Clearing the decks

Well, I've had a great to getting to grips with Revelation 18 in the context of 15-19. It's not what I'm meant to be writing this week but the decks are now cleared to write world of the first Christians stuff tomorrow - yippee!!

It'll be interesting to see what people make of tonight's helping of the Apocalypse. We're focusing on John's critique of the economic power of Rome in chapter 18. And it's very relevant to the times we live in. Not for the usual escapist reasons but because John asks searching questions of where the loyalties of those who claim to follow the Lamb really lie.

I have really enjoyed getting this occasional series on the Apocalypse. I am going to see whether there's a book in the debris once it's all been delivered. I'm not sure I have anything original to say but I think a mid-level overview that brings the insights of Bauckham, Koester, Da Silva et al to the ordinary Christians who've suffered from a diet of Lindsay, LaHaye and the like for too long might find a market.

I've also discovered that I bought ten CDs this year that came out this year! So i shall be compiling my festive top ten over the next couple of weeks (I know you can hardly contain your excitement!)

Busy days

It's been really busy over the past week or so. January always does this to me - all those things I put off in the run up to Christmas catch up with me!

We've started our new series in church on Why Follow Jesus? and later I'll blog on our first session which went down really well with people - so I thought it was worth sharing with a wider audience.

We had a second messy church yesterday which was a riot (I think they are supposed to be!). Lots of families, good breakfast and chat, singing songs and doing craft. It looks as though it's caught quite a few people's imaginations and I hope it'll become a fixture in our programme. We have a particularly committed and gifted couple heading it up.

We also had a very well attended church family meeting talking about, among other things, charity registration (Oh joy! Oh rapture!). Everyone responded very well to the prospect of adopting a new governing document this year; hopefully it will be as straight-forwards as these things can ever be.

I've been listening to Dear Science by TV On The Radio and Merriweather Post Pavilion by Animal Collective. Both excellent. I've somehow managed to miss these bands - they've been around a while - though I gather this new work from Animal Collective is their best to date. Check 'em out.

The journey goes on

It's been all go since returning from Prague, so I haven't had a chance to sort pictures or reflect on the experience.

I've been reading a manuscript for a publisher which is good and sorting things out for going to France tomorrow.

I also had a chance to catch up with a few friends - always excellent.

So, I'll not be blogging for a couple of weeks. lots of updates when I return.

Off to the seaside

Off to Spring Harvest in the morning for five days on the pastoral team.

The weather forecast for Skegness is sunny and warm - a first for us up there! So we're looking forward to a good week with a great team.

back blogging next week....

Catching up

I'm becoming a once a week blogger - bad boy!

Listening to Arcade Fire's new album, Neon Bible. Can't decide whether I like it as much as Funeral, but it's got some storming tracks on it.

I've also been thinking about our church conference in April when our discussions about membership and belonging will reach some sort of conclusion. At the moment I can't really get my head round how this is going to work but I'm sure inspiration will strike.

I've been reading Bruce Longenecker's The Lost Letters of Pergamum which is surprisingly convincing and very informative and some stuff on the social position of early Christians, particularly poverty levels in Pauline communities. An article by Steve Friesen in JSNT is worth checking out if you're interested in these things - though I think he's a little too prone to reduce everything to economics and dismiss discussions of social status. He'd align himself more with Justin Meggitt than Wayne Meeks, I suspect. It's a fascinating area of NT study.

This Sunday we'll be looking at the Jerusalem Conference as told to us by Luke in Acts 15. I'll be suggesting to our people that we need to face the changing circumstances of our ministry and mission with the same boldness as everyone in Luke's story did. In particular, just as it was the Jewish Christians, the in-group, who had to change to accommodate the late-coming Gentiles, so too we have to change to welcome those outside the church into our communities. Often we expect new Christians to take on our culture - derived more from the 1950s than the bible - along with our version of the gospel.

I've also been putting together the Spring edition of Talk, the Mainstream magazine. This one is devoted to missional church - what is it? And it features an interview with Jonathan Edwards, an excellent piece of Baptist church planting by Stuart Murray Williams and great reflections on Christian youth work by Clare Hooper. A rich and heady mix!

Actually, I quite enjoy editing it - but the week when I put it together (three a year) get to be a bit fraught and hectic.

I'm also loving the new Kaiser Chief's album.

So, it's been a good, though somewhat busy week