Specifics

Hello all. I hope that you are well.  I'm not sure that I will have much to detain you this week. I haven't done very much, really. You know - one of those weeks. I went to work - which is good of me because they are paying me, and I actually did, you know - work.  Working obviously leaves me ready for a nap, so what with working and napping, there doesn't seem to be much room for anything else. 

I was at Messy Church yesterday.  Messy Church has been doing "meals that Jesus was involved in" for the last three Messys. There was the Feeding of the Five Thousand and turning Water into Wine at the wedding (please note, as my Father's mentor said  - "Jesus turned the water into wine, but the Bible never said that he drank it" hmm.) Anyway, this week, we did Communion. You know, even though I am now a paid-up member of the Methodists, I'm not sure that I will ever understand them. For those not in the know, Messy Church runs mainly for what they used to call "the unchurched", but we sat the families down - including all the littlies, in circles on the floor, and then they were served Communion.  My old Brethren background red flags were waving like mad at the idea of serving Communion to children, but it was really lovely and moving. But to do it, they had to call in an ordained minister because everyone else's fingers are not considered magic enough to serve Communion. Christians are weird.

The craft was pom-pom flowers for Mother's Day. This involved wool, pipe cleaners and a fork, as all good crafts do. It was quite complicated (see the photos), but once you had a go, it fell into place. That's not bad for me - I'm not what you would call naturally gifted in the art department.

I'm not sure that I'm cut out for Art. A couple of weeks ago, we went to a student art exhibition. Some of it was excellent, but I'm still struggling with the three books on the windowsill - see above. They represented loss, I think. They just made me want to tidy them up. 

How is everyone doing with their Lent run-in? I have been rubbish, and I haven't even given anything up. I pinched the idea I saw that said every morning, you should set your watch for seven minutes and just wait on God. Don't ask for stuff - just wait. I think I have managed to do it about five times so far. Some of the reasons are not my fault - we have been away, and I have overslept a lot. Also, I am still of an age where I still do a morning "Quiet Time". (I do not have a notebook with a fish on it, so I'm not sure if it counts). This means I already have a fairly healthy morning routine. It's not Daniel throwing his windows open three times a day to pray, but you can't have everything. Shoehorning something else into it has just made me feel a bit discombobulated. There's also the problem of my serious shallowness. Once I set a timer, all I can think about is, "How long until it goes off?" There's no room for serious levels of enlightenment. I'm the same timing eggs. All it is leaving me with at the moment is a vague sense of failure, and I'm certain that is not what is meant to happen. I'm also struggling with the way it makes me feel like I'm dog whistling God. "Hello - I've set my timer now. ready when you are." I'm not saying it's like that for everyone. I'm sure it's not. I'm not sure if I will stick with it. 

I've always been quite a specific sort of person in these areas. If I'm praying - it's about something. If I'm thanking - it's for something. If I'm complaining - it's about someone something. People talk about leaving their minds open for God to come in, but that always reminds me of a thing I saw where Lulu was describing her meditation patterns. Blimey, it looked boring. 

They say that there are "thin places" on Earth - places where the gap between heaven and earth is so fine that you can sometimes almost feel that God is physically there. I believe that Lindisfarne is one of these places. But I think that for me this can also happen when I read something or a preacher says something, and my heart is "strangely warmed". In my personal experience, though, it seems to need to be something specific. As I said - shallow. 

One of the many things I am currently annoyed by is those posters that are everywhere saying, "You are loved." By whom? How can I tell? You don't know me. Actually, some people can't think of one person that loves them. I know that the posters mean well, and someone is trying to make people who are thrashing about in their loneliness and doubt feel that there is solid ground there, but - for some, that is as foreign a concept as being weightless in a space rocket. Tell 'em how. Tell 'em why. 

Reading this back - I'm not sure that my run-in to Easter is going that well. Remember that Custard Cream "egg"? Well, I did put it in the work raffle in the end. Not for religious  - "it's not an egg" reasons but because one of the girls at work has already eaten hers, and she says it was really sickly. I shall be buying an EGG, and it shall be Cadburys as God intended, and I shall be staying in my lane. 

Have a good week.