Ben’s Musings

While reading Velvet Elvis I made some notes on my Palm. They’re not extensive and are simply conclusions which hit me.

I really absorbed this book, probably because I have lots of questions about God and my faith since Amy died.

Anyway, here are my notes:

Questioning the Christian faith is mandatory in the Christian faith.

The bible needs to be interpreted to understand it’s application.

In Jesus’ time, Rabbis would call their interpretations and applications their “yoke”.

Jesus said his yoke was easy.

When a rabbi was teaching a new yoke, he was validated by two other rabbis putting their hands on him. Jesus was baptised by John, then God blessed him audibly – that’s why his baptism was so important.

Rabbis would “bind” some practices and “loose” others.

Jesus gave us permission to do that, and when we do, it would happen in heaven. He gave authority to make new interpretations and applications of the Christian faith.

When we debate, discuss, pray, wrestle, God is involved.

The whole earth is full of the “kavod” - weight and significance of who God is.

So whenever we see truth and beauty and goodness, we see God, and should claim and affirm it whether it is termed “Christian” or not – the word Christian is a noun - it is a bad adjective.

We are tour guides, pointing out what others dont see around them – God.

It is easier to remain busy than to stop, stare your problems in the face and recieve healing.

Shalom is the presence of the goodness of God. It’s the presence of wholeness, completeness.

Jewsh children memorised the torah from age 6 - 10. Then if they showed natural ability, they would learn the other Old Testament books until aged 14. Then if they were still good, they would learn the Jewish commentary and wisdom about each part. Then they might ask to follow a rabbi who would accept them if he thought they could live as he did. He would say “come, follow me”.

Jesus disciples were fishing because they hadn’t reached this stage, yet Jesus chose them believing they could carry his yoke and do what he did - be disciples.

He got frustrated with their lack of faith in themselves being able to do as he did – eg. walking on water.

God wants to restore us to who he made us to be. We are a new creation. When God looks at me, God sees Christ because I’m “in” him.

Christians are people learning who they are in Christ.

To Jesus, the goal isn’t getting into heaven, the goal is to get heaven here.

The church doesn’t exist for itself; it exists to serve the world.

We need to embody the good news by serving those around us. This will require difficulty and suffering but will bring great hope.

I’ve been busy recently. April was a busy month because I was organising ASBO, a skate competition over 4 sundays in April, and ChurchMCR launched on April 1st so I was deaing with that too.

I decided not to be busy in May. Mary-Lou was upset that I had not given proper time for my grief over Amy because of my busyness in April. I agree that it is not healthy to push away my grief so I wanted time to dwell on Amy and to work through by pain and confusion, especially about God.

But the last couple of weeks have been hectic!

First, some of the Advisory Team for ChurchMCR have become concerned about the sustainability of ChurchMCR after the current funding runsout in a couple of months. It has been a stark warning that I need to focus on ChurchMCR’s financial future, which has meant busyness.

Secondly, I’ve got involved with Burnt To The Ground, a fundraising festival being held as a positive response to the Dale Street fire a few weeks ago. It destroyed a whole building and the work and property of many small businesses and freelancers who have been left without offices.

The organisers of the festival wanted there to be a skate area, so they contacted me. I thought it was a great idea and got involved, but it has led to a great deal more busyness which I wasn’t expecting.

I’ve been reading a book called “Velvet Elvis” by a chap called Rob Bell. It is about his understanding of the Christian faith and is brilliant and challenging. I have made notes on it which I will share soon as it has impacted me in many ways.

One of the things Rob Bell says in this book is that it is easier to stay busy and get busier than to stop and face your personal issues and get healing for them. God wants to restore us to become the people we were created to be, but we rarely give him and ourselves the chance to do that.

The chapter made me want to be less busy and to go for counselling to work through my grief and other things. So I’ve gone ahead and got a counselling session booked with Reach at Kings Church, but at the moment, it seems like just another item in my busy schedule!

We hosted the first BARF of 2007 yesterday evening and the film we watched was “The Cave Of The Yellow Dog“.

It is a beautiful, gentle and uplifting film with some great story telling and moments of humour. It is centered around a Mongolian nomad family, and particularly the 6 year old girl who finds a dog and wants to keep it, but her Father doesn’t want her to.

The scenery, music and acting of the real-life nomad Batchuluun family are incredible and wonderful. The attitudes, values and way of life of these people are refreshing and really interesting.

Everyone who stayed after the BBQ loved the film. It is one of those films which stick with you for days or weeks afterwards. Here’s the Trailer to inspire you to watch it:

Mary-Lou suprised me again after my Archery yesterday. She had organised a bunch of friends to be waiting for me with a picnic! I was a bit overwhelmed and quickly sat down - I didn’t really know what to do, I wondered whether they expected me to give a speech!

I uploaded a couple of videos of me on ChannelM to YouTube and put them on the SkateMCR website the other day - take a look.

The only thing that is in my head when I watch me in the second video is “BELLY”!

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Mary-Lou and I watched a film last night called Look Both Ways. I had seen it in Blockbusters and thought it looked interesting so I added it to my EasyDVD rental list.

It is a film about people dealing with Death - an unusual theme for a film. But it isn’t a morbid film, instead it is quite upbeat yet reflective at the same time.

It’s got some great quirky moments and it made me laugh in a number of places - Australian films seem to have a sense of humour at the same time as being emotionally poignant (eg. The Dish and Strictly Ballroom which I both loved).

I really liked Look Both Ways, I thought the acting was great and the story was told very well.

Here’s the trailer:

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I have wanted to have a go at Archery for around a year now and for my Birthday, Mary-Lou got me some Archery lessons with the Bowmen Of Lyme. So at 9am this morning, we got Minty (our car-share car’s name) and set off to Lyme Park near Disley with a picnic.

There are 4 sessions on each Sunday in May. Today was my first session and I loved it! The members of the Club were all really nice and encouraging and the chap who trained us, Mark, was really clear and helpful. I really enjoyed having a go and Mark even commended me on having a good group of arrows on the target - a sign of accuracy.

After the Archery lesson, Mary-Lou and I went back to Minty to get our picnic when my Mum, Sister and Brother turned up as a suprise! It was wonderful to see them and to share a picnic together and have a catch-up.

After our Picnic, we went to fly my kite because it was really windy on top of the hill at Lyme Park. It was really fun! My brother, Tobbit, went a’prancing about not really caring what the kite was doing but my Sister, Kate, was good at controlling it.

I’m looking foreward to my next archery lessons and can see myself getting into it as a hobby.

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Yesterday was Poll Day in England to vote for our local Councillors. I voted for the Green Party. I don’t even know the name of the guy who was standing for them, but I see it as a vote for a political party anyway.

My first vote was when I was 20 and I voted for Labour in a General Election. Then the next vote I voted Lib Dem, the next was for the Green Party, then Green again yesterday.

I recently found out that my Grandad, Neil Crompton Haigh (we all called him Bobop), voted for the Green Party towards the end of his life. My Grandad and Grandma, Florence, met because their parents were involved in setting up the Labour Party, back when it was socialist. Before he died he wrote this for his funeral:

The greatest disappointment has been in the World Community - in its failure to build good, peaceful, respectful and generous International relations. My parents and Florence’s worked very hard years ago for a more caring and equal society, and with some success. This success has been less than they hoped for, and we see that, today, there is much to do before all will enjoy a caring World Community. My generation must regret its failures.

It pleases me that I decided to vote Green for my own reasons and as it turns out, Bobop did too.

I heard an interview with someone from the Green party on Radio 4 a few weeks ago where the interviewer was asking him about how their own website describes the Green Party as anti-Capitalist. He went on to talk about how Social Justice was much more important to them than whether a multinational make a few more million this year. I had never heard a Green Party member talking about Social Justice and the fact that they are a large Party with an anti-Capitalist agenda excited me!

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