The Beginning

Reading this put me in awe of God just a little bit more. Of course, how can scientists be certain of this? But even if it's kinda right, WOW! I especially like the dismissive comment,

Even so, the timeline of events now emerging is every bit as astounding as the creation myths of the world's religions.

And, as to an infinite universe...it had to come from somewhere! Big bounce, now that's a creation myth if I ever heard one.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/26/universe.physics

Demo Week Finished

We did it! The old is gone, the new is come. Under the direction of Tim Bailey, we now have a new, smaller platform in the church building. The old dirty curtains have been removed as well which opens up the room considerably. It was a very tiring week, and I didn't even do as much as some people. We're all hurting. What's great is that this new stage is constructed only out of the material from the old stage, which means we spent very little money on this. It looks like it has been there for years! The acoustics have been changed, which makes our singing audible now, but speaking is a little muddied.

You'll have to watch the time-lapse video for the whole week. (Click to watch)
(14/5/08 - having problems with my video hosting site, so it won't work. Will fix shortly. This is the YouTube version. It messes it up, grr. Still trying to figure out a better way to show it.)

demo week

Today we started 'Demo Week' where we 'demolish' the church stage area. It's really more like dismantling because we will reuse much of what we take down. We got all of the stage and substructure removed today, much quicker than we thought. The next challenge is rebuilding a smaller stage and removing the big curtains. There were no injuries and no setbacks, thanks to God.

Brick Testament

This is such old news, I'm surprised it took me this long to hear about it. Thanks to Megan for forwarding it. An atheist reads the Bible and makes Lego scenes depicting the text. Some of his interpretations are dodgy, but very funny nonetheless. Check out the teachings of Jesus.

http://www.thebricktestament.com/index.html

Feast and Open Mic

These absolutely dreadful photos are trying to depict the wonderful feast and music we had last night. There were maybe 140 people there, and we still had leftover food. The musicians were top rate, especially the children who sang. The purpose was to provide a fun place to invite friends to, just to be around a bunch of Jesus-lovers having a good time. A definite success.

London

What do 13 members of CRM's newly born International Church Multiplication division do when they want to have a conference? They mainly get to know each other and visit other people who are doing similar types of mission. And eat Krispy Kreme doughnuts. In London. For 3 days we visited some of London's hidden gems, those people and works of God which opened our eyes to new ways of doing mission and encouragement for what God's already doing through us.



First stop was Grace Church Hackney, which was introduced to me by some friends who used to be a part of it when they lived there. A few years old, this Anglican church was formed from a partnership wtih Redeemer Presbyterian in New York. This church demonstrates the striking contrasts that are sometimes involved with contextualization - the adapting of the church to it's surrounding culture. Their neighbourhood demographic is starving artist to financial manager; left wing and spohisiticated; mostly unchurched, but open to some form of spirituality. So how does a church which rents a ragged, 250-year old historic church building, sings hymns, has a leader who identifies himself as 'vicar', and reads ancient liturgies appeal to this demographic? Well, that's exactly how it appeals. People looking for a spiritual foundation, in this context, want something that's been around for a while. Grace Church isn't stuck in the past though. The church also has a wide variety of music during the service, such as jazz, experimental, and classical. But, unusual for Britain, Grace Church actually believes the Bible and preaches Jesus. They get involved in existing social action projects in the area. They love the city. They listen.

Other planned encounters our team had were with Texan Shannon Hopkins, who networks quickly and initiates 'social enterprise' such as building awareness of human trafficking. "The Truth isn't Sexy" is a campaign that advertised on coasters given to pubs and even led to her meeting with some members of Parliament. We met with a musician who has unique contacts throughout the worldwide music industry. He's made friends with lots of folks and raises questions among them about how he lives and follows Jesus. There was also a couple who bought a council flat and moved in. You just don't do that. Council flats are free housing for people on welfare. Finally, we met with the head mission guy in the Methodist church of Britain. He had some great stories of how the church is beginning to wake up and start new churches again.

Overall, I came away with the encouragement that some ideas I've had about Re:Hope's getting involved with things that are already happening in the community. We can also do a better job of using the talents of the people who are already part of Re:Hope. What are they good at? How can they use that for mission? Personally, I was reminded that I really need to be more intentional in how I meet people outside of the church. It was also great to be able to hangout with 'real' (i.e. frontier) missionaries from some countries in SE Asia. These guys speak from experience and had some amazing stories of God at work.

Kiva

Kiva is a site that lets you make individual loans to entrepreneurs around the developing world. I think it's exciting to be able to help people in the poorest countries by lending $25 to $1000 which to them is a significant amount. There is risk involved, but it appears that most of the microfinance institutions, through which you are lending, have a good repayment rate. Nevertheless, Jesus said to lend without expecting any back. I just lent to a motorcycle taxi couple in Bolivia, a farmer in Cambodia, and a fruit seller in Ghana. It will be interesting to see how they do over the next 6 - 18 month repayment period.

Baptism Wow

Today, Amy was to be baptised. The service was going along great, Brian's message was on having a healthy fear of God and obeying, and the time neared for everyone to move over to the kiddie pool font. Sunlight was streaming through the windows and the steam rising from the water was evidence of God's provision earlier this year. Amy gave a brief testimony about how when, during a baptism last autumn, Brian asked if there were any others who wanted to be baptised. She said that she almost hopped into the pool right then and there. Today, she got to give a public profession that she's into following Jesus whatever the cost.

After emerging from the water and praying, Brian didn't let the opportunity pass by and asked if there were anyone else that wanted to be baptised. Immediately, almost every child raised his hand! "Okay, anyone over the height of Duncan want to be baptised?" was Brian's chuckling response (I trust that the parents of these children are quite aware of the children's readiness). Then after a few seconds another hand went up. It was Allison's! She had been indicating readiness for something like this for a few months, but hasn't been around enough for us to pursue this question. No matter, she was ready, NOW.

Someone offered a shirt to be worn in place of her jumper, a new towel was quickly retrieved, then she took off her shoes, and got in wearing her normal trousers. In amazement of God's movement, we looked on as Allison indicated she was ready to make this decision, that she was convicted by the message, and felt she needed to do it today. She was baptised.

This was definitely one of the best moments in Re:Hope history. We were all pretty excited. The decision was made to leave the pool filled for the evening service in order to offer the opportunity to those guys. No one took it, but Brian was ready, standing up front with his jeans rolled up.

News from the Island

Stupid

In other news, 75% of Brits think sex between unmarried people is 'perfectly acceptable.' The associated article and poll results are in the Economist. (Scroll down half-way and click on the 'enlarge image' to see all the results.)

The Revealing

I met yesterday with someone who attended the Laurel Bank School, which met in the church building we now hold our services. She gave me some of the history that she knew as well as a couple of photos of the building interior circa early 1950s. It's interesting to see what is behind the curtains and wooden stage which have been in place since the 50s. This is what people in 1894 thought would last generations. Instead it lasted 55 years. We hope to remove some of the stage so that more of the original layout will be visible. We don't have to worry about the war memorial (in front next to the sword-shaped cross), organ, or pulpit - they're gone. But the basic space is still there.