Owner: Scream Without Raising Your Voice URL:http://swryv.wrdpress.com Join Date: Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:13:29 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: Thoughts on God, life, church and other stuff Site statistics:Click here
the west wing - best tv show ever 2007-07-07 16:22:39 I haven’t written much about The West Wing. I guess I started blogging after it ended but Matt posted this clip and another and it reminded me just how amazing the show was. This is how season 2 ends…
Just amazing.
general assembly 2007-07-07 12:32:48 Well, here I am at the general assembly of the United Reformed Church. The opening session was long and formal with guests from other denominations, a too long sermon and I have to say nothing much else to engage with. The highlight so far was the warm welcome given to the representative of the Muslim faith who brought greetings and good wishes. Oh, and the conference folders are great!!! They have a ring binder and a bit for loose paper!
Next session at 7 when we talk about some very dull stuff like pensions. Joy.
‘wow!’ - just ‘wow!’ 2007-07-11 07:11:50 Trace Bundy plays Pachelbele’s Canon… on an acoustic guitar!
Read more:lsquo
URC General Assembly days 3 & 4 2007-07-11 05:46:42 Day 3 was a bit of an odd one for me. I spent most of the morning in bed after being unwell for most of the night (no alcohol involved!). In the afternoon I laid out a labyrinth for the FURY Oasis (activities and chill out for youth delegates).
The labyrinth went really well and those who walked it left some amazing comments and lots of them were clearly deeply affected by their journey. It was great to get to spend some time getting to know more of the Fury folk.
Day 4 was another odd day. Most of my morning was taken up with clearning up and getting boxes to Sue to bring home for me. I missed most of the Bible Study which I was annoyed about as the guy was showing lots of pictures children of all ages had made depicting their understanding of Psalm 139. Powerful stuff.
I sat in on the Racial Justice and Multicultural Ministry discussion around compelling every synod to send at least one delegate from the black or ethnic minority community. The resolution was eventuall Read more:General
, Assembly
sounding odd 2007-07-15 12:02:56 This morning went well at Lanark I think. I eventually got something to say (thanks for all your suggestions and support!) and was working with all the powerpoint, video and sound. I have to say it is such a big space that when you stand behind the speakers it sounds very odd! I hope the rest of the monitors arrive soon to give some more fill! As a result I’m not sure how I sounded which is kind of strange when you’re preaching.
People were really welcoming and I had met some before when I was guest preacher at the joint Holy Week services when I preached about Mary of Bethany and Judas (it’s in my BOX if you want to read it).
I’m at my dad’s churches next week… and the texts are about Mary and Martha! Looking forward to that!
Read more:sounding
You would think it should be easy 2007-07-13 08:55:56 I’m leading worship on Sunday. Nothing new in that. I’m at Lanark Greyfriars. That is new. I’ve never been there before.
I’m struggling a bit. The text for Sunday is the Parable of the Good Samaritan, perhaps the best known of all the parables. And there in lies the problem. What can you say about the most famous story in the world?
I’m sure I’ll think
of something… maybe!
I’ve noticed a bit of a pattern with preaching. I definitely find the more well known texts harder to preach on. I wonder why that is?
theology for beginners 2007-07-18 06:56:48 The Faith and Theology blog has been around for a while but I thought it would be good to highlight a section that Benjamin Myers has included called: theology
for beginners. It’s a collection of articles and essays that address a whole load of theological issues under the headings of faith, gospel, god, creation, salvation, community and end. Well worth a look.
Harry Potter - the ending! 2007-07-20 08:05:02
Midnight sees the release of the final HarryPotter
book, ‘The Deathly Hallows’. I’ve read all of the books and enjoyed most of them although I though a couple were a bit long and acted as filler to pad out the story to make it 7 books. That said, I’m looking forward to the postman delivering my copy of the new book tomorrow morning! I wonder if Harry will survive?
Sing Your Own Song 2007-07-19 06:08:35 I was surfing around and came across a blog called morphine life. The blog’s authour is a musician called Trent Yaconelli. I met his father, Mike, a couple of times and Mike is one of the people who has inspired my journey of faith. This post on Trent’s blog is up there with anything his father wrote. Thanks Trent for your wisdom.
‘Writing the song for the song’s sake
The lights shined bright on my face as we hit the first note of our set. On the bigger stages it is hard to see because the lights are coming right at you. Often you don’t know how many people are out there until you hear them applaud or worse you hear the lone cough after ending a song. I knew he was out there. My father had come to see me play. I kept thinking in my head that he was out there….watching…judging…wondering where he went wrong. The band lurched forward into rock song after rock song trying to get the energy of the room up. I was pushing all of my energy o
ASBO Jesus 2007-07-19 05:39:33
Jon Birch has some brilliant cartoons over at ASBO Jesus
(for those of you not living in Britain an ASBO is an Anti-Social Behaviour Order).
This one made me laugh out loud… Not sure why…
Holidays 2007-07-25 13:04:49 I’m on holiday for a week so not blogging much, just in case you are missing my ramblings. I did finish Harry Potter today. I liked it lots!!!
Read more:Holidays
That’s my boy! 2007-07-28 11:34:01
Ben finally made it to see the world’s greatest football team for the first time today. If only that were true. We went to see Motherwell FC at Fir Park in a pre-season friendly against Nottingham Forest. It was a reasonable game but with few scoring chances, ending 0-0. Ben seemed to enjoy it although I’m sure his lack of football knowledge and experience helped! Comedy was provided by Neil Lennon, former Celtic captain who got loudly booed every time he touched the ball. For what it’s worth I thought Motherwell were the better team and they have played well over the pre-season. Here’s to winning the league!!! LOL. Oh, and Ben didn’t like the pies!!!
NEXUS - formerly Christian Resources Exhibition 2007-08-02 06:43:00
In just a couple of weeks time the very first NEXUS Scotland event will take place at the Scottish Exhibition
& Conference Centre in Glasgow. The event runs for 3 days from 23-25 August and will be the biggest resources event for Churches ever held in Scotland. Professional resource agencies will exhibit alongside local churches, all showing how you can be better at being church in your place.
On Saturday afternoon there is a CHILDREN’S PRAISE PARTY in the Clyde Auditorium and in the eveing 3,000 people will meet there for worship.
All ticketing for NEXUS Scotland 2007 will be handled by the SECC Box Office.
Box Office Hotline: 0870 040 4000
SECC BOX OFFICE
Ticketing Options
£5 3-day Exhibition Ticket
(Thursday 23 - Saturday 25 August, SECC, doors open 10 a.m.)
£4 Fandabidozzie Children’s Event
(Saturday 25 August, Clyde Auditorium, doors open 1 p.m.)
£4 Evening Worship Event
(Saturday 25 August, Clyde Auditorium, doors open 6:30 p.m.)
Group Bookings
We r Read more:Christian
, Resources
I’m Back! 2007-08-13 05:53:37 Sorry for the break. Well, no actually I’m not. I’ve been on holiday in Tenerife in the sun.
Now I’m back and it’s raining. Anyway, I’m back home, back at work and back to blogging.
I guess this is the start of the new session for me. Most churches start back their normal routine around this time and I’m looking forward to doing some training, some developing and some encouraging over the coming months.
The most immediate big thing is Nexus which is almost upon us but this year sees the introduction of a new Youth and Children’s Work Committee and Synod so that promises to be interesting! I’m running a web 2.0 training day in November, some youth work training over October, November and December, got team meetings, a review, Synod… I think I need another holiday!!!
Anyway, it’s good to be back, even though my sunburn is very itchy today!
new worship project 2007-08-15 08:41:47 I’m off to spend some time with the churches of Murrayfield Churches Together tonight to talk with them about a new worship
project they’re thinking about. Not sure where it will go but it’s exciting to have a blank piece of paper and some enthusiastic people to work with on something like this. I’ll let you know where we end up…
Big Boy 2007-08-20 08:20:43
Jack started school today! I can’t believe he’s off to primary school. People always say your kids grow up fast and they are right! He seems to have a had great fun although when I asked him what they did he said that they cut their hands off, coloured in and stuck them back on again!
Ben’s in Primary 4 now! I wonder what he’s been up to today?
Read more:Big Boy
animoto 2007-08-17 11:13:03 Tired of boring slideshows? Don’t have the time or the software to make you snaps look interesting…
ANIMOTO is for you!
It’s a genius online application that allows you to import your photos and creates very cool shows with music. Click the My Videos link on the right and see what happens when you import a random selection of holiday snaps! (HT Ewan)
Together 2007-08-17 06:09:30 It seems likely (unless someone comes up with another name) that our alt worship project at Murrayfield Churches Together in Edinburgh will be known as ‘Together’, drawing on the joint nature of the project but also the commitment to forming a worshiping community drawn from each of the churches involved and people in the community around them.
The first Together will take place on Sunday 28th October at Saughtonhall United Reformed Church with a cafe from 5.30pm and our worship from 6pm until around 7pm.
We’re working on a theme but ’seeds’ came up in our last discussion and I like that as a theme for a first event.
Nexus is HERE!!! 2007-08-23 08:02:19 Nexus opened today at the Scottish Exhibition & Conference Centre and it’s going really well. Lots of people here browsing, listening, watching and buying. Come on down and join us 10-5 today and tomorrow, 10-6 on Saturday for the exhibition.
We have a massive children’s event in the Clyde Auditorium at 1.30 on Saturday and worship for 3,000 at 7pm on Saturday evening!
Read more:Nexus
Nexus Build - Day 2 2007-08-22 07:30:42
Today sees the exhibitors arriving to build their stands for Nexus
, which starts tomorrow. It’s looking good with a great mix of professional resource companies and local churches showcasing their congregations.
Read more:Build
Nexus Taking Shape 2007-08-21 08:20:05
Things are really taking shape now.
The feature areas are being built and will look amazing!
The office is up and running and open for business!
Read more:Nexus
, Taking
, Shape
Nexus Scotland 2007 2007-08-21 05:53:10 The build up for Nexus
2007 has started. I’ve been at the SECC in Glasgow watching lots of people working very hard! I’ve taken some photos and uploaded them to Flickr so you can follow our progress if you so desire.
Read more:Scotland
Christian Resources 2007-08-27 18:13:47 Q: How do you know a fish is a Christian
?
A: It has a car stuck to it!
I’ve spent all week in a very large room full of people trying to sell things to Christians or offer themselves and/or their organisation to support Christians. I started this post with the fish joke because one of the exhibitors was a car leasing company. I have no idea what makes them more Christian than other car leasing companies, I didn’t ask.
There seems to be a huge industry around the church. People selling stained glass, tables, chairs, Christian books, Christian CDs (don’t get me started on that little nieche market!), robes, pulpits, pupets, photocopiers, youth organisations, envelopes for your offerings… It goes on and on.
It’s good to be resourced. It’s good to read books and be challenged and to learn. It’s good to speak to people, share your thoughts and your ideas. It’s good to find out what other people are doing.
I wonder what Jesus wo Read more:Resources
It’s over!!! 2007-08-26 05:21:08 Last night, just before midnight, I flopped into bed having survived NEXUS. It’s been a long week and very tiring. It’s been great to watch an event go through a cycle from empty hall through build up and then back to an empty hall again. I’ve met some great people and had some fun. I’ve walked miles and stood up for much longer than is good for you.
As for NEXUS, I’m not sure what my impressions are. There are some parts that seemed to work well but others that didn’t.
I had a thought last night that perhaps most of the the event had been about resourcing the church to stay as it is, not to move forward, and I hope I’m wrong in that. I know that some people who came found the exhibition interesting and enthusing. What I can say, without doubt, is that the coffee was great and the friendships enduring. Maybe that’s what church should be all about.
You can download some of the seminars from the NEXUS website.
It’s my bag! 2007-08-29 15:36:01 I’ve come to a point in my life where I just can’t fit anything else on my desk. (See this post for my present system) Action is required! I’ve spent some of the day clearing up, some of it writing for Sunday and the rest looking at Life Hacker’s feature ‘Show us you bags’. I was looking for some tips on getting organised but this was much more entertaining! It’s interesting to see just what people end up carrying about. Some obviously think the world will end while they are on the bus to work so their bags are full of waterproof matches, fishing line and breath mints. Others have a more expected approach to their assault on urban life with PDAs, laptops and the now obligitary moleskine notebook.
So, what’s in my bag? Well I have 2 bags that I use regularly. One is a Gap rucksack that has loads of pockets and compartments, great for a conference or meetings. It cost £10 in a sale. This is my laptop bag, a Jansport
John Orr blog!!! 2007-08-28 12:02:55 For ages I’ve been trying to get John Orr to blog. I’ve known John for years and he has been on a very interesting journey from giving up gainful employment to become a student of Divinity and potential minister. That’s interesting enough in itself but I would love to hear more about John’s theological journey. Along the road John has thought deeply about who he is, who God is and how the two of them relate. I want to hear about it…
and now I can!!! And and so can you!!! at http://johnorr.me.uk/
I look forward to reading your thoughts and questions John!
Being organised 2007-09-23 14:02:03 I’m still being pretty organised. For those of you who missed the ‘clearing out and starting over’ kind of posts a few weeks ago, I’m having a go at being tidy and organised.
So far it’s not too bad, although I have a small pile of things that need either sticking back in my bag or in a file but that’s a job for work time.
The one thing I have added to my arsenal of tools is ‘Micro$oft OneNote’. I’m liking it for some of my projects as it lets me collate different types of files and info on one page. Handy for planning classes, training and stuff like that but also for bringing together large amounts of web stuff and PDFs gathered while researching. Worth a look if you haven’t seen it and you can download it as a free trial.
I still haven’t quite got to grips with my paper notebook. I’m a little scared to write in it I think! I’ve divided it into sections and put tabs in and it looks great but I&r
Blogging Birthday 2007-09-21 11:14:24 Happy blogday to me…
one whole year ago I started blogging. It’s been an up and down year blogwise but I have tried to blog at least every couple of days. It gets hard to think of stuff to post about sometimes!
Thanks to everyone who has read and continues to read my thoughts and ramblings. I have met some great people through my blog and I really do value everyone’s thoughts and comments.
Read more:Blogging
, Birthday
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