Books from 2005

The Power of One. Courtenay, B. (1989)

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Lewis, C.S. (1998)

Journeying Out. Morisy, A (2004)

Urban Theology: A Reader. Ed. Northcott, M (1998)

Saturday. McEwan, I. (2005)

The Human Stain. Roth, P. (2001)

The Shaping of Things to Come. Frost M. & Hirsch A. (2003)

Urban Church: A Practitioner's Resource Book. Eds. Eastman, M. & Latham S. (2004)

Waiting for the Barbarians. Coetzee, J.M. (2004)

Frank Skinner. Skinner, F. (2002)

God Has A Dream. Tutu, D. (2004)

Fatherhood: The Truth. Berkmann, M. (2005)

Small Island. Levy, A (2004)

The Alchemist. Coehlo, P (1994)

The Kite Runner. Hosseini, K (2003)

The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World. Robert E. Webber (2002)

The Five People You Meet in Heaven. Albom, A (2004)

Sophie's World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy. Gaarder, J

Carpe Manana: Is Your Church Ready to Seize Tomorrow? Sweet, L (2003)

Dare to be a Daniel: Then and Now. Benn, T (2004)

Chocolat. Harris, J. (2000)

Introducing Mr & Mrs McIntosh

'Forgiveness is at the heart of love'

Roger Batt 28th December 2005

Wise words - as ever.

The irony of a great Christmas Day…

It’s fair to say that Christmas Day was a busy day, but it was a cracker (no pun intended!).

It was great to be part of an established and committed team for whom catering for, serving and entertaining 80 or so people is seemingly second nature.

It was great to meet new people and to feel we were really making a difference.

It was great to have some our new friends from Stratford helping out.

Strangely it was great to knock on the wrong door.

You see as we weaved our way around East London picking our guests up I managed to buzz the ‘wrong’ flat. Instead of finding Harry I met Eva who was disappointed to learn that I wasn’t delivering meals. She was facing another day on her own until we managed to ‘knock on the wrong door’! It pretty much made my Christmas to see how chuffed she was to be invited out for the day and to see her face light up when she arrived at the centre to see a number of her friends also tucking in.

She didn’t seem to mind that her driver was a convicted getaway driver! Mind you, having spent a few hours being driven around by Paul I’m not surprised that he got caught!

Getting known and getting to know

That’s really what we are about at the moment – getting ourselves known while getting to know our neighbours, our community, what’s happening and what’s not. So we were chuffed when the Newham Mag (a local council publication that gets delivered to every household in the borough) expressed an interest in doing a feature on what has brought us to Stratford.

To be honest the response has been amazing, really encouraging and quite humbling. As a result of the feature we are now regularly being ‘recognised’ in the street, in the doctors surgery, at the local schools - seemingly wherever we go. While many people have phoned or emailed just to welcome us to Stratford and to encourage us with their own stories of living and working in the communities that make up Newham.

Two such calls were from Paul and John. Paul works locally for Involve - a drugs programme/team working to raise awareness, while educating and aiding rehabilitation. An ex-addict himself he exudes an all-consuming passion to reach those on the margins of society and share from his own experience the hope-filled possibility of an alternative story. As it happens he’s also dead keen to get involved with what we are up to!

John manages a local church-led community centre and he got in touch to encourage us with stories of their own community-focussed journey and to invite us to have a look at their ‘place’ and to learn from what they are up to. Having been across it was great to meet John, to hear how God had blessed what they were up to and to glimpse a little of their future vision. Oh and I also saw my first ‘toy library’. It was really encouraging to see how from fairly small acorns a pretty large tree had grown.

We continue to be humbled by the response to ‘our little feature’ and the warmth of welcome we’ve received since arriving. We’re chuffed that John and Paul felt compelled to get in touch, it’s great to be getting known, but its better still to get to know others. Who knows, perhaps the very article which prompted these new connections will itself prove to be a fruitful little acorn.

Fame at last!

As I wandered around delivering Christmas cards to everyone on our estate, wrestling with reluctant letter-boxes and avoiding overly enthusiastic four-legged ‘friends’ one eagle-eyed, junk-mail allergic resident spotted me from his window….

‘No thanks mate, your alright, I’m not interested.’

‘Oh OK, it’s just a Christmas card to wish you a happy Christmas.’

‘Oh right. Oh I recognise you – you’re the local vicar(!) who’s just moved in.’

‘Em yeh, well I’m Nick, but I guess that’s kinda right – call me Nick.’

‘Well Nick, I will have one of your cards after all – Happy Christmas!’

Happy Christmas indeed! I have no idea why or how I was recognised as the ‘local vicar’, but in a bizarre way I was really glad that I was!

A ‘Taste of Christmas’ - a recipe

Ingredients:

One SA Emergency Vehicle
Plenty of mince pies
Urns of tea and coffee
A group of musical friends willing to provide seasonal music
Some carol sheets

and…

…(hopefully) people.

To be honest once we had printed the invitations for our ‘Carols on the Green/ Taste of Christmas’ ‘event’ we had second, third and fourth thoughts about how things would pan out.

For one reason or another many of our established ‘contacts’ and new friends on the estate couldn’t make it and coupled with the fact that we’d also managed to choose the night of the X-factor and ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ finals its fair to say that our nerve was being tested!

But thankfully our final ‘ingredient’ did turn up and a fun (if freezing) time was had by all. So much so that as we all made our way home to see Shane Ward and Darren Gough emerge victorious a number of people were heard to inquire as whether or not ‘we can do it all again next year?’

Who knows, but there a few mince pies still to be eaten this year first!

Sometimes success merely means surviving!

This was certainly the case on Saturday when along with the Tenants & Residents Association we opened our doors for our inaugural Kids Christmas party.

An unknown ‘adventure’ from start to finish 25 kids accompanied by their parents nevertheless turned up for some festive fun. Which was great until we learned that the children’s entertainers who had been hired to ‘entertain’ the assembled youngsters for two of the three hours weren’t coming! Nice!

Thankfully this is where years of kids clubs, youth groups, icebreakers and a shed full of useful ‘junk’ comes in handy! While stopping just short of fire-eating and uni-cycling it would seem that the kids (and their parents) had a great time. Some of them even stuck around to sing some carols on the green.

A tad hoarse and pretty knackered, for me just surviving meant success, but when you throw in the numerous new families that we met, the toys we were able to distribute, the chance that the parents had to relax for a couple of hours and the fact that everyone seemed to have a really good time I reckon it was a decent way to spend a few hours.

Shetlands & Stratford – the Corps exchange (part two)

Having had Shetland corps visit us in October it was our turn to complete the exchange while furthering the ‘close links’ that the two corps have shared historically.


An epic journey resulting from a missed connection ironically caused by a fog-bound Gatwick rather than any extreme weather up near Norway(!) meant that the trip will linger long in the memory. In particular the unscheduled eight hours spent at Edinburgh Airport will ensure that the departure lounge will linger for a long time to come! Mind you, when Lisa eventually saw the plane that was to take us to Lerwick I think she was more than happy to wait another eight hours! Still it meant I was able to read ‘The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’ – time well spent!


As was the week that were able to spend catching up with friends, making some new ones and exploring the windy wilderness that is the Shetlands.

And now for a time of...sleep?!

Lisa has just started reading Nick Page’s book ‘And now let’s move into a time of nonsense’. The book’s tag-line ‘why worship songs are failing the church’ leaves the reader in no doubt about the writer’s pretext. And it’s true to say that Lisa is already worried that she’ll never be able to sing some songs again! (But then that may not be a bad thing)

Anyway its one of those books that as you read you can’t help but share it, so last night (after my light had been switched off!) Lisa started to read (aloud!) some of what Mr Page had articulated…

‘It’s popular in many churches to talk of ‘times of worship’. ‘Now we’ll have a time of worship’, says the leader at the front, before introducing a series of songs which can last for anything from 15 minutes to 15 hours. Strange that. Because you might as well talk about having a ‘time of breathing’ or a ‘time of just being ourselves’. Worship – true worship – is not about singing songs, or holding up your hands or bouncing up and down or chanting Gregorian plainsong. It’s about how you live your life.’

I grunted by drowsy assent, but Lisa and Mr Page weren’t finished…

‘So you cannot separate off worship from the rest of the Christian life. The idea that ‘worship’ is something that only takes place in a church or at a conference – and then only in a ‘time of worship’ is profoundly unbiblical. Worship – showing God how we value him, how much he is worth to us – is an attitude of life. Worship, putting it simply, means showing Jesus what we think of him. And we do that not only by singing songs about him, but by changing our lives so that they reflect our new master.’

Ding, dong, some of us are trying to sleep! But there is more…

‘Real worship stems from a conscious decision to live our lives in God’s way. It’s not about singing; it’s about living.’

Too true, but I wonder if that extends to sleeping?!

I had such plans...

As Robert Burns once wrote…

‘The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men
Gang aft a gley,
An’ lea’e us naught but grief an’ pain,
For promised joy!’

Today I had plans, but they’ve gone well and truly ‘a-gley’!! My plans have gone so far out of the window they’re not aware there ever was a window! Still, I guess that’s the way it goes sometimes.

I’m not sure about the ‘grief an’ pain’ that Burns writes of but I’ve met some interesting people and had some great conversations.

Geoff came to check our fire extinguishes – nothing remarkable in that perhaps, but Geoff was a really nice, down-to-earth guy and it was good to talk. We spoke about work, our wives, his boys, my son, his parents, football, fostering, autism and a whole host of other things. We talked about the things of life; two men who didn’t know each other. Yet as we shared our stories and talked about our passions, interests and shared experiences there seemed to be a connection, an understanding. Fleeting perhaps, but I was reminded of the power of stories to enrich our relationships.

Similarly Tariq came round to see if we could work together to support local families from various ethnic minority groupings. As we talked about different potential projects inevitably the conversation drifted and spilled into the things of life again. Again it was two men chatting, two very different men, yet two very similar men. Both men of faith, Tariq’s a Muslim, I’m a Christian. Both men away from ‘home’ Tariq’s from Bangladesh, I’m from Scotland. Both married, both fathers, both of us want the best for our families. Having both moved into Stratford, both of us have a desire to serve the local community, to support the marginalized be they young, old, black, white, Muslim or Christian.

As we sat and talked I was again aware of so much that we shared in common, so much that united us. While undoubtedly different, our similarities were also undeniable.

My plans may have been thwarted and I’ll no doubt ‘pay’ for it tomorrow, but I’m glad I met Geoff and I’m glad I spent time with Tariq. I’ve learnt a lot. I’m still learning that when I’m not looking for things, not expecting people, things and people come my way.

‘Many are the plans in a man’s heart, bit it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.’ PROVERBS 19:21

Thank goodness for that!

Latest Scam: be careful

The following arrived in my inbox recently from a selfless friend keen that others should benefit from his own painful (and embarrassing) experience...

'Generally, I hate the warnings that get sent around but I have to admit that this one is important. Please protect everyone you know by sending this to your entire
email list.

If someone comes to your front door and says they are conducting a survey and asks you to show them your bum, do NOT show them your bum.

This is a scam. They only want to see your bum.

I wish I'd got this yesterday, I feel so stupid and cheap.'


You've been warned! Personally I will be advising my 'entire email list' to be careful of any emails sents by this man...

Be afraid, be very afraid!

What a corker!

It is nigh on impossible to tell you how hard it is to get a photo of Joshua smiling. Its not that he doesn't smile - he does, a fair bit these days, but he just won't do it when you produce a camera to capture the moment. No matter how happy and content he is the briefest of glimpses of the Olympus Superzoom and his bottom lip starts to jut!

This is probably as good as we've got - so far.






























He's a blinkin' cracker!

Thin places...

George MacLeod (the founder of the Iona Community ) believed that in this world there are places (and times) where only a 'tissue' separates us from a deep sense of God's presence. Not surprisingly Iona was for him one of these places.

Having been to Iona earlier this year I can understand why, but I've also been thinking about my own 'thin places'.

Interestingly the first two 'places' that sprung to mind both involved beaches and both involved STOPGAP cross-cultural missions. I couldn't help recall two similar nights; two nights in two different continents with two completely different groups of people yet two nights where God's awesome creation dramatically reminded me of glorious presence.

Sitting on a brilliant white sandy beach on the east coast on Zanzibar and watching the night sky so unpolluted by man-made light that shooting stars seems to streaking everywhere it was easy to sing...


'O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the worlds thy hands have made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed:

Then sings my soul, my Saviour God to thee:
How great thou art! How great thou art!'


Two years later (2002) I was on another beach this time in South America - Rio's famous Copacabana. Above the hubbub of the evening market and the ever-throbbing Rio night-life and beneath the distant out-stretched arms of the Cristo Redentor it was the roaring waves of the South Atlantic crashing down onto the beach that vividly represented God's power and majesty as we sang...

'Shout to the Lord all the earth, let us sing
Power and majesty, praise to the King.
Mountains bow down
And the seas will roar
At the sound of Your name.
I sing for joy at the work of Your hands.
Forever I’ll love You, forever I’ll stand.
Nothing compares to the
Promise I have in You.'

I'm not sure that all my 'thin places' have been, or will be so exotic, but then whenever we're aware of God's presence it's pretty exciting!

Emerging church...

The shape or nature of the church we are endeavouring to establish is gradually emerging - slowly.

In his article 'Community Regeneration' Andrew Mawson writes that ‘the role of the church in urban areas, where high-rise living produces a dehumanising privatisation of life, must be as a catalyst to bring together in concrete ways the variety of people who live cheek by jowl and yet often seem unaware of each other.’

Since Newham allegedly has more high-rise buildings than any other borough Mawson's assertion is particularly apt for us here in Stratford. To this end, reflecting the historic calling of the Church to create community we are seeking to establish a human context, a space, through which people can enter and explore together the connections that exist between them.

What this context/space will 'look' like is yet to be revealed, but we're getting there - slowly.