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CREATING COMMUNITIES OF WHOLENESS WITH CHRIST AT THE CENTRE
Blog Archives: April 2008 - March 2008 - February 2008 - January 2008 - December 2007 - November 2007 - October 2007 - September 2007 - August 2007 - July 2007 - June 2007 - May 2007 - April 2007 - March 2007 - February 2007 - January 2007 - December 2006 - November 2006 - October 2006 - September 2006
Saturday 26 April: 8.15am
As with my last post, apologies for my long absence! I hate not being up to speed - see my adver article.
But some more positive and fun stuff.
On the same morning that I [and it seems everyone else] was despairing of every seeing anything like spring - let alone summer, I heard the first Cuckoo of the year earlier. The morning was still damp and cold [it was only 6.15am] but it was a good moment, and the bird got it right, within hours it was getting warmer. And the deer have been out more, but the woodpeckers seem to have gone quiet, at least while I'm running. This year though has been the first time that I've ever heard woodpeckers.
So much for the joys of spring - although a friend used to say that he looked out into the garden and didn't see much joy, only endless sex and violence. This though is the same friend who, when years later I'd begun to hear some fun stories about him and strapless, spangley purple ball gowns [and much more] replied simply: 'Mike, you should believe all of the rumours, they were, after all, the good old days!'
On a very different note, Alice [just five and learning to write] came to my desk with a card that she had created and written. I'm assured that although there was some [largely unsuccessful] help with the spelling, there was no input from any other members of the family with the content - and it reads 'Dear Dad and Mum [I] hope you have more children' [!] I'm not sure that there's anything more to be said! Except perhaps the answer that I've been giving since this fun journey with children began eight years ago - that I've given up predicting anything!
Swindon Advertiser Article
I hate being off sick. It hasn’t happened for years, or not until the day after Easter. But on Easter Monday my mind and body crashed.
Jesus says that he has come to bring us life in all of its fullness and abundance. But too often we translate ‘life in all of its fullness’ as ‘full life’. We work fifty, sixty, seventy hours a week.
When we’re asked how we’re doing ‘tired’ is not only the honest answer, it’s the one that everyone expects us to give. It’s almost as if, unless we’re on holiday, if we’re not tired and stressed we’re not doing our jobs properly, we’re frauds and not working hard enough. We’ve created a culture that we can’t escape from.
We work longer hours and take less holiday in the UK than in any other European Country. And most of the time, for better or worse, we just about cope. But it all has its consequences, for us, for our families and friends, for our work.
I lost count of the number of new black millionaires that I met when I was last in Cape Town. They were amazing men and women who in the twelve years since the end of Apartheid had achieved a phenomenal amount. But alongside their millions too many left a trail of broken relationships behind them.
And then, aside from the brokenness and pain there are the times when we completely crash – as I did on Easter Monday; and the hours I work were part of that. Giving up caffeine and alcohol during Lent was easy – working less and praying more was a disaster.
Jesus promises life in all its fullness, but if we’re going to live that, we need to make some choices, to turn off our computers, to say ‘no’ occasionally, to take a day off each week, and not work more than fifty hours a week [the limit above which studies of workaholism start].
And then we can take some time for relationships, we can relax, have fun, play games with the children, enjoy cooking and eating good food with our friends, even veg in front of the TV; we can listen to God.
I’m writing this at 11pm at night and still haven’t shut my laptop. My attempts to work less and pray more are still on-going!
BLOGGERS NOTE
You'll notice in this blog that I use clauses and sub clauses and square brackets and lots of other grammatical aberrations! Also that I can't spell. Jane sometimes compares my sentence structure to St Paul, going on and on and on... I'm afraid that you're going to have to live with it. I try to edit it all out when I'm writing for print, but I'm going to indulge myself here.