Thursday thoughts

1. This is a depressing piece entitled 'What state is the C of E in?'  Why is it that when free fall sets in the solution is often to appoint more people in senior management? Did I mention that I wrote a piece called 'Why plant churches?'. If I was seeking to turn a few of those graphs upwards I might look to appointing people to lead churches who were either a. Apostles b. Evangelists. Just a thought. (Acts 15:18-25)

2. I passed on to Senior management a question that a few on my PCC have asked me recently. What do we need to do to be considered worthy of any support or resourcing from head office? After seven years, after some growth and grace, a more than doubling of our parish share and sending out resources for mission outside our context we have much that's been so encouraging. We aren't a 'resource church' that received money from the Commissioners, we are simply a local church planted out of another local church to keep a closing one open, doing some mission and evangelism. seeking to love and support the poor, making a few disciples and having some fun. If I was looking at graphs like those above, I'd take more of an interest in what God's been up to here but honestly what do I know.....

3. I've been working on a small project for nearly a year that I hear news on today. It will either make me hopeful about the prospects for the C of E graphs or more depressed. I'll let you know.

4. I have returned to using 'Seeking God's Face' as my daily devotional.

5. I've been pondering why one might 'pray to Cardinal Newman'.

6. Christian Smith's phrase 'adultesence' is one I'm chewing on which I heard referred to in a sermon.

7. I've been getting Ryan Holidays reading email for ages and I've recently signed up for 'The Daily Dad'. It's jolly good.