42

Datasoul - Free Open Source Church Presentation Software

What a nice surprise. I have been doing some setup on a replacement laptop (after much abuse all 3 USB ports have given up on my old laptop which is a big problem for mobile internet access, presentation remotes, external hard disks and cameras).

Anyway I decided to have another look for free software for Church services (I can't yet find my SongPro CD and anyway would prefer to use open and free software, plus it helps if it runs on Linux).

Anyway, good news. I found Datasoul - Free Open Source Church Presentation Software. It is already excellent, written in Java and immediately ran on my new Dell Laptop running 64bit Linux as well as on Windows.

I have spent the last couple of days exchanging emails with Samuel and Jean-Philippe with some ideas for making it work a little better for our small Churches (Samuel is in Brazil in a Church of 4,000 so has rather more complex needs than the Churches of 40+ that I serve).

I have already been able to download the source code and start making some sense of it. Java coding has changed a huge amount in the several years since I did any (especially when it comes to designing forms in Netbeans - wow!). So the learning curve is a bit steep.

I am very hopeful that I'll be able to use it for services very soon (my needs relate to not usually having an operator and so needing to move through the whole service using a remote presenter with next and previous buttons. I think it is going to be great for several of our churches and of course the fact it is free software produced by a worshipping congregation is very attractive too.

There are some really nice features of Datasoul that are better than the commercial stuff I have found in the past.

• One is the very simple text files used for service plans which are self contained and so contain all the song words.making it much easier to move them between machines.
• Another is the way a song can be changed, either in the library for all future uses or in just this service (eg miss a verse out).
• The interface is very simple and straightforward so it is really easy to use (and from our conversations going to get better too).

This is a great find and I am really excited about it. If there are any other Java programmers in your churches who would might like to get involved that would be fantastic and your Church could then get something really good at the best price.

Good reasons for a big car

While I frequently wonder if we could manage with a smaller car today reminds me why it can be useful.

The whole family have just been helping me load the car with donated food, toiletries and clothes for the Whitechapel Mission. At 4am in the morning I am taking a very full car with 4 volunteers and all this stuff down to London so that we can cook around 150 breakfasts for people who are homeless.

Despite the enormous size of the back of a Citroen C8 we still did not manage to fit everything in. No matter, we are going again in December and January.

As usual finding volunteers for a 4am start is very hard. Hard because so many want to volunteer that I have to turn them away. Again we have a mixture of those who have been before and some who are new. I love it when people discover the huge joys in serving others.

Within the Church so many people have found this a really significant point of change or awakening that it has opened many eyes to the needs that we are so frequently told do not exist (and that most people believe should not exist).

Should be back home for around 1pm.

Note that despite the efforts of the Nene Valley Circuit the Whitechapel Mission always need more stuff and there are always opportunities for volunteers. The page of stuff they need was updated tonight so I was pleased to see that we have loaded some of the things labelled "We are desperate!!" and "We need Help!".

Exciting Churches: Wollaston Methodist

A few weeks go I wrote 42: Exciting Churches: Raunds Methodist. One reaction was from David Matthias in The Road to "Elder" ado: Exciting Churches in which he wrote

Dave Warnock is excited about his Church, which is great to see.

Of course Raunds is only one of the Churches for which I have pastoral charge (Methodist speak for being the minister). So, being a pedantic person - when it suits me :-) - I wanted to point out that a) no Church is "my" Church in a possesive way and b) "my" other 4 Churches (Irthlingborough, Old Weston, Thrapston and Wollaston) are also exciting. So I guess I get five times more excitement than David does.

In fact I could even argue that as Methodist Ministers are appointed to Circuits (in my case the Nene Valley Circuit) not specific Churches that I get either 12 or 15 times more excitement (the difference depends on whether you count Churches or distinct congregations).

Anyway, enough randon rambling.

Today I want to share some of the excitement of a small village chapel. Now I know that many people do not think that a small village chapel can be exciting. So let me tell you about Wollaston Chapel.

Wollaston is a village just south of Wellingborough, there are four Church traditions in the village (Baptist, CoE & Salvation Army as well as the Methodist). They all work closely together and have different strengths.

When I say that Wollaston Methodist Chapel is pretty traditional in Worship style and in the rest of it's life many will dismiss it as boring, irrelevant or dying. In fact it is none of things. Instead it has chosen to be unfashionable in order to serve people in the village that might otherwise be missed.

So Wollaston Methodist Church has deliberately chosen to serve the elderly of the village. It has done a lot of preparation for this over the years. For example in making the premises attractive, safe and easy to access for the elderly (and in the process made them very effective for others too such as the uniformed organisations who use them regularly). But this is not a Church that understands mission as providing a building. Instead they are incredibly active in all aspects of the Methodist calling : Worship, Evangelism, Learning & Caring, and Service.

Beyond the Sunday worship there is a large Wesley Guild meeting every Monday evening (well over 40 when I was there last). On Tuesdays there is a Bible Study group and on Thursdays the Church is open for quiet prayer followed by either a lunch or a Womens Fellowship (alternate weeks).

Then there is the long list of events, most of which are carefully tailored to the target age range.

For example tonight there was a tea at 4pm followed by a concert. There were over 90 guests at the tea plus the "staff". The numbers were made manageable by setting a minimum age of 70 (there is a repeat on Monday night for anyone younger).  So far as I could see it would have been pretty much impossible to fit any more in the hall. The team were clearly well practiced at serving and clearing away with no fuss and great speed.

One tea was over most guests went downstairs to the chapel to sing their favourite hymns while the team cleared away all the tables, set out the chairs, built the stage (it needed to be folded away to fit so many in for tea) and then got into their costumes - all done amazingly quickly, downstairs we were still in full swing with favourite hymns when all was ready. (Note that depite having an upstairs and downstairs we also have level access to front and rear depending on whether you enter from the High Street or College Street).

The concert itself was ideally suited to the audience, there were loads of songs they knew. Plus a comedy duo (certain Church Stewards were seen in a very new light) and a set of songs from Oliver performed by children (children playing the childrens roles is what I mean). Afterwards the Church organised lifts home for anyone who wanted one.

Over the next few weeks it seems that barely a week goes by without a special event for the community organised by Wollaston Methodist Church, in them all they make sure that the good news is proclaimed and lived out.

Beyond all this the Chapel is also very active in world mission with collections for many places, plus a team goes to Croatia every year (late Nov/early Dec). They also make sure to invite speakers and preachers from a wide range of mission agencies to learn and offer prayer and practical support.

So in the morning when I am leading traditional worship and preaching at Wollaston I will do so as someone who is excited to be part of this Christian community living the gospel in the village of Wollaston.

Biblical Manhood and the lost gospels

I feel it is a abiout time for a rant. I have not had a good rant for a while. So when I read CBMW » The Gospel and Biblical Manhood and Womanhood it got the blood pressure up and I prepared to write while the steam was still coming out of my ears. However, since then time has passed and I am now writing this at a little distance from the initial reaction.

I am grateful that others have already responded and encourage you to read The Gender Debate – a Gospel Debate? - a Church by Dave Woolcott.

I so often find that beyond my concern for justice and the Kingdom of God that it is the poor tactics and the poor use of scripture that really gets to me when I read articles like this one. So here are a few challenges to the article:

• John Starke writes:

A good question to ask in order to gauge the importance of an issue is, "How closely related is this issue to the Gospel?"

Well yes, I would not argue with that. But what Gospel is it that we are talking about? The entire article is based on Ephesians. Now I love Ephesians, a fantastic letter for encouraging Churches. But to imply that "Ephesisans = The Gospel" is plainly ridiculous. If we are going to decide if something is important and consider how related it is to the gospel then it is more than a little odd to not refer to any of the four gospels at all. Or to the rest of Scripture. This is a strange beast, neither a Bible Study on Ephesians nor a full Gospel based examination of an issue.

• If we are going to refer to the Gospel (the Good News of Christ) then personally I want to hear more about Jesus. I want some theology that refers to the teaching of Jesus and to who Jesus is (the article has a low Christology - Jesus as fully divine is never recognoised except very obliquely).

• If we are going to use Ephesians then let us do so by recognising that this is not a letter to individuals but to a Christian Community, a Church (or more than one). This post individualises Christian faith, it makes it about individual men and women rather than about Christian communities (Churches) and Christian households (families). This individualisation puts a very different perspective on every issue including gender. Paul is writing about a household as he knew it. That does not match a Western understanding of an individual man and woman with or without 2.3 kids. Anything that tries to apply Paul's writing without any consideration of cultural differences is trvialising Scripture, not engaging with it.
• If we are going to use Ephesians then let us be sure to pick up some of the significant themes. Dave Woolcott points out that John Starkey ignores the demand for unity that is so powerful in Ephesians. Given that unity stands against the division of people and communities then it hardly supports the case for dividing people based on gender, maybe no surprise that this theme seems to be missing fcroim John Starkey's Bible.
• If we are going to use Scripture then let us be careful to not pick and choose and ignore verses that challenge our simplisitc viewpoint. It is therefore hugely significant that Ephesians 5: 21 "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." (TNIV) gets missed out. Instead the whole argument is built upon verses that follow and depend on the very verse 21 that is carefully ignored - Oops!

Finally the biggest failing of the argument and one that totally destroys the whole cae being presented comes in the last paragraph which I quote in full:

Second, a central concern of Paul in all his letters, especially Ephesians, is not only Gospel clarity, but also how the Gospel applies to the Christian life. If we have confusion as to how men and women ought to act and fulfill divinely intended roles in the Church, marriage, and family, then there will be confusion as to how to apply the Gospel to the Christian life. As we see in Ephesians 5, God has particular applications of his Gospel that are gender specific. If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application.

Remember this is the edited version of the section that starts in Ephesians chapter 5 no mutual submission). He writes "If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application."
Hold onto that  for a second.

Now go back to Ephesians 5 & 6 and review the other forms of submission that it requires.

6⁵ Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. ⁶ Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. ⁷⁸Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, because you know that the Lord will reward each one of you for whatever good you do, whether you are slave or free.

Does anyone believe that we should tell slaves to obey their earthly masters? Does anyone believe that today the gospel is better served by telling slaves not to rebel and seek freedom but to serve wholeheartedly? Should we be telling girls trafficed for msex today that they should obey thgeir earthly masters. Should we condone and support such trade on the grounds of Ephesians 6. Of course not. Yet the need for women to submit to men is taken from the very same section as the one for slaves to obey their masters. How can we treat the two differently?

John Starkey writes: "If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application." But we have already lost the master/slave specificity and would anyone dare claim we have lost a divinely intended Gospel application.

In fact far more than that. We came to realise through using the whole of the Gospel of Christ - in particular the example and teaching of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God - that to not condemn slavery was to deny and damage the Gospel of Christ. In the light of Ephesians 5:21 to continue to demand submission for women after after rejecting it for slaves is unsupportable.

Hat tip: Role Calling: The Gospel and Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.

Blog Action Day 2009: Climate Change

It seems appropriate on Blog Action Day 2009: Climate Change to report on one of my meetings at Methodist Church House yesterday.

I met with the very recently appointed Carbon Reduction Policy Officer and I was very impressed and excited. I learnt loads about how we can measure our footprint and how we can cost effectively make a significant reduction.

I got a real buzz from seeing the Church responding to Conference initiatives by appointing someone who is highly qualified, very committed and who has hit the floor running. This looks like an area where there is a real possibility of the Methodist Church taking decisive and effective action.

Very encouraging

maggi dawn: The Busy Pastor

In The Busy Pastor Maggi includes this quote:

"The adjective busy set as a modifier to pastor should sound to our ears like adulterous to characterize a husband, or embezzling to describe a banker. It is an outrageous scandal, a blasphemous affront..."

and then writes

I read this today in Eugene H Peterson's The Contemplative Pastor. It's an excellent book. If you are too busy and run off your feet, buy it right now, take the afternoon off and read it. The busier you are, the more you need to read it.

I have taken the advice (at least part way) and ordered the book.

It is of course being busy that has stopped me blogging over the last few weeks. Not blogging and not reading blogs has been a spot of self protection by trying to make sure I had time for more important things. Not always successful but a worthwhile attempt.

Anyway this week has been planned to be rather lighter. I have some gaps in the diary and will hopefully get quite a bit of writing done. Maybe I'll even do a bit of blogging (they idea of blogging about maybe doing some blogging always makes me smile a little).

Exciting Churches: Raunds Methodist

In 42: Drowning in excitement I wrote

I am going to write separately about what is happening in the Churches as it is really exciting and there is a lot to say.

So here I am writing about some of the reasons why I find Raunds Methodist Church exciting.

WOT (Worship on Thursday)

We are now starting our 4th year of WOT and the numbers continue to grow. We now have 40 on the list with around 30 each week with ages from pre-school to mid 80's.

We meet every week during school terms opening from just after 3pm until 6pm (we just about manage to get cleared up before the Scouts arrive for 7pm). If you can't get to WOT on time then no problem you can join us at any point in the afternoon.

Our programme is unashamedly Christian. Every week we have a theme from the Bible, all the games and crafts (for all ages) relate to that theme and we worship together before we eat a proper hot meal.

As WOT is so popular we can only properly care for a limited number of unaccompanied children, if you come without an adult it is on a first come, first served basis with the total depending on the number of trained and CRB checked adults available.

WOT has become a caring and supportive community, something that has been wonderful to see.

There is no charge for WOT. It is supported entirely through the generosity of Church members.

Kitchen

We confess that we love food. So we are delighted that we have now opened our fully refurbished kitchen (all stainless steel with all the gadgets like dishwasher). Already it is used to cook for 30 each week at WOT and over 50 for Sunday lunch (2nd Sunday of the month at 12:30pm).

Sunday Worship

We love worshipping together, we often lose track of time - don't expect us to watch the clock and finish in an hour. We have a worship band who play regularly and love contemporary worship, but we also have more traditional (but still very informal and welcoming worship) on other weeks. Our focus is on God's grace (celebrating that all are loved and welcomed by God) and on the call to follow Jesus (working out together what that means today).

Life

Raunds Methodist Church has a very active life as we explore and live out the love of God for all. Lots of food, small groups, prayer, study & service.

Excitement for Dave

It is not just what is happening but the way it happens, the attitudes and especially the presence and power of the living God that makes it so exciting to serve this Church. God is at work and we love it!!

Drowning in excitement

It has been a long time since I last posted. In fact I have not just been behind on posting I have also got way behind on reading blogs, facebook and twitter.

However, this is not the result of boredom. Instead life has been both full and exciting with no energy left over. I want to share some of the things that have been keeping me busy.

In my personal life in this new year (Methodist and School) two changes are significant. Jane has a new position as a teaching assistant, that means more hours but also means we get a day off together which we did not have last year. Very nice it is too. Secondly, our youngest son has just started secondary school, that changes a number of dynamics in the family.

In work terms there have been lots of changes too.

• Our circuit has a new superintendent and it is his first superintendency.
• This August we have moved from 4 to 3 ministers in the Circuit
• I am now responsible for an additional two churches while dropping one. So in alphabetical order I am the minister for Irthlingborough, Old Weston, Raunds, Thrapston and Wollaston. Fortunately Wollaston has a very capable Lay Worker which makes a big difference.
• I am now on the Methodist Council as Northampton District Representative, the first meeting is Monday and Tuesday next week in London. Still ploughing through the 160 pages of agenda items.
• As a result of being the District Council Representative I have found myself on the District Executive Committee.
• A number of the elements of our Circuits Vision are really starting to kick in now. Among them is my role as Circuit Worship & Fresh Expressions Enabler.

Beyond these things there is another work related change on the horizon. My 5 year appointment to the Nene Valley Circuit ends in August 2010. We decided not to seek an extension and so will be moving next August. Please note that there will be no discussion here of potential stations. All the Churches in the circuit were informed several weeks ago. This was a hard decision but we believe that it is the right thing for the Circuit and for our family. It will be hard to leave so many friends and wonderful churches but on the other hand leaving would only get harder if we stay longer.

I am going to write separately about what is happening in the Churches as it is really exciting and there is a lot to say.

Greenbelt update

Having a great weekend. Far too busy to blog. Some great talks, great meetings with friends, great coffee and food.

Currently learning about intersex conditions. Eye opening.

More talks planned, more friends to meet plus a big book shop visit.

Greenbelt 2009 - Arrival

Today (Friday) we arrived at Cheltenham Racecourse for Greenbelt. This year we were organised better. We came away on Monday for a few days holiday in the Cotswolds first, so today we only had a 30 minute drive. Hence, we got on the campsite much earlier.

We are part of a 30+ group of old friends, family and a large group from our circuit - more than 10 tents, 1 caravan (yes that is us living in luxury again) and a motorcaravan. So it was handy to be here early to keep enough space for everyone.

Lots of improvements again at Greenbelt. Here are some we have noticed so far:

• drainage for the taps on the camping field. Should reduce the mud a lot.
• better layout of festival, more venues and more space between
• more camping space
• wider paths between the different festival areas
• better traffic management
• less intrusive but still effective fire wardens (with good sense of humour)

Just one negative. If you have 11 or 12 year old children then while they are welcome at the youth events and free to come and go  they have the same colour armbands as the 4 to 10 year olds. We have experienced over this some confusion with stewards, they are rightly watching out for younger children who are lost or who have been inappropriately left to wander alone. Anyway we have talked with a youth event manager and the head of Greenbelt Child Protection about the confusion experienced. They were helpful, kind, friendly and very professional in their response.

Managed a couple of talks this evening. A excellent speaker Dilwar Hussein on "Can you be British and a Muslim", pity there were not more people there. Also Dave Tomlinson on "Church without borders" good stuff if not very new or challenging (at least in terms of where I would want to be - getting there is a different matter).

Bumped into lots of friends. So hi to John & Mary, my cousin Mark & Rosemary, Pete & Catherine (only texted meeting so far), Kevin (hoping to see Mimo, Peter & Mpalo later) also to Anna who is not on the Methodist stand but on the themedianet.org stand. Lots of others who I know are here and will see later.

If you are at Greenbelt leave a message and I will happily pass you my mobile number to arrange to meetings.

Bible Study responding to a Shane Claiborne Challenge

Tonight we took two quotes from Shane Claiborne as a challenge for out Bible Study. The idea came from a blog post by Bishop Willian Willimon: A Peculiar Prophet: Claiborne’s Call to Young Christians.

In it he had a collection of quotes from Shane Claiborne. Two stood out for me at the moment:

"Most good things have been said far too many times and just need to be lived."

“I need to be born again,…. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the Kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy, too. But I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."

So we used the Bible Study to evaluate our Church and selves by these criteria.

As a starting point we took the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew chapters 5, 6 & 7). That seemed a straighforward way to get a wide collection of the teaching of Jesus in an amount we could handle(ish) in an evening.

We went through point by point (taking the TNIV headings as points - that made 19 excluding the beatitudes) for each we had a short discussion before awarding out Church a score (0-5) for how visibly taught this passage was in our Church and then another score (again 0-5) for how much action took place in our discipleship based on this passage.

I left the beatitudes til last as I suspected we would run out of time if we started with them and sure enough we ran out of time so did not get back to them.

We found it a challenging way to explore the quotes from Shane ie the extent to which we highlight some of the teaching of Jesus while ignoring other bits  and how much we actually live out the teaching.

We are going to come back to this to look at how we can respond to the lower scores.

Advice to Complementarians

As any regular readers will be only too aware I am generally not considered a complementarians (that is male headship supporter to the rest of us) best friend.

So I thought I would change this with some excellent advice. Two bits of advice in fact.

Advice 1. Protection

This is simple. Do not engage in a debate on complementarianis, (male headship) with a woman. You think it will be easy because in your universe women are not allowed to teach men. You are wrong. You stand a great chance of being totally decimatated.

Sadly for him Mike Seaver of Role Calling did not get this advice in time. Sadly for him he did not do his research before entering in a debate with Cheryl Schatz of Women in Ministry. If he had then he might have realised how knowledgable and skilled Cheryl is despite being a woman. He might then have realised that he was out of his depth. But he didn't.

So the first four parts of their debate are now available. Each part can be read on either blog, but Cheryl has collected many more comments which are worth reading.

• Part 1 on Role Calling and on Women in Ministry
• Part 2 on Role Calling and on Women in Ministry
• Part 3 on Role Calling and on Women in Ministry
• Part 4 on Role Calling and on Women in Ministry
  

The series so far is worth reading to see how gently but consistantly Cheryl demolishes Mike's arguments using Scripture leaving him floundering in a sea of vagueness.

Advice 2. Closed blogs don't protect.

Mike has a policy of strict moderation on his blog. He describes it as:

1. Please comment! But know that all comments will be approved and possibly edited by me. 2. I won't be able to respond to many comments, but look forward to conversations developing and good resources being recommended. 3. I may not post your comment and simply answer it in a later post. 4. I may delete it altogether if an attitude, recommendation, or resource isn't something I think will be helpful to readers. This is a public forum, but one that seeks to promote the worship and glory of Jesus Christ both in content and attitude. Thanks!

He means it. Disagree with him and it is unlikely your comment will ever appear. This attempts to protect the sensitive men who read "Role Calling" from arguments that might demolish their bubble of superiority. But by the very nature of the internet such protection is useless. The open comments on Chreyl's posts are a good example.

So the advice is. You can't protect yourself from the truth. Don't try to close your blog to comments or feel that you can control things through moderation. The truth will get published elsewhere. Those who disagree won't disappear simply because you edit their comments or don't have comments. Instead the word will spread.

Conclusion

Don't take the advice very seriously. But read the posts to be reminded that complementarianism & male headship is built on sand and that sand cannot hold against knowledgeable debate. To paraphrase Dad's Army - "you are all doomed!"

I love Muslims in the NHS

The video from Fox I have watched at clayboy » All go mad on health care made me really, really angry.

Two people who ought to be in jail for racism made horrible accusations about Muslim Doctors in the UK. They equated being a Muslim to being a terrorist and descibed the NHS as a breeding ground for terrorism.

In my post 42: We love the NHS I wrote about the double bypass surgery my Mother-in-Law had at Glenfield Hospital in Leicester.

Now consider this Leicester: Ethnicity profile.

Leicester is widely predicted, within the next five years, to become the first city in Europe with a majority non-white population. Nowhere else in Britain has proportionally fewer White British residents. According to the 2001 census, only 60.5% of the city's residents described themselves in this way.

In numerical terms, Leicester has just over 100,000 ethnic minority residents out of a total population of 280,000. The Indian population in Leicester, numbering over 72,000, is by far the largest outside London. Indians form the bulk of the total Asian population (84,000), and make up one in four of all Leicester residents. Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, however, are represented only slightly above the national average, in proportional terms. The city also has over 5,500 residents who ticked the Asian Other box in the 2001 Census; many of these are likely to be Kenyan and Ugandan Asians who fled from east Africa during the 1960s and 1970s.

In some parts of inner-city Leicester, white people are ethnic minorities. The Latimer ward has the smallest white population outside London; 83% of the population are from other ethnic groups (74% are Indian). Indian people form an overasll majority in three other wards: Belgrave (63% Indian), Spinney Hills (60%) and Rushey Mead (53%).

Although ten times less numerous than the Asian population, black people are also represented in Leicester at a level above the national average (3.1% of the city's residents, compared to 2.3% for the whole of England). Slightly more than half (4,600 people out of 8,600) are Black Caribbean. There are 3,400 Black Africans, or just over 1% of the population.

Leicester's mixed-race population is also proportionally higher than average, totalling 6,500 people. It is one of very few places outside London where the White and Asian Mixed group begins to approach 1% of the total population; nearly 2,000 people ticked this box in the 2001 census.

While in Leicester my Mother-in-law was treated and cared for by doctors, nursing staff and many others who come from all over the world. There were many Muslims among them and thanks to their love, skill and care my kids still have a grandma.

This horrible way of referring people who are often British citizens from birth or who have come here to care for people makes my blood boil (and let us not make the mistake the Americans are making of descibing anyone who is not white as Muslim - Arrgghhhh!!).

Everyone who has been cared for by the NHS will have been treated by people who these Americans are describing as terrorists. In all my many experiences of seeing NHS care I have many many memories of Muslims caring for people I know and love. In every case they have been good examples.

I resent these ignorant and racist Americans describing my friends, my community, my health care professionals in this way. I vote to cancel the health insurance of everyone of these Americans on the grounds that they are so ignorant they probably won't even notice.

Oh and I thoroughly recommend Leceister as a friendly and nice city for a shopping visit, particularly when your Mum is being cared for in hospital there.

We love the NHS

Lots on this everywhere. At the bottom I have links to some of the posts I have read recently.

I am motivated to write because of the rubbish that some in the USA are saying about the NHS. It is striking to note that apparently as a proportion of GDP we pay approximately half what Americans do for health care, that we have better hospital infection statistics and are ranked a lot better by the WHO. See this comment:

I looked up this info a few days ago for someone so I have it to hand Lisa. The UK HAI (hospital acquired infection) rates seem to be lower than the UK ones nowadays

UK HAI rate 7.6% http://bit.ly/CAzs8
US HAI rate 10% http://bit.ly/2aegk

The link to the US rates is to a wikipedia article but there is a ref in that to the original source for you to check out the figures.

and from this comment:

We spend 8.5% of our GDP on healthcare, compared to 16% in the US. This seems like incredible value to me. The end result is that we have a longer life expectancy than US citizens, and fewer of our babies die in infancy (actually fewer babies die in infancy in Cuba than in the US, which is a fair indictment of your system). The WHO rated us 18th and the US 37th in terms of the healthcare we provide to ALL our citizens.

As a Methodist Minister I see a lot of the NHS. We have a lot of elderly people in the Methodist Church and so, more than most outside the NHS, minister see a lot of the results: visiting people in hospital, when they are ill, when they are getting better, when they are talking about it after or when we are doing their funerals.

I will not talk about people I minister to, I don't think is is right or fair. But I will say that many of them need the NHS a lot and that most of the time they get excellent care from the local doctors surgeries and from the NHS. In a huge majority of cases they are very happy with the care they get.

For those who are hearing about how bad our system is a few anecdotal family stories:

One example would be my mother-in-law. Just over two years ago just after moving to Raunds she had a heart attack (83 at the time). I went round just after midnight and called the ambulance. They were there within 15 minutes and the operator stayed on the line the whole time til they arrived and confirmed with them that they were on the scene. During that time the operator was regularly checking with mum via me how things were and giving helpful advice how making her more comfortable.

A few days later she was transferred to Glenfield in Leicester a heart specialist hospital. After examining her arteries with one of those clever devices they decided on a double heart bypass which was done within 2 weeks of the heart attack. After a few weeks in hospital she came home and when it was clear she could not quite cope she got several weeks of rehabiliation care nearby in a lovely place in Rushden. Oh and home visits by Occupational Therapists to see what equipment she needed (and free loan for as long as she needed them).

Over the next year she slowly improved with a few short hospital visits to drain her lungs (including one where she got MRSA, or more likely had it and they discovered it) and she is still with us, still living on her own and coping (with a care package). Now struggling with double curvature of the spine she is on a long list of drugs (3 pages of the standard prescription forms) but still has a good quality of life.

A couple of months ago she had a heart attack scare, again the ambulance came they were pretty sure it was ok but took her to hospital for thorough tests to confirm she was ok.

In the last 6 months she has had two cateract operations both were done at a local private hospital by the NHS and for both they gave her a general anaesthetic and kept her in overnight for checking (she can't lie flat for the operation so this was the only way it could be done). Now she does not need glasses except for reading - the hospital sold us a pair for £2.99 :-).

Through all that treatment neither she nor we have ever had to pay anything, or sign any papers relating to payment. That is despite after 60 odd years in this country she is still an Austalian citizen. There were questions about having the double bypass, but they were clinical - would she survive the operation, would it make enough improvement to her life to be worthwhile for her to go through (clearly the answers to both are yes).

I could look back to the years of treatement my father-in-law had for cancer that greatly extended his life and gave it a high level of quality. Care that supported the family so that exactly as he wanted he could stay at home to the end.

No this system is not perfect, our local hospital is very overloaded. But many things are improving. Over the last 4 years I have seen huge improvements in cleanliness at the local hospital and we will be getting a new local clinic.

Meanwhile we will continue to take Mum to the doctors several times a month for checkups, the podiatrist and everything else that seems to go wrong. She will continue to make friends with the doctors (although her hearing makes that a bit more difficult - I did not mention that the NHS have provided her with hearing aids for years, now very fancy digital ones).

So yes I love the NHS, it means my boys still have a grandma!

Onto the posts around the net.

First an excellent post and hundreds of comments many by people with experience of both US and UK health care: This American’s Experience of Britain’s Healthcare System (ht Pam in a comment on a cpost on theConnexion)

Watch the video at clayboy » All go mad on health care to see the absolute rubbish that is being said in the USA about the NHS (HT: a comment on NHS / US healthcare compared | connexions).

Good post by Dave Faulkner We Love The NHS

Ask John Piper - Do some complementarians deny women opportunities?

Ask John Piper - Do some complementarians deny women opportunities?.

John Piper admits that there are “ambiguities” and that he is “sure” people make “unwise decisions” in their restriction of women. After all what is a woman to do when men start gravitating towards her room when she is teaching the bible? Does she kick them out of her class, stop her godly teaching, or continue to teach? What is sin and what isn’t sin?

If women are “equals” with a man spiritually, then what biblical spiritual restrictions are there on men? When does a man who is a godly Christian man go from servant of God to sinner just because of who walks into his bible class? The fallacy of “equal but different” is never so blatantly false as when complementarians like John Piper try to talk about the “ambiguities”. The fact is that they teach “unequal and different” while the Bible teaches “fellow heirs”.

I confess I love it when Cheryl Schatz ties complementarians up in knots. Sorry about that. Make sure you read the whole post as Cheryl is very nice about it and does not gloat as she demolishes John Piper.

United Methodist Church Developers Urged to Learn from their History

Great article: United Methodist Church Developers Urged to Learn from their History.

"Early Methodism was evangelistic," the Rev. Dr. Laceye Warner explained to the 2009 United Methodist School of Congregational Development. "When the Wesleys talked about spreading 'Scriptural holiness,' they meant evangelism." She defined evangelism as preaching the gospel of salvation in Jesus Christ and "living it out."

She also identified 4 key strengths of Methodism in the early days (see the articvle for more details).

• Growth in grace is as important as growth in numbers, and preoccupation with membership figures can become an obstacle to gospel proclamation.
• Theological reflection is essential.
• Sustained Christian practices maintain the community of faith.
• Wealth and material goods are meant to be shared.

Sounds good to me.

A pause for breath

We are home, but for less than 24 hours.

Jane and I have had a wonderful week alone, we took our 2 seater sports car (created by removing 5 seats from our 7 seater Citroen C8). The small car is waiting a replacement windscreen and anyway we needed the big car to tow our 6 berth twin axle caravan (ideal home from home for two people) to Reedam Ferry, Norfolk.

We had some very nice rides on our tandem recumbent trike, one less rather nice ride on our upright bikes (the bridlepath disappeared leaving us making our way almost at random through fields on a marsh). I also did a bit of unicycling (until I managed to bend a crank with a particularly spectactular crash).

On the campsite we had the luxury of plumbed in water and waste water - no filling water containers for us. Plus no phone signal.

The wonderful thing about being on our own was just how much time we had to do things. None of the jobs (cooking, clearing up, getting ready to go out) take very long when there are only two of you so we suddenly found all these extra hours in the day. No only more hours but someone lovely to share them with - fantastic.

We did have one slight problem. On a trip out on the Monday we realised that the rear brakes seemed to have suddenly worn out. Fortunately we saw a Citroen garage a few minutes later. Unfortunately when they reversed it in to look at the brakes they hit a recovery truck which sliced right through a rear quarter panel. Fortunately they gave us a nice C5 courtesy car for the rest of the week while they fixed it. Unfortunately it meant using Friday to go and collect the car. Fortunately they had valeted the whole car and it looks imaculate plus the brakes work.

Today we got home first and started our washing. Oldest son got back from the Keswick Convention mid afternoon and the other 2 from Scout camp late afternoon. Washing machine going non stop. About to go out for a meal all together (and start grandma's washing machine at the same time). Oldest son is away separately for the next week with his girl friends family while the rest of us head for more rain in Derbyshire, camping at Edale for a few days.

No blogging til I get back.

Jesus’ Repudiation of Old Testament Violence » Blog » Greg Boyd (Christus Victor Ministries)

Jesus’ Repudiation of Old Testament Violence

Here’s a thought to start with. I think its very clear Jesus affirmed the divine inspiration of the Old Testament. Out of fidelity to Jesus, I feel compelled to accept this collection of ancient writings as divinely inspired. Yet, also out of fidelity to Jesus, I feel compelled to emphatically repudiate it’s violence.

Superb post, looking forward to the book.

Have no Fear

One of my teachers, mentors and friends Angie Shier-Jones has written a powerful post on responding to cancer in the form of a prayer: The Kneeler: Have no Fear.

Angie hits several nails on the head with this one.

I have written a fair bit about cancer over the years. One post that sums up much of my own experience is from August 2004 when I wrote:

So within 7 months and 2 days our boys have lost 3 grandparents to cancer. What can you say to a son when he says "Will we ever have good times again?" at a time like this? 42: Father-in-law has died.

Tonight I watched "The Wheel Heros" a story of the Geoff Thomas foundation and how Geoff and other cancer survivors rode the whole route of the 2007 Tour de France staying one day ahead of the race all the way. It was completely inspirational, as a cyclist myself I know a little about how impressive their achievement is.

In their response to cancer these cyclists put much of the Church to shame. Angie makes that point clearly, for example:

Similarly it is only on being told that I have cancer that so many of my staunch Christian friends discover how painfully weak their faith and their confidence in you is, and how deeply enslaved they are to their fear of sickness and death.

At times when as a minister I have travelled alongside someone fighting cancer I have been asked how I cope, how does it feel for me? That is a complex question to answer, there are lots of feelings:

• a feeling of honour, of privilege at the way people are willing to allow me to to be part of their journey.
• feelings of anger at the destruction caused by cancer
• feelings of anger at those who claim cancer is sent by God
• feelings of gratitude for all those who dedicate their lives to helping people with cancer

But above all those is the joy when Christians look beyond the cancer and see Jesus, when despite or even through the cancer their faith blossoms and they come to be sure that the healing and wholeness offered by God is true, that it might not include a cure for the cancer but it will certainly last for eternity. Now those are the people who really inspire me, who give me so much more than I can ever repay.

So I am with Angie all the way and echo her messsage "Have no Fear", and that not just for cancer but ewvery part of life and death. This is the start of the theological defeat of cancer, of fear. Thank-you Angie.

Angie also writes:

If after preaching the gospel all this time, I still haven’t managed to communicate your message that life is eternal, that we need have no fear – and that life in all its fullness doesn’t mean a life without pain or sorrow, then I despair that I will ever succeed in helping to set people free.

At this point it is important to note that Angie was leading the seminars I was attending during the time my parents both died. It was Angie that got me reading Moltmanns "The crucified God". It was Angie's walk alongside me (as well as many others) that encouraged me and helped ensure that fear did not win.

Please read Angie's post and then start contributing to the theological defeat of cancer and to freedom from fear.

What I'd say if I was wrong about climate change

The report Hope in God's Future (link is to the pdf) while adopted by a huge majority at the Methodist Conference upset one blogger.

David Hallam ended up writing four posts against this report, climate change itself, the Methodist Church, the President of the Methodist Conference and commentators like myself who responded in support of all the above. See (Welcome to the house of sin, Global warming - an alternative spirituality?, Dare to be a Daniel, Dare to stand alone and Climate change - an impossible debate)

Part way through that debate I made the decision to leave that debate and I have not been back to that blog except to create the links above. I no longer track it or visit it.

My reason for writing now is that I found a helpful response to the challenge "What if I am wrong about Climate Change?" at No Impact Man: What I'd say if I was wrong about climate change. He starts with

I get emails from people, every so often, what I would say and feel if I was wrong about climate change. What would I say if, after dedicating years of my life to bringing attention to the problem, I found out there was no problem.

Well, first, of course, I would praise God in thanks that we have no catastrophe to contend with. Then, since many of the measures needed to deal with climate change have a lot of positive benefits, I will think:

There are then 17 positive benefits that he identifies that come from responding to Climate Change, evcen if there is no climate change.

He concludes with this challenge:

And now, to turn the question back on those who say that either there is no climate change or that it is not a serious problem:

What would they feel if we did nothing about climate change and they turned out to be wrong?

What would they feel if we buried our heads in the sand, ignored the problem, and then irreversibly damaged the planetary habitat that we depend upon for our health, happiness and security?

Of course I would also want to analyse Climate Change and our responses theologically (as the Hope in God's report Future does) but I think these responses provide a good starting point.

In fact I think it is helpful to ask the question "What would I say if it it turned out I was wrong" about many of our beliefs. Why not try it, I have found it illuminating and what have you got to lose - you are probably always right anyway.