Richard's Ramblings

Don’t laugh, I’m mentoring disadvantaged young drivers to get their 100 hours driving experience before they can apply for a test. So-called “friends” ask, “are you teaching them the proper way of winding down their window and shouting imprecations at other road users?” Cynics. Although that will be important after they’ve passed their test 😉 No, what I offer is encouragement. After an hour of reverse parking, reversing in a straight line, hill starts, they need to hear “Hey, you’re doing really well, I think you’ve cracked it, you should be proud of yourself”. If you knew the background of some of these kids, encouragement is a rare commodity. A late acquaintance of mine exercised what he called a “Barnabas ministry”. Barnabas features in Acts 4, not taking as prominent a rôle as the better known apostles, but supporting them in encouragement and prayer and in practical giving. His name means, Son of Encouragement. I have a very simple test when I plan and look back on church ser...

The Rambler Returns Since I last graced the pages of this august publication, a few things have got worse. With my physiology, I mean. I’m deafer, my balance is even more, er, unbalanced, the doc says my blood sugar  takes me into diabetes land, and my memory is not as an elephant’s. But on this latter point, I have a couple of things in common with John Newton. With Rambling Love Richard (who has just noticed that he held his first service at KUC seven years ago next Tuesday.)

You don’t know John Mercer or Robert Detheridge or Barry Cooper. Not the particular people of that name who feature in this ramble, anyway. They were among my playmates of almost 70 years ago. Why do they come to mind now? Well, a more recent and cyber playmate, Bob Chapman, a mate in the playgrounds of Facebook and Ship of Fools, in Real Life(™) far away in Washington State, USA, has posted about a reflection which then Archbishop Bergoglio offered at the last Papal Election Conclave, on Revelation 3:30, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock.” We’re familiar with Holman Hunt’s representation of that scene. Some of us are familiar with a jokey caption accompanying it: Jesus: Let me in! Householder: Why? Jesus: I want to save you! Householder: What from? Jesus: From what I’ll do to you if you don’t let me in. A theology (if you can call it that) of soteriology to which I don’t subscribe, btw. In Revelation 3, St John has Jesus saying that he wants the door to open so th...

  Like all of us, I guess, I get earworms. Sometimes they’re songs or tunes which I’ve always thought were dreadful, and the instant they worm (intended pun) their annoying way into my head, I shudder and try to think or sing over them. Other times, I love the music and words, or at least they’re OK, but perhaps they’ve worn out their welcome after playing on loop. An aural invertebrate like that wriggled in yesterday. It wasn’t the music, but the words of one of the song’s verses which made me happy because they displaced troubling lyrics from a song from Friday. First, that Friday song. I was at an event organised to enthuse a Christian denomination’s ministers, active and retired, in the “Regions”, ie not the big smoke. We are thought to be more depressed and in need of self-care than our metropolitan sistren and brethren. It’s my experience in my particular region, that we’re a jolly sight happier and more cohesive than the poor folk in the smoke, but maybe that’s just me. We ...

Job 23:1-10 Job is undergoing awful suffering. He has lost his family and his wealth. Three remaining so-called friends are telling him that it’s his own fault. He answers one of them. Like us in terrible situations, he is looking for answers from God, but can’t find Him or hear His voice. Still, despite all evidence to the contrary, Job is convinced that God is there somewhere and does know what Job is going through. We are reminded of the old chorus, “Standing somewhere in the shadows, you’ll find Jesus”. Then Job replied: “Even today my complaint is bitter; his hand is heavy in spite of my groaning. If only I knew where to find him; if only I could go to his dwelling! I would state my case before him and fill my mouth with arguments. I would find out what he would answer me, and consider what he would say to me. Would he vigorously oppose me? No, he would not press charges against me. There the upright can establish their innocence before him, and there I would be de...

 It’s TCCM’s Church Camp this weekend. I don’t know if that means a posh retreat centre, or members’ own tents or caravans, or kipping under the stars in a swag, or a mix. My tent camping has been of three sorts. Fun Boys’ Brigade camps, not-so-fun field camps during Army basic training, and fun again in our own tent in assorted lovely locations, in Australia and Europe. Those Army camps, often on Dartmoor: Imagine a treeless Qld/NSW border wilderness in winter. Barracks, not usually associated with happy thoughts, were yearned for. Luxury, as Monty Python’s Yorkshiremen would have put it, compared to a flimsy two-man tent in a cutting gale. So its easy to understand how a nomadic shepherd would have longed (Ps 23) to “dwell in the House of the Lord for ever”. And what comfort has been derived over the millennia from the assurance that there’s room for everyone in that House, (John 14). “there are many rooms”. We look at houses through two lenses. One sees other people’s houses, p...