Great news on the ordination front

Mrs is beginning to make progress towards ordination.


Followers of this blog will know that we have always felt that our Vicar had prejudices about her that would always be an obstacle to her making progress in this direction. And I think I reported before that she had met with him and he said he wanted to see her initiating more things. After that she wrote him a long letter – well more to the point a short letter with a 15 page appendix – in which she detailed all of her initiatives over the last twenty years, most of which he has overlooked.

Well it seems to have done the trick.

He arranged another meeting with her, this time with our assistant minister present too.

That was yesterday afternoon. I was at work, but held my breath and prayed a lot while she was in there.

It was basically an interview. He seemed really impressed by her document, and she spoke confidently (for a change) backed up with the things she has recently been learning n her MA.

So the meeting culminated with him giving her the phone number for the DDO’s office which is tantamount to an endorsement of her desire to be ordained.

I cannot state strongly enough what a breakthrough this is. We know there will be many difficulties along the way, but we have always seen getting our own Vicar’s buy-in as being the biggest obstacle of all.

Hallelujah!

Day of the wild women

So, you've been following my gender traffic survey?

In today's morning commute, I was overtaken by more women than men.  And they didn't just inch past me - they were flying! ... hunched over the wheel, pedal to the metal, teeth clenched in determined grimaces.

Female overtakers outnumbered men by 4 to 3.

Female overtakers outnumbered female 'overtakees' by 2 to 1.

(As with all my commutes, this was a very small sample - 22 drivers of which 12 were women.  Overall, it's still 66% of men encountered that overtake me and 58% of women encountered that overtake me, both measured when I am driving at the speed limit in freely flowing traffic in good weather, at times when the traffic is not too dense for counting without causing an accident)

Evangelism box

£540 to sort out a jammed gear box. Ouch!


The mechanic offered “£450 cash or £450 plus VAT” – the tone of his voice questioning the sanity of anyone who would choose the latter option.

So I said I was a licensed lay minister in the church, and that like with MPs you have to be whiter than white. He asked ‘What church?’ so I told him.

I regret not saying more, but at least it is the beginning of a seed of knowledge of the gospel. Maybe next time there is an event of some kind at the church, he will hear about it and make the link.

God is really real

So I had to speak at the informal, interactive evening service. I spoke on the lead-in to us making a declaration of faith in Christ, showing how God has been calling us right from the foundation of the earth. It was quite a Calvinist talk, but balanced with a healthy dose of Arminias. As part of my ‘interaction’, I asked some people to tell the story of how they became Christians. Three of them I had primed two weeks earlier. One came up through Sunday school, one felt God’s call through the beauty of duck eggs, and one had had a difficult life with multiple cancers, bereavement and family tensions. All good stuff, illustrating that often God does not conform to our evangelical ‘Sinner’s prayer’ models.


But the thing that made the evening for me was a 75 year-old lady who does not normally come to the evening service. Not knowing my intention to ask for testimonies, as she came into the building she went to the Vicar and asked him if she could give her testimony. He was reluctant knowing her tendency to ramble on. But I was thrilled that God was endorsing my event by sending extra testimonies.

And what a testimony it was! As a young woman she had been the 1960’s equivalent of a ladette – but one night on her own in her bedroom she begged God that she should not go to hell. She then had a supernatural experience with stuff glowing that doesn’t scientifically glow, etc., and filled with the Holy Spirit she had danced and praised God all night long, followed by the puzzlement of colleagues in the morning when she was no longer interested in cigarettes and pubs. POW! So not only did God endorse my event, but he sent along the most powerful testimony I have heard for a long time.

The rest of the evening went well. The music was terrible but that did not stop genuine worship at the end. And I went home happy, knowing that God had looked down from heaven and seen …. Me!

Driving gender

Went for some longer motorway trips over the weekend, using the main north/south motorways rather than the minor branches. The driving patterns here seemed different, and so my overall statistic are now:


Proportion of the men encountered who were speeding:                   66%

Proportion of the women encountered who were speeding:               58%

* Note that this excludes people of either gender driving legally at 70mph, because travelling at the same speed I never encountered them.

So that fits better with expectations - that men are worse, but it also underlines the reason why I started this survey in the first place - there are an awful lot of illegally fast (who could therefore be classed as 'aggressive') female drivers  out there

Another point that I find surprising is that overall male drivers still outnumber women 3 to 1. I would have thought we were more equal by now.

Driving gender

Today's total stats

When I was driving at the speed limit on three commuting trips I counted the men and women that I encountered:

Men I overtook            34
women I overtook        15
Men passing me           41
Women passing me      20

Analysis

Two thirds of those breaking the speed limit were men, but you have to consider how many of each gender were on the road.
Proportion of the men who drove too fast            55%
Proportion of the women who drove too fast        57%

Conclusion (based on this limited sample and questionable method)

Women are worse drivers than men.

I will keep counting!

10, 2, 14, 6, driving and gender issues

The numbers are this morning’s traffic statistics.

Data

While driving at the speed limit on my way to work this morning, I overtook 10 male drivers and 2 female drivers. Meanwhile the 20 cars that zipped past me at illegal speeds were driven by 14 men and 6 women.

A similar statistic is:

0, 0, 0, 1

Which means that zero drivers of either gender were driving irrationally slowly in front of me, and I was tailgated by zero men and 1 woman.

Notes

• My journey to work is 30 miles, of which about 12 is motorway and a further 2 dual carriageway – these are where all of the manoeuvres took place today, but I do overtake/get overtaken on other roads on other days so I will include these in the stats.
• HGV's not included.

Conclusions

• The main conclusion is that women drive more illegally than men. 58% of men were overtaking me, i.e. speeding, while 75% of women were speeding.
• In my mind, speeding and tailgating are measures of aggression.
• Of course, since insurance companies say women have better accident statistics, one could conclude that if women drive faster but have fewer accidents than men then they are better drivers! 
• 100% of the tailgaters were women – but a sample size of 1 does not really count, and she only tailgated me around the roundabout and in the small local village 30mph zone.
• The overall sample size is too small. So I will carry on for at least a week, gathering the same data.
• I don't promise to gather tailgating data very day - it's hard enough remembering the overtaking stats.
• These stats do not include the woman I followed for 10 miles last week whose hands I could see in her rear view mirror - not her eyes!!  Very worrying

Feint cheer

The Vicar announces ....

"Next week, the speaker in the morning services will be [so and so]"  (loud cheer)
"The in the afternoon will be the joint churches service at [XYZ location]"  (loud cheer)
"Then in the evening [SaintSimon] will be speaking" .... (feint cheer from one person - my own daughter)

Well, I suppose if no one is planning to attend it saves me preparation effort!

Show some initiative

Original post deleted.

"Love keeps no record of wrongs"

The Lords' will and the LORD's will

On our Sunday’s church bulletin, the Vicar wrote an article expressing his disappointment on the Gay Marriage bill passing through the House of Lords.


But if he has prayed for the LORD’s will to be done with this bill, then by faith he should accept that it is the LORD’s will for Gay Marriage to proceed.