Just got back from ECG (the new 'convention' event taking place in the week after Easter in the way that Easter People did for 20 years). Fantastic. A great feel and everyone I met agreed. The 1200 folk there was enough to provide the crowd needed to make a celebration, but few enough to allow that 'intimacy' of a group being bonded together in something special.
Paul Smith preached a stonker of a sermon, as did 28 year old Gavin Calver. The partnership with Youth For Christ seemed to work well and young adults were visible in leading almost everything. This was one of the aims of ECG, that it identify, recource and enable emerging generations of young leaders. The bible studies were highly thought of, delivered with power and passion by Clive Calver. The weather wasn't up to much, but it didn't seem to dampen many spirits.
So all credit to the organisers, going out on a limb, and delivering a great event. Especially the Methodists among them, Ashley Cooper, Steve Lindridge, William Porter, and their long suffering spouses, Moira, Elaine and Karen. Thank you all.
Were you there? What did you think?
Sunday, 30 March 2008
Thursday, 27 March 2008
Update on asylum issues
Earlier this month I went to an Independent Asylum Commission Briefing for the Churches' Refugee Network. Today they published their interim findings. These can be found online at:The Independent Asylum Commission was convened at the start of 2007. During that year it heard evidence in public and in private, and received briefings from a wide range of groups and individuals.
The Commission has had no Government funding - all its costs are met from voluntary support and other groups.
Asylum and Refugee issues are key areas of work and mission for many churches and the work of the Commission is important as it considers three key areas of:
How we decide who needs sanctuary
How we treat people seeking sanctuary and
What happens when we refuse people sanctuary
Real food for thought.
Wednesday, 26 March 2008
Eastern europe
After a few days back home and on holiday I am able to digest a great few days visiting Methodism in eastern/central europe. I got to Serbia and spent a couple of days with the faithful few folk making up the Methodists there.
There was the 'family feel' here as in Hungary, whereby a small community, dwarfed by other Christian traditions, lives in a culture religiously and culturally challenging to it. This gives a warmth to their fellowship, and they all seem to know each other. They are currently beginning to find ways of 'opening up' and one little church was running the local 'kindergarten' in the village.
The last morning in Serbia was spent visiting the ecumenical humanitarian organisation (EHO). To be honest I hadn't come across much 'ecumenism' on this visit and so was interested to see what such a project looked like. It was formed by 5 contracting denominations, including a Greek Catholic tradition, Reformed and Lutherans as well as Methodism. British Methodism contributes to the project via the Fund for World Mission.
What a good work it does. It provides pastoral support for cancer victims, and a major project for the small but growing numbers of HIV/AIDS victims. And it does major work among Roma communities who, are being sent back to these areas from which they fled years ago in the War years. However they return to very little: no proper housing, paperwork, employment. EHO are a major player in helping them in this dire situation.
So I returned ready for a handful of days off (the first since Christmas) but, as always, deeply moved and impressed by Christians living in this needy and wonderful world.
There was the 'family feel' here as in Hungary, whereby a small community, dwarfed by other Christian traditions, lives in a culture religiously and culturally challenging to it. This gives a warmth to their fellowship, and they all seem to know each other. They are currently beginning to find ways of 'opening up' and one little church was running the local 'kindergarten' in the village.
The last morning in Serbia was spent visiting the ecumenical humanitarian organisation (EHO). To be honest I hadn't come across much 'ecumenism' on this visit and so was interested to see what such a project looked like. It was formed by 5 contracting denominations, including a Greek Catholic tradition, Reformed and Lutherans as well as Methodism. British Methodism contributes to the project via the Fund for World Mission.
What a good work it does. It provides pastoral support for cancer victims, and a major project for the small but growing numbers of HIV/AIDS victims. And it does major work among Roma communities who, are being sent back to these areas from which they fled years ago in the War years. However they return to very little: no proper housing, paperwork, employment. EHO are a major player in helping them in this dire situation.
So I returned ready for a handful of days off (the first since Christmas) but, as always, deeply moved and impressed by Christians living in this needy and wonderful world.
Sunday, 23 March 2008
Christ is risen. Alleluiah!
This is the Good News -The grave is empty,
Christ is risen
Alleluia!
This is the Good News -
the light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness can never put it out.
Alleluia!
This is the Good News -
Once we were no people,
Now we are God's people.
Alleluia!
Christ is our peace
the indestructible peace
we can share with each other.
Saturday, 22 March 2008
Crucifixion
A silhouette of a depiction of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ is seen at Wesley Church on the outskirts of Hyderabad.
Friday, 21 March 2008
The really good news gospel - Easter message from the President
Donald English used to say that death and resurrection is not simply what happened to Jesus but is the deep movement God implants in all creation. The Christian God is a God of death and resurrection.
Like many I have been challenged by poignant examples of death - its reality and hard consequences - and blessed by wonderful examples of resurrection - and the hope and joy it brings. I will never forget a conversation with a Sierra Leonian man, bearing the scars of the rebel war in the 1990’s so powerfully depicted in the recent film Blood Diamond. He thanked me fervently for bringing the gospel to his land - he talked to me as if I was one of those first Methodist missionaries to West Africa! He explained with deep emotion how he had received Christ quite recently, in the war years, and this coming to faith had enabled him to begin to forgive those who mutilated him - and, as I learned a little later, killed his wife. I was moved to tears. In all his pain and lasting disability he knew that Jesus was alive, and there was hope in his life. He knew in a deep way that the gospel of Christ truly is good news.
More recently, when in Uganda with MRDF, I met Christian folk who have so little, who live with the reality and proximity of death and suffering in a way I do not, yet who remind me more than most of the life and hope of Christian faith. Death and resurrection belong together.
Or I think of some friends who have died in recent times. They knew their prognosis. They lived with the stark consequences of their impending death, for themselves and especially their loved ones. And at just the time when hope might be most lacking in these dear people and those who love them, they talk of the nearness of Christ, the wonderful love and forgiveness of God, the comfort of their faith, their trust in Jesus, the salvation he freely gave and their hope of heaven. In the most traumatic situations of life, it is often those going through them who embody and make clear that the Christian gospel truly is good news.
Death and resurrection is also evident in the life of our churches. I was at Walworth Methodist Church some weeks ago. A church with a venerable past, ‘Clubland’ had a great ministry among local youths and others in that London neighbourhood. But there came a time when almost all signs of life disappeared, and a long three days of darkness ensued. But resurrection has come and new life bursts out everywhere. Methodist Christians, young and old, many (originally) from various parts of West Africa and beyond, share life and worship that exudes the good news gospel. “Our world lives with death and resurrection in many ways and in many places. An ‘average’ news broadcast gives cause to both weep and rejoice. In places of death and darkness we must continue to weep with those who weep and ‘look for the morning’ as people of resurrection faith and hope. With those who rejoice in life and hope we must celebrate and point to God, the giver of it all.
Our Easter faith is not death or resurrection, it is death and resurrection. The resurrection of Jesus is not a reversal of death. It is much more than that. The risen Jesus is known by the scars of crucifixion. He is the Living One Who Died. But now he is alive forever. And, marvellously, he stands today with this needy world in the reality of death and the promise of new life. This ministry he shares with us, his Easter People Church, a people bearing the marks of both death and new life. A people who know and live out the profound truth that death and resurrection life both lie deep in the purposes of God, in whom all things will be well. Alleluia!
This is Martyn's Easter message posted by Ruby
Like many I have been challenged by poignant examples of death - its reality and hard consequences - and blessed by wonderful examples of resurrection - and the hope and joy it brings. I will never forget a conversation with a Sierra Leonian man, bearing the scars of the rebel war in the 1990’s so powerfully depicted in the recent film Blood Diamond. He thanked me fervently for bringing the gospel to his land - he talked to me as if I was one of those first Methodist missionaries to West Africa! He explained with deep emotion how he had received Christ quite recently, in the war years, and this coming to faith had enabled him to begin to forgive those who mutilated him - and, as I learned a little later, killed his wife. I was moved to tears. In all his pain and lasting disability he knew that Jesus was alive, and there was hope in his life. He knew in a deep way that the gospel of Christ truly is good news.
More recently, when in Uganda with MRDF, I met Christian folk who have so little, who live with the reality and proximity of death and suffering in a way I do not, yet who remind me more than most of the life and hope of Christian faith. Death and resurrection belong together.
Or I think of some friends who have died in recent times. They knew their prognosis. They lived with the stark consequences of their impending death, for themselves and especially their loved ones. And at just the time when hope might be most lacking in these dear people and those who love them, they talk of the nearness of Christ, the wonderful love and forgiveness of God, the comfort of their faith, their trust in Jesus, the salvation he freely gave and their hope of heaven. In the most traumatic situations of life, it is often those going through them who embody and make clear that the Christian gospel truly is good news.
Death and resurrection is also evident in the life of our churches. I was at Walworth Methodist Church some weeks ago. A church with a venerable past, ‘Clubland’ had a great ministry among local youths and others in that London neighbourhood. But there came a time when almost all signs of life disappeared, and a long three days of darkness ensued. But resurrection has come and new life bursts out everywhere. Methodist Christians, young and old, many (originally) from various parts of West Africa and beyond, share life and worship that exudes the good news gospel. “Our world lives with death and resurrection in many ways and in many places. An ‘average’ news broadcast gives cause to both weep and rejoice. In places of death and darkness we must continue to weep with those who weep and ‘look for the morning’ as people of resurrection faith and hope. With those who rejoice in life and hope we must celebrate and point to God, the giver of it all.
Our Easter faith is not death or resurrection, it is death and resurrection. The resurrection of Jesus is not a reversal of death. It is much more than that. The risen Jesus is known by the scars of crucifixion. He is the Living One Who Died. But now he is alive forever. And, marvellously, he stands today with this needy world in the reality of death and the promise of new life. This ministry he shares with us, his Easter People Church, a people bearing the marks of both death and new life. A people who know and live out the profound truth that death and resurrection life both lie deep in the purposes of God, in whom all things will be well. Alleluia!
This is Martyn's Easter message posted by Ruby
Monday, 17 March 2008
Down by the Danube
Home thoughts from abroad? Well, I am in Budapest.
The diaconal convocation was, as usual, a great affair, aided by the powerful and persuasive input by Steve Hollinhurst on Implicit, New age and contemporary forms of spirituality. He sets out cogently the challenges and opportunities before us if we are to communicate Christianity in an authentic and accessible way to increasing proportions of our populations. I was grateful to be able to preach and lead communion to conclude the convocation.
Then it was off to the airport, Manchester to Zurich Friday evening. I was meeting with the executive of the Central and Southern Methodist Conferences meeting in Zurich. I went to attend the executive of the Central and Southern Conferences of European Methodism. This includes representatives of Methodist Churches in
Austria, France, Switzerland, Slovenia, and several others.
From there we (Colin Ride as Europe Secretary is with me) flew to Budapest, where I am now. Yesterday we preached three times in different Methodist churches around Miskolc circuit. One of these was a Gipsy congregation (their description of themselves, not mine) which was just fantastic, and will certainly figure in a future Methodist Recorder piece.
Then today we have looked round other aspects of the Methodist Church in Hungary, including a home for the elderly.
Tomorrow Colin and I head south to the Methodist Church in Serbia. If I can get on the net from there, I will blog again...
M
(posted by Toby on behalf of the President)
Austria, France, Switzerland, Slovenia, and several others.
From there we (Colin Ride as Europe Secretary is with me) flew to Budapest, where I am now. Yesterday we preached three times in different Methodist churches around Miskolc circuit. One of these was a Gipsy congregation (their description of themselves, not mine) which was just fantastic, and will certainly figure in a future Methodist Recorder piece.
Then today we have looked round other aspects of the Methodist Church in Hungary, including a home for the elderly.
Tomorrow Colin and I head south to the Methodist Church in Serbia. If I can get on the net from there, I will blog again...
M
(posted by Toby on behalf of the President)
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