Thirty-two years ago, I sat in a minister’s study. It was Maundy Thursday, and the last session of a church membership (‘confirmation’) class. We studied the promises and professions of faith that candidates for membership had to make. First came repentance. Second came faith in Christ. Only after that, and third, came obeying Christ in the world. It was the moment the penny dropped. I found Christ. I discovered that Christianity wasn’t the mathematical sum of believing in God plus being good.

It’s now two thirds of my life away. I thank God every 9th April.

Technorati Tags: conversion, confirmation, Gospel

Well, I’m glad Holy Week is over for another year. And this time next year, I shall be on a sabbatical, so I won’t have the hassle.

Yes, that’s right, hassle. This year, more than ever, I have felt the joy of Easter sucked out of me, much as I have often lost the thrill of Christmas in the mania of a minister’s activity.

What was different this year? A number of things. One, I didn’t have any additional services, but the turn-out (apart from this morning) was disappointing. I work just has hard for a small congregation as for a large one, but when it persistently happens, something can get to me. So, having had only five for Christmas Eve (four of us were on duty), there were five Methodists at the ecumenical Maundy Thursday service at the parish church, and nine at our Good Friday evening meditation (six for tea beforehand).

Actually, there was one additional event, at which I was required to mingle but not lead: we had a Messy Church afternoon on Tuesday. I also took a large funeral on Wednesday.

Two, yesterday was our daughter’s fifth birthday. On the day, it was a wonderful occasion. Rebekah was immaculately behaved, kind and sensitive. However, preparing for that during the week largely fell on my wife, because I was consumed with Holy Week. She got frustrated with me, and I got stressed with her.

Three, there were some other personal things to fit in on Maundy Thursday. I had to see the nurse for the latest appointment about my blood pressure. My new glasses – much needed – were also ready for pick-up that morning. I went in first thing, and then my car broke down in town. Thankfully, the RAC turned up far quicker than the two and a half hours their call centre guy estimated, and the patrol man solved the problem in less than five minutes.

Four, in all the production line of service preparation at this time of year (and it hadn’t been possible to do any in advance), I had to miss certain things I would have wished to have been at. Ministers always have to make such decisions, but this year I felt I had to miss things that could have recharged my batteries. One was my New Wine network meeting. The other was Churches Together in Chelmsford’s annual Good Friday open air service. It’s the first time in my adult life I’ve missed a united Good Friday service. But I needed more preparation time.

Five, the other thing about the non-stop service preparation is that your thoughts are operating proleptically, and you can miss the important time frame of Holy Week, and walking each step with Jesus, which is a helpful spiritual discipline. Like chain stores preparing for Christmas at the end of the summer, writing Easter Day sermons when you want to be thinking about Jesus’ trial or his time in the tomb, means missing helpful spiritual disciplines.

Having described that, you will see it wasn’t as though I underwent any personal tragedies. It was a cumulative effect. I didn’t look forward to Easter Day this year: rather, I just couldn’t wait to get it over and done.

I don’t have any neat solutions. They may come, they may not. The best I can do upon early reflection at this stage is to think back to the Gospel story of when the woman with the haemhorrage touched Jesus’ garment. ‘Who touched me?’ he asks. The disciples tell him that’s a silly question when the crowds are pressing in on him. But Jesus knows someone has touched him, because power (‘virtue’ in the AV) has gone out of him.

Right now, I feel like power has gone out of me, and I suspect it has for thousands of church leaders tonight. I’m not so silly as to think I’m unique. Having led our people to the risen Christ and prepared for that ahead of time, now after the event we need to find him ourselves. If we are truly blessed with grace, he will come looking for us before we find him. If you are as shattered as I am, may he come looking for you, too.

Technorati Tags: Easter, HolyWeek, ministry, MessyChurch, MaundyThursday, GoodFriday, EasterDay, NewWine

And not next week, either. I began a week’s leave today (albeit with a funeral in the middle), so I didn’t have to write anything for today. Next Sunday, when I come back on duty, I’m leading in the morning with an Anglican vicar friend preaching. Then, in the evening, I’m helping out at café church while a Local Preacher leads. Next sermon is therefore due for Palm Sunday.

Technorati Tags: sermon

When I was a child, our parents couldn’t afford much. But we
did have Scalextric. We only had a
modest track, but there was pure boyhood delight in racing with our Lotus or
our green Jaguar. Uncle Frank and my cousins might have filled an unused double
garage with a train set, but those trains couldn’t speed like racing cars.

Other families at church had bigger sets than us, and every
year we put them all together. We did so at the annual church bazaar. It was
our church’s way of keeping the kids happy while Mum and Dad spent money. We filled
a whole room with an amazing set-up. Who needs someone dressing up as Father
Christmas when you have Scalextric?

It lasted until my mid-teens. Dad and I got interested in
Proper Hi-Fi. We wanted to replace our music centre with something decent. We
sold the Scalextric to raise some money. I remember the night the advert
appeared in the free paper. Two families sped to get to our house first and buy
it. I haven’t played with Scalextric since.

But three Christmases ago, I told Debbie it would be great
to have a set for when our children (then 21 months and four months) were
older. She thought I was dropping a hint, and so my Christmas present in 2004
was a Micro
Scalextric kit. But I wasn’t hint dropping. We stored it until the children
were old enough.

Two days ago, I got it in from the garage. Last night,
before bedtime, I assembled it. As if to enhance the retro/nostalgia mood,
Debbie had tuned into UKTV
Gold, who were showing highlights of Morecambe
and Wise. I was having my own retro moment, though. It was not so much that
I was a five-year-old again. I was my father. I was doing something he had done
for me.

In the nearly five years since Rebekah had to be prised out of
Debbie’s womb by emergency Caesarean (she was enjoying the Cadbury’s Crème Eggs
too much), I have done many things for her and Mark that my father did for me. Buying
groceries, paying utility bills, washing and bathing, changing Technicolor nappies,
reading. You name it, I’ve done it. I’ve eschewed superintendent ministry,
partly because I don’t want to be an absentee Dad, having become a father later
than most.

But last night I was
my father. Last night, I lived within my skin the fatherly love he showed for
me as a child. I felt the satisfaction of putting the track together. And since
I am the world’s most impractical man, that achievement was a real pleasure. I felt
the frustration as crash barriers on the bends refused to clip on properly. (That’s
more like me.) I felt the anticipation of knowing that two little monkeys would
come downstairs this morning and see the track, the cars and the controllers. I
prepared for them sending the cars too fast, so that they unintentionally flew
off at corners.

I wasn’t disappointed. Rebekah was up before any of us. We didn’t
hear her creep downstairs in her pyjamas. Where did she learn creeping, then? But
we did hear her call up to us her delight at seeing the track. The cars did fly
off sometimes, but not as frequently as I had expected. She and Mark successfully
drove the cars around the circuit at a far greater speed than I expected them
to manage. (What will they be like when we finally cave into a gaming console?)
I had to solve problems when the cars refused to work. To my surprise, I was
successful. I guess Dad was, too, when something went wrong all those years
ago.

To walk this small way in my Dad’s shoes is a great
privilege. It’s a spiritual discipline, too, to walk in someone else’s shoes. There
are several analogies. We do so in empathy for the hurting. We use holy
imagination in spiritual exercises such as Ignatian Bible reading. We risk joy
and pain in wanting a small glimpse of the
Father’s ways. Last night, it was enough to feel like (my now 80-year-old) Dad.

Technorati Tags: Scalextric, UKTVGold, MorecambeAndWise, IgnatianBibleReading, fatherhood

In early December Brant Hansen posted
a powerful, honest account of his struggle with depression and the challenge to
his faith that he takes a drug, which has altered his personality for the
better. How is Jesus ‘enough’, he asks, if he needs his medication?

There are spiritual-common-sense answers to his questions.
Firstly, Jesus is enough, but the way he supplies the ‘enough’ is through what
Calvin (yes, this Arminian is going to quote Calvin positively!) called ‘common
grace’. That is, God sends the sun on the righteous and the unrighteous. The
general blessings of his creation are available to all. Properly prescribed and
taken prescription drugs are surely part of this. Healing comes as much through
the medical profession as directly in answer to prayer, and is not inferior for
that.

Secondly, depression and other conditions such as anxiety
state are just as much medical conditions as a fractured leg, especially if
they are caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. It’s hard to induce that
by some kind of moral or spiritual negligence or wilfulness. Yet the stigma
remains for many.

Thirdly, and implied in this, we need to distinguish between
prescription drugs and recreational drugs. Being ‘on drugs’ is very different
if a doctor has said we need them for our healing.

So far, so uncontroversial, I expect, for most readers of
this blog. I don’t expect any of you would have given the hassle to Brant he
received when he talked about this on the radio: you know, the ‘not enough
faith’, ‘not living in victory’, ‘satanic attack’ clichés. Why write about it? I’ve never been diagnosed with depression, as
Brant has.

But it makes some
connections for me. My father was diagnosed with depression. He had to take
early retirement as a result. What I did have, in 1995, was six weeks signed
off ministry with stress. My first two years in the ministry were spent dealing
with an awful situation with unsuitable children’s workers, before all the
child protection laws and rules came into full force. I lived under threats of
violence. I was watched. There were anonymous phone calls at all times of day
and night. Much else, too. After putting that struggle to bed, there was a
nasty struggle in the church over worship styles. Then I had a broken
engagement. Finally, I cracked. After much resistance and receiving reassurance,
I ended up on beta-blockers. They gave my body space to recover.

Yet I still had big
questions about my experience and my faith. Surely if God didn’t allow us to
face more than we can cope with, given his presence in our lives, the fact that
I was issued with doctor’s certificates with the words ‘Anxiety state’ meant my
faith had failed?

There are other
connections, too. No, I don’t suffer from depression, but anyone who knows me well
sees the occasional periods when dark moods and an almost disabling lack of
confidence sweep over me for short periods. Some would say that isn’t much of a
testimony. When my head is together, I know I can point to heroes of the faith
who have been through the same: Jeremiah, Luther, William Cowper and others. I
tend to forget that when I’m down.

And Brant’s
experience came back to mind last Monday. A much lower scale than his, again,
though – I must emphasise that. Early this year, it was discovered I had
slightly raised blood pressure. The doctor told me to get more exercise. I’ve
failed to do so. I went to see the practice nurse about something else two
weeks ago, and she noticed I’d never been back about the BP. My readings are
now a bit higher than they were at the start of the year. Action needs to be
taken. We talked about the stress in 1995 and my tendency to panic first and
reach equilibrium later. We talked about family medical history. And guess
what? It’s beta-blocker time again. The hope is, they might give me a calmer
personality and lead to a lower BP.

During the
appointment, the questions came back – from the nurse. She asked very nicely,
why I as a person of faith had these difficulties. Surely, I shouldn’t be like
this when I had the comfort of expecting an afterlife. I replied that I had the
same questions, too. The best I could do off the top of my head was to say that
yes, some Christians do have a serene faith. Others of us are like some of the
psalmists who rant at God and then calm down. I was more like them. I don’t
know whether that is a valid answer, or just a bit of self-justification.
Perhaps I should have more faith (= trust).

After the
consultation, and waiting for my tablets at the pharmacy, I read a few pages of
Tim Keel’s wonderful
book Intuitive Leadership. It seems I had arrived at some pages that
made some unintentional connections with my experience. He talks about leaders
not only giving spoken words but also being living words (pp 232-4). ‘The
person of God hosts the word of God and there is a cost to be paid,’ he writes.
I connected this with a conversation at a recent ministers’ meeting. We got
onto the subject of pressure. I related my 1995 story of stress, and the
unanswered questions I had about it. One friend replied that he thought my
stress constituted the carrying of the cross for me. It was my suffering for
doing the right thing. That insight came as revelation and relief to me. Keel
seems to be saying something similar.

In the next
section, when talking about leaders transitioning from ‘preparation’ to ‘meditation’
on the Scriptures, Keel writes about Elijah. I think this is worth a fuller
quote:

Elijah, serving God
at a time of enormous confusion in the identity of Israel, opposes Ahab and
Jezebel and their altar to Baal. At first, it seems that his labours have paid
off: the offering of Yahweh is consumed by fire while Baal’s priests work
themselves into a frenzy that ultimately goes nowhere. But when his work does
not result in the end that he had anticipated and Jezebel issues an edict to
kill the prophet, he flees for his life. When he finally collapses, he finds
himself on a sheer cliff burrowed in a small mountain cave. All of his
preparation and work have amounted to very little, and in his despair, he hides
himself away. You know the story. You have probably lived it. It is in this
very hollow of desperation that the hallowed voice of God comes to Elijah. It
is in this place that Elijah learns he had not nearly comprehended the scope of
God’s power or intent. It is to a servant of Yahweh emptied of his own agenda
and strength that revelation comes. (pp 236-7)

God meets Elijah in
his time of extreme stress. He feeds him. He lets him sleep. He encourages him
quietly. He gives him someone to help him with the next stage of his witness.

Some of my most
dramatic experiences of the Holy Spirit were around my 1995 stress. Admittedly,
that was when the Toronto Blessing was big news, but as I look back, I don’t
think it was a coincidence that God most clearly made himself known to me at a
down time. Could it be that God is kinder to the stressed or depressed than we
are? None of that absolves me from the need to exercise as part of my cure, but
maybe – just maybe – God is gracious, and he doesn’t go in for the ‘Pull
yourself together nonsense’ that is still prevalent inside and outside the
church.

Technorati Tags: BrantHansen, stress, depression, Calvin, Luther, Jeremiah, WilliamCowper, TimKeel, Elijah, TorontoBlessing

This morning, I preached for church anniversary back at the main church I served during my first appointment in the ministry. It’s frightening to think I began there fifteen years ago. I ought to know what I’m doing by now! But maybe it’s good to feel that you don’t know what you’re doing.

Preaching as a visitor is so different from regular preaching in the church(es) you are serving at present. My wife commented on the way home that my whole style and demeanour were different. Returning as a visitor, I enjoyed seeing old friends and was delighted to see several faces who were new to me.

But it was different when I was their minister for five years. Then, I had to participate in the struggles and battles of that church. My preaching in that atmosphere didn’t have the liberty it seemed to have today. This morning, I could return as an ‘outsider’ and say things I am saying regularly here, but without the ongoing work to transform thinking and attitudes that accompany it in leadership. When I was at that church, we had some terrible things to face. An awful problem with the children’s work consumed my first two years, and took a huge toll on me. Problems over the style of music soon followed. I stood up for what I believed, but ended up having six weeks off with stress, three years into the appointment.

Today, on the other hand, was full of laughter. There was a buzz about the place. Even the challenges ended up being set in a relaxed atmosphere as we grappled with two hymns the congregation didn’t know. Their ability to laugh together was beautiful.

It was a particular joy to see the number of children and teenagers present. That work had been decimated at the time when the crisis I mentioned two paragraphs ago really blew up. Looking at them today, it felt like all the pain of those five years was worth it. Seeds had been sown, and had grown.

Likewise, I was delighted to hear that some still remembered what I preached about five years ago, when I previously returned to take a church anniversary, and how some of that thinking has fed into their future plans.

Now I pray that the times of struggle that occur in the current appointment will one day also bear fruit.

Thank you to my old friends for a wonderful time sharing in worship, and for the lunch and all the conversations.

Technorati Tags: church, ministry