Not the celebrity Speaker or worship leader

I dream of a spiritual revolution that will sweep across Ireland. This revolution will be lead by the nameless, faceless ordinary radicals whose lives are marked by service, sacrifice and suffering.
I affirm the good work of the highly visible men and women of faith.
But when community changing revolutions come, they happen in the raw reality of everyday life, when people are inspired to incarnate the truth. When people are broken and humble enough to let that truth shine through them.
We must seek His face and presence, that we would be transformed. Then through us God's spirit will move to transform communities.

That bloke off The Apprentice that got fired.. Shibby Robati

Fired on week 3, Shibby Robati.

I was really shocked at someone on The Apprentice being a Surgeon and business owner. He also seems to play the piano well.
But maybe it is symptomatic of something very broken in our society that a very intelligent and successful person, who has trained to make a positive difference in the world, should have a desire to enter a reality TV program to prove himself.

In some sort of twisted way our society values people of fame over people with talent and skill and I think Shibby is a real-life example of an epidemic of brokenness that invades the minds of young people.

It's sad that fame (for its own sake) should be of such high value and that hero's and role models are increasingly likely to be those on our TV screens and magazines who have 'made it' as opposed to people who have made a genuine contribution to society.

I am generalising, but to make a specific point.

For me, when we value true skill, endurance, service, intelligence (applied positively), artistry and leadership - we are valuing something of the beauty of a God given creation, of a human nature which reflects (even if through a glass darkly) something of the nature of God.

Bonhoeffer on the Bible

This is from a letter Bonhoeffer wrote to his brother-in-law. In the letter, the first paragraph actually comes at the end, but I am assuming you might not get that far! How are we to hear the voice of God through the Bible if we do not create the time and space (of quiet and reflection) to listen?

If it is I who determines where God is to be found, then I shall always find a god who corresponds to me in some way, who is obliging, who is connected with my own nature. But if God determines where he is to be found, then it will be in a place which is not immediately pleasing to my nature and which is not at all congenial to me. This place is the cross of Christ and whoever would find him must go to the foot of the cross as the sermon on the mount commands. This is not according to our nature at all, it is entirely contrary to it, but this is the message of the Bible, not only in the new but also in the old testament.

I believe that the bible alone is the answer to all our questions and that we need only ask repeatedly and a little humbly in order to receive an answer. One cannot simply read the Bible like other books, one must be prepared to inquire of it only thus will it reveal itself, only if we expect from it the ultimate answer shall we receive it, that is because in the bible, God speaks to us. One cannot simply think about God in one’s own strength, one has to inquire of him. Only if we seek him, will he answer us.

Of course it is possible to read the Bible like any other book, that is to say from the point of view of textual criticism etc. There is nothing to be said against that, only that it is not the method which will reveal to us the heart of the Bible, but only the surface. Just as we do not grasp the words of someone we love by taking them to bits, but by simply receiving them so that for days they go on lingering in our minds simply because they are the words of a person we love. Just as these words reveal more and more of the person who said them as we go on, like Mary, pondering them in our heart, so it will be with the words of the Bible. Only if we will venture to enter into the words of the Bible as though in them this God were speaking to us, who loves us (and who does not will to leave us alone with our questions), only so shall we learn to rejoice in the Bible.

Good without God?

The Humanist Society of Scotland have launched a poster campaign at the same time as the Pope's visit to say that 2 million Scots are 'Good without God'.

It seems strange that any group would define itself by what they are not into. It would be a lot more constructive to offer an alternative to God and his Church.

If people are so well off without God, what would happen if he took everything back? All the schools, hospitals, charities started by the Church, homeless shelters etc. Plus all the positive things that churches in Scotland are doing as representatives of God. If we remove God, maybe we should remove the influence of his laws on our legal system and the influence of morality on our society.

Much of what humanists believe to be good and true finds its roots in God and the Bible. It is impossible to remove God from society without unravelling the very fabric of that society in the process.

Now it is very easy to look at the mess religion has caused over the centuries, but just because God has been misrepresented at times, doesn't mean that we are better off without him.

Hyperconnectivity 1

About 3 years ago I heard the Chief Technical Officer (CTO) of Nortel networks speaking at a business briefing about advances in technology. This is the first time I heard the word 'hyperconnectivity'.
This word basically describes the connection between people and between people and information. The word hyper has been added because of the amount of connections we now have.
As I listened to this Techie describing how people will be connected to each other and know what everyone is doing and where their friends are (with GPS in mobile phones etc). How even our kitchen appliances will soon be connected to the internet; I felt like putting my hand up and shouting STOP!
One of the questions that is seldom asked when it comes to technology (by the way, I have worked in IT for over 10 years) is 'should we?'. The question is normally 'can we?'.

Just because we can, doesn't mean we should!

What are the long-term consequences of people turning to technology for information, as a primary means of communication etc?

We live in a world where we are connected to the internet, and therefore to each other, in many different ways. We are now bombarded with information 24 hours a day. The data we have been bombarded with in the last few years is not so much information, but a sort of news. Not news from media sources, but news from just about anybody we can think of.

Twitter and Facebook in particular are the engines of this endless barrage of information, the vast majority of it of little consequence to anyone. Its often chit-chat, conversation, banter etc.

But one of my concerns is that it could have a negative effect on a form of communication I think is superior to that which is technology driven, face to face conversation.

Have you ever bumped into someone you haven't seen in ages? You might spend a long time catching up with life and all the biz? Except maybe now Facebook has robbed you of that opportunity for personal interaction. I already know you got a new job, your dog died, your iPhone feel down the toilet and you got your eyebrows waxed for the first time ever last Tuesday.

Sometimes a feeling of dis-connection causes us to seek out people and community. Technology can fool us into thinking that we have community and relationship (maybe we do, but its a watered down, inferior version).

We need to consider again what makes a healthy human when it comes to relationships.

to be continued

This Beautiful Mess

Rick McKinley wrote a fantastic book a few years ago, it's a great, concise perspective on the Kingdom of God. Rick brings a lot of practical stories to illustrate what happens when theology influences reality.

Here is my favourite bit...

"The kingdom of God is the living, breathing presence and purpose and reign of God on our planet. It’s beautiful and irreducible. To reduce it to a seven-point outline might help you on the quiz, but it won’t get you any closer to the experience. It would be like cutting up a corpse to figure out what it means to be human-sure, you’d end up with identifiable body parts in formaldehyde and maybe a micron photograph of a neurotransmitter, but the wonder of pulsing human life would elude you. Do you think in some piece of brain you’d find clues to friendship and falling in love, or learn why beach sand feels good between your toes, or what it means to be a child of God who also happens to like football, cigars, and the taste of a great cabernet?

To be human is to live with loose ends, with people and in a world of loose ends, feeling you’ve been made for perfection but knowing you can’t get there on your own. Knowing that you’ve been placed here to bring a taste of something beautiful and blessed.

I love studying theology, but I’ve noticed that theology has little tolerance for loose ends. As the study of God, it mostly uses human tools like logic and interpretation and systems to define Him and how He works in our lives. Countless brilliant women and men have written penetrating works that help us think more clearly about God. The give us a rich theological heritage, and I encourage you to read them. But be careful. You can study God expertly in His parts and miss Him entirely in His Being. Sometimes I think today’s evangelicals have dissected God, put Him in jars, labelled all His parts, and then breathed a sigh of relief. Whew. Job done they gasp. Now we have no more confusion about God. Now we have a God we can market. At least now we can be excruciatingly confident that “our team” is right.
As right as body parts in formaldehyde."

This Beautiful Mess by Rick McKinley

A sacred moment

I live with the understanding that God is all around me. But how do I live in the reality of God's presence in life every day?

The pace of my life doesn't seem to help when it comes to recognising a sacred moment. Probably the moment is sacred when recognised as such. The nature of that moment doesn't have to be one of profound revelation or accompanied by a sense of being on Holy Ground.

It's maybe just a glimpse of the fact that we are wired for connection, a relationship with someone far greater than ourselves and that we carry the image of this God somewhere deep within us.

A sacred moment for me this week happened somewhere around 2am when my 3 year old daughter woke up with a nightmare. I held her in my arms for a few minutes and she clung on tight. Tired and half asleep, I sensed in that moment a deep connection with God, his heart, his desire to hold me. Yet the very act of describing the moment seems to lessen it. Very often these moments of intimate connection with God defy explanation or description and are better off experienced.

I think these moments are out there all the time waiting to be discovered. They can be found wherever we are and whatever we are doing, if we will tune in.