A Heavenly Manifesto

A few weeks ago we watched a Delirious? video in Sunday club, and ever since then it has been running through my head, and the more I mull it over, the more it seems to be significant. Those of you familiar with the D: live experience will know all about Martin Smith's talky sections during History Maker, and I suspect you'll be quite fond of them too! During this one (from My Soul Sings DVD), he reads out Isaiah 58:6-7 from the Message;

"This is the kind of fast day I'm after:
to break the chains of injustice,
get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
free the oppressed,
cancel debts.
What I'm interested in seeing you do is:
sharing your food with the hungry,
inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
being available to your own families.
Do this and the lights will turn on"

Then he begins to talk about child traffiking, finishing by saying "If it is not acceptable in Heaven, it's not acceptable here"

The more I think about this, the more it seems a deeply profound statement, a heavenly manifesto if you like, for those of us who profess to follow Jesus Christ and be part of His kingdom. "If it is not acceptable in Heaven, it's not acceptable here" It goes wider than the context of people traffiking and right to what is at the heart of the kingdom of God. It is Christians living out their lives here and now, but as if we were in heaven, a place of joy, peace and justice where God is centre of all things and righteousness reigns.

Everywhere we look in this world, there is pain, suffering and injustice, but in Jesus and the gospel there is the answer, the kingdom of God, a kingdom where the world's values and standards are turned upside down, where love is the overriding principle and compassion is the modus operandi.

In this kingdom the first shall be last and the last shall be first, actions will speak louder than words and faith will move mountains. It gives the voiceless hope and makes the comfortable uncomfortable. This kingdom is counter-cultural, it is growing faster than any other and will never end.

I'll be the first to admit, the church, Christians in general, and myself in particular have not always lived up to this standard, and sometimes fail spectacularly, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't strive to meet it every day of our lives. Just imagine what the world would look if the people of God stood up and said "If it is not acceptable in Heaven, it's not acceptable here", if we prayed the Lord's prayer "your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" and then went and lived that out.

The world would be turned upside down in the name of God's love and what could be better than that? Take up the heavenly manifesto this week and see where it leads...

Arm Update #7

I have just got back from my first visit to Fracture Clinic in Morriston since having the Zoledronate infusions at the Nuffield, and it was a good trip.

Turns out the infusion is doing its job, and the Fibrous Dysplasia cyst is getting smaller as the Osteoblasts do their job and re-establish the bone tissues. The fracture itself is also healing well, but they said I would be in the cast for around another month.

The big shock was the state of my arm under the plaster! It was so withered and absolutely grim! The unfortunate job of giving it a clean and rub down fell to a sister who commented it was like I was moulting! I've got to say, despite that it felt great!







On a postive note my arm is now strong enough for my wrist to be exposed and used again. I am currently shaking imaginary hands in an attempt to strengthen the muscles and get them working well again. However properly exfoilating my hand and wrist when I got home was a gross job, that I'm not looking forward to repeating when the cast finally comes off!






My visit was also made more entertaining by an encounter with Ospreys hooker Marc Breeze who was sat next to me in the plaster room. He was sat in his training top and shorts, so I passed a diverting couple of minutes whilst I tried to figure out who he was- although to no avail- the Ospreys website provided the answer when I got back!

So the countdown to 12th May begins when hopefully my cast will be coming off and physio will begin!

Tom Wright: The Church must stop trivialising Easter

On Friday, the Bishop of Durham Tom Wright wrote a fantastic article in The Times. You can find the whole thing here, but I'll copy and paste a bit of it here to give you a flavour...

"Easter was the pilot project. What God did for Jesus that explosive morning is what He intends to do for the whole creation. We who live in the interval between Jesus's Resurrection and the final rescue and transformation of the whole world are called to be new-creation people here and now. That is the hidden meaning of the greatest festival Christians have.

This true meaning has remained hidden because the Church has trivialised it and the world has rubbished it. The Church has turned Jesus's Resurrection into a “happy ending” after the dark and messy story of Good Friday, often scaling it down so that “resurrection” becomes a fancy way of saying “He went to Heaven”. Easter then means: “There really is life after death”. The world shrugs its shoulders. We may or may not believe in life after death, but we reach that conclusion independently of Jesus, of odd stories about risen bodies and empty tombs.

But “resurrection” to 1st-century Jews wasn't about “going to Heaven”: it was about the physically dead being physically alive again. Some Jews (not all) believed that God would do this for all people in the end. Nobody, including Jesus's followers, was expecting one person to be bodily raised from the dead in the middle of history. The stories of the Resurrection are certainly not “wish-fulfilments” or the result of what dodgy social science calls “cognitive dissonance”. First-century Jews who followed would-be messiahs knew that if your leader got killed by the authorities, it meant you had backed the wrong man. You then had a choice: give up the revolution or get yourself a new leader. Going around saying that he'd been raised from the dead wasn't an option.

Unless he had been....The world wants to hush up the real meaning of Easter. Death is the final weapon of the tyrant or, for that matter, the anarchist, and resurrection indicates that this weapon doesn't have the last word. When the Church begins to work with Easter energy on the twin tasks of justice and beauty, we may find that it can face down the sneers of sceptics, and speak once more of Jesus in a way that will be heard."

Easter Sunday (on Monday!)

Sorry part 2 of the video is a day late, but had such a fantastic day yesterday celebrating the resurrection of Jesus, plus a brilliant baptism at Caswell Bay I didn't get near the computer!


THAT'S EASTER Death to Life from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

John 20

The Empty Tomb

¹Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. ²So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him!"

³So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. ⁴Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. ⁵He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. ⁶Then Simon Peter, who was behind him, arrived and went into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, ⁷as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen. ⁸Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. ⁹(They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.)

Jesus Appears to Mary Magdalene

¹⁰Then the disciples went back to their homes, ¹¹but Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb ¹²and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.

¹³They asked her, "Woman, why are you crying?"

"They have taken my Lord away," she said, "and I don't know where they have put him." ¹⁴At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

¹⁵"Woman," he said, "why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?"
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him."

¹⁶Jesus said to her, "Mary."
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher).

Good Friday

It's Good Friday today, but why is it so good? Please take 3 minutes to watch part 1 of this video to find out why. Part 2 will be coming on Sunday!


THAT'S EASTER Life to Death from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

Romans 5:6-8 says this: "You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

Amazing! Yet there is more... It's Friday, but Sunday's coming!

The Youth Work Charter

It may surprise some of you to find this out, but currently the church is one of the largest employer of youth workers in the UK, with an estimated 8,000 full time employees on the books. These individuals are responsible for much positive work with young people that would not otherwise happen and make a huge difference in the lives of those they work with. The vibrant, exciting reality of Christian youth work is often very different from the gloomy picture painted by the media and pessimists in power.

The trouble is youth workers employed by churches do not have many of the safegaurds and protections that are afforded to those employed by councils, and in fact are subject to many other pressures too, such as a congregation to be accountable to as well as a line manager, a potential lack of professionalism/experience in their employers and the desire of the church to see increasing numbers in youth groups, a constant stream of conversions, baptisms and an abiliy to work 25 hours a day!

In response to these, and other issues, the Youth Work Charter has been commissioned and launched by Youthwork the partnership, a collection of various Christian agencies involved in youth work such as Oasis, Alove, Spring Harvest, YFC and Youthwork magazine, who aim to resource, support and encourage youth workers up and down the length of the UK.

According to the blurb "The Charter is meant to be a helpful way for churches to think through the key issues in employing a youth worker. It contains seven declarations churches make about these issues.

The seven areas come from the very real experiences of youth workers up and down the country: they reflect situations where youth workers, and the churches that employ them, can often find frustration, conflict or simply unmet needs."

The basic 7 points churches would commit to following are as follows

We will pray and support

We believe that our youth worker needs spiritual support in their work with young people.

We promise to pray for our youth worker and keep their needs a high priority in the church’s prayer life.

We will give space for retreat and reflection

We believe that taking time to think and pray is just as essential for our youth worker as organising events and meeting young people.

We promise to encourage our youth worker to use part of their schedule to give space for retreat, reflection and personal development.

We will provide ongoing training and development

We believe that learning the skills of youth work is an ongoing process and that it’s important to continually invest in professional development.

We promise to set aside time and money to provide this for our youth worker.

We will give a full day of rest each week

We believe that taking regular time off helps maintain our youth worker’s passion and energy for their work with young people.

We promise to actively encourage our youth worker to take a day away from their role each week to do something different.

We will share responsibility

We believe that having a youth worker does not release the rest of the church from our responsibilities towards young people.

We promise to encourage everyone to play a part in volunteering, praying for or supporting young people.

We will strive to be an excellent employer

We believe that it’s important to have clear structures and procedures for recruiting and employing a youth worker, and to provide supportive management structures.

We promise to follow good practice guidelines in the way we employ our youth worker.

We will celebrate and appreciate

To see the details in every point and find out more in general, please visit the website and have a read! There is also a campaign running alongside the launch of the document called We Love Our Youth Worker which aims to resource churches and help them put the charter into practice.

Now, feel free to call me biased, but I think this is a really positive document. I am genuinely blessed with a fantastic working environment, brilliant colleagues and plenty of support, however I am aware that this is not the case for all church youth workers. On average we burn out after 18 months, suffer from stress and many church youth workers are managed poorly due to a lack of professional structures.

Yes, the positives of the job generally outweigh the negatives, but its worth making people alert to the downsides of full time Christian youth work and how to deal with them. I believe this charter could go a long way towards that, and I hope that as many churches as possible take it up when it is officially launched on Monday...

How the congregation can help with youthwork

One of a series of cartoons about Youthwork by the brilliant Dave Walker. Any fire eaters out there for the return of Ignite in a couple of weeks?!

Romans 8:28-39

This week I have been meditating on Romans 8:28-39. Usually I would write something about how this passage in God's Word has encouraged me, challenged me and changed me, but on this occasion I will just post it, and pray God will speak to you too.....

"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

More Than Conquerors

What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then can condemn? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Amen!