More on dying to live

Full of promise

I am preaching in the main church this Sunday- I work in a Methodist Circuit of 10 Chapels , lots of little villages that centre on the town (if you can call it that). Putting this town into perspective, when my daughters friends drove up here from Kent for a weekend they hit Thetford Forest and thought they'd entered another land...miles of nothing....we have a Tescos and amazingly are on the mainline into London Kings Cross, therefore it is a town!!!!

Waffle aside, I feel challenged by the gospel reading for Sunday- John 12:20-33 and the talk of death and resurrection. I am challenged because as I have been preparing God has challenged me about what it means to die to self...here is why; we took this job  looking for something that would complement our work as itinerant evangelists...seeing the itinerant work as the most important. Over the last few years I have grumbled and complained about the work here finding it hard to fit into rural Methodist life, finding it hard to fit into the staff team. The church here desperately needs to produce new growth or it will die the congregations are ageing fast, apart from staff the leadership team are all in their 60's and 70's...mostly 70's!

So why I am I challenged? Because God has asked me to die to self to stop complaining and start praying, to give myself to this place...slowly I am getting to know some of the quieter people, those who want to see God do something, who are tired and stretched, and desperate to see new life, new growth...people who have hung in there when others have left. There are many loud voices who resist change...but they are growing fewer as they grow older.

So it is time to die to self and to ask God for the water of his Spirit on a small and seemingly insignificant seed, yet like all seeds it is full of promise.

I am grateful for my itinerant work which takes me around the country as I teach and help groups reach out to the New Age community, I am grateful for the freshness and inspiration it brings as others engage and add to the creativity of the project, and I am grateful because it keeps me in touch with the spirituality of the nation and I know that people are interested. But I recognise that this needs to be rooted and as I settle in I recognise that this is a good place to be rooted...I am currently training for Methodist ministry so it could mean a move soon, unless part of that dying to self means remaining in Lay work and staying put...as I said I am challenged!

I am preaching in the main church this Sunday- I work in a Methodist Circuit of 10 Chapels , lots of little villages that centre on the town (if you can call it that). Putting this town into perspective, when my daughters friends drove up here from Kent for a weekend they hit Thetford Forest and thought they'd entered another land...miles of nothing....we have a Tescos and amazingly are on the mainline into London Kings Cross, therefore it is a town!!!!

Waffle aside, I feel challenged by the gospel reading for Sunday- John 12:20-33 and the talk of death and resurrection. I am challenged because as I have been preparing God has challenged me about what it means to die to self...here is why; we took this job  looking for something that would complement our work as itinerant evangelists...seeing the itinerant work as the most important. Over the last few years I have grumbled and complained about the work here finding it hard to fit into rural Methodist life, finding it hard to fit into the staff team. The church here desperately needs to produce new growth or it will die the congregations are ageing fast, apart from staff the leadership team are all in their 60's and 70's...mostly 70's!

So why I am I challenged? Because God has asked me to die to self to stop complaining and start praying, to give myself to this place...slowly I am getting to know some of the quieter people, those who want to see God do something, who are tired and stretched, and desperate to see new life, new growth...people who have hung in there when others have left. There are many loud voices who resist change...but they are growing fewer as they grow older.

So it is time to die to self and to ask God for the water of his Spirit on a small and seemingly insignificant seed, yet like all seeds it is full of promise.

I am grateful for my itinerant work which takes me around the country as I teach and help groups reach out to the New Age community, I am grateful for the freshness and inspiration it brings as others engage and add to the creativity of the project, and I am grateful because it keeps me in touch with the spirituality of the nation and I know that people are interested. But I recognise that this needs to be rooted and as I settle in I recognise that this is a good place to be rooted...I am currently training for Methodist ministry so it could mean a move soon, unless part of that dying to self means remaining in Lay work and staying put...as I said I am challenged!