Come as a child.....

Watch this - hilarious and also serious:-


Goes to show how much children are natural copy-ers of what we do and say - our mannerisms and and intonation.

This small clip resounds with depth for anyone with a heart for discipling (people of any ages!)

- is our chat something we want copied by those "learning"? Is our chat engaging and even delightful to listen to?

- Even more importantly, what does our chat sounds like not just when we are "on show", but when we are in more private places; in the kitchen, in the car with our partner/kids, frustrated with a slow download (!)

- do our hands follow through with what we are saying? Are we combining talk with a life lived differently?. God's Way is not a matter of mere talk; it's an empowered life. (1 Cor 4:20 from The Message)

- do we talk with one another in a state of utter vulnerability (as represented by the babies' half-nakedness?)or do we dress it all up with fancy clothes and fancy words?

In this clip which I have watched several times today while meditating on some scriptures, I wonder if many of us are not entering a stage where what we know is being stripped back. Stripped back to the bare essentials!!

It's a time for simplicity, not for fancy stuff. Time to love, time to pray, time to aligned hearts, time to practice selfless actions, admitting mistakes, time to love beyond anything else, move on and grow, honour one another, persue passion and holiness and the kingdom above anything else. Anything else. Ambition, empire, fame or fortune.

Who are your runners? Who runs with you? Forget the strategies or politics or plans for a moment, these are the ones you can have heart to heart exchanges with, talking about dreams and visions and stuff that's exciting you. And this, I believe is key: you will not always understand everything the other is saying, you will not always be able to talk back in a way that they firmly understand, but you are united in your love for one another and for the Father. This is kingdom.

"da da da da-da-da da da-da da" to you:-)

I've probably gone far too deep with this innocent wee youtube clip, but its impacted me quite a lot today!

Album Cover Game

HT: That Hideous Man

Here's how the "Album Cover Game" works.
1 - Go to wikipedia and hit random. The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.
2 - Go to quotationspage.com and hit random. The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.
3 - Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”. Third picture no matter what ...will be your album cover.
4 - Use photoshop or similar (picnik.com is a free online photo editor) to put it all together.

Note: picnik is great! I found it so easy to use!!

Unhappy Hipsters

Am loving this photograph.

The theme of the blog Unhappy Hipsters is "it's lonely in the modern world".
I'm not doing any theological reflection - just giggling!

I think Bad Vestments still ranks first for sheer hilarity courtesy of the caption writer(s)but this is coming a close second.

HT to Lincoln for this.

How would you World Cup your church?

HT to David for this.
It's great! The comments are as funny as the post.

I think he has a prophetic gift - I saw two of our church's under 12s walking up the road on Saturday with vuvuzelas under their arms!

Bit of Fun

I have put together two all age service on Sunday, the topic of which I cannot reveal here. In one of them a 1981 Graham Kendrick song will be used. Can you guess which one?

At the last count I had 38 social networking comments suggesting which one and at least two disturbed worship leaders aghast at the depth and breadth of Kendrick comments!

Suggestions/answers in the comments section, please :-)
What song could this children and families pastor be using for all age services THIS week?

Experience!

Many, many thanks to Matt Glover for giving me permission to use this cartoon to close the recent series of posts (rants!) on the need for children to experience the things of God rather than just be told them.

I'm trying to make sure my own children and those under my pastoral care have these experiences (which in itself is easy to do, children love to experience the presence of God; they generally find it easy) but the challenge for me post-theology degree is to set these experiences in solid biblical foundations, using my understanding of doctrine and allowing kids to apply truth to a wide variety of contexts. We adults sometimes have narrow and subjective opinions on children's experiences.

I have been facing some situations recently that highlight again and again that there are scores of adults around (attending churches near you and me!) who can hardly believe that God would ever communicate with them personally, much less do anything kind for them.

I have appended a quote from Ivy Beckwith below and then I will be quiet!

“Generation Y is experience-oriented. These kids find meaning and value in immediacy and in living in the moment. Their mantra for life and learning is “I want to try it”. Only then will they decide if they like the experience or not. They’ve grown up with theme parks stimulating every imaginable experience and event and with virtual reality computer games that transport them into fantasies and scenarios they could never access in real life.

They want to use all their senses as they learn, and they want their learning environments to provide experiences, not just facts and formulas. They want to DO in order to learn. And when it comes to experiencing a spiritual life – and they are spiritual people – they want to experience God, not just learn about God. They don’t just want to be entertained".

Ivy Beckwith (2004)
Postmodern Children’s Ministry

Two Must Reads/Watch

OK so I am suposed to be doing something else - like finish writing Parent History Maker Sheets for the children's discipleship group tomorrow - but I have just found two things I simply *must* recommend you read or watch.

1, George Barna's blog. With no disrespect to some megachurch websites (far, far west of here), where I read the senior pastor's blog and positional statements on why only women must wash dishes, this is the one BLOG you have got to read.

We need to get into worldview thinking and watch the signs too. Prophetically significant, not a slave to culture but an interpreter thereof; an adviser, not a soothsayer - that's my roundup of George Barna and the Barna Organisation.

2. I wish I had an iPhone. But I can't. So to make me feel better I laughed and laughed at this.

Pictures of the Day - Thursday

Today - long walk in Glenmore Forest and later in the day, a visit to see Mercedes the Polar Bear at the Highland Wildlife Park.

I would have posted some of the photos from the latter but the children had control of the camera at that point and invariably photographed snow monkey's bottoms and red panda poo.


How jaunty would YOUR smile be in the crowded Mountain Cafe while your small son shouts loudly, whilst holding the camera: "Can I take a picture of you mummy quick because I need to do a fart!"

Amazing Grace

That last post was far too long!

A short one now.

I posted a song by this wee girl ages ago.

Here is her latest song - she was still 2 years old when she sang this

Ooooops

I have had a testing two days. Anyone slightly close to me knows I have an *interesting* relationship with keys. I've already lost a set of keys for this new house we have been in since.....June.

I'm not going to go into it all suffice to say I have been locked out totally and utterly and had to take refuge in the manse (Tuesday) then ran out of petrol 50 miles away with no purse and phone out of charge (Wednesday) but in both of these cases my heavenly Father has intervened pretty hugely saving me from huge cost (thank you kind, kind locksmith) and using his people (the whole staff team for morale boosting, eddie, gary and joanne) because he loves me so. I'm rather dizzy at times.

Our family support group (a requirement for those on staff in this church) met also and brought such kind words from Father God to me; never a truer word was spoken by one of the group though, about there being a tug on my heart. She is someone I hardly have to say a thing to for her to know my mind. She is older than me and more senior in ministry terms. She is from another church, another city, another whole kind of ministry role but I so admire her prophetic ability that I learn from it every time. She is one person with whom I rarely have to speak and she knows what is on my mind.

I have a whole lot going on in my head and heart just now but this I know for sure; I want to be so close to Father God that lots of moments within this family are filled with worshipping and praying and talking and thinking. I don't think I am coping that well with some things coming my way, and I have been told as such too, which is hard to move on from. Oh to be instantly refined - but that was never promised us!

But my love (for the children here, for mums and dads desperately seeking more in every sense of the word, the Christians and the not-yet Christians) is growing stronger rather than waning. But the tug is for more...of more than I can or should write here. Pray as we work this out.

Perhaps you could post in the comments the answer to this question: what tugs at your heart?

And now for something completely different

After my squint at the past year - time for something completely different - based loosely on some resources at ColdWater Cafe Humour section.....

You Know You've Run a Holiday Club When.......

You're seeing breadsticks and raisins in your sleep
You calculate just how many paper cups for Sunday morning supplies you can take without anyone noticing
Your own kids think you get abducted by aliens every August.
Summer doesn’t start for you until Monday 10 August when the club is over
You blew your holiday club budget and the Exec Pastor chose you for some "additional support and counselling"
You tasted PVA glue accidentally.
You tasted PVA glue on purpose - just to see if its toxic, of course.
The office staff and/or caretaker schedule holidays around August
You can build pretty much anything with some midget gems and cocktail sticks.
Everyone starts stalking your volunteers.
You have glitter in your teeth.
People in your church appear to feel sorry for you.
The worship deacon still glares at you for accidentally leaning a holiday club prop on the drum shields (I wouldn't DARE btw!!)
You and your family are willing to lay down your lives to see some kids and their whole families touched by the Lord.

More seriously, when balancing all the demands on time/staff attention/space/money etc in a busy church, I came across this quote on the website which I think is pretty accurate and perhaps helpful in terms of a vision for children's ministry:

Get aggressive to bless kids and people will come to you. McDonald's learned that years ago.

Dedicated to my friends....

HT to Anne for this.....

My favourite lines:
"even though it isn't Christmas he lets youngsters in the church....."

and "now the organ's got the scrap, every vicar's got the clap"

Keys

I have lost my keys again.........

It's actually putting me off going into the office, mainly because
(a) I can't get in (!)
(b) I'll be teased
(c) the office manager will be really annoyed

(at least the keys don't say "hi, we're keys to confidential storage" on them. They look like anonymous house keys)

Prayer appreciated, they always come back when I pray, but I'm turning round in circles with boxes to pack and things to take to charity shops.

I need a thick lanyard that doesn't dig into the neck so I wear it all the time, like the staff and volunteers of a large beautifully refurbished church with great facilities and storage for children and family work near us (not that I'm envious!) and/or a whistling keyring so I can find the keys........

Moving House

Moving house on Saturday. And my little boy is off school sick while I try to work on an independent study paper. Am worried that I may be suffering from slight stress.

~ Found a sock in the lawnmower............

~ Got inexplicably emotional about my daughter's coming home from hospital outfit as I unpacked boxes of baby clothes to give away..........

~ Shouted at a goldfish...............

~ put a pen in a knife drawer and a knife in my pencil case.........

I am hoping for fun times with some friends after this weekend.

Feel in need of night out that's not for a church meeting!
What's your top stress-busting tip?

Grumpy Old Men

I had coffee with two grumpy old men today, respected theologians and thinkers the two of them, kidding on they are all prickly and hard-edged when really, they are kind, caring individuals with hearty chuckles and a great sense of humour (I used to work with one of them. He had to have a sense of humour!)
This is for them:-

Nothing really to do with children.........

........but I saw this clip today and I thought it was really funny!

Humour, Seminars and All Age Services

I'm off to our annual denominational conference tomorrow. I would be relaxed about it as I will get to catch up with lots of friends who will be there but I will be slightly nervous on Day one as I am leading a seminar on discipling children and families new to faith.

Hmmm.

I've been trying to guess - how many people will be there? - do I have enough packs of information made up? - will I hit the mark in terms of what information people are looking for? - am I going to be explaining something that makes me look like I'm wired to the moon ("space cadet")? or will I be teaching something that is far too basic? Dear reader, I just don't know. I'll update you.

I've got a big day on Sunday as well. I've organised an all age service in my new place and I am teaching on the parable of the wedding feast as well. Ah. Senior Pastor is away somewhere. So if I make a horrible mistake with something.....?? (I might get away with it? 'cept its recorded)

I'm tempted to play the Hidden Word game sometime. If you don't know what that is then I can't tell you - watch the film Leap of Faith and listen out for "aluminum sidings". But I had the utmost respect for a friend who responded to this challenge almost exactly one year ago and totally pulled it off.

Does God have a sense of humour? This was the subject of devotions at college this week. Watch this and see what you think.........but laughter is infectious - and made by God to be so!

For smile purposes.....

Holiday club is going really, really well. The team are absolutely AMAZING.
Wanted to post this as it made me laugh so much tonight.

I've been tagged!

Thanks to Anne for this great meme. I've only been tagged once before so I hope I've done it right!

My ex... boyfriend was a fisherman from Orkney. This is quite some time ago (she adds hastily) and he had loads of money and bought me the most expensive bible I have ever owned - a leather bound Thomson Chain Reference Bible, giant size - and then flew me to Shetland for my birthday (how romantic. Seagulls and freezing fog) Oooops, how come everyone else has written about their bosses? As a true-to-form Heat reader, the phrase "my ex" can only refer to romantic attachments from the past....

Maybe I should... start packing for my holiday instead of blogging here!?!?

I love... my Father God, my family, my friends, my job! I love this country too. Is it OK to say that and not sound nationalistic? I mean, I love what is ahead for us here, I sense God is stirring the church in Scotland up for the good and I think there could be a dropping of denominational barriers ahead as we get on with the job of bringing the kingdom in.....

People would say ....like Anne, I find this hard to speculate on as I am leaving my current situation and city and people are saying lots of nice things to me and generally make me go all weepy. I am pretty certain some would say I can be cheeky and a bit irreverent (only a few months ago our office administrator and myself took it in turns to fire elastic bands from the office photocopier the length of the office to try and "score a goal" through the narrow window vent. Then we had a phase of using only Jack Bauer 24 speak in the office - she'd "patch people through to me" and "reposition the satellites to trace the Senior Pastor's whereabouts" etc, to much hilarity which got us frowned at a little.)

I don't understand... How working families tax credit is calculated. Roadworks planned to start on Mondays. Why it rains after you put your washing out despite the sky being sunny. Men (sometimes).

When I wake up in the morning... I immediately snuggle down again and try to ignore the noise from my children.

I lost... respect for the current government when the Home Office locked away a family of ours with four children under 10 for 31 days in August 2006 in an English detention centre for doing nothing wrong other than being asylum seekers from Rwanda....

Life is full of... purpose. Not a single thing I have ever done, been or experienced is wasted.

My past is...something I look back on with gratitude.

I get annoyed when... people drive at 25 mph. Hog the middle lane. Put their fog light on at dusk AND IT'S NOT FOGGY. Turn right with no advance indication. (do you spot a theme here? Driver. Lynn. Intolerant. (<--- rearrange to form a phrase)

Parties are... a chance to chat and laugh and dance (depending on the party); a definite occasion for a babysitter. Unless its your child's 8th birthday party of course. In which case you'd be a bad parent.

I wish... that NEVER again would any child be harmed. For that transformation to be amongst the first in the new heaven and earth

Dogs... are smelly.

Cats... are less smelly. Unless you're beside their litter tray. Then they're smelly too.

Tomorrow... I'm going to have a lie in. Then be a "chatting person" at a local community festival where our church is getting involved in providing children's activities and free food and chat.

I have a low tolerance for... miscommunication in any shape or form. I am pretty sure it accounts for about 95% of all fall-outs in this world. Take emails for example - I try to send even just a short acknowledgement "thanks for this" etc - prevents miscommunication/misunderstanding/disharmony! Sometimes emails don't get through whereas paper put in the boss's tray always does get there, if you put it there. If I haven't returned a phone call, I'm bothered by it until I do it! (I'm probably like this because I work with so many volunteers and people need to feel I'll listen and respond to them)

If I had a million dollars... I'd bless my mum and dad with all they needed for retirement, invest the rest, tithe to my local church, with gifts and offerings above that to children's projects e.g. Tear Fund's work to provide refuges and skills training for child prostitutes in Thailand. Or Iris Ministry's babyhouse in Maputo.

I'm totally terrified of... nothing really. There are things I don't like, like spiders, and I don't relish the thought of having a major illness or operation, but I'm not walking in fear of any of these things. On the spider front, that's what a perfectly good shoe is for.

Now I tag: Amie, Lorraine, Lucy, Brodie and Stuart.

Competition Time - Tuesday

This is not a staged photo - this is my dining room today (Tuesday)
Similar to the last competition, which GadgetVicar won, there will be prize.
(check out what he did here) I will make a donation to one of three charities:-

* Positive Action in Housing's Destitution Fund
or
* The Bethany Trust
or
* Tearfund - to go directly to women in Darfur - see Lucy's blog

The winner can choose which charity they would like the donation to go to.
The competition question is this:
In the photograph above, how many books are on the table?

BONUS - an extra £5 will be added to the donation if the first person with the correct number of books has additionally added the title and author of FIVE of the books with their answer.

TOP TIP (I'm far too kind) Double click on the picture to see my mess on an even larger scale. Is that tea or coffee I'm drinking do you think?

All reponses to the comments section. Please don't be shy! Give it a go, those who lurk, come and say hello!