Category: Children

Sabbatical, Day 17

He may not have vomited again today, but Mark remains far from well. He was awake most of last night, complaining of painful legs and stomach. I took him to the doctor today. She said it was potassium depletion, caused by the sickness. He needed Dioralyte and potassium-rich food. Just one problem: when Mark is ill, he won’t eat. Only back in December did he start eating healthily again for the first time in two years, a spate that began with – yes, an illness. Tonight he wouldn’t even eat his favourite sausages and broccoli. I couldn’t convince his four-year-old brain that eating would help take away the pain of which he was complaining. All he wanted was his bed. We’re hoping and praying we’re not into another protracted spell of refusing food. 

First thing this morning, Rebekah twice thought she was going to be sick, too. And since the doctor later in the morning told me that every GP in the practice was seeing two or three children every day with this virus, we wouldn’t have been surprised. She was distraught, because today she was due to travel to Kent for a sleepover with her old childminder. By late morning, nothing untoward had happened and so we relented. However, we’ve spoken to Pat the childminder this evening and she says Rebekah is unusually quiet. We wonder whether she is brewing the bug, and has been putting a brave face on things today, just to get her sleepover. 

With all these family concerns, then, today has not been a day for much progress with the sabbatical. I did manage to read sixty pages of Goldsmith and Wharton’s book that I mentioned yesterday. I used to think I was sure which Myers Briggs type Debbie was, now I’m not so sure after reading the pen portraits. I’m only certain she’s extraverted, but you wouldn’t need a psychologist to tell you that!

I did, however, think it might be worth emailing Trinity College, Bristol, where I am due to be next week to look at this question of ministry and personality type within a wider course entitled ‘Management, Leadership and Professional Practice’. It’s a good job I did. They had forgotten to book me in. That’s all corrected now, and it’s all systems go. 

Time to sign off for today, I don’t fancy being late to bed after last night’s disturbances with poor little Mark.

6

Sabbatical, Day 16

We thought Mark was getting better. He wasn’t. A persistent tummyache, followed by spectacular vomiting this afternoon has proved he still has a long way to go. So much for a twenty-four-hour bug.

Rebekah has also been struggling on and off with a headache over the weekend and today. Thankfully, it had disappeared by bedtime. Hopefully she is on the way up, and Mark will be before too long. It isn’t how they’d want to spend half term.

All of which means I haven’t done that much today. However, one theme of my sabbatical is meant to be about faith and technology. Really it’s bottom of the list, ‘do something on this if I have time’. Yet I’ve found more than one blogger (Brother Maynard was one of the most recent) point to an interesting article by Kevin Kelly called Amish Hackers. This is fascinating. Kelly debunks the popular image of the Amish as hostile to technology. The Old Order Amish may fit that image to a large degree, but it isn’t true of all Amish streams, he says. What does he say? Here are some important themes.

Firstly, the Amish tend to use technology without owning it. Someone who is part of the Amish community but who works outside (there isn’t enough work on all the farms for them all) may well hire a car or a taxi to get to and from work. There are even Amish websites, often put together in local libraries.

When I first read this, I thought it was a hypocritical stance: we don’t want to own something, but we want to get all the benefits. However, on reflection, I think they are trying to enshrine an important point. It’s the problem of possessions and idolatry. That which we possess often ends up possessing us. Have they found a way to guard against temptations to idolatry? Someone somewhere still has to own the car or computer, but they do seem to be onto something important. 

Secondly, their attitude to technology is not so much negative as cautious. They do not assume that new inventions are automatically bad. Instead, some Amish who are excited by an invention will go to their bishops and ask for permission to trial it. The bishops will often let them in order that the technology may be evaluated to see whether it would benefit the community. They have been trialling mobile phones since 1999, and the bishops could still say ‘no’. If the bishops do decide something would be harmful, the early adopters have to relinquish it.

What’s important about this? It’s the emphasis upon community, that much-overused-yet-sucked-of-its-meaning word in other Christian circles. The well-being (shalom?) of the community is paramount. Individual preferenes have to be subsumed to the church. The initial objection to cars a hundred years ago was about the danger of unbridled mobility in taking people away from enriching the local community: they would not shop locally or visit the sick on Sunday. I don’t think this is the way Marxism despises the individual in favour of the society to the point that people are but cogs in the machine, but it is a profound sense that we are not merely redeemed individuals, we are called into a redeemed community. 

As Kelly observes, we haven’t seen any evidence of widespread social relinquishment in broader society. He realises it isn’t simply about a mass boycott (we’ve seen them, albeit not generally permanent), but also mutual support. The Amish have a closeness of relationship in order to provide that, too. Social relinquishment is very difficult in a technological-consumerist society as ours, even in a recession. 

Not only that, there is a process of discernment going on here that goes beyond the wooden application of texts by some fundamentalists. You can query how long the bishops take to evaluate not only the usefulness but also the goodness of an invention, and it does – according to Kelly – put the Amish about fifty years behind the rest of society. However, this is a serious attempt to find the mind of Christ.

Have a look at the article for yourself. Do offer your comments here. I think it’s intriguing. Naturally, as a lover of technology, I think the Amish are too cautious, but my image of them has changed radically and I have to admire their profoundly Christian values that they bring to the subject. 

One last thing before signing off. Next week is my second trip as part of the sabbatical, when I shall be visiting Trinity College, Bristol to study ministry and personality type. I began dipping into one book I already have that touches on the subject, Knowing Me Knowing You by Malcolm Goldsmith and Martin Wharton. At the end of the introduction, they mention two books that have shaped their thinking: Prayer and Temperament by Chester P Michael and Marie C Norrisey and Personality Type And Religious Leadership by Roy M Oswald and Otto Kroeger. Goldsmith and Wharton’s book was published in 1993, so these other two titles will be older. Does anybody know them and are they any good? Michael and Norrisey’s book has two good reviews on Amazon, and seems to be written from a Catholic perspective. Likewise, Oswald and Kroeger get one five-star review. 

Does anyone know any other decent works in this field? Searching on Amazon uncovered Who We are is How We Pray: Matching Personality and Spirituality by Charles J Keating. It also found Prayer Life: How Your Personality Affects the Way You Pray by Pablo Martinez. However, while personality type and prayer is helpful and interesting, my primary focus is about ministry and leadership issues in relation to personality type. 

The course at Trinity uses the Myers Briggs Type Indicator as its basis, so work connected to that approach would be especially helpful. However, if you know material that comes from other approaches, particularly that of Hans Eysenck, I’d be quite interested, too.

I mentioned this theme before on Day 5 of the sabbatical, but didn’t make any particular appeal regarding literature, and it provoked some helpful comments, and Tess Giles recommended some reading on the Enneagram. However, this time I want to appeal a little more specifically regarding literature on the ministry and personality issue, especially looking at Myers Briggs, whether favourable or critical. Thanks for any help you can offer.

5

Sabbatical, Day 15

Change of plan today. We were all set to visit Holy Trinity church, Springfield, but little Mark woke up vomiting. Debbie said she’d stay at home with him while I took Rebekah to church. However, she was nervous about going into a Sunday School on her own where she didn’t know anyone. However, she had a Plan B. She said she’d prefer to go to a church where she knew some people.

One church fitted the description: our local parish church, St Andrew’s, where the vicar is my prayer partner, the curate is our next-door neighbour, the reader was one of the children’s pre-school teachers … and tens of other people, too. Checking their website, I learned that the third Sunday morning of the month was all-age worship. I explained to Rebekah that she wouldn’t be going out to Sunday School but would be staying in the service with me, where we would all do things together. She was happy, and off we went. 

It’s always interesting to see how another church handles these things. I think all-age worship is notoriously difficult to carry off well. It’s hard enough pitching something for a group of adults at some times. And it isn’t without cause that children are split into year groups at school to focus the teaching. (Even then, the teacher has a challenge.) With breadth of ability, background and so on, I envy any church that can turn in a good act of worship that helps people across the generations to connect together with God. For my part, I don’t assume that all-age worship or ‘family service’ simply equals ‘children’s service’. I try to include several little elements, each mainly pitched at a different group within the congregation.

So what did I think? Well, naturally I’m not going to write something here on a public blog that constitutes a review of worship largely led by good friends of mine. However, one observation struck me in particular. As an Anglican church, they are largely constrained to use official liturgies in their services. What we had this morning looked like it must be a General Synod-sanctioned order of service for all-age worship. It was like a cut-down version of Morning Prayer. However, if some liturgist thought this was sufficiently simplified to include children in the worship, then I’m afraid someone at Church House needs to meet some kids. I wouldn’t expect everything in even an act of all-age worship to be accessible to a nearly six-year-old, but I was on a permanent translation exercise with Rebekah. Phrases like ‘source of all life’ are way too philosophical and abstract to work with children. If only the liturgists had rewritten things in a more narrative form rather than thinking they had to give them a taste of Chalcedonian or Nicene Councils, it would have been promising.

Haveing nevertheless been sold a pup by the hierarchy, I have to say that St Andrew’s did put two or three good things into the service where they had the liberty to do so. The Bible reading was dramatised effectively. I still needed to explain to Rebekah what leprosy was, but I would have had to have done that anyway.

Then there was the use of a DVD clip at the end of the talk. The theme was how we exclude people whom God wants to include. They used Hans Christian Andersen singing ‘The Ugly Duckling’. It resonated with older people who remembered the song and/or the film, and children were invited to the front to get a better view. It made sense to them, too. 

Finally, one song in particular that I didn’t know but probably millions have known for aeons. Jim Bailey wrote a version of the Lord’s Prayer in the mid-90s (yes, 1990s) and I found it very singable. Definitely one to note for trying out when I return from sabbatical.

Welll, there’s nothing very interesting in blog terms to report about the rest of the day, as it mainly consisted of me taking Rebekah out while Debbie continued to stay home with Mark. But hopefully what I’ve written on the all-age worship will stimulate a conversation. I look forward to any comments you’d like to make.

4

Sabbatical, Day 14

Valentine’s Day. Debbie and I had it all worked out. A nice day with the children, then we’d pack them off to bed at the usual time and share a Marks and Spencer’s meal. 

And the day started so well. The children had signed Valentine’s cards to Mummy. They had also jointly signed one to me. But then they derailed things.

For the better, I might add. This evening’s quiet meal somehow ended up off the agenda in favour of a family lunch trip to Pizza Hut. And since I had been away for five days until yesterday, I think a family meal out was probably the better option. Our romantic evening has instead become me clearing down hundreds of emails that arrived while I was away (no exaggeration – I’ve deleted four hundred) and Debbie doing the ironing.

However – in response to popular demand – well, one comment by Olive – here is some more information on what I sketched last night about ‘the life cycle of a congregation’. I don’t have time to rework this substantially, so what follows is simply a copy and paste from OpenOffice of the notes I made in Stephen Skuce‘s lecture. Therefore, please be aware that the structure of what follows is his, not mine. All that is mine is my attempt to record as faithfully as possible what he was sharing with us in the lecture. I went straight from this lecture to coffee and then drove home. There are some compelling parallels with a lot of church experience, but also some gaping holes, as he indicates in the section entitled ‘reflections’. But I hope they might lead to a useful debate in the comments below.

THE LIFE CYCLE OF A CONGREGATION

STEPHEN SKUCE

Understanding this helps us know where we are and help us diagnose what to do next. Various proponents can be found on the web, including George Bullard.

Western linear thinking – but much of life is cyclical.

Gene structure of a congregation (Bullard)

  1. E-factor is concerned with energising a congregation or group, such as a project within a congregation.

  2. P-factor is for programmes and schemes. A congregation that is to become stabilised and growing needs structures.

  3. A-factor is concerned with intentionality. The way a congregation expresses itself in mission statements, and how human and financial resources can be used efficiently. Specific goals, outcomes, plans.

  4. I-factor is concerned with inclusion. How are individuals and groups drawn in and assimilated into the congregation. How are factors like power and conflict handled?

Ascent scale of a life cycle

  1. Birth – high energy levels, organised around vision, or the charisma of the founder. So many ideas bubbling up they can’t cope. The need isn’t dreams and visions but needing to broaden the congregation in order to carry them all out. People are generally very unified in a church plant, because they have all chosen to be part of the project.

  2. Infancy – time scale of this move from 1 above is hugely variable. The high quality of personal relationships matches the enthusiasm. High level of inclusion immediately. Programmes not particularly developed or thought through: this is not a problem. One or two who were present at birth may have drifted away, however. Time needs spending to develop the sense of mission. Ministries start to develop – worship team, social caring project, etc. Distinct roles and places within the church, rather than stage 1 where everyone pitches in everywhere.

  3. Adolescence – energy levels high, focussed on development of congregation. Everyone busy. Early unrealistic idealism has been curtailed. Not completely seeing eye to eye over future direction any more, although not falling out. Early leaders from stage 1 are beginning to take a less active role. The church planters are moving off to start something else. Others have been burnt out already. Paid staff may burn out. Membership still needs to be broadened to cover a range of interests and different understandings of faith.

  4. Prime – by now comparatively a large and successful congregation with strong interaction between inner and outer members. Intentional and inclusive. Still working well for newcomers who join. A number of programmes, which are organised, visible and attractive. We are pastorally caring for one another. By this stage the danger of the dominance of one or more groups has started to emerge. Youth leaders and children’s leaders may conflict, for example. Separate roles become more important than the group identity. Starting to splinter. Conflict resolution skills need to be developed in order to keep things smooth. Overall the church still moves where it’s meant to be going. Visitors from elsewhere come to see good practice. Commitment levels and financial giving are both high.

Descent scale of a congregation

  1. Maturity – hard to distinguish from ‘prime’. The movement happens as soon as the repeat of good practice is desired. Comfort zone instead of risk-taking. Maintaining high standards mean that changes start to be questioned. Still a good welcome for newcomers, but those who are a little different don’t fit in so well. Church members very busy, just not quite so enthusiastic as they were before, because they’ve been busy for a long time. Members feel important and affirmed. Corporate vision of the church, e.g., mission statements begin to develop, even though they become an exercise in navel-gazing.

  2. Aristocracy – more like a club than a church. Busy but not energetic. People enjoy coming to meet their friends. They defend their positions and territory. Status and inclusiveness can be factor. Dwindling base of support as fewer newer and younger people join. Newer and enthusiastic members are not joining. Lost sense of mission. Nobody can recite mission statement, even if it’s on all the stationery. A need to restore God’s sense of purpose through the history of the church. What was our secret in the past, and can we recapture it?

  3. Bureaucracy – people are disillusioned and the good old days are no longer sought. If loads of kids turned up we wouldn’t have the leaders. People defend status. Boundaries. People are a bit suspicious of each other – why are you doing that? Several factors induce the suspicion, but the reasons are lost in the mists of time. Structures are rigid. Hope still exist if the silent or powerless can be heard. Change is possible with new leadership (not the minister, because that post has been changing, but rather the key lay leaders).

  4. Death – the congregation is all about preserving the past or the building. The building is of great historical importance and the community would miss it if it weren’t there. Despair about the congregation’s future – it’s not going to last but it’s going to last while I’m alive. A hospice church, allowing me to live out my life of faith in ways I like until I can die with dignity. No missional impact in the community. Doesn’t mean the situation is hopeless. You can’t change the hospice church, where people are now so tired and old and can’t change that now. Alternatives for the building or mergers with other churches or circuits are considered. We kid ourselves we’re doing it for mission and growth, but we’re doing it to eke out another ten years of existence. Mergers are like two drunks staggering out of the pub at closing time, holding onto each other, but they can’t and they collapse to the ground. More chance if congregations are going to come together if all the premises are sold and something completely new built.

Reflections

  1. This may illustrate a relatively small congregation or groups and ministries within a large congregation.

  2. There is nothing inevitable about the growth or decline.

  3. It depends more on the spiritual leadership than on sociological factors.

  4. External factors, such as good or bad actions, can have a significant influence.

  5. The changes in the surrounding community are not included.

  6. Times of revival (as a God thing) are discounted in this analysis.

  7. Death is deserved if a church is apostate.

  8. What does the picture of the early church in Acts and more established congregations in Revelation 2-3 impact on this?

Bibliography

  • Bullard, G., ‘The Life Cycle Model’ www.bullardjournal.org. (2007)

  • Grundy, M., Understanding Congregations (London: Mowbray, 1998)

  • Saarinen, M. F., ‘The Life Cycle of a Congregation’ in Action Information (Alban Institute, May/June 1986)

9

Sabbatical, Day 12

Yesterday, Olivia Newton-John. Today, the Rolling Stones. Mixed emotions, that is.After breakfast today, I helped another minister lead a communion service for the college body in the chapel. She had found some excellent material in Andrew Pratt and Marjorie Dobson‘s book ‘Nothing Too Religious‘, including a powerful retelling of the institution of the Lord’s Supper that we used as a thanksgiving prayer.

An intriguing morning either side of coffee with Nick Helm, the Bishop of Sheffield’s Advisor in Spirituality. He lectured us on spiritual direction. Quite a lively debate ensued about the similarities with, and differences from pastoral care and Christian counselling. The second half was less lively, being a rather protracted history of the movement. That could have been shortened and we could have got into more meat, I think. But stimulating.

This afternoon, though, Phil Meadows once again led us into powerful and painful places, spiritually. His subject was Anabaptist Discipleship. He emphasised just how radical their rejection of infant baptism was, because it also conferred citizenship of the state. Rejecting it in favour of believers’ baptism was an act of civil disobedience. Hence, given the (unholy, in my opinion) alliance between the Magisterial Reformers and the state, vicious persecution followed. This was the first example of Protestant persecution of other believers. Phil shared with us two stories, including that of Michael Sattler. To hear the details of the persecution reduced some of us to tears: me for one. Hearing about their children just did for me.

Phil’s point was that we don’t have tongue screws attached to prevent us preaching the Gospel, so what are our metaphorical tongue screws? What things have colonised our minds and hearts to prevent us sharing the Good News, at the risk of lesser persecution? Clearly, the Anabaptists held strongly to believing that Jesus was Lord of all creation, way above all earthly rulers.

I was relieved we had a coffee break followed by the MA students having tutorials and library time. So I wandered out of college into the nearby village where I found a craft and gift shop. I shall be returning tomorrow with little presents for the family.

This evening, a session in which Stephen Skuce argued that what he called ‘evangelism in the power of the Holy Spirit’ – namely, evangelism where there is a clear demonstration of God’s power (for example, healing) – is the normative form of Christian evangelism. Another debate on that one. Nobody here seriously doubts that God can and does work in that way, but an interesting and passionate discussion about the relationship between evangelism and signs and wonders, also bringing in the question of large-scale missions versus one-to-one sharing. We covered a lot of ground.

In between all this, I seem to have earned the reputation as the techie on the course for the week. I have been in demand to help people with what to me are simple tasks, but which to others are daunting. Installing a Java update and uninstalling earlier ones for security reasons. Discussing phishing emails. That kind of stuff. I’m only too conscious of those friends who know far more about this than I do, but I’m glad if I can put my moderate knowledge of the area to use in helping others.

I shall be leaving here after coffee tomorrow. The MAs have a final question and answer session, but there’s no point in me staying to that if the consequence were to be hitting the M25 at Friday rush-hour time, so I’m looking for an earlier getaway if I can. I shall be said to leave behind the teaching and spirituality of this place and the people I’ve met. However, I’ve missed Debbie and the children, and I’m looking forward to a happy reunion.

0

Sabbatical, Day 11

First of all, a bit of techie stuff: late last night I finally succeeded in installing Ubuntu Linux in a separate partition on the hard drive of my laptop. Previously, I’ve managed to install it within Windows using ‘wubi’ on our desktop, but that PC always protested regarding a separate installation. Anyway, I saw a suitable hand-holding article in Computeractive magazine in a newsagent last week. I bought it and it came in handy yesterday evening. So now I can have some fun.

Or so I thought. Ubuntu doesn’t recognise the wireless receiver in the laptop, so I can’t connect to the Internet through it while I’m here. Windows Vista only for that task. I’ll be able to use it when connected via an Ethernet cable to our router at home. Not exactly the flexibility you hope for with a laptop, but at least there is an operating system that will to some extent substitute should Windows ever fall over or crawl in RAM.

Anyway, to change the words of Olivia Newton-John, let’s get spiritual. The lectures have been extraordinary today, right from the get-go. Phil Meadows could hardly read a quote from Samuel Chadwick at the beginning of our first session this morning without weeping. A lecture that began in prayer ended in prayer, with some overcome by the power of the Spirit. A constant theme today has been pain at people in church not receiving Gospel basics. It hasn’t been the judgmentalism of such people that can be found in some evangelical circles: it has more been an agony. And the recurring response has been that we are just as free to proclaim the Gospel as we always have been, but with it we are free to be persecuted. There is a constant historical thread that people who have initiated reform or renewal in the church have done so from the margins (how postmodern is that? If you’ve followed my Starfish and the Spider posts, you’ll have seen it recurring there) and have suffered for doing so.

After lunch we had the coffee and cakes I mentioned yesterday. I ended up sitting again with Stephen Skuce, talking about all sorts of things from family to church life to – yes, the question of a PhD again. I shared a particular misgiving I have about the idea. Not the money: we’ll pray about that if it’s right. But I’ve been deeply concerned about motivation. I don’t want to explore this if it’s just an ego trip to get more alphabet soup after my name. Stephen encouraged me that there might be a number of worthy reasons for pursuing one. I really wasn’t ready for these conversations. Suddenly these ideas are accelerating and I’m thinking ‘Oo-er’. Clearly, I shouldn’t have opened my big mouth on Monday!

Well, I’m going to draw this to a close in a moment. I’m typing this whilst taking part in a chat with three other students about children’s openness to God and other aspects of the Holy Spirit’s ministry. Also, someone wants to find the Lego Gospel on the web and have a look. There are a few possible sites she might mean: The Brick Testament, this YouTube clip

or maybe this site.

See you tomorrow.

4

Sabbatical, Day 9

They must have designed the beds here for monks. Certainly my bed kept me awake enough last night to observe night prayer at all hours. I reckon I got about three hours max. I’m typing this before an early (by my standards) night.

Three different lectures today. An Old Testament lecture that was very lively and fun, which sang from the same hymn sheet as Chris Wright. A New Testament lecture that rehearsed all the standard evangelical points about the Holy Spirit. (I spent some time looking at pictures of the children on my Facebook profile.) And a lecture on discipleship in postmodern culture that didn’t for once start from the cultural context but from a spiritual theology based on the Fathers, especially Irenaeus.

Good conversation with one of the postgrad tutors, too. We got onto my occasional desires to do a doctorate. He suggested a Doctor of Ministry course would probably not stretch me, since the dissertation would be MA level, and that’s below the MPhil I already have. He was steering me towards a PhD. Just a few problems: a research area, and wrong time ministry-wise and for our children to contemplate it right now. And money. But maybe one day.

Tonight a ‘student sharing time’, praying for one another, followed – by popular request (but from whom?) – bythe return of the ever-popular ‘fun evening’. That proved to mean a quiz night. My team came second out of four. Given that we only had three on the team and the others all had four, we think we won a moral victory! It was a bit of an effort, though, with a headache from last night’s monastic sleep.

Anyway, I’m going to lend my laptop to another student in a minute so she can check her emails, then it’s supper and bed. Night night.

4

Sabbatical, Day 8

Well, I’m here. Cliff College, that is. I had to miss church this morning to get ahead of the weather. The BBC forecast was right: sleet hit Derbyshire mid-afternoon, and it was snowing by tea-time. I got here around 4:30 pm, before it got bad.

As I thought, our daughter was distressed at n my leaving this morning. Phoning the family after I got here, she was no better. “Daddy, tell the teachers you’re leaving and come back tonight,” she pleaded. Heartstrings were well and truly yanked. I had so looked forward to getting away to study, yet this simple incident told me how much my family means to me.

On the pleasurable side of being here, it’s been good to begin making acquaintance with some of those with whom I shall share this week. Not only is the usual ‘small world of Methodism’ in operation, I have met a blogging friend for the first time. Lorna is here from Finland. I think I may be able to help another student by putting her in touch with a friend of mine.

The literature from Cliff says that wifi is available in most rooms. Unfortunately, my room is not included in ‘most’. Apart from that, the room is basic but fine for five days.

Thankfully, I can get a good wifi signal here in the Stanton Lounge (the presence of a router was a clue), and so I’m typing away while others have retreated to their rooms to prepare for tutorials and the like. There is one other person here as part of a sabbatical, but most are here to work. I’m intending to enjoy the lectures – at least when I’m not overtaken by thoughts of little Rebekah’s pleading voice, poor girl. She loves her Daddy and her Daddy loves her.

6

Sabbatical, Day 7

Just a quick post tonight as I’m busy packing for the drive to Cliff College tomorrow. The weather forecast for the Peak District tomorrow isn’t as sinister as it sounded a couple of days ago, so it looks like the trip is on after all.

By the way, if you’re in the UK, check out the new Weather Beta service on the BBC site. Much improved. You can set several favourite places, see three-hourly forecasts for them for the next twenty-four hours, and a five-day forecast. Plus you can see a video of the forecast on the relevant BBC regional news programme.

Today has had little overt sabbatical work. I took Mark to the library this morning while Debbie took Rebekah to her ballet lesson. This afternoon I took Rebekah into town while Debbie took Mark to a party.

Coming home, I went to check and pump up my tyres ready for tomorrow. Having trouble with the digital pump I have that plugs into the cigarette lighter, I borrowed Debbie’s foot pump. However, I have some kind of Midas touch, except that rather than everything I touch turning to gold, it tends to break. She has just ordered a new pump off eBay. After that, my pump more or less decided to work – well, enough to get the requisite quantities of air into every tyre.

Tonight I’ve tried to catch up on comments here on the blog, and apologies again if my replies have had to be brief. I’ve also been photographing objects Debbie wants to sell on eBay.

If you have a moment, say the odd prayer for our children. They’re not happy about me going away for five days, and aren’t used to me disappearing like this. And it’s the first of three such trips during the sabbatical. Thanks.

Hopefully the next update will be via wifi or mobile broadband from Cliff tomorrow night.

0

25 Things

I’ve been tagged by my friend Jenny Vass on this web meme. This will take a while, so I’ll type a few random things as I remember them over the day, so here goes:

1. I was born in the Salvation Army Mothers’ Hospital in Clapton, north-east London. 

2. I have a big head (I hope only literally), which made my birth distressing for my mother, and explains why my parents waited six years before having my sister.

3. I grew up in the same road that Bruce Forsyth did. Not at the same time.

4. On a school trip to Whipsnade Zoo, my mum gave me nineteen shillings in spending money. When the teacher announced we could only take seven shillings and sixpence with us, I kept quiet. I spent every last penny in the zoo gift shop. Mum was distraught: she had given me the balance of her housekeeping and had only intended the extra sum for an emergency.

5. I became best friends with my mate Jean when he joined my primary school at the age of seven. Nearly forty-two years later, we’re still friends and he was best man at my wedding.

6. Once, while Jean and I were boys, we were stopped by a van driver asking for directions. We made it all up and off he went.

7. Jean is an accomplished guitarist. We used to write songs together, even though I’m not musical.

8. When I was eight and my sister was two, she hit me over the head with my cricket bat.

9. I was the only child from my primary school to go to my secondary school.

10. I hated school, even though I did well academically. The reason? Bullying.

11. Glandular fever-like infections seriously disrupted my schooling at fourteen and fifteen, and a neck problem at eighteen. But for the neck problem, I would have read Computer Science at Imperial College, London.

12. I was a union rep for my office when I worked in the civil service.

13. I used to go to winter nets to practise with my Dad’s cricket team when I was a teenager. I didn’t know until adulthood that the men couldn’t read my spin bowling. I’d have given up quick bowling if I’d known.

14. Theological study: I had three wonderful years at Trinity College, Bristol and three terrible ones at Hartley Victoria Methodist College, Manchester. 

15. On the surface I’m all academic, theoretical and conceptual, but underneath a creative person is trying to break out. That’s why I did a creative writing course at the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity with the Association of Christian Writers in my last sabbatical, and I’m taking a photography course at Lee Abbey in this one.

16. I am left-handed, have blue eyes and have worn glasses since I was eleven.

17. My first computer was an Amstrad PCW 9512. I ditched the noisy, inflexible daisywheel printer, bought an Epson 24-pin dot matrix and installed that instead. I wrote my MPhil thesis on it. I’ve been fiddling with computers ever since. Had the neck problem not hit when I was eighteen (see 11 above), I would have done so from a younger age.

18. My first car was a hideous yellow Ford Escort with a grim gearchange. I backed it into a tree, the boot sprang open, and for a long while I held it down with a friend’s old tie (= ‘necktie’ for my north American friends).

19. I once saw Oasis before the were Oasis. They were called The Rain and were supporting Roachford at a Manchester University gig. They were rubbish. Still are.

20. Our son Mark is named after my favourite of the Four Gospels. We brainstormed four names, wrote them down, folded them up and put them into a hat for Rebekah, then a small toddler, to pick. Both of our children have middle names taken from grandparents. Mark’s is Alan after my Dad, Rebekah’s is Anita after Debbie’s late Mum. That gives both of them full initials that have something to do with flying. Rebekah is RAF; Mark is MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship). That’s a coincidence, but a nice one, since I come from an Air Force family.

21. I got into SLR photography after a mission trip to the north of Norway in 1981 when I was the only member of the party not to own a camera. Dad has been an amateur photographer as long as I can remember, and he took me to his favourite shop, City Camera Exchange by Cannon Street station in London, where I bought a Minolta XG-1.

22. I once tried to learn the guitar when a church member offered classes free of charge. As a result, I own a Fender acoustic. Unfortunately, the lessons began clashing with essential church appointments and I was unable to continue. The guitar and its electronic tuning gadget stay dormant in its case.

23. I studied Theology under George Carey. Shame he’s an Arsenal supporter.

24. I went from being a rabid teetotaller to a wine lover and now back to being teetotal. Originally, I held to a teetotal view on what I realised were legalistic grounds. Giving them up, I discovered the joys of wine. Unfortunately, medication I’m on for raised blood pressure now recommends I abstain.

25. The most serious surgery I’ve had is a pleurectomy on my left lung to prevent further recurrences of spontaneous pneumothorax. Go look it up. That’s why I inserted the links.

Right, that’s taken far too long on and off. I’m going to tag twenty-five people on Facebook, once this has uploaded to my notes there.

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