This is what the LORD says:
"Stand at the crossroads and look;
ask for the ancient paths,
ask where the good way is, and walk in it,
and you will find rest for your souls.
But you said, 'We will not walk in it.'
Jeremiah 6:16
It Saturday morning. The clock is yet to click onto the 8 mark and I'm up drinking tea and chatting with the movement of people in the flat. I felt so blessed yesterday by the activities and encounters, the invitations that ranged from insult to apology, familiar faces I've seen only days ago to ones I've not seen for months, from meal to street-side hug, from frivolous to constructive planning. Sadly my master-plan of writing got enveloped and then sidelined somewhere amongst the ticking minutes. Our plans are futile things often. And it's the plans that have started to unnerve me, to what will I do, of where will I be of 2010, that dance through my head as the night pushes me to dream. My time working with the Korab kindergarten over the end of last week and the beginning of this was a beautiful encounter that I thoroughly enjoyed and felt honoured to have been so welcomed and invited into such a loving community. My time this week since has been full of time spent with people I am quite attached to, but my mind also calls me to recognise that mission is about empowering the community, and I was never supposed to settle here. Then I find myself talking about so many possibilities, admitting to myself my love for this land and people (and certain person) and again I am confused. My weekends are numbered and full from this point onwards. My time during the week is by no means empty either. And so I throw myself back on my scripture, I make the time to be quiet and hope that in this time of advent and waiting I will discover the birth of an answer to the question I seek.... This is what the LORD says: "Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, 'We will not walk in it.' Jeremiah 6:16
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This past week i've spent in Pivnice with the Korab preschool and the methodist community there. it's been a joyful trip getting to know these children and the warm and welcoming grpups that attend the church. I do aplogise for the lateness of thsi post, and subsquently it's briefness. but some stories shall be saved for when you next meet me in person! Suffice to say, i have been challanged to keep moving forward, fallen in love with the concept of continuing to serve in these comminities i feel I've discovered, and been left with the feeling that january and it's decisions will be one of the hardest things i am to go through. Somewhere in this week daydreams got confirmed and started to bleed into reality, I started to wonder to which home the father will lead me before I run into his arms and something started to scare me. There is a temporariness about mission trips such as mine, a reassurance that a time will come when you return to where you were sent from and though never the same will live again in a sense of normal. My heart longs to be in England and standing in worship amongst faces and words I can connect to. My mind turns to an English tune, but my spirit has felt the kick of the unborn child and my eyes see the subtle pregnancy signs of a new thing arriving in this land, of an advent sound being sung before God shows his hand. Now I am caught. And as my daydreams started to run strange things started to happen, I met people with the same daydreams, heard worship songs play on random internet soundtracks, and started to think in less dream and more concrete. Probably I shall return to England and all these whispering shall slide under the carpet, but if these whisperings are mine to fulfil then the prospect is indeed daunting.
This week has sparkled like a snow-globe, and truly from the windows of the flat it looked just like that on Tuesday. Thankfully the snow stayed away for the weekends wedding, which I found surprisingly alien. There was no church service which was a bit of a disappointment, but the ceremony happened at the reception and the groom and bride were surrounded by a great crowd of friends as they promised and completed the various traditions. What amazed me the most was the amount of money that kept changing hands, the individual quantities were not huge but many of the traditions involved paying, musicians get money placed into their instruments of stuck on their forehead, things you receive you place token amounts as thanks back, the most lucrative is when the bride circles the crowd with a sweet alcohol and a big basket in her hands for the cash. Probably the most bizarre for me was the buying of the bride, the pantomime performance of offering money and the offering of an unsuitable alternative until an amount is given. There is something within me that smiles at this tradition, but something in me that recoils from anything that puts a price on a human life. And yet that is exactly what we have done throughout human history, our religions effectively do that, they put a price to be paid for our salvation, whether than be paid in prayer, or works, or conversions, or finance, or the blood of another. The thought came home to me last night as I shared the tradition of Guy Faulks night with friends (yesterday being the 5th of November). We brought fireworks and sparklers and stood canal-side as they lit up the sky. Telling the story of Guy and his fellow conspirators and the end they had to their lives. It was at the kings discretion what would happen to their battered bodies and I realised just how much history has traded human lives. On Wednesday the English crowds will be sprinkled with poppy's as a recognition of this, a moment of silence will be held. Yet the practice of purchasing life is far from absent from this world today, a mere 27 million souls know that. From a purchased soul, set free, I thank my master and I shine with whatever light I can reflect because of you today. |
The other siteWho is GfeefGfeef is the name that my writings have been under for some years. As far as I know it's unique to me. Originally from the UK, I now live in Serbia but continue to have a passion for childrens and youth ministry. Archives
October 2014
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