Having now been home a week, I finally got round to un-packing and sorting all the things as I went. And I re-found (or possibly RE-re-found) a letter I'd written to myself at the Mission Direct de-brief day, a couple of months after my first trip with a missions team to the Dominican Republic: As I get ready to return again, in just under 3 weeks, I'm taking this moment to ask myself - did I forget? And of course, at times I did! At times, I was more worried about writing an essay, than about noticing who around me needed loving; or about whether my hair was still in place and my dress fitted in with everyone else's, than how God might be waiting to use me in that situation. And of course, at different times and in different places there have been different people in front of me - but different people who needed God's love just as much.
Two years on and I think I'm finally beginning to let God take control. Finally edging toward trusting him completely with my future and not needing the entire plan before I can begin. Finally learning to rest in his presence and grow, in his strength, out of that. And every day, God is teaching me how to do that more. And for that, I praise and thank him. May God's love evade my life. May God's hope provoke my dreams. May God's will be done in me.
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Sometimes we just need space. Space to think; space to be; space to re-focus our lives back on God. SPACE. I was given space this weekend, at an event for young Methodists, deemed by their churches to have "leadership potential". Most of us went simply because our churches had recommended us for it, not really with any idea of what it would be; but I think we all came away from it refreshed and emboldened to go forward and move mountains for God! We had times of worship surrounded by cushions, prayer spaces, art materials - surrounded by space to personally and fully respond to God. We had workshops and discussions among new friends with open hearts and no fear of being knocked down - space to realised and share what was on our hearts. We had shared meal-times and games in community - space to live and to be. As the weekend started we reflected on Jesus' call to everyone to "Come to Me," drawing on the image of the disciples in the boat at night when Jesus, walking on water, comes out to them. And Peter questions him, "If it is you, call me out too." And in reply to Peter's demanding, un-thought-through question, Jesus gave a one-word response: "COME." And then we looked at how he calls to us further; "Follow Me." We were reminded of the people Jesus called. That they weren't perfect. That we don't need to have "all our ducks in a row" before we can follow God! Following Jesus is an adventure, one where ordinary people follow and their worlds turn upside-down, so that through Jesus, they may turn the world upside-down! In the middle of the weekend we took time out as a 'Discernment Time.' Time to actually listen to God. To think of how God speaks through our hopes and dreams; how God equips with our gifts and qualities and how God speaks, again, through other people. How often do we really stop to listen to God. Not often enough. ... (I'll just leave that with you!) After this we looked at a session on Jesus saying to us, "Wait for Me." And we spent time waiting. People used the art materials, or laid down on the beanbags and cushions; people prayed and sought after God earnestly and desperately. And God met us there, in our waiting. I learnt that waiting is not passive, but an active endeavour; one through which we grow and learn and meet and become completed - become whole - find our peace. And finally, we moved on to Jesus' call to "Go for Me," anointed and courageous: with God right in front of us, leading us; right beside us, experiencing with us; and right behind us, ready to catch us if we fall. I want to share how all of this spoke to me:
I have just begun a year-long process of discernment called 'Candidating,' in order to work out if God is calling me to ordained ministry in the Methodist Church at this time. And since this journey began (a few years ago!) I've been fluctuating between absolute certainty that this is what God is calling me to do right now, and absolute fear and doubt that I could ever do it. So maybe I was wrong...? And I was in one of those moments going into this weekend. The day before, I'd missed an important meeting, for which other people had travelled quite far to be at and re-arranged their schedules to make happen, some of whom I'd never met; and I felt absolutely terrible. My organisational skills were clearly not good enough. Maybe I just wasn't grown up enough yet. Maybe I'd been impatient - maybe I should wait until I'm older. How can anyone take me seriously if I sleep through a 10am meeting!!! But God spoke to me this weekend. He knows I'm not perfect. And he knows I'm not going to get everything right. And yet he calls me still. It doesn't make it any less bad that I missed the meeting, but there is forgiveness when we get it wrong, and a hand to pull us up when we stumble and doubt as we approach God, walking on the water he has called us to walk on. And actually, I learnt that when we talk about hearing God's voice, for all us of, most of the time, that is not 100% certain. We all go through doubts, and it is often only in hindsight that we can look back and see where God was and what he did. I don't need to be afraid of falling into the water, because God will be there to catch me when I do. So this term has been a bit crazy, but as it draws to a close I thought I might (briefly!) reflect on my time here at Cambridge as a university student.
Straight off the bat; first year is strange. And not the easy kind of strange either! :-P It's just so different to life before uni. To begin with, I really struggled to make friends; fresher's week was a terrible amalgamation of trying to force "friendships" on people, usually amidst alcohol fueled antics. And I just couldn't get on with the fact that I was going to something with the aim to make friends. After my first 5 weeks here, I wanted to leave - I didn't fit in, I didn't get on with anyone and I didn't like it one bit. But apparently I wasn't the only one feeling that way, so if you do, hang in there! I joined the rowing club with my college, because I've always loved being out on rivers or in the sea or on a lake, and a couple of the girls in my crew invited me back for pasta one evening after training. And that was the beginning of two beautiful friendships which I hope will remain with me forever! It also led to my introduction to other friends, and gradually - though I ended up attending less of my lectures! - I began to really enjoy being in Cambridge. Around that time I also found a church I could settle in to. Again, the first few weeks of "church touring" are really weird. I didn't really like how big and full the "student-y" churches were and I missed being with people who weren't all doing exactly the same thing I was. I found a church with all-ages, though at the time, no students, and it just felt like family. It was what I'd been missing; love, care, interest in what I was doing; and as I got to know them too, people to love and care about, people to be interested in what they were doing. Meeting on Sundays and during the week became like the time at the end of a day, when the family sits around and talks about what they did. I needed that. The rest of first year and second year flew by in a whirlwind of adventure and excitement. Looking back, it took me a while to work out who I was - to stop trying to be who I thought I was supposed to be and, often, pretending I was something I wasn't. But I certainly loved life! I was in love, I had a great group of friends around me, was part of a loving church family, I loved getting involved in all kinds of things, and I was enjoying my degree as well (even if still not attending quite as many lectures as I should have!)! Third year suddenly got more complicated, but still, having good friends around me kept me just about sane! Some difficult family news in first term, coupled with the way Cambridge's short terms are packed absolutely chocka, and some delay in supervisions starting the following term, meant that I've kind of been playing catch-up this whole year! So when my final exams came around, I didn't feel as prepared as I would've liked; possibly contributing to some stress and anxiety issues around that time. Thankfully, with the support of friends and the college particularly, exams have now been and gone, and weren't as terrible as I thought they'd have been! So now, I leave. Another time of transition and change. But I'm ready for it; I am so ready to do something that isn't a degree and I am excited for what the next year may hold. I will still be in Cambridge, and most of my friends are planning to stay on for another year of study, so some things will no doubt remain the same. But what I will be doing and how I will be living, will no doubt be different too. So watch this space - as this blog will probably change a little too! And anyway, before then I will be heading back out to the Dominican Republic again in July, which I am INCREDIBLY excited for - so there will be quite a few blog posts documenting my time out there! And I'm also finally getting the time to delve into the relationship between theology and art, so expect more posts along that kind of theme too! Exciting times!!! And speak soon! ;-D This morning at my church it was all-age worship; a service where the children stay in for the whole service and which is supposed to be accesible to all ages - certainly no easy task! Anyway, this morning our local preacher engaged the kids (and to be honest all of us!) in 'Godly play' (I might talk more about this in another post, as it intrigues me, but if you want to know more about it now, there's a good, brief article here!)
So early on in the service, she had the children up at the front in two teams; one team building a lego house on a brick/stone foundation, and the other building on sand. Then after they'd finished, she came out with a big watering can; and it rained, and the water rose up, and - as I'm sure you can expect - the house on the bricks stood firm, while the house on the sand (with a little help from one of the boys who'd clearly heard this story before!) fell down as it began to stand in a swimming pool of gloopy, slippy sand. But it was what she said in explaining it that struck me - "Sometimes, it's not what we build with, or the ideas we have, but the foundation we're building on which is important." Now I've heard this parable a million times in both church and a Christian home growing up, but these last couple of weeks I've been beginning to look to the year ahead and praying desperately that God would give me new ideas of how to live out his calling on my life in the slightly different setting I'm going to be in (HAVING FINISHED MY DEGREE!!!). And when the preacher said those words, I just felt like God was challenging me > Why was I so worried about what I was going to be building with? I can trust that over to him. I should concern myself with what I'm building ON. Later, the preacher talked about looking at a big, tall tree. It stretches up to the sky; it's strong; it has beautiful flowers and nourishing fruit; its branches spread far and wide. But what we don't see is the deep, wide roots - that's where the strength is, holding all of that tree where it is, through the wind and the rain and the people (like me!) who want to clamber all over it! And it's the same with a tall building. We see its solidity; its constancy; particularly with some of the college buildings here in Cambridge, its majesty - but we don't see those deep and firm foundations beneath, holding it all in place. She left us with these questions:
I'm also currently learning a sharp lesson on control. On giving that control over to God and actually allowing him to take it - something I struggle with SO MUCH. But I feel him promising me; that as I depend more on him - as I allow him to be the roots and the foundation on which I stand and act - he will bring fruit to blossom and he will give me strength to move forward. As I dig deeper into him, and give over every part of my life to him, I can only come to depend on him. For it is when I discover how huge and wonderful he is, and how magnificent and beautiful his plan is for me, that I realise I truly cannot do it in my own strength, but on the firm foundation of his true power. So where does your worrying and the source of your comfort lie? What are YOU building on? Theology is in all of our worship. Most obviously it is in how the Bible readings are unpacked in a church service, or fellowship/study group, or even just in discussions between friends; looking at what that reading says about God and what that might mean, is doing theology. It is also present in the prayers we pray - referring to God as 'Loving' or 'Creator' or 'Saviour' are all ways of exploring who God is and what that means to us.
One of the ways perhaps not used quite so widely in a lot of our churches or groups is reading a creed. A creed is a statement of belief and read together can be quite powerful reminding us of the bare-bone structure, to some degree, of the shared beliefs we, as Christians, hold. Another way, which as you know I am very interested in at the moment, is in art and architecture. This had a HUGE place in the past, and though it may not be used to quite an extravagant extent now-a-days we certainly still see this in our churches and homes today. For example, something as simple as what people see when they come to worship can bring theology into that - flowers speaking of a wonderful creation, a stained-glass window reimagining a Bible story, a wall hanging, a cross, or a lighted candle; all saying something about the human response to God. This message may even be more powerful and subliminal than a similar spoken message. A way I haven't really considered theology being done before is in action, rituals and practices. These enable us to actually embody our convictions about God and Christ and the Spirit. Like how a Christening of a baby proclaims God's sure love for them even before she/he can speak for themselves. Or in sharing the 'sign of peace' we say something about God's love that became present in Jesus bringing reconciliation and peace to the world, or in carrying forward the offering plate, how we express our offering of ourselves in response to God's self-giving to us. This list could be longer; including actions Christians do in the community and discussion/reflection groups in the wake of challenging circumstances and so on. Worship is a setting in which the aim of a worship leader is to enable people to meet with and experience God, or put another way: "to make a space for encounter with God". We should thus be bringing more theology into our worship; purposefully and intentionally (using the many diverse ways we can!) speaking of God through all that we do and say and are. |
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AuthorI'm a recent Cambridge Theology graduate now studying for a Masters in Biblical Studies and blogging about all sorts of things! I'm interested in faith, Church, theology, social action, the great outdoors and being creative, and all of those things - along with many more - come through in my posts!
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