Just imagine a place named after the very boundaries of what is known to exist; boundaries that are unreachable, that sailors spent centuries upholding before someone told them the Earth was round and that they’d never reach them. They used to think that they’d come to a point where the boat would perch momentarily over an abyss of cascading brine, before descending forever into – well, who knows what horrors came forth at that moment when they awoke bathed in sweat? And did they imagine that they could they see daylight beyond this place, or did they see a magnified version of the midnight sky, with stars the width of a finger held up at arm’s length and a moon three feet in diameter?

Jude Langston used to wonder about matters such as this. Matters that most would quickly dismiss as daydreaming; perhaps even blasphemous (for even the working class boys knew that the Lord had created the world as a wonder for us to behold, not to fathom for ourselves through misplaced endeavors….). He had a mind prone to wander amongst the corridors of a whole range of puzzles relating to the infinite, the supernatural and the divine, much more than would be expected of a boy gainfully employed in his family business and of modest – but comfortable – means. There was much to be learned, his father regularly reminded him, in a tone that implied that he was well off the pace when it came to the slow and steady race to secure his future.

Jude wanted to absorb all that his father taught him, not because he was desperate to become a tailor but because he didn’t want him to fall from the emotional tightrope he had been walking ever since the death of Jude’s younger brother just after Christmas. It had happened like this – Louis, who was just three at the time, had been playing at the side of the street outside the home, under the occasional watchful glance of his mother (who, like most, allowed her offspring a freedom that fitted nicely with her never-ending housewifely duties. Having seen this approach work successfully with her eldest, she naturally followed suit with her second). His attention drawn to something a short distance away, on the opposite side of the track, the unfortunate Louis was in such a state of single-minded intention that he was oblivious to the oncoming horse-drawn carriage of Mr Barton, who was, ironically, arriving with a delivery of cloth for Mr Langston. Despite the best efforts of Mr Barton (whose devastation at the outcome led to his decision to never drive the vehicle again) to avoid the collision, Louis’ head was crushed by one of the carriage’s sturdy wheels, the small mercy being that he died instantly. A few days later he was interred at Wardsend, and this was the start of the fascination that Jude felt towards the place. It was also the birth of a new way of thinking that felt to him like the opening of a box.

It was a box that he could clearly visualize, appearing as it had in many of his dreams, during both conscious daydreaming and the recesses of darkest sleep. Its basic shape and its purpose were clear to him, but no matter how he tried he could never add any detail to the image. He assumed that the box was wooden, and that the huge lock (one of the only features he knew to be present), was of iron. He had never seen the key that had opened the box for him, but he imagined it to be several inches long, sturdy and heavy. Upon its opening, Jude had peered inside, and had been surprised at the infinite space he had seen within. The box contained only an endless night sky.

Wardsend always set Jude’s mind to the puzzle that was the world beyond what he knew; the contents of the dream-box, its secrets, its treasure. Although he didn’t fully understand it, there was a part of him that believed that his brother was simply beyond the end of the world, still unsteady on his feet and unable to catch his elder sibling, still liable to cry at the slightest hint of torment, still placed high upon that pedestal built by his parents from nothing but pride, expectancy and the glue of disappointment in the firstborn. Jude’s curious but unschooled imagination had yet to grasp the concept of death. To him, one world ended and another began just like villages, towns and counties; the only difference was that these boundaries between worlds were solid, physical structures that were transparent yet totally impenetrable, and if one were to be so inclined as to actually desire passage from one to the other then that person would find themselves not only frustrated but bound from that moment on to live out an existence based on one principle – that we are surviving in a place that is cold and utterly lonely, meaningless and empty when placed side by side with the alternative.

            Anyone unfamiliar with Wardsend may deduce, from reading of its mysteries, that it is remote – a place distant and deliberately separated from civilization. In fact, it is extremely reachable – you’d struggle to get any distance beyond it though, and this must give a rather large clue as to how it got the name. It’s the cliff face that towers up behind it; a sheer, rocky facade like the outer defences of a giant Medieval fortress, making the walls of the Garrison, on the other side of the wide valley, seem a little inadequate. The chapel of St. Philip nestles at the feet of these forbidding monsters, where the flood plain of the Don starts to climb as though making an attempt to scale the cliffs and erode them down to the mirror of its opposing banks. It’s only a little chapel, but the graveyard extends for at least a quarter-mile up this slope, and the same to the north and south following the course of the river. The graveyard is heavily wooded; tall, hardy English trees form a dense, verdant carpet that extends along the base of the cliffs as far as the five arches railway bridge to the north.

            The reasons that Wardsend is so huge are twofold. Firstly, it is used by the Barracks to bury those unfortunate enough to be killed in action (actually, no small number of soldiers buried there died in training manoeuvres, and even in freak accidents that may have involved a drop too much of the local ale). Secondly, and more significantly, the land was actually purchased by St. Philip’s of Lower Walkley, itself a much more populous area, as an overflow for its own crowded burial ground. Anyone who didn’t know this would be forgiven their bemusement at how such a small chapel could produce such a rapid and consistent turnover of the deceased.

            When the chapel was first constructed at Wardsend, and the land consecrated for burial, an untraceable but clever rumour persisted that it had been designed in such a way that on a clear night, the clock face of the main St. Philip’s would catch the moon’s beams and reflect them across the valley onto the chapel and graves. It was at around this time that the despicable practices of the Resurrection Men were at their most prominent, and it didn’t take much for the story to proliferate amongst the congregation. They clung to it like a talisman against all that this vile group represented.

            Jude had always thought of graveyards as majestic places; all those exquisite carvings, the well-tended plots, the twisted and gnarled yews and the sense of peace and rest from the sufferings of the grime-coated city. But Wardsend always was a decidedly uncomfortable place. There was never any birdsong; even the sound of the valley’s industry, the clanking of machinery and the roar of the furnaces, echoed a distant warning as though calling the listener back from a place of emptiness and into an unforgiving but familiar world. Even before this strange affair came about, Jude always knew that there were others present whenever he was up there – other eyes, other minds and other souls, separated from him by that invisible and impregnable wall that marks the boundary of the worlds of the living and…..well, wherever it is that those who leave us end up.

He didn’t know what he thought of the idea of heaven. Or Hell. But he reckoned that there was more truth in the idea of the latter. He certainly seemed to hear a great deal about it at church every Sunday. The average working class man knew that as things stood, he’d got, at best, a slender hope of reaching paradise and so his mind tuned into all references to eternal damnation, gradually resigning itself to being tortured and roasted alive along with anyone else who wasn’t rich, white and English during their time on Earth. Gradually, the whole idea had, for him, lost its threat and with it the sense of urgency to try and avoid it. Eventually, every man comes to an understanding about the situation, but it’s just not the ‘done thing’ to admit that you know. Jude was more of a man than those who were already men perceived of him. To them, being a man was equated with the mastery of a trade, the production of as many sons as possible and the right to consume a gallon of beer of an evening. His father saw a little further beyond the material, being grounded in the teachings of his father and the church, and sought, in an often feeble way that gave the impression of a lack of conviction, to impress some sense of moral duty upon his heir.

            Maybe the drama of Wardsend has been exaggerated to some degree over time. But Jude would argue that its sense of being a stage, its tragedy, was there for all to experience and to live, if consumed in the right light. He didn’t care so much for the physical light that hung moodily around the place like a troubled drunk dispensing with the glass in the corner of a dingy tavern, but the light of context – knowing that what happened there delves deep into the spiritual nature of humanity. Yes, even into the nature of those poor wretches living in the squalor of factory housing; in fact, even more so as they were, in his view, the ones most in touch with the naked flame that flickers and struggles inside us throughout our fleeting existence on God’s good Earth, the expendable, replaceable commodities that stoke the furnaces and line the pockets of the few that manage to obscure, or at least ignore, the flame.

            What Jude knew of Wardsend, both before and after the events of those few days in June, confirmed much in his mind. He felt sure that beyond the end of this world, thriving beyond the barriers, there were others.

 However, I am conscious of the fact that I’m approaching this book with an attitude similar to the ‘fundamentalists’ that Dawkins criticises in the book. If I set out in the mindset that this book will only serve to help me argue with atheists, and refute the possibility of an alternative viewpoint before I’ve begun, then I’m doing the very thing that he finds so objectionable. Am I right to take this stance? Or should I actually be prepared to be converted to atheism, unlikely though this is? I guess it all comes back to the fact that we cannot have true faith without doubt……

 I’ll be interested to see what he has to say about the value of ‘religious experience’ ie: how people of faith have interacted personally with God. My guess is that he has no experience of God’s presence, and his encounters with Christians are limited to those focused on the ‘religious’ aspects and on militantly defending their viewpoint on some issue or other (Dawkins seems particularly keen to argue against Creationism – I suppose that’s natural for a scientist….). I find myself agreeing with him to some extent – rigorously defending something like creationism seems to me to be a waste of energy on the part of the Christian. Why aren’t we focusing on the commands of Jesus? The Bible says that we can’t fathom God, so why are we worrying about producing tons of evidence to fly in the face of evolutionary theory? And more importantly, why are people so angrily defending their stance on ‘issues’? There’s no wonder people are put off religion (for want of a better phrase).

 I think it’s vital that anyone who really wants to live as a disciple of Jesus seeks to understand where we’ve gone wrong over the years in portraying out faith, because that is a large part of the reason why people like Richard Dawkins feel like they do (that, and a load of scientific evidence…..). Shutting out other viewpoints makes us narrow-minded and less able to relate to others effectively. One-to-one relationships are, in my view, the way forward in making Jesus known. I love the church (by which I mean the people), but I agree with Dawkins – organised religion is responsible for a lot of crap. I propose to comment more on The God Delusion as I read it, as I think we can gain valuable insight from such books. Obviously I’ll be offsetting all this heathen-ery by reading plenty of the Bible (I’m looking at John at the moment, trying to make more sense of Jesus…..).

 In other news, I’m excited about letting everyone hear the new Responding with Tea songs. If you’re on Facebook then there’s a RwT page on which I intend to post the songs for download (some other tracks are there at the moment). There are also plans afoot for some CD artwork to accompany the music. On the writing front, I’m going to put the next part of The Weight of a Voice in a separate post to this one. I had another agent rejection the other day. This summer was supposed to be the time when I made a big push to get an agent, but that hasn’t happened. My efforts have gone into music. And camping…..

Anyhow, on with the first snippet of the book, which is the prologue. Hope you enjoy…..

It was yet another pristine darkness; there had been a seemingly endless string of mild, still nights. The valley lay moonlit and silent, the silver river snaking away towards the city being the only source of sound and movement. Away to the river’s east, rows of stone houses were darkened, their occupants sleeping. To the west, the thick, sloping woodland was unidentifiable amongst the ocean of black.

Yet at the centre of this gloom, something moved.

A fox?

No, those were definitely human footsteps. Heavy, weary, purposeful.

But was that a light?

Yes – it looked like the flicker of a candle, vanishing from sight, and then reappearing a little further along what must have been a pathway. A lone figure was making his way towards the cluster of buildings nestled amongst the trees.

He reached a clearing. As misfortune would have it, he chose this moment to stumble; the light from the candle was inadequate, and its flickering flame threw dancing shadows that disguised the uneven surface. He whispered a curse as he dropped what he had been carrying. A shaft of light caught the blade of a shovel as it rang noisily against the hard ground.

He froze, ears alert for the sound of pursuing footsteps or an angry voice. All he could hear was the deep throb of his accelerated heartbeat.

Picking up the shovel he moved on, reassured. The silence was part of the fabric of the place he was about to enter.

At last. There it is, he thought to himself. The wrought iron fence, and the gate, just as he had left it at the end of the working day. He trudged through the thick, summer grass, and took hold of the rusty metal, lifting slightly as he pushed; he knew it would creak angrily if he simply swung the gate open. The ornate main entrance gates were well oiled, and glided open smoothly. Indeed, ensuring this ease of access was one of the many tasks that the figure carried out regularly. But this entrance was barely used, and had become overgrown, forgotten by all but a few. It was the perfect point of entry for his current purpose.

He moved quietly, carefully parting overgrown branches to avoid them rustling as he brushed past. Suddenly, he broke free from the tangle. He felt the cropped grass underfoot, and knew that he was nearly there. Although weak, the candlelight was enough to illuminate the first gravestones a few feet away. Now it became easy for him; he had his bearings. Checking first that he had the means to re-light it when necessary, he snuffed out the candle. The moon would be enough to light his way for the next few minutes. He would have to pass within sight of the buildings, and although it was the middle of the night, he knew there was always a chance that someone would be watching.

Within a short space of time, he was taking a moment’s rest, sitting with his back leaning against a modest looking headstone. He had passed the chapel, cottages and coach house without detection, and the spot in which he now paused was out of sight of those within. He had checked this carefully when he had a spare moment during the day’s labour.

As he sat gathering his strength, a sneer crept across his face. All the hard work would soon be worth it when he held the money – as it always was in this line of work. After re-lighting the candle, and hanging it from the headstone, he hauled himself to his feet and took up the shovel. He paused to take in the chiselled inscription borne by the stone.

“You were a young ‘un,” he cackled quietly, before forcefully plunging the metal deep into the turf.

So anyway, my current vision is basically to make some new music and then give it away to as many people as possible. Should making any money, or ‘succeeding’, be my motivation for making worshipful music? I want people to hear it – at least that way they can decide it’s meaningful/terrible; charging money for it immediately limits the audience. Also, I’m reminded of the parable of the talents, when Jesus talks about the master rewarding the servants who invest the money they’ve been entrusted with – I should be investing the gifts/songs that God has given me. I don’t own them, and I don’t want to hide my light under a bushel, or whatever the verse says…..

It’ll be mostly acoustic stuff I guess. If you want to get a feel for what it might sound like, and you haven’t heard me sing/play before, go here. Tomorrow I’m hopefully going to be helping my friend Andy (a very talented singer/songwriter) to set up his studio equipment in church, with a view to exploiting the resources asap….. In a minute, I’m going to return to finishing the lyrics to a new song, called When I close the door on love. Here’s a snippet:

How can I receive / The life that renews / When I close the door on love? / How will I become / The image of grace / When I close the door on love?

I want the idea of You / The status but not the pain / I crave our time spent alone / As long as we stay the same

But when the sun goes down on me / Or the flood is breaking me / Where will I find myself? / Alone on the sand / Shaking and insecure / When You promise so  much more

I’ll try to be more faithful in blogging over the next few months, and hopefully there’ll be some music to share with you soon. But I’ll definitely start with installments of the book…..

Have you ever thought about the phrase, ‘You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone’? I think someone must’ve said it to me recently, but I don’t remember in what context. I was probably complaining about something….. It’s one to lump in with, ‘The grass is always greener on the other side’. It crossed my mind that both are tantamount to saying, ‘Don’t try to change your life. Stick with what you have. Don’t risk anything. Your lot has been decided.’ I realise that both sayings are intended to be applied to one-off situations, but there’s something in their sentiment that I don’t get on with; I can almost hear my Grandpa saying them both – he was always very content with a simple, straightforward life….

Consider the flip side of both phrases – is it not possible to appreciate what you have? Are we not capable of assessing an alternative and then deciding against it? And sometimes – is the grass not greener on the other side? Why would anyone bother trying to achieve anything if it wasn’t? What would the world be like if everyone though that their side was always the greenest? I’m the first to want to play safe on issues that I consider trivial, but I dread to think what I’d be doing right now if I’d never questioned certain aspects of my life in the past.

Of course, we can sometimes be blinded by the green-ness, and make poor decisions. We can be blinkered to the favourable situation we’re in, and go after the quick-fix option. That’s why it’s good to listen to the take of others; to get a second opinion. But I’m saying this as though I always do. I don’t, because I think I know best and hate advice if it contradicts my own desires…. I’ll take advice if it’s something I don’t care about that much or if I can’t be bothered, or am unable, to make the decision for myself. Yet when it comes to an issue that I do care about, I tend to get a bee in my bonnet and just do what I want. I then usually end up regretting how I managed the situation. The ‘thing’ has gone, and I know that I had it (or was on course for having it), but don’t any more.

Is this a bad thing? I don’t think so, because without this process happening we don’t learn. Which is why they’re such dangerous phrases. How many times do you hear other people (or yourself) say that they wished they had done things differently? I guess that’s hindsight though, which is the driving force behind their sentiment. Our sense of foresight, by its very nature, is nowhere near as well developed…..

I’m not feeling like I can get started on anything new in the meantime, either. If I do, I know that I’ll lose what little motivation I have to improve this book. Despite numerous people advising me to the contrary, I thought the original ending was ace! Editing and re-drafting doesn’t quite give the same level of satisfaction as creating a new chapter or whatever. I guess I’m going to have to get used to that, though. At least I have Mrs Cooper to keep me motivated towards making it the best that it can be before I allow it to be subjected to the merciless scrutiny of the publishing world. And anyway, my plan is that the original draft can be released as the tenth anniversary edition, with a posh new cover…..

I finished reading The Testament of Gideon Mack. I quoted it a couple of times in my last post, and here’s another:

‘Denying the existence of God [is] as arrogant and stupid as asserting it. The only sensible way to behave is to believe in what we know to be real.’

A sensible philosophy with one flaw – what if we know that God is real? Clearly the character who says this (and perhaps the author) think it impossible to believe in God, as we can’t know that. It got me to thinking about whether or not I do know that God is real – and I concluded that I do, because of the works I have seen him do. This, I presume, would raise a counter-argument from any agnostics: How can you attribute those works to God, and not luck/medicine/science, etc? I would say firstly that God controls those things, and uses them for his purposes – God gave us brains to look after each other, so why should he always perform blinding-flash miracles just to heal a medical condition? Secondly, and beyond that, I reckon that I can’t, with 100% certainty, say that God did those things – I have no concrete proof, only faith. Faith requires that I am confident in what I hope for, and certain of what I do not see, or words to that effect. To some, that will seem like foolishness (the Bible says that, too). To me, it sometimes seems like foolishness. I guess that then makes me a fool…. Well, that’s fine by me. God knows I’m a fool, a sinner, an idiot of the highest order. And he loves me just as I am….

For more on this theme of my (and our) stupidity coupled with God’s betterness, click here to listen to the song that I mentioned last time. Thanks go to Andy B for a great job on the recording front…..

So anyway. I’ve discovered a new love in my life – Twin Peaks. How cool was/is that show? I finished watching the first series on DVD last night (thanks Sam and Helen), and it’s just blown me away. I think it’s knocked Look Around You from top spot…. The humour is so black, and Agent Cooper is just hilarious. You should watch it. I realise that anyone over the age of 35 will probably be wondering why it’s taken me 20 years to discover it, but it was probably on past the watershed when I was 10….. I knew the theme music though; my Dad had an album of synthesiser music from tv programmes and films, called Synthesiser Gold, and I used to be transfixed by that and the theme from Rain Man…..

I just remembered what I was supposed to be talking about….. My writing career might be yet to lift off, but in the field of radio I’m a semi-legend….. Only this week was I deposed from my position at the top of the leaderboard on Hallam FM’s weekly teacher quiz, a position I had occupied or 7 or 8 weeks I think (I never listen to it, so I had to rely on a kid in year 4 keeping me updated every week…..). And tomorrow, Mrs C and I have been asked to be interviewed for some radio feature (not sure of the station) about how the Government can help married couples, probably as part of a boring politics feature that no-one will listen to. Nick the Vic is the main man, but we’re his token ‘young family’, I think. I don’t really know much else about that – I’ll be reflecting on it next time, I expect. Hopefully I won’t make too much of a fool of myself….

I’ve also been reading a book called The Testament of Gideon Mack (quite quickly, so as to be able to start The Autobiography of FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper – £0.01 eBay….). It’s about a (fictional) Scottish Minister who doesn’t actually believe in God, goes mad, and ‘meets the devil’. For an atheist, he makes some very valid points about religion. How about this:

My time in Leith had taught me that it was possible to be a Christian without involving Christ very much.

Or:

The great age of religion had passed, I said, and if there was to be a role for religion…..those of us who were the messengers of God would have to earn our right to be taken seriously by showing that we were, first and foremost, human beings.

There ends the sermon….

One final thing – I tried to upload one of my songs, but it was too big (Andy?). I think it might be ending up on the St. John’s website, though, so check that. Check it anyway, even if the song’s not there…..

Over half term I spent a couple of mornings in Gracie’s, reading, making notes and observations and working on various bits of writing. One particular morning, my friend Andy, who also likes coffee, texted me the following quote as part of an ongoing SMS-based exchange of wisdom: Why can’t we think of churching together as a web of relationships? Why are we obsessed with the singular event rather than seeking the rhythm of a community together? It’s from a book by Michael Frost called, ‘Exiles – Living Missionally in a P0st-Christian World. After spending a few seconds laughing at the idea of posting Christians (a good way of solving church disputes, maybe?), I started to think about it seriously. It even made it into my notebook.

Because during that morning, I’d been giving some thought to the question, ‘Where’s my place of worship?’ During my teenage years, I got involved with leading musical worship at my church, something that I’m still involved with today. But looking back, the word ‘worship’ was inseparable from the word ‘music’. Worship equalled music. When people asked, ‘What’s the worship like at church?’, I would answer by telling them how much it, or I, rocked (in my book, the more it rocked, the better it was. I was convinced that that God loves Pearl Jam…..) If someone had asked me, ‘Where is your place of worship?’ I’d have answered with the name of my church, which would’ve been a reasonable answer.

As I grew older I realised that worship is about lifestyle. It’s about what happens outside the walls of the church building (another misconception – church equals people, not building). Worship is about making every action, every thought, about God and not ourselves. It’s about making each encounter, each interaction with another person, reflect our relationship with Jesus. It’s about seeking and finding; learning and developing. Songs can help us to do this, but they are one expression of worship; people who are tone deaf or can’t play an instrument are not somehow ‘worse’ at worship. This might be obvious, but to me, growing up, it wasn’t. Now I can see just how poorly some areas of my life reflected, and still reflect, the call to worship.

I’ve touched on the fact that I saw the church building as the place in which to ‘do worship’. I propose changing ‘church’ from a noun (a thing…) to a verb (a ‘doing’ word…). We need to be church, not just go to one. What should a church be? Where can we do that? Where is the greatest need? I’m willing to bet that it’s not within the walls of the building (althought there will be needs there that should also be met).

A church should be a source of support to its community. How can we support others? By using our gifts and talents. By talking to people (remember that, Facebookers?) about how they’re doing and what they need. Is it likely that the needy and broken from our community will just walk in on a Sunday morning, admit they need Jesus, pray with us for five minutes and then be changed forever?  People want, and need, actions that express love without an agenda.

If you’ve ever read about the early church (again, ‘church’ as in the group of people….) in Acts, then you can see what church should be. In chapter 2 verse 46, it says that ‘They broke bread together in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts’. They didn’t have an annex with a kitchen. They didn’t even have a coffee machine (maybe their PCC should’ve looked into that one). They also hung around in the temple courts, where the everyday people also hung out. In the following verse it tells us what happened as a result: ‘The Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved’. By being amongst the ‘normals’, the average people, people were saved. How many people are saved over the course of the average year as part of our church services?

The church building is vital for us. Communal worship in musical, liturgical and prayer form are essential – we aren’t called to be hermits for our faith. But it musn’t become the focus of our faith. Sunday morning or evening must be a starting point for a week of worship that can take as many forms as there are members of the congregation. Worship through teaching. Worship through cooking. Worship through cleaning, writing, talking to the lonely. It’s about dedicating every task, every talent, to the glory of God. ‘Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus’ (Collosians 3 v17).

Where is your place of worship? Do you have more than one? Do you confine worship to Sunday morning? Worship in Gracie’s, anyone?

A moment ago I had to run downstairs to answer a cry of, ‘I’ve done a poo, Daddy!’, and left my steaming cup of freshly-ground coffee standing as the electric heater stirred into life. When I returned, the room smelled exactly like one of those healthy vegetarian cafes that sell things made from soya and carob, and in which everything is made from wicker…. (Interestingly, when I just Googled wicker, the first search result was the website of an unusual shop in Chesterfield called Huckleberry Willow, which I used to love going in when I was younger. It had exactly the vibe that I associate with the smell I just encountered. I think it was owned by hippies…..)

This week I’ve been fortunate enough to receive some feedback on the book that I recently completed. I’m extremely grateful to the people who’ve read it, and they’ve given me some really positive comments. Yet a couple of themes seem to be recurring when it comes to the ‘constructive criticism’ part. Firstly, no-one seems to get the ending. Quite a worry, given that the ending is my favourite part of the book. But secondly, and perhaps more easy to remedy, is the fact that people felt that one particular character wasn’t developed well enough. Looking back, I’m inclined to agree; as Mrs Cooper put it, ‘He needs more meat on his bones’. I need to add more description of him; of his appearance, demeanour, and background. The more he is included in events, the greater the depth of characterisation created. Words - the right words, words that will put him in context – are so important.

I came across this idea earlier in the week when I was reading a passage in Jeremiah. It was only a couple of pages after a quite famous verse from that same book, which I had highlighted ages ago, and the flash of green caught my attention. I turned back to look at it. It was the one that reads [I have] plans to prosper you and not to harm you – Jeremiah 29 v11. As I read the verse, the thought occured to me that I had no idea what the passage as a whole was saying – there was very little meat to the bones of this verse. What if I was taking it out of context?

And so I read the whole chapter. The verse before talks about God’s promise to bring the exiles (us) back to ‘this place’ – wherever that may be for us. He wants to come to us – but we must meet Him halfway, as it were. We need willing and receptive hearts. The verses after it say that He will listen when we call on Him, and that when we seek Him, we will find. Sounds familiar….. It seems that there is work to be done on our part in order to access these plans that God has for us…..

Have you ever watched Score, the BBC’s attempt to hide the fact that they don’t actually have the rights to any live football? (Somehow, live bowls and cross country doesn’t quite have as much of a pull…..) It’s basically two and a half hours of four men (and sometimes Gabby Logan) talking about something that only they can see, i.e: the game. A myriad of statistics flash by in red, white and yellow. Scripted banter plugs the gaps between goals, and ‘burning issues’ are discussed, even argued over. Yet somehow, this spectacle is more entertaining than the real thing.

Live games are ninety per cent boring. Let’s be honest here. What Score does is enhance the exciting bits and gloss over the dross (a term which most Wednesday fans will be all too familiar with). Hearing the opinions of four over-excited middle aged men is like watching a game with your mates – you hear opinions, some of which you agree with, some of which you don’t. It lends a whole new depth to what’s going on. Seeing it for yourself is good, but sharing the experience is much better.

We need that context of conversation, of words, of other people’s interpretations, when we read scripture. That’s why belonging to a community of like-minded people is so important.

Now here’s where I’m going to make a smooth link to my point, and it’s going to be grade-A cheese: Reading the bible is like our own ‘performance management’. We need regular ‘review meetings’ (aka church/cell group). We need people ‘higher up’ to advise us and check we’re on track. Maybe we even need some targets….

I’ve been reading a book (another one…..) called ‘Velvet Elvis’ by Rob Bell. I was initially sceptical given its silly, abstract title, but actually it’s amazing. It’s subtitled ‘Repainting the Christian Faith’, which is exactly what I think we need to do at all levels – individually, in our small groups/churches, communities, etc. He talks about this concept of ‘binding and loosing scripture’ which, at the risk of over-simplifying it, means that we should wrestle with the bits we don’t understand, discussing it in our communities (there’s that theme again….) until we have arrived at what we think is the interpretation most appplicable to us, now. Biblical Rabbis did this all the time.

This doesn’t mean that we can make the bible fit whatever we want to do (history is full of idiots who did that). It means that we allow God to speak to us through his word again and again – even the same passage can hold something new for us every time we read it afresh. The other day I re-read a couple of verses, from 1 and 2 Timothy. Both kind of reiterate the same message; if you’ve received a gift through a prophetic message and/or the laying on of hands then don’t neglect it – fan it into flame. At University a friend gave this prophecy about me – that I would speak and people would listen. In a poor interpretation of binding and loosing, I tried to make the prophecy fit what I though at the time was my ‘calling’, which was to be a Christian rock legend…. I did this for six, maybe seven years, with no success. Finally I gave up – but the prophecy kept returning to me. It is only in the light of re-reading those verses that I have attach meaning and context to it.

So that’s what I’m doing now. Talking – and you’re listening. To what, or why, I’m not sure…. I hope I say some things that are helpful. Maybe not the Postman Pat bit…..