The ninth day of Advent - togetherness

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This morning I was glad to join my new colleague Sue in Boroughbridge at the vicarage to lead an Advent study group. We are doing Nick Baines’ York course called “Who am I” and this morning we had a really good conversation about needing others to support us and pray for us on our spiritual journey. We all shared stories about how, in hard times, we’ve had saints carry us in the darkness. We talked about needing Good Friday in our theology and Holy Saturday when we wait and we need companions who sit with us in the darkness. 

I reminded the group that early Methodist practice was to be in a group or class where you were accountable to each other, and you shared what God had been up to since last you met. I suggested we might in the church spend more time discussing God than discussing the church! 

A good question to ask on the Advent journey is who are our saints in the mess of life? Who hold us in times of fear? Remember God comes into the struggle of life and if we are to be credible again we need to sit with each other in the hard times and help each other find God who can lead us through them. That takes honesty and trust —- maybe that’s why people don’t come to study groups! 

The second Sunday of Advent - Light in the darkness

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This afternoon we had a Christingle Service in our chapel in Sawley. The church was full as the village church and chapel worshipped together and we had some children from the local school with us. 

It was perhaps fitting we met on a really dark and dreary afternoon outside. I love the picture above of the light shining out of the chapel onto the village green.

I said in the service today one little light, one candle is a protest against the darkness. The Advent story is that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness shall not put it out. I love the fact that a lot of the Christmas narrative is in the dark. I love the fact that later Jesus rises in the dark. I love the fact that in the darkness we see the power of light transforming murk and mess. 

I used the prayer below in the service today. Here are 7th century words which are powerful. In Advent we are not only reminded that Jesus is the light of the world but that we are to be lights in the world too. 

May we as Advent progresses and the world feels very dark indeed pray urgently into the darkness of this world, o come Lord Jesus, come. 

The seventh day of Advent - receiving gifts and remembering Saint Nicholas

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On 6th December, the Church celebrates the feast of St Nicholas of Myra. As a Bishop he was known for his habit of leaving gifts - sometimes in the socks drying by the fireside. His reputation spread beyond his locality as he was seen as the saint of generosity and kindness. In many European countries, today is the day when gifts are exchanged, remembering the kindness of Nicholas: in the Netherlands, children put out clogs filled with hay and a carrot for St Nicholas' horse, while in Poland, 'nice' children hope to wake up with a gift from St Nicholas under their pillows. It is easy to see how this 'saint of giving' morphed into 'Father Christmas' or 'Santa Claus. So welcome Saint Nicholas, welcome to a world in need of cheer and hope. Your goodness and care for all kinds of 'others' means you now remain one of the most popular of the Christian Saints and have turned into a symbol of giving and compassion in the figure of Santa Claus, which is really your name. I actually like the sound of the Middle Eastern Baba Noel, Papa Noel, but I don't want to lose sight of the fact that you were a living breathing person and now share in our lives as one of the great company of saints!

Today I’ve been at a Christmas dinner and at a superb Christmas concert. We’ve shared gifts of food, fellowship and musical talent. Giving and receiving cheers us. 

How can we discover you Saint Nicholas a bit more? There are people and websites who can tell us your historical story and places closely associated with your ministry and life. We can go to your tomb in Bari and venerate your relics, travel through Turkey to see where you were born and spent your life as a Bishop! We can link you to so many kinds of people, children, sailors, brides, the poor and even those who teach church doctrine (as you were supposed to be at the Council of Nicaea in 325!) 

Tales of you capture our imaginations. In England you came with the Norman Conquest and before the Reformation put you on a shelf for a while, there were 500 churches in England alone dedicated to your name! So it seems you are never very far away from people at all. But perhaps most of all, you can help us all young and old just relax a moment, spend a day being concerned and caring about others, making your feast day a big preparation for the coming of the child of heaven who lives in each one of us always.

Prayer (adapted by Fr Robin Gibbons)

Generous God,
who in your love gave to your servant Nicholas of Myra
the gift of caring for others by deeds of kindness on land and sea:
Enable us who honour him to love as he did and never cease to work
for the happiness and protection of children,
the safety of sailors and all who work on the sea,
the relief of the poor,
and the help of those tossed by tempests of doubt or grief. Amen

The sixth day of Advent - the message to the outside …

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This isn’t the best picture as the window had rain all down it but on this sixth day of Advent there is good news!!

The nativity figures at Allhallowgate are the right way round facing the world! It’s taken six Christmases for this to happen! My cup overflows!! In Covid I put some lovely posters in our windows telling the Christmas story. I was told they were the wrong way round as people inside the building couldn’t see them. The next year nativity figures were placed facing inwards. Mary’s bum had “Gift Aid, 25p” on it for all the world to see! The years following it happened again and again. The Christmas story is for us! 

But this year we are facing outwards! Alleluia! I remember my accreditation letter when I was received as a local preacher in 1990 from the President that year, John Vincent, which included trade words “for every word you preach in church, preach two outside.” I also recall those words of Archbishop Temple, who famously said “the Church exists for the benefit of its non members.” 

We can as a Church be a cosy inward club. But the Christmas story seduces us to see it is our vocation to share good news of incarnation with the world. 

This week in my Allhallowgate church I’ve had WI ladies have their carol service, and last night a large group of scouts filled the church for theirs. It was fun. A rare treat for me to have a church full of young people. It’s a challenge to tell the story of Jesus coming to a largely unchurched congregation, but I did my best. We’ve a chance every year to bring people into his presence. We need to think what people outside are thinking about and try and relate the story to their world. 

I told our preachers meeting last night we have to be relevant and know where people are. They are largely biblically illiterate. I hope the WI, people in Boroughbridge for lights switch on who were given pamphlets on peace, and our people who have been about in our churches faithfully for years, keep us journeying on.

It might be we are content.  It might be we are compelled to make a journey. It might be we need peace after a dreadful time about suffering and angst. Jesus is offering it not once but always. Trust him. The world needs good news. It needs relief. It was fun to host the scouts tonight. We laughed, we sang, and I hope some might have heard a tiny bit of good news. For this story entered the world and today touches the pain of the world and yearns to transform stuff.

Isn’t that a little bit encouraging? 

The fifth day of Advent - remembering a Fens legend

Today we’ve driven three hours back to the Fens to remember a dear man, George Rollins, who with his wife Mollie befriended us when we began to attend their chapel. Mollie and George enjoyed 64 years of marriage and were only apart 15 weeks and are now reunited in the sprouting broccoli patch of heaven! Here’s the tribute I gave in the service today. I choose to blog it to remind us in Advent we don’t journey alone but we are sent people to welcome us and encourage us by who they are.

After a very wet drive back up the A17 and A1 I told our preachers meeting tonight we minister to faithful people week in and week out like George who have kept chapels going for years. They minister to us when we go to them as much as we to them. On this fifth day of Advent take time to thank God for ordinary people who are extraordinary to us. They are everywhere! 

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It’s been very interesting to read the tributes to George posted on the Tydd St Giles in the past Facebook group over the last few days. My favourite is that George was a “Fens legend.” 

That’s not a bad epitaph is it? 

My wife Lis and I arrived in the Fens MethodistCircuit in May 2019 after a rough time. I was unwell and the church gave me a recuperative year. We decided to attend the most rural chapel we could find and see what welcome we got.  That chapel was Tydd St Giles and Mollie and George welcomed us, and over that year and a bit we were there, they cared for us, and Mollie would ring us up after we’d moved to North Yorkshire to see how we were. And when we came back this way and called on them, the best china came out!  I’ll never forget their kindness. Genuine kind Christian people.

We celebrate in George a long life of faithful service to community, family, chapel and farming. George’s 95 years were well lived, a simple life, a happy life, a life of quiet gentle devotion and care. 

Mollie used to enjoy chatting to Lis while we were here and later on the phone. I used to get George! He would tell a story very slowly whether it be about chapel in the past and great anniversaries or friends in Tydd Fen and Tydd St Giles or sharing in great detail about how long his greenhouse had been standing or about this years crop of tomatoes and sprouting broccoli, or what he’d been up to visiting family or giving you graphic information about his latest scar. He’d roll his trouser leg up to show you! He was a real character it was good to know. 

George enjoyed talking about his upbringing in Newton. He treasured Mollie and they were a team. He was a loving husband, father, grandfather and great grandfather.

George and Mollie enjoyed a long and happy marriage. We used to smile when Mollie would say on the phone she had to go as she needed to get George out of his boiler suit! 

George was deeply grateful for the care he received from David and Maureen and Susan and Andrew and the family. When Mollie went into residential care and then hospital, he would drive every day to visit her. I used to find the roundabouts in Wisbech scary and I’m not 95.

George loved the land. His small holding at Westlands was a pride to him. Lots of people have commented about his stall and having time to chat. Peter Thatcher in Gorefield sums it up: “George was one of a rare breed of fen smallholders, he and Mollie were unique. Always had some time to enjoy a chat. I'm sure George will be tending the heavenly broccoli patch and tomato crop now.” 

I read that the Fens, although it covers less than 4% of England’s farmland, it produces more than 7% of England’s total agricultural production, worth a staggering £1.23 billion. George was part of that story! I also read the Fen farmer was a hardy soul with the wind and the rain blowing across the land. He was though passionate about his work and George went to work up to fairly near the end of his life. No one was going to stop him climbing a ladder! Pottering about was a joy to him and the array of flowers as you drove past the house lifted your spirit.

Chapel was important to George. He was a faithful Methodist. The chapel at Tydd Fen was obviously a lively place where lots of people were nurtured and George and Mollie were at the heart of it. When it closed, they went down the road to Tydd St Giles chapel. We know about Mollie’s faithful playing of the organ, George welcomed people and 2pm on a Sunday was so important to him. It was so hard when the chapel was declared unsafe very suddenly in 2019. George thought it would be okay to go in and rescue stuff and took some persuading that wasn’t to be. 

The Methodist folk worshipped for a while in the community centre and then in the lady chapel of the Church until Covid came and finished things. I’m so glad we landed in the village one afternoon. Had we not we would not have had the privilege of knowing George and Mollie who became our friends. 

Both have been an inspiration and while they never went far, Wisbech and Lynn were a bit of an adventure, both of them made a difference to our and your world. For George, what mattered were Mollie, family, the smallholding, chapel and friends. He was a lovely lovely man the like of who we will not see again. His long life was well lived, quietly and faithfully. One of my favourite pictures on my phone is of George in his cap outside his home chatting away to us as we sat in the car. We told him we hadn’t got long but he had a yarn to tell — slowly and in detail! 

Without his sort today, life would be so much more difficult. He leaves those of you closest to him a large hole as he does in this area, but he also leaves a huge legacy and a call on us I think to live more simply. Love the land, love family, love God. Be genuine. 

It struck me thinking about George that God at the beginning of time needed a farmer, someone to care for the land. He created us and gave us the world, the garden, to look after. We only make a difference to the world if we look after what we’ve been given. George had a small part of God’s world to look after and he did it brilliantly and now after a life of faithful service he is now at rest in the church triumphant. He wanted to live longer than his father. He told me that often, He is reunited after only fifteen weeks apart with his beloved Mollie and life which as the old hymn says which began with a garden, has ended with a city of gold. Death has been passed through,and eternity is real for him. Because of Jesus. 

George Rollins, Fens legend, thank you for everything. Dear friend, may you rest in peace and rise in glory. Amen. 

The fourth of day of Advent - Christmas in your face :)

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I joked on Sunday my Advent would only last until Wednesday afternoon! This afternoon the local Federation of WIs had their carol service with me and tonight we were at the town Christmas evening in Boroughbridge. 

Both events had people somewhat hyper! Carols and mince pies were in abundance this afternoon and more carols, mulled wine and a hog roast tonight. There was in both events a feeling of comfortable bonhomie and contentment. 

Perhaps we need a month of Christmas to get through one of the darkest bits of the year? The ladies this afternoon thought the service lovely. The children tonight were excited to sing in their school choirs and to see Santa on his sleigh. There was a convivial atmosphere as I walked through the town. It’s as if suddenly we switch on happiness and community spirit. Bizarrely. 

Dare I be honest and say I’m already fed up with it?!!!!? I’m so not ready for Christmas and I’m trying to work out why it’s getting earlier and longer. I’m not sure it’s about anything but escapism from our mire for most people. 

I will get into it I guess! I have another carol service on Friday and a Christmas dinner and a carol concert on Saturday. I need to keep focussed. There is a message beyond the frills to be shared. I’m glad people at both gatherings enjoyed themselves. I’m just wanting something deeper… 

In other news - six Christmases in - for the first time the nativity figures at church are facing the right way round!!!!! 

The third day of Advent - your journey starts here.

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Writing for the third day of Advent from the Toyota garage in Knaresborough as my car is in for a service. 

The sign on the desk on arrival says “your journey starts here.” 

I’m reminded of the old story of the tourist in Ireland wanting directions. He’s told “I wouldn’t start from here if I were you.” 

The point of Advent intervention is that God comes and finds us where we are and beckons us to start a journey with him. We start from our here. This season is all about transformation and working towards a better future. I had a meeting this morning discerning how we work through a difficult time to a place where things might be more straightforward long term but how to journey through the immediate challenges is hard. 

“Your journey starts here.” 

The challenge of Advent is being brave enough to be prepared to go. We need good preparation to travel. Like a through service for a well used car. We need good Advent disciplines of listening, discerning and vision to travel well. We need to be open to surprise. The first recipients of incarnation didn’t expect what they found on the road or where they needed to travel. This Sunday we will hear of a call to start again to really receive what is coming on our journey. 

Wherever we are, God comes, whether our starting point is joy or sorrow, clear direction or no idea, certainty or disillusionment. 

The point is God finds us and leads us to where we should be. We can choose to travel or stay where we are. But not to go is to miss where he might be, isn’t it? 

On this third day of Advent let’s start a journey. How about it?