Fire!

One of the things that we are required to do in the church is a fire risk assessment. This involves evaluating fire hazards, evaluating those at risk, seeing whether it is possible to reduce the risk of fire and try to reduce the danger that that fire is likely to cause to people.

For a fire to start you need to have (1) a source of ignition, (2) fuel and (3) oxygen. So not keeping the petrol lawn mower next to the gas oven is a good idea. (Not that we did!)

I wonder how many of us would benefit from conducting a spiritual fire risk assessment?

We know that we do things that let God down, and sometimes it seems that we keep on doing them. But do they just happen, or do they happen because a number of factors come together at the same time?

Let's suppose that (a) there is a certain person in the church who regularly annoys me; (b) I lose my temper easier when I'm tired; and (c) I find it easier to 'say' things I later regret when I use email.

If all these three things were true then it would not be wise to come home after church, having been annoyed (again) by 'that person', to stew on it all day, and then at midnight, when I'm tired, to fire off an angry email (lots of capital letters), highlighting all their failings and wondering how on earth they can think of themselves as a Christian.

Assess the risk and then take steps to minimise the damage.

A Summer of Sport

If you enjoy watching sport on TV then the last few weeks have been great. The football World Cup still has a few days left to go, we've had two weeks of Wimbledon, there has been the cricket between England and Australia. Just a few days ago the Tour de France started. And next year is the London Olympics.

Of course there are those who hate having their regular TV schedules messed around with in order to accommodate '22 grown men kicking a bag of air around!' Maybe you're one of those people. (There are other channels).

If you'd lived in the first century in the world influenced by the Roman or Greek Empires then sport of a different nature would have been a big part of city life. Chariot racing, the Gladiators, the Olympics...all played a big role in life.

And last Sunday we looked at a few verses in the New Testament where the writers pulled out some of the similarities between what is required to be successful in sport and what is required to live the Christian life.

One example is 1 Corinthians 9:24-27. Just as the top athlete goes into strict training - watching what they eat, making sure they get enough sleep, following a carefully worked out training schedule etc - as a Christian I need to realise that growth and maturity will not just happen. There need to be disciplines (such as Bible reading, prayer, coming to church, learning Bible verses) that I need to be developing. This will not come naturally, it will require sacrifice and will at times seem like hard work.

An athlete makes these sacrifices for the hope of an Olympic gold medal. But for the Christian there is a much greater prize.

Welcome

On Monday I went to part of a Hindu wedding. Although I have been to Asian Christian weddings and Muslim weddings before, this is the first Hindu wedding I have attended. In reality it was only a small part of what was apparently a very long day for others, which was one day of three.

The daughter of our next door neighbours was getting married and we were invited to the reception. [As it turned out this meant that you turned up any time between about 6pm and 8pm, went straight away to eat - a served buffet of great tasting food - and then went to greet the bride and groom and their parents - and then leave when you were ready.] But having never been to a Hindu wedding we didn't really know what to expect. But we were warmly welcomed at the entrance to the hall, and after looking aimless and clueless for only a matter of seconds we were instructed that we should first of all go downstairs to eat. Again at the next entrance we were greeted and told which way to go. We were helped with our selection of food, directed to a table and one kind gentlemen even carried my tray for me as I had our 1 year old in the other arm.

Friendly faces greeted us back upstairs and helped us to understand what we were supposed to do and took the time to answer our questions, they offered to take photos for us, spoke with the children...

Going somewhere for the first time or doing something for the first time is always a slightly nervous experience. I think sometimes we forget, in our churches, how nervous coming into the building can be, especially if you've never been in a church before. Which way to do I go? Can I sit anywhere? What should I wear? Will there be chairs? Do I need to take my shoes off? When do I stand up? What happens when the offering comes around? What's communion all about?

Stewards are there to do so much more than simply give out the Bibles. They can make a person feel comfortable and at home within seconds. And all of us have a responsibility to be welcoming and helpful. It is the warmth of welcome and the friendliness of the people that may make more of a lasting impression than the quality of the sermon!

Knock Knock...

I have an office at the church, at the end of a corridor - that doesn't really go anywhere. So most footsteps that make their way along the corridor are almost certainly coming to see me. And sometimes these footsteps make interesting listening. They get less and less confident as they approach the end of the corridor, almost as if there is some internal battle going on in the walker. When they reach the door there is invariably a pause - as if the visitor is first of all trying to establish whether I am in or not; if they think I'm in am I in the middle of an important meeting or phone call; maybe I'm too busy and they should come back later; maybe their 'issue' is not so important after all... The majority will then knock, and wait to be invited in.

But there are three people in the church who refuse to follow this protocol. They simply run down the corridor at full speed and burst into the office without so much as a knock or 'excuse me' (the latch on the door doesn't work so the door can simply be pushed open). They are, of course, my three young daughters. They're not coming to see the pastor, they're coming to see their daddy. And whatever it is they want to show me or tell me, or even if they just want a cuddle, they will interrupt whatever I'm doing.

In our weekly series in Hebrews we have reached chapter 8, which talks (amongst other things) about how the 'new covenant' is about having a relationship with God. It is about knowing God - not just knowing about God. God invites us to be his children, to be in a relationship with him. He offers forgiveness for sins (verse 12). And part of this all means that we can come into God's presence with confidence (4:16).

How do we feel about coming into God's presence? Do we stand at the door and knock cautiously, full of doubt as to whether we should even be there? Or do we run down the corridor and burst in without knocking because we want to see our heavenly daddy, who loves us?