Like i've never been away

Just returned from a week away on holiday over the Easter period. It was a great quiet break back home visiting my Dad in Inverallochy.

I've paid for it today though. With our annual event at Alton Towers less than 4 weeks away things are very hectic to say the least. Catching up on a weeks worth of e mails took a few hours.

Had a very productive day though. We are putting together a great new initiative in conjunction with our friends at Music Wire. An event programme which contains a CD. The CD is titled Ultimate Love and contains songs that tell the story of God's message of love and salvation as well as some notes on following Jesus. More of that later.

I also took delivery of printed backdrops for our new Sunday teaching series starting this weekend. We produced the graphics but they were printed in to giant banners and laminated by STW Signs. They have done some great work for us at very reasonable prices. Check out one example below.

Denomination: Dead or Alive

Since birth I have been associated with the Assemblies of God denomination of church life. My family were part of a the Cairnbulg AOG church. Once I had started to follow Jesus and knew I wanted to commit the whole of my life to His cause I left home to attend the national AOG Bible College, Mattersey Hall. On gradation I went to work in an AOG church, Milton Keynes Christian Centre. I now Pastor and lead the church with my friend and Senior Pastor, Mark Sherratt.

Unfortunately I never became an AOG minister. I had some difficulties with their statement of faith. I didn't really believe anything different to the majority of ministers and even some of the senior leadership but that did not matter. It was somehow OK to ignore the stated beliefs of existing ministers but a different matter for anyone wanting to join.

I've just spend a few days at their annual conference joining their business sessions as an observer. They were debating some changes which they felt that would bring the denomination into the 21st century and create a structure for the denomination to flourish in the future. It was interesting to listen to the debate and good points were made on both sides. In the end the conference voted for the change in constitution which in simplistic terms gave the leaders more power to lead. Which in the end I suppose is a good thing. You have got to give leaders the freedom to lead.

I was left still wondering its relevance to us as a church in Milton Keynes. (The views here are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of the whole of MKCC) It seems to me that denominations have to constantly try and prove their worth by creating departments and posts which they can point to and say what a great job we are doing.

The bare facts are that we are so busy trying to build local church here in MK that we have very little time to invest in a denomination. National initiatives just don't seem to connect with us or our people. Much of our mentoring and resource comes from other local churches such as Willow Creek, Saddleback, Hillsong and Abundant Life Church Bradford.

So I am left with the question I posed in my title. I suppose the answer is both. It remains alive to many local churches throughout the UK but it is also becoming more and more irrelevant to many.

What do you think?

God found me

Have not posted much recently. The Ultimate Event at Alton Towers is taking up much of my time. However took some time out last night to go and see the new release - Amazing Grace. The very title alone was enough to get my interest.

For those of you who do not know, it tells the story of reformer William Wilberforce and his battle to abolish the evil slave trade 200 years ago. There are many things which hit me watching the movie. You have got to see it! Apart from the main theme of the cruelty of man to man there were other slightly more unexpected messages for me.

One scene shows Wilberforce in his garden amazed at the creation and talking to God only to be interrupted by his butler. His butler acknowledged that Wilberforce had found God only for him to reply: "Its more that God has found me and it is somewhat inconvenient". I loved this description of His relationship with God. I once heard some one say that Jesus was the hound of Heaven and he is after you. We very often talk about our spiritual quest to find God but its amazing to think that God is looking for us!

In another scene William is trying to decide if he should become a preacher and follow God or become a politician to change society. The answer came back that he could change the world by doing both. Sometimes we set our sights to low. Through years and years of arguing, politicking, convincing, hardship, misrepresentation and illness Wilberforce fought to bring God's Kingdom into this world.

We are not here to do or play church. God found us so that we could find our cause and bring God's Kingdom to the earth.

Now thats a cause worth getting up in the morning for.

Out a control

Spent a quiet evening in last night watching my favourite sport - Football. I was introduced to this great game as a nipper by my Grandad - William Whyte. He used to entertain me with stories of great games he had been too and I was consumed with excitement when we set of with my Uncle and him to watch my first game at Pittodrie stadium. Home to Aberdeen Football Club my first love.

Our start at that time was Joey Harper our top goal scorer. At halftime we were 2 - 0 down and my dream had turned into a nightmare. Joey hadn't touched the ball and my faith was evaporating fast. Everything had the perfect ending though as Joey scored a hatrick in the second half and we ended up winning 4-2.

My journey with AFC has given me some great highs and some terrible disappointments. Passions run high. I've never been quite so bad as the "fan" who ran on to the field last night and tried to punch Frank Lampard - a chelsea player. I may have wanted to do it but always managed to restrain.

After all it is "only" a game! You got to be kidding!