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Dear Friends We enter the season during which vicars write prefaces at the beginning of parish magazines about New Year resolutions whilst tacking on some tenuous link with the Bible. But rather than trying to sanctify the secular practice of the New Year resolution is there another way? In our culture a vast Continue reading More Tea Vicar? Dear Friends If there is one thing that makes Uplyme Church distinctive from any other church of which I have been a member, it is the warmth and friendliness of the people. Anyone walking into one of our gatherings is made to feel welcome – and that welcome is genuine – as we Continue reading More Tea Vicar? Dear Friends It is a funny thing, what some non-Christians think about what some Christians think about stuff. I mean, I am frequently amazed and shocked to discover someone thinking something about Christianity or thinking I believe something or adhere to some doctrine or other. If I am honest, once I have picked Continue reading More Tea Vicar? (Gavin’s article for the August/September edition of the parish magazine) Dear Friends There’s this lovely bit in Paul’s letter to the Christian community in Corinth (an ancient city in Greece), where he says, “I am a fool for Christ.” I have to confess that I looked a bit like a fool to the Continue reading More Tea Vicar? Dear Friends I recently upgraded my digital camera (for those into photography, I am now running a Nikon D5100 with a 35mm 1.8 lens), and to test it out, I took it on a walk around Uplyme. Photography enables me to look afresh at the world; the delicate petals on the dog rose, Continue reading More Tea Vicar?
One of my favourite stories in the Bible is the story of Jesus after he has been resurrected. Jesus appears on the beach and calls out to his mates who are fishing. They’ve been fishing all night and they’ve not caught much at all. Jesus shouts to them to lower their nets down on the right side of the boat and they haul in this huge net full of fish. One of the disciples says, “It’s the Lord” and Peter, in true Peter style, jumps out of the boat and swims/wades to the shore. Jesus is there and he has a small fire going with some bread and some fish. He asks his friends to bring some of the fish they have caught. Jesus invites his friends to breakfast. I love that. Dear Friends This week, as I walked along a beach with my dog Whispa, a little girl ran up to me wanting to stroke her. The little girl said, “I had a dog like this called Barney. He’s in heaven now.” I smiled and told her all about Whispa as she ploughed her Continue reading More Tea Vicar? Dear Friends There has been a huge surge in the uptake of ebooks (electronic books). I recently visited a retreat centre and was gobsmacked to see how many people were using Amazon Kindles and the like – and these were not young people. The publishers are reporting a phenomenal growth in this area Continue reading More Tea Vicar? Dear Friends Here we are, one month into 2011. I wonder if you have managed to keep up those New Year resolutions? Or did you not make one, thinking it was a waste of time. After all, you would just be setting yourself up to fail again. You had tried making resolutions and Continue reading More Tea Vicar?
So, on Sunday, after writing a resurrection hymn and then discovering that God was asking me to rest, I decided to let God speak to me. He had made it clear that he wanted my attention, and now he had it, would he speak? |
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