I can’t believe it.  Jeremy Beadle has carked it.  A part of my childhood has gone!  How sad.

If you ever doubted that this world wastes money…  Remember Art Attack on kids’ TV?

“Buchanan’s Art Attack jumper costs £700 to make as it is made from a special material. This is because of the way TV cameras behave when they pick up red pigment”

!!!!!!!!!!!!

Recently I was forced to succumb to common sense and purchase a grown up bicycle *wail*.

JT practically had to force me…  I was saving up for the Marin Bear Valley 07 (now 08) which is a stunning pink mountain bike, which I have been peeking through the window of Leisure Lakes at for over a year.  My current bike had begun to squeak, was very difficult to ride, very rusty and since it got kicked in a while ago in town, it has been, well, faulty.  So I counted the proceeds of the pink bike fund from the pink camper van piggy bank and found £22.57.  Hmmm not quite enough really!

So we went out in th January sales to try to find a compromise.  I found some excellent compromises - a pink BMX (seriously cool!) and a beautiful pink bike called BELLA.  She was a low-rider, kind of like a Harley, but in pink with a basket on the front, a twisty bell, a light up saddle, chunky motor bike tires, wing mirrors and, well, she was a stunner.  Sadly JT wouldn’t let me buy either of the compromises, pointing out that I had to have something that was going to be practical and easy to ride.  I was devastated and sifted sadly through the pile of ‘mummy bikes’ in Williams Cycles (Mummy bikes are those ones your Mum has when you are a child - you have the sparkly mountain bike and she has the sensible one with mud guards, a carrier, etc.  Nothing wrong with mummy but I have just always called them that due to the association of cool vs. practical).  Eventually we found one that was sort of a compromise.  It was silver (so slightly sparkly), the frame was a slightly mountain bike-ish shape and it wasn’t toooo bad.  It was also a bargain.  So that was what we bought.  JT said that maybe I could have a pink bike another time.

So yesterday we decided to test it out.  I was thinking that round the block would be an adequate bike ride, but JT had other ideas.  Cleeve Hill, so that he could fly his kite.  I warned him that it is very steep but he thought it would be ok.  It took AGES and I was spluttering and stopping every few minutes, but we made it eventually with painful legs and not a lot of breath.  We ate a picnic lunch with Dave Dorey at the top of the hill and then the boys flew their kites whilst I froze to death in a blanket and several layers.

We then descended the hill (which took a surprisingly short amount of time) and visited Grandma in hospital…  Grandma was in fairly good spirits but is confined to a little room as her medication is giving her the runs (nice!)  She was a bit bored by this and said that she had ‘taken a few steps this way and a few steps that way but have to stay in here today’.  Tim had written her a list of street phrases and told her that she must learn them.  She had taken this very seriously and referred to the list in her handbag for practice.  She said she had tried a few on a nurse, who had, in return, taught her a new phrase to say to Tim, but she had forgotten what it was!  I had to laugh

Recently I have been chatting with a good friend about the way we ‘do church’.  Now, Trinity is a big church and various people have often made criticisms about this for many different reasons so finally I decided to actually have a think about various aspects of this.

In the past I have always defended the notion of ‘big church’ based upon the fact that when you strip the gospel back to bare essentials, the response comes down to “heaven: yay or nay?”  That is the choice that every person should be offered and given the opportunity whether to accept or refuse.  Therefore, to all those who have said “it’s not about numbers”, I have replied “no, the gospel is, absolutely about numbers.  You are either with it or not.”  That said, we are not addressing the issue here in its entirety.

How can you make the most impact in a town?  (Let’s start at a small scale, so the numbers can be imagined..)  Is it better to create a huge congregation in the middle of town, with lots of ‘ministries’ operating from that base, where people can ‘come to church’, or is it better to plant smaller congregations spread all over the town so that those ministries run in relevant areas for people to receive?  Jesus invited us to spread the gospel, not contain it.

Now, at Trinity I do believe that we seek to do a bit of both.  There are ministries that go out to the people, but still a large base in town.  As the clusters grow, we see a greater spread of the gospel across the town and this is a good thing as far as I can understand.  But we need to be careful.  As with any large congregation there are dangers attached and potential traps that one could easily fall into and these are the traps that I envisage the church (at large, as an entity) falling into.

If you are the leader of a big church you must must must release other people to do the work of the Lord.  Unfortunately many people set up endless training programmes around themselves that offer the illusion of releasing younger people into leadership.  They have names such as “emerging generation” or “emerging culture” (I jokingly called this post “emerging couture” because often these programmes seem to create clones of their very trendy leaders and they go on for ever).  One preacher once stood up on an emerging generation stage and said “YOU’VE EMERGED!!  Now get off your butts and do something” (or words to that effect).  By running these programmes and training and training people, we end up making disciples (or rather clones) of ourselves, in the hope that they might get through life and do their job ok, but this is not right.

People are never going to be perfect and the enemy’s biggest tactic for bringing down the church is distraction and excuses.  Just let go and let God be God because if you don’t then you run the risk of saying no to God’s will and becoming an idol.  Don’t place people on a pedestal before God - I remember being challenged by the words of a secular song (Counting Crows) which said something about putting someone on a pedestal to watch them fall.  How true.

So why not send people out to fill some of the empty church buildings around here?  Why not run a ministry for the poor in the poor areas of your town?  Why make 30 old people travel across town for a dinner when you could go to a retirement complex and make dinner for them?

If you try to build a church that is top heavy (i.e. the minority leading the masses) then you run the risk of building the tower of Babel, - creating an empire to stretch to heaven only to have it crushed and resulting in everyone speaking in a different language that no one else understands.

Great excitement…  On Tuesday, Annie and I are visiting Fallon London (responsible for the Sony Bravia adverts, the Cadbury’s gorilla and the Skoda cake ad amongst others) and Artem (responsible for the plasticine bunnies of sony Bravia, Lara Croft and George Clooney in Madame Tussaud’s amongst other things!!)  We have to make a film about a design practitioner, but after choosing ‘whoever made the bunnies advert’ as a starting point and then discovering that 5 companies were behind it, we decided to use the bunnies as a focus and then look at the agencies behind them.  We actually get to meet 400 bunnies before they are shipped off to America the next day, so we are really very excited indeed!

We had another project set today, to design an ident for a TV show about the arts, targeted at 18’s-25’s.  This should also involve some film as well as still graphics, so again, should be quite fun.  I was, however, concerned and amused to receive an email from the University today inviting us to do a year’s placement designing for McDonald’s in London!!!  Interesting I am sure, but I don’t think I want to delay my degree for it, even if it did lead to a job at the end of it.

Had a great night at Hungry for God (big prayer meeting) on Tuesday, we did a new song by Hillsong called “Hosanna”, which was really good (download it if you like!)

I have also finally come off my throat infection anti-biotics which have left me feeling a bit sick and IBS-ish during the day *sighs loudly* it is disappointing because I have been regaining a little confidence recently as I haven’t been feeling so bad!

I have been tagged with this Love and Hate Meme. Thank you to Hoggstar - not sure what a “meme” is either but here goes!!

Format of the type has gone a bit funny.
I love to eat: most things that are bad for me!!  Curry being one of them.
I hate to eat: Custard *shudder*, milky puddings

I love to go: Anywhere hot (I loved Florida and Brazil) and anywhere pretty

I hate to go: to places when it is windy and rainy, especially when the places are grey.

I love it when: people laugh

I hate it when: People are incompetent (especially telephone customer services) and just lie because they can’t be bothered to work

I love to see: JT at the end of the day.  I also love to see stunning views

I hate to see: People being bullied
I love to hear: Music, cats purring, God’s voice through music, Bible verses, in my sub-conscience, a beautiful view etc

I hate to hear: the alarm clock, people saying horrid things about God and Christianity, abusive speech

And now it’s time for me to tag some more people:
Steve, Weon.

Unfortunately poor Grandma had to go back into hospital on Saturday, just in time for her birthday today!!  This was very sad as she spent Christmas in hospital too and these are the two times of year that she gets very excited about…  Still, she managed to wink at my Mum from the Medical Assessment Unit bed and say quietly “Bo Selecta, keep it real” complete with hand gestures, so she remains in impressively good spirits.

I phoned the hospital this morning and they said that she is doing well - the nurse seemed to know who I was talking about when I said it was my Grandma’s birthday so I expect she has told everyone that has crossed her path!!  I imagine that she has also pointed out that she is “the same age as the queen you know” several times.

I hope to go and see her later, with some balloons, a birthday badge rosette, a banner for her bed  and some pressies (a pretty sparkly bracelet and a nice scarf).  I might even choose a nice fairy cake from the bakery too if she feels up to it.

Happy birthday Grandma!  Have a good one.

I was so glad to see the other day that I could go to the cinema on “23th January.”

I always wonder why my over-efficient bank feel the need to send me a credit card statement every single month in the post, even when I have nothing to pay!  This morning I received a huge fold out bill saying “balance now due: 0.00″ and loads of instructions on how to pay my £0.00.  Not only that but I receive a leaflet every month which I have yet to read, an envelope to send my cheque in for £0.00 (if I am feeling too archaic to do an online payment) and often an invitation to buy some shares (if it was in forestry, at this point I might feel tempted!)

Now I have already opted for paper-free banking because a) it saves trees b) by the time the bill gets through the post it is out of date, as are bank statements c) it is much easier for me to be notified online or via email.

So Halifax, if you are reading this, please have a think about paper usage and utilise one of the following options:

* Issue my credit card bills online, notified by email

* Don’t send a bill if there is nothing to pay

* If you must send a bill just send a postcard or a single sheet of paper.  Print it on the inside of the envelope if you like!

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