Who wants to be a millionaire? (Part 2)

Apparently I’m definitely on it tonight (as a phone a friend before I get begging letters).

8pm ITV. I can confirm that I was near a toilet during this phonecall.

Links to Carly and Si in India

A couple of the older teens (Carly and Si) from Holy Trinity have gone to India to work at Hebron School for 6 months. Here is the link to Carly’s blog and here is Si’s Blog

Check them out and pray for them

Preaching yesterday

Preached at Holy Trinity yesterday on “Worship that comes naturally – 2 Samuel 6:12-23 and as I’ve had one request to link to where you can hear me (thanks Mum) then go to here , click on the sermons link and it will be up this week.

Fishing at the weekend

Aside from unpacking lots of boxes now that we’ve moved back in to our house (woo hoo!!) I did manage to find some river inside its banks. Had a really great few hours fishing and had one Barbel that weighed 6lbs. Conditions are spot on at the moment so really wish I could get out some more. However, responsibility calls…

Healing the broken

I’m sat in my office on the phone to BT (on hold funnily enough!!) and I’m reading a Faithworks magazine that has landed on my desk. There’s a great article in there about Maggie Ellis, who has pioneered the first Christian based rape crisis centre in the UK.

Maggie set up the Life Centre in response to a great need for more care and counselling for victims of rape and sexual abuse. She tells the story of one woman who had been raped, and the only support she was offered was a number in another city, and when she called she was told that they couldn’t help because she was out of the area.

The centre is thriving (although not without needs) and Maggie would like to see other such centres set up around the country. Check out their website HERE. If you can support them in any way then its certainly making a huge difference.

Youth Alpha

We’re running a town wide Youth Alpha course here in Tewkesbury, with loads of churches involved. Last night was our second evening – we had 39 teens the first night, and 36 last night. Most of the young people wouldn’t call themselves Christians, or at least aren’t sure.

It went really well… we’re doing all this under the HOPE 08 banner – and it seems to be making a real difference. We’ve got youth leaders from lots of churches working together under the common purpose – communicating Jesus through our words and deeds.

I hope this really grows…

Who wants to be a millionaire? Part 2

She got the wrong night… we weren’t on!

Try again next week…

Who wants to be a millionaire?

Tonight at 8pm. My friend Elaine is on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire… and I am her phone a friend. Its very exciting. I got to talk to Chris Tarrant. I made a complete arse of myself. I think its worth watching. I couldn’t possibly give away what happened, but £500 is a lot of money…

There is a rumour going around that I was on the toilet when it happened. I couldn’t possibly comment…

Spiritual Director

Yesterday I went to see my spiritual director – I see him every 3 months or so and we chat about how life is going and most importantly how my “soul” is. After a really hectic start to 2008 it was such a welcome relief just to spend some time talking and praying.

I’m still convinced that the most important question that we can ask ourselves on a regular basis is “How is my soul today?” Even more important I guess is how we answer it…

This year so far…

Lots going on for us both so far this year…

As per last post, we’re moving house on Thurs, so its back to packing boxes over the next few days… Work has been really challenging. We had a week of prayer at Trinity last week, which went really well I think. We had nearly 70 people from 5 churches praying for HOPE 08 in Tewkesbury – see www.tewkesbury08.co.uk – I think its nearly finished!

We started our Youth Alpha course last Tuesday… with 39 young people! Nearly twice as big as last year… brings challenges but its what we pray and hope for so when it happens I can’t complain!

In just under 5 weeks seven of us from Trinity are going to Uganda for a fortnight to work at the Potters Village in Kisoro. Its not all finalised yet which is making me a bit nervous but I’m sure it will all come together. The team have worked really hard to raise money and we’ve got a couple of events coming up to raise some more.

I’ve not caught a fish yet this year either…

I scored a goal though yesterday.

Moving house

Next Thursday we’re going to be going HOME!!!!!!!! Builders are nearly finished, decorators are in painting and putting up our very expensive wallpaper (not my choice but hey I’m not the expert!). Cleaners come in next Weds to sort it out and then we get back in.

All we need now is the insurance to agree some final payments and the whole flooding thing might be finally over…

Rain

Well its raining and we’ve just had our first flood warning for a while…

People are starting to panic a bit – I’ve seen some people getting sandbags out already.

I’m 99.9% convinced that we’ll be absolutely fine… but clearly others are feeling much more vulnerable. Here’s hoping that things stay OK for everyone. It’s not the best night for sleeping in a caravan.

What am I looking forward to this year…

Quite a lot…

1. Trip to Uganda in Feb with a team from Holy Trinity (and beyond). Working with an orphanage and other local projects for a couple of weeks. Going to be A M A Z I N G.

2. Climbing the 3 peaks with my Dad (over a year!!)

3. Doing as much fishing as I can

4. My job… I love it and the people that I work with

5. Being surprised (in a good way)

There’s probably others, but that’ll do for now.

C

Happy New Year

Hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year…

We both spent most of Christmas and New Year feeling sorry for ourselves with a really bad cough and cold… I am not a good patient as I hardly ever get ill and when I do I feel as though I deserve the world’s sympathy. My lovely wife strongly disagrees.

Last year was a really challenging year in many respects, not least the wonderful flooding last summer. In 2 weeks time we’ll be moving back home!!! I’m hoping for a slightly drier 2008…