The first real frost of the winter – the car is covered in ice and the footpaths are a bit slippery.? We love it – esp as it means the wind has died down and the sky is clear and sunny (well sunny for the week before Christmas).? BTW how are the forty degree days going?
It’s happened!? My trousers are all too big!! Several weeks at the gym, jogging, rowing, cross-training, cycling and generally looking in agony has done wonders for my fitness.? 75-76 kilos!? I’ve actually being eating healthy too, and with the amount of walking we do Jill and I are feeling pretty fit
The only killer is the outdoor soccer match every Tuesday evening in the freezing cold.? A whole bunch of twenty-something students show me why playing soccer for ten or fifteen years in Australia is no compensation for growing up in England.? Hmmm – wonder why their national football team is so rubbish?? Funny, none of them mentions the cricket too much either.
After four weeks of going to an actual church building this last Sunday night we got to our first actual Crowded House church meeting at “Abbey”, the congregation that meets in, well, Abbey.? Tim and Helen Chester host it in their TARDIS of a house; rooms snaking everywhere and leading to goodness knows what.
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About thirty or so people, including ten kids, crammed into their two front rooms and watched the movie Millions, which I then spoke about for twenty minutes.
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Great bunch!? Very diverse, ranging from single mums with four kids from two different dads; a recovering alcoholic who became a Christian in January, A PhD student from Thailand; a young Turkish guy who is not Christian yet, but loves being with the group; a bunch of Americans on their way to house-church planting in Belgium, and of course a smattering of people you’d expect to see in a middle-class evangelical congregation, including us!
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Tim and Samuel – the congregational leaders – obviously do a great job with them.? There is a real sense of family and accountability within the congregation and a desire to help each other be what God has called them to be.? I was struck with the level of honesty from people who hardly knew me.? I’ve become a bit of a conversation sponge recently (recently?! – ed) and hearing people talk candidly about where they are at has been a great challenge.?
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I’ve been interviewing five or so people from within the network for a number of vignettes called “A Week in the Life of…” that I’m writing for Tim and Steve’s new book, Total Church. The issue that the Abbey group highlights is the need for TCH to reach the working class with the gospel not just middle class England.? Class distinctions seem to be very clear here.? Steve Timmis? and Tim Chester are keen for a whole range of leaders to emerge, not just those with degrees.? The issue of theological education, therefore, becomes one of giving specific leaders what will be best for them, rather than simply pushing everyone through the same theological sausage machine.? Will it work?? Can it work?? What do you think?
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