk five minutes, now it would be catching the hourly bus service for a half hour ride, followed by a taxi trip. And she would not be meeting the mums shopping in the town as she did for the old church. It’s really hard to see how it will work, or why God has lead us to this church.

Rheumatoid arthitis flare-up

2011-02-23T12:00:00.000Z

It’s nearly a month since I blogged.

Option A – nothing happened worth talking about
Option B – it has been too hectic to write.

It’s B.

Mrs has been having a massive flare-up of her rheumatoid arthritis. She has got to the stage where she needs help to get out of a chair, and sometimes help to walk across a room. She has taken to using disabled toilets, which are higher, in case she can’t get off a normal one. She has been sleeping badly at night, wracked with pain. So she ahs stayed in bed most of the day instead.

This is not good, when you have a two and a half year old toddler in the house. So I have had to stay off work. Two days a week she is in the nursery. Apart form that I have to stay off work or go in late. Over the last month I have been doing about 3.5 days a week of work. Which means losing 1.5 days pay each week. And annoying the bosses by not being available for meetings. I don’t think it has delayed the project yet, but it may come to that and then I will not be flavour of the month!

Mrs had a routine appointment with the specialist on 22nd Feb., but had been trying to get in earlier for a steroid injection, to get her back on her feet as soon as possible. She had been told that because the specialist had been on holiday, there was now a queue of both urgent and routine cases, and she was unlikely to get in. But last Friday th9ngs came to a head at home, with me being off work again and her being in a lot of pain. We managed to push into the queue, and got seen that afternoon.

The steroid injection had very little effect, which was partly expected: she has needed boosters before. So she had the booster at her routine appointment yesterday, and they say she may need another booster this Friday. Not encouraging. But she did manage to go to the loo three times last night – so maybe it is starting to work.

They are proposing to change her medication. She seems to have become immune to the sulfasalazine, so they are planning to try her with one of two anti-TMF drugs. These are expensive (£10,000) so in the English National Health System they will only put you on it if you have tried two other drugs unsuccessfully (in her case this is methotrexate and suphsalazine) and the specialist has to get authorisation from the Primary Care Trust for each case. So that will take a month.

These new drugs are injected, so I will have to learn how to do injections. The only practical difference between the drugs is the frequency of injection (weekly v fortnightly) so I expect she will choose the fortnightly one.

So today things are very bad, but the future does seem a bit brighter.

What now?

2011-01-24T17:13:00.002Z

After the meeting, given that there had been some measure of apology, we conceded that our names can remain on the electoral roll. And the Vicar has agreed to our proposal that we should go to another church on 'an extended sabbatical' for at least six months.

The world will be a different place in six months. I can't see us going back, but lets not pre-judge.

We are currently trying to get an appointment with the vicar of the new church to put him in the picture of our situation.

We also need prayer for healing. we need space. Etc.

We do feel that God has been on our side through this. My wife even thinks taht my outbursts have been the work of the Holy Spirit - not that he endorses swearing - becasue without them the truth would never have come out.

She is very pleased that I defended her. Our marriage is stronger than it has ever been.

At the new church this Sunday they were asking for volunteers for the Easter Holiday club. It looks very professional. Perhaps someone should tell them they are expecting too much and sack them all! Or maybe my wife is actually quite normal and the old church had excessively low expectations.

I'm quite hurt by the way they talk about her. I may have had gripes from time to time, but she's certainly not bad enough to warrant the treatment she has had.

Tuesday's meeting

2011-01-24T16:48:00.003Z

I took Monday off sick because I was so stressed. Had a wonderful time with my wife, driving to the top of the nearest hill to look at the tranquil panorama. Very therapeutic.

But we still hanging over us the 'big issue' that they had not told us. So I emailed them, asking for an email reply to clear this up so as to stop us thinking ill of innocent people.

On Tuesday morning I went to work much happier than for a long time, thinking that I could see God in all this. I would not normally leave my church, split my family and go to another church impractically in the next town, and so God had brought drastic measures in to make me make a drastic move that will ultimately pay dividends when it comes to ordination (i.e. a lot more experience in a more traditional Anglican church). But when I got to work I had my email reply - 'please come to a meeting'.

We went that afternoon. This time they seemed to have planned more carefully what to say, starting with trivial niceties and bits of flattery. I asked them to cut to the chase. It nearly tipped into a big row about my attitude. But they did as I asked.

The big issue: They claim that a majority of mothers in the creche have said that they can't work with my wife. "Her expectations are too high".

But even if this is true, it does not justify the way they have treated my wife. They have clearly had a lot of meetings with them; why have they not had any meetings with my wife, firstly the general type you would expect a a matter of course in managing the system and secondly specific meetings to hear the other side? If there was a problem in her approach, why was she not offered training?

Now casting back to about 2004, my wife had done the church Christmas play. Normally this is a pathetic affair where the children put on the previous year's costumes and come forward in groups to build up a nativity tableau. My wife has drama skills and did something much more complex, much more visual, with a more intricate plot, but still ending with the tableau [too keep them happy]. Towards the end of the last rehearsal, when she was highly stressed owing to key performers not turning up etc, the Vicar asked for the plot to be changed. Mrs told him about how impossible that would be at this late stage. Since then, we have always felt that he and the assistant minister had something against her. In fact, shortly before this meeting, the Holy Spirit had prompted her to remember this incident. So when we asked why all this had been done behind her back, as we half expected, they quoted the Christmas play in 2004 as a time when she had snapped at them and been hard to work with. So, because of the Holy Spirit's prompting, she was able to tell them again why it had been impossible to alter the plot, about the stress, etc. It was certainly not something that should still be held against her after 6 years of excellent involvement in childcare at the church. And even if what they say is true, the answer is counselling and training, not an intricate conspiracy to oust her.

They did accept that in some things she had not been treated well, and gave an almost sincere apology for those aspects. On that basis, we ended the meeting with a handshake.

But I still don't see that any return is possible. Originally we thought it was the new superintendent against her. Now we find out that it was an extensive conspiracy involving all levels in the church including those who were supposed to be her friends, planned over a period of months in a series of meetings to which she was not invited.

Would you go and sit amongst them? Even Christ only forgives those who repent. and I am a sucker for an apology - which I why I shook hands - but they have only apologised for bits, not for the overall thing.

The Big Meeting .... !! [Update - originally written 18 Jan 2011]

2011-01-24T16:43:00.001Z

…started badly and deteriorated rapidly.

[Me and Mrs, Vicar and assistant]

We were both very nervous as we went in. We both felt that we would know within the first few minutes how it would turn out.

The first thing that happened was that we were shown an A0 size print of the proposed church structure – which of course still had the name of the offending Sunday School superintendent. And the Vicar was proud of it, and apparently clueless that he was rubbing salt into the wound.

The second thing was that he turned to my wife and said “The children’s work is not the important thing here….” Now to be fair to him, he merely meant that that the fact of us leaving was more important to him. But if he was more switched on he would have known that to my wife the children’s work IS the important thing – it is her whole raison d’être.

That set my wife off. She had previously asked me to do the talking, but she had been triggered into a full account of her time at the church listing some of the times she had been slapped down. I chipped in with bits of support. We were able to communicate that it was not just the recent incident but the whole history, not just the new man but the two people in front of us as well.

Then there was a silence – each party waiting for the other to speak.

Then they asked us what we proposed; what olive branch we could offer.

That set me off. We were the aggrieved party – it was their job to be offering the olive branch, not us. It was for them to come up with proposals to win us back, not for us to set terms for return.

The best offer was for Mrs to run just her mid-week groups and to have a pastoral role. The mid-week groups were coming to the end of their natural life anyway, as
Various parents had started work or children grown up and gone to nursery. And in any case, both they and the pastoral role had been offshoots of her work as crèche leader – you take away the hub and the whole wheel falls apart.

Our return proposal was that they should commission us for the play church idea, (since it lies within their parish). We would still be part of their church structure, which would be best for appearances all round, but would not have to rub shoulders every week. The assistant minister liked this idea and said we should definitely go for it, but the Vicar just laughed it off.

We the asked why Mrs. had been sacked, what had she done wrong etc.
The Vicar wanted a ‘more collaborative approach’. He clearly does not realise that Mrs was already running it on a team basis, with regular consultations with the mothers, taking on board their ideas where possible, and using their skills and taking into account the various other pressures on their lives. He seems to think that she was domineering. But being the best person for the job, in terms of qualification, experience and availability, does not make one domineering.
He felt that she ‘henpecks’ me. My philosophy of marriage is that ‘husbands should love their wives as Christ loves the church and gave his life for her’. I sacrifice what I want for her. In any decision I consult her to find out how she feels and how my decision will affect her. Apparently my deliberate godly submissiveness makes her a domineering henpecker!!!
“There is other even more hurtful stuff”

What it all amounts to is that, as my wife has long suspected, he through ignorance and misjudgement has held things against her, and for that reason has never allowed her to progress.

He continues to blame us. He thinks that it is all her perception, based on her ‘unloved childhood’.

But let us imagine that all the above was true and correct. It was still wrong to sack her without notice. It was still wrong to appoint a less qualified and experienced person in her place. It was till wrong that if she was running the group so badly that they didn’t talk to her and train her to do it their way.

In the end, my wife had had enough. She put her coat on and walked out, with me following.

But the vicar came round to the house in the evening. “We left an open wound….” So he proceeded to rub salt in it, still blaming us, still refusing to apologise in any meaningful way. And he wonders why we don’t want to go back?

Towards the end, he was saying ‘Simon, even now I still love and respect you’ [which of course taken out of the context sounds good], but I had to close the door on him saying sadly ‘But you don’t love and respect my wife’.

The Big Meeting .... !!

2011-01-14T13:24:00.002Z

Please pray for us as we meet the leaders of our former church at 9pm tonight.

They will turn on the charm to try to win us back. But will they actually admit they were wrong? (Maybe.) Will they actually apologise? (Maybe.) Can the come up with a workable proposal for us to return? (probably not.)

What are their motives? genuine love? Embarrasment at losing a high profile figure form their church? Afraid of what we might say about them?

It's actually very hard to pitch it right.

We definitely want to leave. Even if they apologise in sack cloth and ashes, sack the sunday school superintendant and reinstate my wife, we will still not trust them anymore, nor the women who should be my wife's deputies but who we believe whispered against her. (We know most people loved her work, but the two nearest deputies seemed to have their own agendas and the church leadership always undermined her.)

Also, if I transfer my readership to another church I would have to negotiate with the diocese, and that would involve telling them why I have left, and much as I am cross with my old vicar I don't want to get him in toruble with his boss. Neither do I want to say things to the congregation which would undermine his leadership, but also our friends deserve to know why we have left them. It's a political minefield. I have no political skills.

I suppose my ideal outcome from the meeting is a reconciliation on a personal level, so that we can go to another church with their blessing and bump into them in the future without too much awkwardness.

Time to eat humble pie?

2011-01-10T14:33:00.001Z

Some of the songs during my sons worship session made me wonder if the Lord really wanted us to get off our high horse and go back to our old church. This is surely the obvious and only righteous answer.

While coming home from taking my oldest lad to university and I was meditating in the car (Radio 4 were doing a very long reading of the King James version – very good – write in to encourage them!) I felt this even more strongly.

If it were just me, then this is what I would do.

But to do that, I would be asking my wife to go back into the situation where she has been hurt and abused. If she had been mugged in the street I would not ask her to go back that way, past the same muggers, the next day. That’s not love! And if it was just that we had been hurt, if the people gave a half-decent apology, we would go back. But it’s the practicality of it: You can’t just sit back and ignore it – we would have to put our children into what we consider to be a seriously damaged children’s work. And even if they were to put her back in charge of the work, it is too badly broken and basic trust with the other mums so badly lost, that we can’t see it working.

Play church idea

2011-01-10T14:32:00.001Z

We visited the play area at the relevant morning time this week. There was a big party on and the place was too full and noisy for a church. But it was an unusually large party, and if we have booked for our church then that aspect would not be so bad (there are two party rooms). However, it did seem to be their peak time for parties, so it would be hard to negotiate a reduced rate. They are less likely to have a party going on Sunday evening but that is because they try to push the parties to the morning because it is full with general customers in the evening, so again it would full and noisy and hard to get a reduced rate.

So it’s not looking good!

Other play areas exist, but are likely to have the same demographics.

Last weekend of the whole family

2011-01-10T14:31:00.000Z

The older boys have been back over the holiday period, but on Sunday it wsa time for them to go back to college/work.

Now that we are an ecclesiastically divided family, we insisted that they cancel all other engagements and have tea with us on Saturday, and then we had a family worship time in the evening. Number three is part of the church band, so he lead us in singing, while Mrs and I did prayers. At risk of boasting, I have to say my ld did very well, choosing songs that were very apt for our situation and leading very well through the set. Of course he noticed all his own mistakes and coma out all concerned, but really it was very good indeed.

Love and Other Drugs

2011-01-06T13:57:00.002Z

Wanted to see 'the King's Speech' but couldn't get a viewing at the right time. Ended up in this instead.

Went in expecting a bog standard Rom Com, with perhaps one or two 'tasteful' love scenes where there might be a brief flash of boob. The first half was therefore quite shocking to me, as it seemed to be one wild burst of passion after another with a lot more flesh than I expected. When I was young back in the 80's and secretly went to adult cinemas some of the films touted as pornography were less explicit than this. My wife is really not used to this kind of thing at all and so I found myself cringing for most of the first part of the film, feeling it had been a big mistake to bring her.

But then the plot moves on. The focus moves to Maggie's developing Parkinson's disease, and questions of the couples motives in the relationship and leading finally to their settling into an honest, mutual relationship. This turned out to be a very good theme for us as a couple, as my wife's rheumatoid arthritis deteriorates and she becomes increasingly disabled. In fact, I would say it was spot on.

And of course we re-enacted some of the earlier scenes when we got home. Yum yum.

Another sub plot was also good - the theme that you can have as much 'empty sex' as you want but it is ultimately unsatisfying. Hear hear!

Holidays

2011-01-06T12:29:00.003Z

Took our boys to visit the local mountains for two days, then took our girls to the distant big city to see the sights and get crushed in the shops for two days, then wenet to see my parents on New Year's eve. They are too old to stay up these days. We made it to a Travelodge at 2 mins to midnight, and saw the fireworks in London on the telly. Took photos of the telly screen so we could pretend we had been there ourselves - honest!

Travelodge full of drunks giving the manager a hard time and us no sleep.

Next stop is my big reminiscence holiday in Spain in April. I think I will kiss the soil as we arrive - I miss the place so much!

Church Search III

2011-01-06T12:17:00.003Z

New year - new beginnings. Hopefully that will be the case.

We tried the church 10 miles away (that we liked the website for) on Boxing Day. Arrived late owing to the snow on the road on the way. Bearing taht in mind we had a reasonably good welcome on the way in. Turnout seemed low, and the service rather dull in the hands of a curate. No signs of friends for our 10 year old, but a reasonable creche for our 2 year old. The sermon was good: Biblical with a godpel presentation. After the service ended, the curate went back to the microphone and announced taht he had just hear that Mr X had passed away. Everyone gasped - clearly this was a key figure in the church and his loss was a shock, particluarly to a number of ladies who became quite tearful and needed support. It was not the time to start expecting people to talk to us, so we left. Dissapointed and flat, but feeling taht it wsa probably not representative and that we should go back next week.

Which we did.

And it was much better. Twice the number of people. A band playing a wi=orship song as we went in - the words for which were very aspt for our situation. THe general service was much more Anglican than we are used to, but was still very good. Sunday school was still not on. I satyed in the crech this time, and found a lady doing a very good lesson - in a fun way - for the kids who were all paying good attention. A good sign! Communion wasa bit hard on my wife - their custom is to kneel at the altar rail, and my wife isn't that flexible! So she was rather awkward and sideways as she pseudo-knelt and struggled back up. Afterwards a couple of people welcomed us, and one in particular spent quite a long time explaining the various children's groups to us. Also, several posters had words on them which my wife felt were for her.

So all in all, it feels like the place where we will be in the medium term. It's too distant to rely on for the long term.

Every second Sunday of the month is their parade service, and we will probably take this opportunity to pursue our play church idea - starting his coming Sunday.

... adding insult to injury

2010-12-20T14:14:00.002Z

We found out that the new man who took over my wife's work at the old church ran the CHildren's presentation yesterday. The report is that it was mostly him talking. What a surprise! But the annoying thing was that his presentation - unwrapping presents which had meanings - was an idea whic he stole form my wife when she was trying to arrange to do something with the toddlers. She would 0f course have involved the kids more than him, but he doesn't share her skills. He rejected her, saying he had ideas of his own. But when it comes to the actual event, he steals her idea and presents it as his own work.

Lord, help me to forgive, because I don't think I can do it without your intervention.

Workplace Christian Fellowship.

2010-12-20T14:12:00.001Z

Encouraged by yet another new face at the meeting today.

Still need to be contacting non-christians rather than simply gathering the faithful.

Church Search II

2010-12-20T14:04:00.002Z

As I said below, we have started looking at churches outside our town in the neighbourhood district.

One caught our eye. About 10 miles away. Same name as our old church. Also an anglican church.

Many church websites are either slick moving things where they have spent a a fortune on style - possibly at the expense of substance. Others have a simple drawng or photo of the church with a few one-liners about the list of activities. THis one seemed to strike the balance.

It had a photo of the church - ie a photo of all the people in it (now the Baptist church we slagged off below had also done this, but this one was much more upbeat, somehow). It had a photo of the new church hall - in the background with a lrge group of people in the middle. It had a very long page dedicated to the youth and children's work, with a detailed analysis of the philosophies and mission statements of each group, ie WHY it was there, and the reason was usually service and outreach.

We felt that this web site was pitched at the level we would hope for.

Now clearly, there is a big differecne between the website and the church itself, and so in the new year we will visit and see. Watch this space!

Candle-lit carols

2010-12-20T14:00:00.003Z

In the evening I visited the church where I did my placement during my training. Too 'high' for us evangelicals to settle there. BUt I did want to see their candlelit carol service. I had checked the time on the internet, but still managed to arrive 1/2 hour after the start. I walked in in the middle of a period of absolute silence while a candle was lit. The huge door BANGED shut behind me! AAARRRCGGGHHH!

The service was good in its own way, very beautiful, with a highly skilled choir. It was strangely moving, and during a carol I didn't know found myslef tearfully praying in tongues over our church-less situation and the whole circumstances of our life. So it was very good.

I hoped to sneak away at the end but was spotted, and ended up having to chat and said far more than I should about our reasons for leaving the old church. Bother.

Church Search

2010-12-20T13:46:00.002Z

So: we planned to go to the Baptist Church.

It didn't happen.

Our town is notoriuos for it's 'ecclesiastical merry-go-round' - people are always moving from church to church and the same faces turn up all the time. So, wherever we go in this town, we will bump into those peole who we were glad when they left us! (Aren't Christians such nice wonderful forgiving folk?!?!)

So on Saturday we started looking at web sites for churches in the neighbouring areas to our town. More of that later, but in the process, noted that the website for the Baptist chuch was rather downbeat. Now, you could argue that a downbeat church needs us more tthan a thriving one. BUt what we are looking for more is a skill match - a church who's priorities and aspirations match the skills we can offer - and the baptist church didn't seem to prioritise the children's work that my wife wants to work in. She's had enough of not being prioritised!

Also, 10 inches of snow dumped on our town and paralised it. Mrs determined that she was not going out in that to visit a church that didn't really look suitible (bearing in mind her rheumatoid arthritis makes it very hard for her to walk on slipery surfaces).

So I said I would take the baby to the play area anyway, because she needs exercise, and that while I was there I would make a preliminary survey for our play church idea, even though with the snow disruption it would be hard to measure. So Mrs then decided that in that case she would come with me. Which meant walking a longer route to avoid the humped bridge, and stopping every few minutes to take a photo of the snow, and struggling to get the push chair across the mounds of slush. It took us an hour to walk 1/2 mile. By then it was lunch, so we stopped in the restuarant opposite the play area. The she went to the play are with the baby, while I went home (10 minutes!) to dig out the car from the snow (1.5 hours plus much sweat) and go back to feth her. Stopped at the supermarket for the weekly shopping on the way back.

And that was almost as spiritual as our weekend got. Not good!

The play area was quiet, but who knows how we shood, interpret that data, distorted by the weather.

Deflated

2010-12-17T09:55:00.002Z

We finally had a look at the job description for the Children and Families Worker at the local Parish Church.

We were already a bit concerned about it being full time, and our friend has declined any job share approach.

Now we saw that the job also requires a full driving license and involves travel to different locations. My lovely wife does have a driving license, but does not drive and hasn't been behind the wheel for over 6 years. So its not really suitible after all. Also, the firsts ection of the application for asks for your referees, so they clearly put a high emphasis on them. And the people that should be her referees are the people who have unfairly sacked her from the role at our old church.

All that sense of divine timing has come to nothing.

And now we really don't know which way to head in the near future.

Meanwhile, realising that it is the 'Christmas special' season when we can measure how churches treat their young, we have decided to postpone our 'play church' investiagtion until next year and look at more churches now. So this Sunday we will look at another Baptist church where our daughter attends one of the youth groups and seems to do well.

Office outreach

2010-12-16T17:43:00.002Z

The office carol service went well today, with approx 65 present (of which 10 were part of the 'team'). We managed to involve some of the office Christians that don't attend our weekly prayer meeting. The Chief executive - who is a Christian - did the opening prayer. Everything good.

The PA system which I borrowed from my old church worked perfectly well, though it was a bit awkward having to go into the building again. Inevitably, the vicar was in the welcome area, and again turned on the charm in the hope of winning me back. He is very good at this, though standing back and looking at it from a more distant perspective, he is actually quite manipulative. He manages to get you to agree to things, and then you walk away wondering why you agreed to such a bad deal. On top of that I find it very difficulat to say 'no' to people, and find it hard to give people bad news to their face. So, although I was supposed to be telling him that my wife and I don't want to attend his meeting in mid January, all I got out of him was a guarantee that we won't be outnumbered there. He also conned me into keeping the church keys for now, and tried to pursuade me to keep attanding events. BUt I know his game - it is all attempts to try to keep me attached to the church.

Meanwhile, Mrs was at one of the loacal play areas (not the one referred to in my previous post) meeting some of the mums from the local Baptist church. Not surprisingly, in that location, she also met a few mums form our old church too - ones we have no contention with and who have in fact been very supportive. It was good to be able to put our side of the story to them, becasue they are still in the churhc reche and can see all of the changes but don't know the background. It's comforting to know from them that the changes brought in by the new people don't seem to be very popular. But that doesn't really help. They still deserve a good creche, and for their sake we would rather the new people do something good. But anyway - Mrs is convinced that there is no way that she can go back to that church. I think maybe, if the new sunday school superintendant and his daughter leave the church, together with the assistant minister, and if Mrs was officially comissioned to rebuild the creche, then it might be possible. But none of that is going to happen.

Next Parish Option - first test.

2010-12-13T10:23:00.003Z

We visited our [new?] parish church this Sunday.

It was their parade service, with Scouts, guides and a Rose Queen.

Q1 - what place does a Rose Queen have in Christian theology???

Apart from that: The good was that we were able to mingle without having to give too many explanations, the bad was that although it was a very child oriented service [good] it probably didn't give us a fair picture of the church. One of our friends who was already there said the service had been 'pretty radical'. So it may not be appropriate for us. Our two year-old toddler is unusually lively and will never sit still that long, and the small baby area at the back would be too small and too babyish for her. There is a creche - not operating this week - so she may be happy there but we don't like excluding children from the whole of the main service. There has to be some time when the whole body comes together if only for a short while. However, if my wife does get employed as their 'children and family worker' she would be well placed to influence these things.

Other points - we met a few of the people form our old church who have left in a huff and come here. They were friendly enough, but didn't leap at the idea of Mrs getting the job. They probably don't realise what she has been doing more recently. My 10 year-old son. who will come with us to whatever church we join, seemed happy, especially when he met a school friend there. The church is laid out in old uncomfortable pews. The vicar was very friendly and much more at ease with kids than our old vicar. We were welcomed well at the start, but nobody we didn't already know spoke to us afterwards. The coffee tasted good. Average age was high, and most of the younger people seemed to be parents of the scouts in the parade just visiting for the day. So if we were presumed to be parents of scouts, why did nobody make more effort to encourage us to visit again, or stay, etc? What a wasted opportunity! Which my wife would be able to influence. Oh yes, the speaker was a young woman. who was very good - competent both in style and substance. And if they already have such good people, why do they want to bring in someone else? And would my wife actually be good enough to meet their needs?

Next week we will case out the play area for our Play-church idea, though that seems less likely now.

Personally, I am feeling more guilty for the manner of my departure from the old church, and wondering if it has all been just a misunderstanding and whether I should just go back. I feel tainted and guilty. But I could not ask my wife to continue in that old church. I could not continue smiling and laughing with the people that were hurting her and continuing to hurt her even after we had explained the problem and they had made long faces and apologised. I have to put her needs and feelings above all else.

Yesterday evening was the first time I didn't turn up for a warden duty at my old church - I wonder how the Vicar coped with sorting it out without telling anyone I had left. But that's his problem, if he wants to manage it that way.

Christmas - Wow!

2010-12-10T16:34:00.002Z

This is good

Some future options

2010-12-10T16:18:00.003Z

Play Church

We thought about starting a 'Play Church' in one of the local indoor play areas. We knew of another couple who have been drifting without a church for a while, with small children, and wondered if they would join us in setting it up. I wanted to do it under the commission of a church or an apostle or a bishop or something similar, but Mrs wanted to go it alone. The most obvious 'cover' would be the Anglican church, but the play area lay within the parish of our old church so we would end up being supervised by the very people we have lost confidence in. And then we found that the other couple had drifted so long that they had rather lost faith. Not really church-planting material! So this probably won't happen yet.

Next Parish

Well, our house is technically in the neighbouring parish to our old church. This parish is also an Evangelical Anglican church, though more traditional than my old one. And I've noticed that there seems to be a two-way street between them, with people leaving each in a huff and going to the other, waving to people going in the opposite direction as they go! So perhaps we are destined to follow the same road? One advantage of staying in the Anglican Church is that my Readership would still be valid - I would just need to be relicensed to the new parish. But they already have 3 or 4 readers form my old church at the new parish already. Do they want another? Also, some of those who have gone there before are people who I was glad to see the back of when they left our old church. Aren't we Christians nice people?

But the main reason for considering this church is that one of our friends, who is already a member there, tells us that they are advertising for a children's worker. So my dear wife is going to apply for the job, which is just up her street, and if successful will be paid £££ to do the very job which was considered to be of no value at our old church. I suppose it would not be appropriate to make rude hand gestures towards the old church!

I need to keep my emotions out of this and make a decision that is based on what the Holy Spirit wants us to do next and what is best for my wife, which will of course be the same thing.

Time for a new church?

2010-12-06T17:52:00.003Z

Well it all came to a head this Sunday.

Mrs could bear to come to church only to sit out and watch her work destroyed, neither was she going to put her child in the care of those who were destroying it.

I had to go - i was on warden duty. I had debated with myself for most of a sleepless night as to whetehr I should go in at all. I felt taht if I were to come into a confrontain with certain individuals I might thump them. Or strangle them. Or both. Neither being ideal behaviour in a deputy warden of the church towards members of the congregation while on duty. So I was going to stay at home. But that would have meant ringing up one of the other deputy wardens very early in the morning and asking them to stand in. Not fair. And I felt the Lord prompt me to go in.

It was galling. I did have to provide keys to the main offender so that he could continue with his act of destruction. I had to watch while his nepotistically involved family strutted about relishing their victory. I noticed taht some of the things they were doing were things that the assitant minister had promised my wife they would not do.

I could take it no longer, and called the assistant minister out of the servoce to ask what was going on. She tried to assure me taht all was OK, that my wife was loved, they did want her to come back and be part of the team but...[the truth slips out]... just not in control. There we had it. Proof that my wife had in effect been sacked, but nobody had told her, nobody had explained why, nobody had tried to find a better way forward.

My following behaviour was indeed unbecoming of a deputy warden on duty, shouting at the assistant minister repeatedly in the church foyer "Everything they are doing is sh**tting on her head". I had lost it. It was time to leave the building rather than make more of a scene. I grabbed my coat, asked the assitant minister to tell the senior warden that someone needed to take over my duty, and walked out, thrusting away her attempted hug.

At home I said to my wife - "Everything you have been saying, confirmed, in every detail".

That afternoon we wrote our letter to the church resigning our memebrship and my various posts and sent it in with our kids - who will stay at the church - on their way to the evening service.

It is done.

Of course anxious Vicar came knocking at the door half an hour later. Trying to pursuade us not to go. He loves me and all the stuff I do in the church. Fine, but I am not alone, I am part of a couple, and he has not loved her or the stuff she does in the church.

Eventually, to get him out of the house, I agreed to a meeting in January once tempers have cooled. BUt I really can't see that he will have any success in finding a deal taht will satisfy my wife that she is loved, and her work valued, when the evidence is otherwise.

So now we have a strange sense of relief. It's done!

BUt it's annoying taht we still have this meeting in January, and can't really tell people until after that.

Time for a new church?

2010-12-03T12:07:00.002Z

Woes

It looks like my time at my church is coming to an end.

I have always flourished at this church as deputy warden, member of the PCC, and licensed lay minister.

Not so my wife, who has always felt overlooked, ignored, invisible – and when she is noticed it is only to put her down.

But in the last 18 months she had finally found her feet. Our baby had given her an entrance into the children’s work, and she had risen to lead the crèche and two of the mid-week toddler groups, and these were bringing new people into the church. I would say it was the best church crèche in the town: not just a dumping ground to give the preacher some quiet but a ministry in its own right. The focus was on making children have a positive attitude to church and Christian things from the outset. There was a wide variety of new clean toys set out attractively. There was a teaching session for the older ones following a curriculum with feedback to parents. Fantastic.

All gone.

And partly my fault!

I was on the ‘vision team’ that said we should have a ‘Purpose Driven’ structure. So as part of that a Sunday School supervisor was appointed. His approach to management turns out to be highly autocratic bordering on fascist. And in two months he has reduced my wife from a confident happy fulfilled leader into a weeping wreck pushed to the sidelines.

Unable to face him, we arranged for the mum’s on the rota to handle the crèche one Sunday while we took a break at a breather different church – the first non-holiday Sunday we have been absent in 7 years. We even prepared the teaching material and set it all out in advance for them. We gave the official reason that she was resting owing to her arthritis, which had flared up to the extent of needing hospital treatment again.

Now, a month ago, my wife had asked for the Vicar to come round and pray over her arthritis. Nothing happened – he was too busy. But now, suddenly, after missing one Sunday – he was ringing on our door bell. Not to pray for the forgotten arthritis, but wanting to know what was going on. He doesn’t want us to leave the church – who knows what tales we might tell!

So it was an opportunity for my wife to tell him exactly how she has been feeling. I say exactly – it was a summary with many details, many crushing events, missed out.

Things should now improve, shouldn’t they?

No. He told her to some back to church but to continue her break. So, we set out the teaching materials as before, negotiating with the rota teachers during the week. I took our baby into the crèche in her absence. WHAATT? It had been completely re-organised. A high prison-like partition was introduced to separate age groups (hard for mums with two kids!). Our teaching materials were pushed to one side, and a new hurriedly prepared curriculum was imposed. The rota teachers were left out, and new teachers, many of whom have shown NO interest in helping before, were put in. Our wall posters were taken down. Was this care-taking while the leader was resting? No - it was a takeover coup!

Mrs has been told to rest for the rest of the month. The new Supervisor has been told that she IS coming back – and he looked taken aback and disappointed.

It emerges that he planned some elements of this with the Vicar beforehand, when he was offered the post. To be fair, I don’t think the Vicar fully knew what he was signing up to. But then it was partially his put-downs that set the scene for the new guy to continue disrespecting what my wife has built.

So how can she go back when her rest is over? How can she continue to work with people who have no confidence in her? How can she work with people who have destroyed in two weeks what she has spent years building? How can she work with a know-it-all man who knows little about crèche, and refuses to acknowledge her qualifications, skills and experience in this area? And would he even take her back as the recognised leader, or just as another mum?

Basically, she considers herself to have been, in effect, sacked.

For six years she has put up with the put-downs because she has seen me flourish in the church.

As her husband, I decree that it is time for a reversal. It’s time for her to flourish, even if I have to languish for a while.

The church still has a chance. It can reinstate her as pre-school leader and take this ministry out of the new guy’s jurisdiction. But if that doesn’t happen, there is no place for her in this church. And I don’t think it will happen.

I have always had a low opinion of people who move churches owing to a personality issue. Now I finally understand them. Apart form anything else, if I had to be in the same room as him I might end up behaving in a way that would shame the house of God.

Where next?

There is a rather strict Baptist church just at the end of our road, which I would find stifling. But it places a high priority on children’s work, so that looks the most likely.

New career?

2010-11-02T17:58:00.002Z

Well the title is stretching it a bit. But the winds of life are carrying me in a new direction. So far most of my career has been in wastewater networks and treatment works, with odd bits of clean water and raw water.

Now I suddenly find myself designing

Reservoir Spillways.

The really good thing is that this will be in a different building. New location (good for the IR35 aspects of my tax situation). New people - new evangelism opportunities. Not that I go Bible-bashing. No-one is attracted by that. But as a Christian in the workplace, by lifestyle, pastoral support, and general conversations you can introduce people gently to the living Lord Jesus.

Racists are the new liberals.

2010-10-29T12:43:00.002+01:00

According to the BBC's Radio 4 comedy.

The argument goes like this.

Liberals say there are 195 or so nationalities.

Standard racists say there is just white, black, chinese and asian. 4 races. So they are 191 steps ahead of us. India and Pakistan are on the brink of nuclear war, but these racists unite them under one race. Brilliant!

Exteme racists recognise only two races: black and white. So they are only 1 step from the goal of a single humanity, and 194 steps ahead of us.

Well I thought it was funny, anyway.

Foaming at the ... air release chamber.

2010-10-29T12:31:00.002+01:00

Found out yesterday that one of my favourite projects didn't work very well in practice. I had designed a fantastic combined diversion/bypass/air release chamber downstream of a new BAFF plant in a sewage works. One of my best bits of work.

When used in practice, it generated a huge quantity of foam (foam gets worse as you pass through a sewage works: there is less muck for detergents in the flow to work on so it just foams). Being an air release chamber, that was where the bubbles came up. And stayed!

So the commisioning team added a penstock to restict the flow so that it would back up and submerge the drop at which I had correctly interpreted that air entrainment woudl occur, and succesfully stopped the foaming. They also removed a very expensive perforated baffle plate taht I had designed. But now they had a supercritical flow shooting under the penstock, which blasted through the air release chamber and made a huge wave against the opposite wall, which of course entrained air here instead.

I said 'Why didn't you put the baffle plate back in?'

The reply 'Oh, that had already been weighed in [at the scrap yard]'.

So the dropped a lump of concrete in instead.

Also, although we had looked at the theoretical Dry weather Flow, nobody had checked the lowest diurnal flow (in the middle of the night), which wasn't enough to keep the pumps running continuously so the UV plant downstream (which needs a steady flow because you can't keep switching the bulbs on and off) failed. Now they have had to introduce a new recirculation flow at these times.

Thieves break in and steal?

2010-10-29T12:27:00.002+01:00

Went to the church late last night to help Mrs set up for one of her toddler groups.

Could not switch the burlar alarm off to save my life. Sure I was typing in the right number. Visions of blue flashing lights and an embarrassing arrest. Gave up trying, and went into the church office to phone the warden. Then the alarm stopped. And there were spooky noises coming up the corridor......

It turned out that while I was busy trying to go in at the front door and switch the alarm off, the Vicar was going out the back door trying to switch it on. The alarm didn't know whetehr to listen to him or me. So it just threw its toys out of the pram. All sorted now.

Hygienic dentist

2010-10-21T10:24:00.002+01:00

Sitting with my daughter in the dentists today, with my head in my hands and looking sideways at the asian dentists name on the wall. H - a -n - d - w - a -s - h - s - i - n - k. Bit of a mouthful..... oh, hang on, its not his name at all - it says "Hand Wash Sink".

Criminal Me

2010-10-18T17:35:00.002+01:00

About a month ago I knocked a cyclist off his bike.

I was dropping my daughter off at school, and paused briefly to let some cars and a box van come through a gap between parked cars towards me. The box van was quite scary as it passed- seemed like mere inches from my mirror, and filled up the whoe width of road. As soon as it had passed, I set off into the gap between the parked cars - no need to check mirrirs becasue the bax van was blocking off the whole road. Wrong! A schoolboy cyclist - either very courageous or completely oblivious - had squeezed through the gap and was no trying to occupy the same patch of tarmac as me.

I stopped, picked his bike up, and walked with him to the side of the road. After a few minutes of groaning and rubbing himself he seemed to be getting over it. I offered him my adress - he said 'no'. He now seemed to be over it and walked on to the school with his friends who had gathered around. I drove off and thought nothing more of it.

Till the following Tuesday.

At roughly the same place a police man stopped me " Were you involved in an incident...?" "Yes" etc. Apparently the boy wen tot hospital laetr in the day and had a broken wrist and ligament damage to his leg.

So this Saturday I was interviewed by the Police under caution, with a solicitor present.

I am accused of Careless Driving, of failing to give details, and of failing to report an injury accident.

Careless Driving (Because I didn't check my mirrors).

Surely that's 'Driving without due care and attention' (a lesser sin than 'Careless driving')?
I was not careless. The mirror check is to see if something is coming - in lieu of that check I had assessed that it was impossible for something to be coming because of the van filling the road. That was a mistake, an error of judgement, but making a mistake is not the same as 'careless'.

Failing to give details

I stopped, I spoke to the boy, I offered him my details, he said 'no'. It's not like I wa trying to run away form my responibilities - I was acting in good faith. The boy's assessment was that he didn't need the details. Was I supposed to staple them to his head?

Failing to report an injury accident

What injury? I knew nothing about the injuries until four days later. I was presented with a boy who was rubbing himself and groaning, but getting over it, telling me he was OK, and walking off. And he was rubbing himslef with the hand they say was broken. The polic man says I should have rung the school to find out how he was, but I don't think that is a requiremnt of the relevant law.

So. In Summary - If I was charged with Driving Without Due care and attention, I would take the hit. BUt I can't accept 'Careless driving' or the other accusations.

The file will go to the CPS, who may get round to looking at it some time next year.

If they decide to prosecute, I will have my day in court!

Holiday in Spain

2010-10-18T17:28:00.002+01:00

Silly taxman. Gave us some money back as a lump sum.

Silly me - booked a holiday with it!

I very rarely travel abroad- costs are prohibitive with a large family on my income, generous though it is. SO I have always nursed a dream of going back to the city in Spain where I lived as a child - to see the old haunts and meet some of the old people.

Now that dream is coming true, and will be fulfilled next easter.

I am REALLY looking forward to it - more than anything I have desired for many years. I want it like water after a long trek in the desert. I want it more than my wife's embrace ... if you get my drift.

I realsie much will have chaged - they have built a dual carriageway over the riverbank where a a child I hunted lizards and snakes among the rocks. But much will remain the same. I am going to be a very emotional chap the whole time I am there. I loved that city deeply, I have not been there for 25 years, now I am going again. I will drink deep! Cannot stress how happy I am!

Feeling unspiritual

2010-10-06T17:32:00.002+01:00

I'm frantically busy at work.
I'm frantically busy at home.
I'm not really in tune with Mrs - she winds me up a lot of the time and I think she's peeved with me too. Our parenting course includes a lot of relationship stuff and I feel very hypocritical.
I haven't had a proper Bible reading time or prayer time for ages.
I really don't feel in touch with God at all.

Fortunately, he chose me without reference to my merit. Romans 9:11-12

The Jews did not have to obey the law in order to be included in the covenent. They were included in it by their birth into the people God had chosen. Their obedience to the law was the lifestyle required of people already IN the covenent. Likewise our salvation derives from God's choice, his mercy, his grace. Our good works are the fruit of that choice, not the cause of it.

But in terms of that lifestyle, which is primarily about relationship rather than behaviour (the behaviour being the symptom of the relationship) I fall short. I have not related to God. My behaviour has gone downhill. My mind is fixed on earth, not heaven.

So please pray that I will get a break - that work will cool down and the kids' bikes will stop breaking so I can actually rest for once at home, then maybe I will be able to pick up the scripture and read, ponder, and pray.

Mrs - childrens work

2010-10-06T17:24:00.002+01:00

Church is setting up heads of ministries, part of moving towards a 'purpose driven church' model.

The person put in charge of children's work is of course a man, who runs one sunday school class, one of the Vicar's pets, while Mrs who does loads of work with kids in the church has been overlooked/ignored/rejected as usual. (I don't mean any disrespect to the man - he is very good at everything he does - its just that he hasn't got much history with the kids work)

But once she had got over that hurt, she has seized the opportunity to have a meeting with the said boss, in the presence of the Vicar, where she will make her case for the work she has been doing and for a major extension to it, moving into other age groups. This will all be subserviently under the supervision of the new man, but somehow the message will get across that she is the one with the ideas, skills, passion, drive, and time to do the job.

Alternatively, she could go and grab the Vicar, slap him round the head several times and shout "HELLO! I EXIST!!!" into his face - so I think the above is the better option.

Next sermon

2010-10-06T17:23:00.001+01:00

Next sermon (Novemeber) will be on Acts 16 - "Paul at Troas". Hmm. Lacking inspiration!

Sad sight

2010-10-06T17:19:00.003+01:00

Commuting to work down the motorway - passed a place on the opposite carriageway where emergency vehicles were clustered around a burnt-out car on its roof in the middle lane. Witnesses awaited their interviews patiently on the hard shoulder. The motorway was close, of course.

About half a mile further on, there was a woman on the hard shoulder next to her broken down car, waiting for her breakdown van to arrive, with only the three empty lanes on the closed motorway to look at. She would have to wait a long time!

Struggling at work

2010-09-29T11:08:00.002+01:00

The usual thing - the project manager wants to issue the drawing before the design has been done.

I cannot get the CSO to work AND pass the right flow to the WwTW. Today's attempt will probably involve a complete redesign of the inlet works configuration, feeding the storm tank from the CSO rather than a local storm weir. All the drawings that are being presented to the HAZOP and ALM meetings tomorrow will therefore be wrong.

Heigh Ho.

Proud of my son

2010-09-29T11:01:00.002+01:00

My sixteen year old has gone for the first stage of his RAF selection procedure - the fitness test. Sit ups, followed by press ups, followed immediatley by the bleep test. As the youngest there, his target was less than for the six other candidates (aged 18-24), but he beat the lot of them.

He still has to go for his main interview and also to the officer and aircrew selection centre. At the OASC they monitor them continuously for 4 days, at the end of each day sending home any that have not made the grade. It is tough - apparently out of one recent batch of 273 only 2 made it through. But I think my lad has it!

That job

2010-09-29T10:57:00.002+01:00

Mrs didn't get that job. It went to the internal candidate, who was already doing bits of the job. With hindsight, we can see that she (the internal candidate) knew before the interviews that she would get the job, and that the whole inetrview procedure was just a sham for appearance sake.

Mrs' Job Interview

2010-09-16T15:38:00.003+01:00

Mrs has a job interview next Monday, for the 'Children and Families' worker at a nearby Methodist church. It's basically doing what she does for fun at our church, only she would be paid.

The good:

It's just her kind of thing.
It's just at the end of our road.
the description says 'no driving required'.

The bad:

It might draw her away from our own church
It might conflict with duties at our church
It includes the Youth Worker role - not really her thing. She does babies and parents.
It might be one of those jobs where they already have someone in mind and have advertised externally only because they have to.
The church is less Evangelical than ours, with a greater emphasis on infant baptism which is generally regarded as 'not what God intended' at our Anglican church. Mrs would be the liaison for families on the baptism register - a hard role when she doesn't believe the theology behind it.
Childcare issues (but they are less with this job than others she has considered)

Anyway - she is in a good place - happy to take on the job, but faintly relieved if it doesn't come her way. So she is a winner either way.

Parenting Course

2010-09-15T15:26:00.002+01:00

First session on Monday.

Went very well, despite some candidates not turning up. Most were there.

I set out the room in a really nice way, with a central table for the snacks, looking very much like the courses I go to for work. I wanted people to know it's a serious course, not just a chat with friends. 10 minutes before its due to start, the wife comes in, and makes me change the whole format to low tables net to low sofas, for an 'informal' atmosphere. When it comes to these things, she's in charge!

Link to course

I'm in trouble again

2010-09-15T14:56:00.002+01:00

On Friday morning I was dropping my daughter off at school (she was late back from her paper round). The road outside is narrow and quite busy, with cars parked on both sides of the road and traffic weaving in and out. I stopped to give way to a wide box van coming fast towards me between two parked cars in front, and as soon as it had passed I moved into the gap. Except that some lunatic cyclist had flown through the tiny gap between me and the fast-moving box van, so just as I pulled out to go round the parked car he was there and my front offside wing pushed him sideways off his bike.

He fell quite heavily, but got up quite quickly and I picked up his bike. Back on the footway, he was still groaning but professed to be OK. He declined to take my details. We exchanged apologies, and went our separate ways.

Turns out he is in my daughter's registration class.

On Tuesday I had to drop off my daughter at the school again (she didn't want rain on her art homework). I was met by a policeman looking for a car like mine. "Excuse me sir, but please don't be offended if I ask if you were involved in an incident with a cylcist last Friday?"

It turns out that in the evening he went to hospital, and was told he had a broken arm and a broken leg.

So I face probably two years of hassle and paperwork and increased insurance premiums.

In terms of responsibility:

He should not have been flying through that gap
I should have checked my mirrors.

So I suppose it's 50/50 and one for the powers that be to resolve.

But when I am thrown into the deepst dungeon and they throw away the key, please come and get me out!

Unemployment prayer group II

2010-09-08T17:41:00.002+01:00

Only one person came last night - the new woman from last week.

So I breached all the churches policies re not being alone with someone of the opposite gender, not praying alone for vulnerable people etc.

Next week we will meet in the foyer, which is a bit more public than the pastoral room we have been in.

I actually reminded all the people I set up the group for, but none came. "I have bought me a cow", "I have married a wife", etc. I originally booked the room for 4 weeks, so I will give them two more goes. If they still don't turn up, I will close the group. The new lady will be happy to go to the ladies 'Finding Your Way' group instead.

What do your kids look like?

2010-09-08T17:28:00.002+01:00

I was giving my son the briefest of introductions to ethical methods of selecting the gender of your children, e.g. adjusting diet and the timing of those special hugs. We had tried these, and it worked. But it occurred to me that this may have been more God honouring our wishes (faith seen in actions as per James 2) than any real scientific value in those methods.

This got me thinking about Jacob and Laban - you remember the story of how Jacob was paid in stripy sheep so when the sheep were mating he put stripy things in front of their eyes, and lo and behold out came stripy kids. Probably not scientific, probably God working miracles.

So in my reverie, I started an imaginary sermon on this: "..... if this was a scientific principle, all your kids would look like the back of bike shed....."

Shall I do it next time I'm in the pulpit?

Parenting Course

2010-09-06T22:37:00.002+01:00

My wife and I have been asked by the church to run a parenting course. That is to say, it is our initiative, but endorsed by the church. Which is nice.

It grew out of discipline issues in the various toddler groups (which my wife runs), with the softy-softly mums and the strict mums both having naughty children fighting each other. One Mum asked for a 'session' on discipline.

We asked the curate for support, and she went of in the wrong direction trying to bring in a child psychologist to do the talk, but in the end we brought her down to earth. But she did delay things a lot and so Mrs quiety did a discipline session with the mums on her own. It went very well.

But the book she used had the details of how to run a parenting course, and we approached the curate and asked if we could do it. She resisted, saying she would prefer us to do the 'New Wine' parenting course. When we got home nd looked at the book again, we found it WAS the New Wine course.

So now everyone is happy, and we are doing our first session of 13th September. Hopefuly at east one parent will turn up!

Righteousness

2010-09-06T22:16:00.002+01:00

Read this useful summary in the case of Piper v Wright. (I go with Wright - righteousness is a state of existence, not a measure of sinlessness, and is not a thing that can be imputed)

I'm mean!

2010-09-06T09:48:00.000+01:00

For the duration of a recent visit to the supermarket my 2 year old daughter sat in the trolley prodding my belly and saying loudly "you're mean!"

Shall I hand myself in to the NSPCC now?

Unemployment prayer group

2010-09-01T17:41:00.002+01:00

Since there are a few people without work in our church, I did a straw poll and found that they would like a prayer group to pray specifically into their situations, opportunities, etc. They told me Tuesday night is the best.

So, with the Vicar's endorsement, I set up the group, booked the room, etc, and had the first meeting last night. None of my candidates turned up. Except for one who arrived and said 'what uneployment prayerprayer group? I'm here for band practice'.

So it looked bad.

But all was not lost - a lady who has only been coming to the church for tthree weeks came, and turned out to be full of faith. She also brought her friend from another city - another prayer warrior albeit just visiting. And another unexpected attendee - a man who has a job and jsut wants to support any prayer group taht's going, particularly one for the unemployed.

So mixed news. But it was a good night overall - one of those prayer meetings that overruns without anyone being aware of it (expect my wife stuck with baby at home)

Ordination

2010-09-01T17:40:00.003+01:00

You may recall that early in my unemployment I was looking at applying for ordination, only to be knocked back on financial grounds.

Now that I am back in work I can start to look at options to sort out those finances. So who knows what will happen next?

It's never straight forward!

2010-09-01T17:36:00.003+01:00

My agent sent my pay check to someone else's account in error. Tey are trying to get a correct payment to me, but it means that I am out of pocket for now, just in that awkward moment between my benefits stopping and pay starting. I have £5.93 in my account, my wife has £20, and we've got to do the week's shopping for our large family as well as pay the gas bill and phone bill. Oh, yes, and the mortgage too.

That's all the agent's fault. BUt then for next week, I forgot to update the date on my timesheet, so by the time I had managed to get a manager to sign the altered version I had technically missed the deadline. So next week looks bleak too! At least the week afetr that should be OK.

I'm Back

2010-08-27T16:43:00.002+01:00

Yeehaa! I'm Back

Not helped by Blogger locking me out of my account for several months!!!!

The main news is that I am back at work. No longer unemployed! It was 16.5 months between finishing my old job and starting my new one.

I am back at my main client between 2006 and 2009 - same money, nearly the same desk, basically the same work.

Basically, my testimony is that the Lord cared for me while I was off work. I'll give more details in future posts.

The main thing is, I'm back.

However, I won't be posting long or frequently - one of my new resolutions being to be more diligent at work and less abusive of the company's internet provision.

Work at last! - update IV

2010-06-17T13:44:00.002+01:00

A bit more promising today - spoke to my direct client and end client - the job is not affected by recent cuts - they still want me urgently - the delay is down to people being on leave and sick and nobody doing anything while they are away.

Looks promising for next week.

Toilet

2010-06-16T23:04:00.002+01:00

The grandmother of all blockages today. Normal plunging did nothing at all. Found a website that suggested using a mop wrapped in a tee shirt and plastic bags - failed. It's a toilet with a double U bend, and the blockage was in the second bend. So al the plunging was just making waves in the airpocket between the two bends.

My sone suggested using atube to blow more air in, and even gave me an old washing macjhine hose for it. I felt this was the wrong thing to do, but stuck the hose through into the air pocket anyway, and blew experimentally to see if any air woudl come out anywhere - no. Next job, suck the air out - but not by mouth! Rigged the vacuum cleaner up to it with lots of plastic and sellotape, then got my son to switch it on and off in pulses to avoid filling the vacuum cleaner with toilet water, while I went back to plunging now that the air pocket was gone, or at least smaller.

It worked!

So I proclaimed myself a genius, and thanked my son for his sidekick role.

Baby news

2010-06-16T23:02:00.002+01:00

She's not really a baby anymore. Tall, a fast runner, communicative, has nappy control (but not yet the initiatuve to ask for the potty). She is a real delight.

But she was sick three times the previous night - all over bed covers and things.

"Yuk" she says, in her sweet high voice. I couldn't agree more!

Work at last! - update III

2010-06-16T22:59:00.003+01:00

Well, my provisional start date of 15 June has come and gone, and two days since, with no word. Part of me is in faith, trusting that this is indeed the job the Lord has planned fo me and I just need to be patient. Part of me is very anxiuos - the end client announced 200 redundancies today - not in my field but they will have to go through a process to prove they need to take me on rather than just redeploy redundant staff. But their skills are not even vaguely relevant to my field, so hopefully that will be a short process.

Joshua v Judges II

2010-06-07T15:16:00.002+01:00

More thoughts on the discrepancy between the triumphalistic end of Joshua and the depressed pessimistic start of Judges.

Is this not a pciture of the Christian?

On the one hand, we are now saved, completely, by the death and ressurection of Christ. We have a the promises NOW. We are a new creation, NOW.

On the other hand, we are still working out our salvation. There are areas of our lives that have still not been brought under the rule of Christ. Stubborn sins and habits that we allow to remain, like dandelions in the lawn, they keep springing back up. Our bodies are still sick. Our minds are still weak.

Jesus says "A time is coming, and now is....".

We have the promise of the final fulfillment of all things, and though we do not yet see it and are honest about its dissapointments, we can still start to live now IN the final fulfillment of the promises.

So Joshua looks to that future, as yet unfulfilled, as though it has already been fulfilled. Because our 'future' is our timeless God's 'now'.