Crimperman.org

Food for thought as we approach the time when we make a significant effort to “celebrate the resurrection”

( h/t Rev’d Lesley & Phil’s treehouse )

Like many people I am a massive fan of Top Gear. So it was with extreme sadness I read of the potential demise of this flagship factual programme for the BBC.

The Tesla Roadster

You may have heard the news that Tesla are suing BBC Top Gear over the way the programme portrayed the manufacturer’s electric vehicle. You may also have read today how Top Gear star Jeremy Clarkson has announced his retirement from the show with immediate effect. Apparently he is unhappy that both Top Gear’s and his own journalistic integrity is being brought into question like this. A lot of people are asking whether this will mean the end of Top Gear itself. Certainly many people are asking how this iconic TV show can continue without its main star. “If they replace him they run the risk of losing much of the female audience” said one commentator.

Clarkson himself has – in his typically shy way – said little except that he doesn’t intend to continue in TV. “What other TV could I do? Hammond has grabbed the cheesy early Saturday kid stuff and James May has cornered the market on reminding us about all those toys our friends had but our parents couldn’t afford.”. Rumours abound that Clarkson is looking to join forces with the Stig and create new Rally team but so far it’s just rumours.

If – on this of all days – Jeremy Clarkson is retiring and it means the end of Top Gear I think it will be a travesty for quality journalism and British TV. Where will we get our fix of presenters using their wit and guile to combat each other in a series of ever-more-elaborate trials. The Gadget Show just isn’t the same thing.

Update 2011-04-01 12:38 Okay so in the UK we have a tradition which says that April Fools jokes must only be played before midday or the joke is on the joker. Continuing that tradition, I am declaring that this post – if you hadn’t guessed – is an April Fool. Apart from the fact that Top Gear is being sued by Tesla, all of the above is made up (including the bit about me being a “massive” Top Gear fan. I like it, just not that much.)

I don’t need to add anything here (except for my UK friends 8th grade is about 13-14 years old).

( h/t Jesus Needs New PR )

I’ve been commuting for more years than I care to remember and since 2005 this has been by motorbike. I work in London and travel around 135 miles per week on London’s roads. Recently there have been far too many accidents not involving me but involving cyclists. Some of them have been quite horrific to consider and in almost all the ones I heard of the “fault” could be laid at the feet of the vehicle driver. However cyclists are not innocent and could do more to look after themselves. How do I know this? Because I see them every day taking risks that quite frankly seem reckless to me. Most commuting cyclists will know the safety advice stuff so I’m not going to go over it here. What I will do though is point out some observations I think that many cyclists either don’t consider or think are low risk. Remember I’m not trying to have a go here, I’m genuinely trying to stop so many of you getting hurt.

Red lights

Yeah yeah I know the reasons you jump red lights and understand it (up to a point). Once you’ve got a head of steam up the last thing you want to do is stop and start all over again. That said: please take the opportunity to look for other cyclists jumping the lights the other way. Also think about pedestrians. I’ve seen a few cycle-on-cycle smashes where both flew across the lights without looking. Yes the law says you must stop and yes a lot of you won’t but if you are not going to stop then at least look and be prepared to slow down or take evasive action.

Two hands on the handlebars

Okay so you use one hand when signalling (you do signal don’t you?) but sometimes it seems like many of you are flapping rather than signalling. Practise riding with one hand – seriously. A car/van/whatever will happily pull to close alongside your right flank and if you wobble while signalling it’s your life and their paintwork. Aside from this there are some – what seem – obvious things not to do while cycling on a busy road:

• Texting, or browsing on your phone
• Holding an umbrella (no really I’ve seen it)
• Opening a packet of sweets/cigarettes and my particular favourite
• Pulling a wedgie out the crack in your bum

I’ve seen all of these more than once and most times the cyclist is all over the place while doing it.

Visibility

Which of these three did you see first? Photo by tejvanhotos CC:By

Yeah I know it looks awful but hi-vis gear will save your life. Look at the photo and tell me which one you saw first. For car drivers that’s the one you focus on. I’ve seen near misses where a car has pulled round a hi-vis cyclist and “not seen” the low-vis one beside them. Yes the car driver should look but let’s be honest in traffic they don’t look so you have to make yourself obvious. While we’re at it you know those flashing lights you have? Use them. In the day time too. Any kind of flashing light immediately grabs your attention. Most modern motorbikes have their lights always on regardless of time of day for the same reason. Again I’ve often seen a flashing light way before I see the bike behind it – particularly in mirrors.

Pedestrians

You know what they’ll do, you know they’ll do it without looking. They are you without wheels. Most of ‘em have music playing, many will be texting while they walk and will therefore miss the fact that the pavemnet is about to run out. Last week I saw a pedestrian step off a curb into a passing cyclist who swerved and was narrowly missed by a car overtaking him. Use your bell/horn/mouth/whatever and let them know you are there.

Indicators and blindspots

You know about not undertaking lorries but honestly the same danger exists if you overtake a lorry when he’s turning right. Actually every motor vehicle has blindspots and you are pretty tiny. In the past two weeks I have had near misses with cyclists who thought they could whip the inside of me while I was turning left (indicator going). Scared the crap out of me to be frank and I don’t thinkl they enjoyed it either. One of them even had the cheek to tell me my indicator was on (5ft from a corner, why do you think it was on?). Look no matter how much right of way you have, bigger vehicles don’t look as much as they should (particularly on the nearside). Motorcyclists don’t either but they do look more than cars (it’s our lives too) and in my experience cyclists rarely look. If you see a hand or an indicator please don’t try to beat the corner. Better to stop than get hurt.

Ride defensively

I know this all sounds like I’m some perfect rider who hates cars and bicycles but honestly: I just want to see less blood on the road and I am sure that car and van drivers would sooner not hit you. The point I’m making is that years of motorcycle commuting has taught me that people make mistakes. Sometimes they forget to look or they do something rash because they’re in a hurry or stressed or whatever. It doesn’t matter why or even that I may have right of way: if they hit me I’m dead. Maybe not dead but every accident has that possibility. My old biking instructor once said that riding defensively was “letting the other guy win because in a few minutes he’ll be stuck in a queue and you’ll sail past him. Last thing you need is an angry person behind a wheel”. Seems to make sense to me. I also wear a lot of protective gear, more than cyclists. So for you guys it’s even more dangerous, unless you look out for yourselves a bit more. I know it’s a drag at times but safe and defensive riding will keep you alive and hoepfully I won’t be arriving at work with yet another tale of how a cyclist almost (or actually) bought it.

The Give Up Bad Coffee For Lent twibbon.

This is a follow-up post to the one on Give up bad coffee for lent (which increasingly becoming a misnomer). It’s been good to see support for churches showing their best in their service. I’ve heard reports of churches experiencing increased activity and participation in their post-service refreshments time (or whatever you call the time coffee is served) just by serving fresh coffee. Indeed some have reported that they have people turn up after church just for the coffee! It’s amazing how the smell (and taste) of good fresh-brewed coffee (and maybe the prospect of some cake) can get people together and it’s important to ensure visitors and regulars alike can share in this most vital but oft neglected part of our church service.

But again it’s more than just serving coffee and cake. We have to be welcoming in all things. This does not mean (as I recently read about) “ushering” first-time visitors into an office to await an “official welcome” by the church leader. Neither is it inundating the poor souls with repeated questions about their personal life. The trouble is in our attempts to not do these things we can often go too far the other way. A friend of mine on (and off) Twitter, tweeted the following:

@Kneewax RT @revmaryhawes: Visited a church. Stayed for coffee 15 minutes later no one had spoken to me <<< #gubc4l it's all about gospel hospitality

The first part was @revmaryhawes experience and the second part the response of my friend @kneewax. I like that term Gospel Hospitality so I’m borrowing it. I did a bit of digging around on it though and found some useful articles. One in particular stood out in the context of GUBC4L. Written by David Black in 2005 and entitled ‘Gospel of Hospitality’ it says:

This Gospel of Hospitality invites people to come with their hopes and failures and questions to a place where they will be unconditionally accepted and, over time, brought to an understanding of their failings and God’s forgiveness. It is a place of refuge for the weary traveler. It welcomes the stranger, the neighbor, the pilgrim. Our only motivation is the fact that, being ourselves recipients of God’s hospitality that made us members of His household, we now have the joy of becoming conduits of His hospitality to others. (emphasis mine)

There’s a lot more to that piece so do go and read it. As you’d expect it also quotes 1 Peter 4:9 regarding hospitality “Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling” _{1 Peter 4:9 NIV}. Other versions speak of doing so “cheerfully” or “without complaining”. Again though I’m going to come back to The Message and widen the context slightly:

⁸Most of all, love each other as if your life depended on it. Love makes up for practically anything. ⁹Be quick to give a meal to the hungry, a bed to the homeless – cheerfully. ¹⁰Be generous with the different things God gave you, passing them around so all get in on it: ¹¹if words, let it be God’s words; if help, let it be God’s hearty help. That way, God’s bright presence will be evident in everything through Jesus, and he’ll get all the credit as the One mighty in everything – encores to the end of time. Oh, yes! _{1 Peter 4:8-11 MSG}

Serve coffee as if your life depended on it? Well yes. Because it’s not just your life. Making somebody welcome could mean a big difference in their life. As Mother Theresa said “We cannot do great things but we can do small things with great love” and “Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.”.

So how do we respond to newcomers?

Many – better than I – have tried and failed to answer this trickiest of questions so I’m largely ducking out of it here too. Mostly that’s because the how depends upon the where and the who. It’s something we should “play by ear”. We should respond to people as people and not just another new face. They’ve come through our door for a reason, they may not wish to share it but if we are to make their visit worthwhile then how we treat them is vital. This should be a no-brainer but sadly it’s not. All too often we can be too busy running around doing stuff that we forget the people the stuff is for.

I would say that whenever I have been to a church for the first time the coffee time is the place where I have been able to get to know more about it than at any other. The friendly churches are not those that have “newcomer spotters” who prey upon strange faces. The friendly ones are the ones where you are engaged and involved in a non-threatening way. More oftne than not that will happen over coffee making it a decent cup means you have given value to those to whom you are serving it. Serving is where we will “entertain angels unawares”. But we shouldn’t serve our best just on the off chance that this is an angel in dire need of a latte. We should serve our best because the people we are serving are God’s children and because like it or not we are His representatives at that moment, in that place.

You can show your support for Give Up Bad Coffee for Lent via the Twibbon on your facebook or twitter avatars. You can also use the twitter hashtag of #GUBC4L but above all you can show support by being generous, serving your best and showing some Gospel Hospitality.

The Give Up Bad Coffee For Lent twibbon. (c) Ryan Cartwright CC:By

So if you haven’t heard I seemed to have gotten involved in the start of a movement. Okay that’s probably a little over-dramatic but following a rather frantic twitter conversation the other day there has begun a genuine call for change in the Church (particularly the UK). It’s called ‘Give Up Bad Coffee For Lent’ and is named after a joke I made on Twitter. For more information on the birth of this campaign and a great summary of what we’re all on about you’d be better to go read the excellent blog post by @Twurchsteward. Come back here afterwards though

Following the flurry of tweets and the above blog post I decided — in a sudden burst of unilateralism — to create a Twibbon campaign. For those who don’t know a Twibbon is a way of displaying a small logo on your facebook or twitter avatar/profile picture to show support for a cause. To my surprise it has been taken up by several outside of our initial group and for that I thank you. It did also raise several questions and it struck me that the name alone might need some clarification so here are some FAQs:

What do you mean by “bad coffee”? To be honest it varies from person to person but this is about doing our best in service and hospitality. So it’s about taste and quality but not necessarily at the expense of fairtrade etc. So it’s not about particular brands or even types of coffee so much as it is about the attitude behind the provision of coffee. See the next question for more.

Why coffee? It’s not really about coffee but that is a focal point because it’s an area where many a Church needs improvement.This campaign is really about serving people with our best effort. It’s about combating the idea that while we’re happy to get and do the best we can for our own use, in Churches there can be too often an approach of “that will do – it’s just for Church”. What this campaign says is That will not do. as @Twurchsteward says..

> The Bible is fairly clear on the subject of hospitality – my current bible study plan covers passage after passage in the OT commanding Israel to offer the best of their hospitality, to welcome all comers with the very best they have to offer.

and…

> The bible exhorts us again and again to treat others with the generosity, love and welcome that we would wish to receive – why ? Because when we honour each other we honour our Creator – because “when you do this to the least of these, you do it to me” .

But we already serve good coffee? That’s great but does your Church show it’s best in all matters of hospitality? How’s the cleaning, the flowers, the toilet roll? This is about so much more than coffee. It’s about love. If we show our best then people may stick around but honestly if you go into a shop and get treated in a sub standard way — how often do you go back?

So you’re saying the Church should pander to visitors rather than attend to more important things? If you want to put it that way, yes the Church should “pander” to visitors or as you might rephrase it: make them feel welcome. This is God’s house and we are His family by adoption. When people enter your house do you not expect your family to make them feel welcome? Serving decent coffee/tea/biscuits may seem trivial but it adds to a welcoming atmosphere.

What happens after Lent? The Lent but is just an accident of timing. This is really a rallying cry to the Church. In the words of many of my school reports this campaign simply says “Hospitality: must try harder”. Also don’t think this is the responsibility of Church leaders, the hand and the heart serving the cup is as important (if not more so) here as the liquid inside the cup and the person buying the beans.

To end I just want to go back to @Twurchstewards quote about honouring God as we honour each other. It puts me in mind of Matthew 5:14-16 which speaks of us as being the light of the world and not hiding our light under a bushel. Personally I like the way the Message puts it:

> 14 “Here’s another way to put it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colours in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. 15 If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. 16 Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand – shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven Matt.5:14-16 MSG

Isn’t that what we’re talking about here? Let’s be generous with our hospitality. Let’s shine. Let’s give up bad coffee…and not just for lent.

If you want to join in then by all means comment here or alternatively show your support via the Twibbon on your facebook or twitter avatars. You can also use the twitter hashtag of #GUBC4L

Do you see people who speak too quickly? There is more hope for a foolish person than for them. ^{Prov. 29:20 NCV}

In what seems to be an effort to show that we can be just as daft as the rest of the world (if not more so) there have been two very good recent examples of Christians not paying attention to the above scripture. The first concerns author and speaker Rob Bell. Apparently he has a new book coming out soon and it may or may not be a bit controversial. What has caused the controversy is quite frankly irrelevant because as yet only a handful of people have read the book (it is yet to be published after all). Now the cynic in me says that the publishers are quite happy with controversy and the associated furore as it will probably lead to more sales but like others it galls me to see so much vitriol directed towards Mr Bell (and even those who share his name) from so many who call themselves Christian and yet have somehow forgotten to think before speaking or acting – let alone actually consider showing any grace at all. This kind of behaviour reminds me of the mess with the Jonathan Ross/Russell Brand phone call “scandal” where thousands of people who hadn’t heard a radio show, read that they might have been offended if they had heard it and so duly complained without actually hearing it! I posted a link to a very apt video a while back which might be useful for some of us to see.

The second example is the much-publicised case of the Johns. This Christian couple were reported as being banned from fostering because of their views on homosexuality. Except as the ever trusty Church Mouse reported (with credit to Peter Ould and Gavin Drake it never happened. The Johns were not banned. No Christian couple is banned from fostering and there wasn’t even a fostering case at the centre of this. The Johns were asking a Judge to rule against the possibility that their Local Authority might try to prevent them fostering on the grounds of their “traditional view of marriage and sexual ethics”. Yet again the Christian knee-jerk machine went into action and the “We are offended” placards were picked up and because we are in a connected world, the “fight” soon crossed to other countries. Again though is this a case of Christians taking an “offended” stance without checking if we actually should be? In fairness the popular media has clambered all over this story and mis-reported it so it really boils down to not believing everything you read in the papers at face value.

There is a worrying trend in the UK (at least) where Christians seem all too keen to presume that the world is out to get us and that we are being “persecuted”. The basis for this seems to be that because some people voice opinions opposing our own (and let’s be honest that happens enough within the Church) we are being persecuted. So we have mass band-wagon jumping whenever cases like these occur. The danger as I see it here is that the rhetoric used to defend Christians is remarkably close to the supporters of extremist political groups and we end up fuelling our own fears with talk of victimisation and persecution. But to date, in the UK: I have not heard of anyone imprisoned for saying “Jesus is Lord” in a public place; I have yet to hear of somebody being physically attacked for being a Christian and nobody has ordered a church closed down simply for being a church. Let’s stop jumping the gun here and pay attention to the scripture above. Okay, sure sometimes people might say or act towards Christians in an unkind, unfair and prejudicial manner but as the first of the examples above shows, the perpetrator is just as likely to be a Christian as well.

image (c) Ryan Cartwright CC:By-SA

As you probably know I can be found on Twitter – actually I have multiple accounts on there for personal, work and church reasons. I also have an Android-based phone and to help me manage those multiple accounts I use a Twitter client/app called Twidroyd. It’s very nice and does what I need it to. On Friday however it stopped being able to do anything on Twitter because Twitter blocked it – along with other clients made by the same company. Apparently these applications had violated Twitter’s policies. I have no real qualms with Twitter taking action if somebody violates their policy – it’s their policy after all. What worries me though is the apparent lack of notice given to Twidroyd users and the oh-so-coincidental appearance of a advert for Twitter’s Android client in the stream for Twidroyd users.

It’s not illegal or even immoral really but something sticks in my throat about the fact that the ability to cut people off from such a useful service rests with a handful of business folk. I know, I know we don’t have to use it and yes it is indeed Twitter’s service so they can do what they want but still when something gets this popular it moves beyond a mere business-arrangement type service and becomes something bigger. But what can we do eh? We use Twitter for lots of reasons but one of the most common will be because people we know/want to follow are on there. It’s the same catch-22 as Facebook to be honest and it comes down to security/privacy being overruled by convenience.

There are alternatives to Twitter, one of the most popular probably being Identica. I wrote an article on it for Free Software Magazine a while back but in brief this is micro-blogging with freedom. I can’t say that StatusNet (the people behind Identi.ca) would not block some app which breaks their policy but I can be pretty sure they wouldn’t act in the way Twitter has here. Identi.ca is designed around freedom. The software it (the server) runs on is free software and you can (and some companies do) download and run your own version of it. Most of us won’t have to and can use Identi.ca often with the same apps we use now. Twidroyd certainly has Identi.ca support and throughout this debacle it kept happily updating my timeline with Dents from Identi.ca.

In brief: Identi.ca is micro-blogging with freedom

You use Identi.ca exactly as you would Twitter and it has some extra features like groups (which predates and is better than Twitter’s lists) and In context (conversations) on the standard web interface (which is much better than new Twitter) – see my Free Software Magazine article for more. I’ve used it for work for nearly two years now and it’s really good. It also bridges to Twitter, you can find your Twitter friends on Identi.ca and set up a cross denting feature which will see your dents posted to your Twitter account. I’ve got a personal Identi.ca account but mostly it’s a place-holder.

Privacy

There is one caveat here though: Identi.ca doesn’t have a protected mode (where people have to request to follow you). For some, I know this will be a privacy issue for others not so much. The thing is that Identi.ca is about freedom and that means not restricting access to content. For this reason all Identi.ca users agree that their posts will be published under a Creative Commons Attribution licence. Once you take that into account there’s really no requirement for a “protect my dents” feature. In the end it means you shouldn’t post something you wouldn’t shout through a megaphone. Is this less private that Twitter? I’m not so sure. I started protecting my tweets a while back and then noticed people were RTing them anyway (some asked first which was polite – thanks). By the way the Press Complaints Commission recently ruled even protected tweets can be considered public domain because your followers may RT them.

So it would seem prudent to consider all your tweets as being broadcasted regardless of your privacy issues. If you are going to do that why protect them at all? So we come to Identi.ca’s stance of make them public but make sure they are attributed if they get repeated. Once you know that something you say has the potential to go public you change what you say. Many people tweet “Child1″ or “Son/Daughter” in reference to the child on Twitter but will use the child’s name on Facebook because they consider Facebook to be more private and yet we keep reading story after story of how Facebook has neglected user’s privacy and where supposed “private” status updates end up in the media. In the end privacy on the web is like car security – all you can really do is make your stuff less attractive to get and hope they go for the least path of resistance.

Using Identi.ca

So I’m going to start using Identi.ca in a personal capacity more now. Of course I will have to refer back to Twitter to keep up with people who are not on Identi.ca. So here’s what I’m going to try:

• new dents/tweets will be posted on Identi.ca and cross posted to Twitter
• replies will be made on whichever service I received the original
• replies will not be cross-posted

Of course to manage this I need some software which will make it easier. Fortunately Twidroyd has multiple accounts and support for both Identi.ca and Twitter and will show both streams as a single feed with smart-replying. On the desktop I use Choqok on KDE (more free software) and that also supports multiple accounts and both Twitter and Identi.ca. Of course I could find myself alone but if Twitter has annoyed you lately why not give this a try too? Signing up is about as easy as it can get and you can register using your Twitter account and Identi.ca will create an account with the same name (if it’s available) and create the bridge for you.

You can (or will be able to)¹ find me on Identi.ca at http://identi.ca/crimperman but right now there’s nothing there because I’ve not been using it and I can’t log in (I’ve forgotten my password and the password reminder system is being fixed as I speak). Watch this space though. In a professional capacity you’ll find me at http://identic.ca/equitas

¹ Update 22 Feb 2011 07:56 – the password reminder issue was fixed shortly after this was posted

(c) Nevine Zaki http://twitter.com/NevineZaki

Dear Christians around the world: this is a photo of Egyptian Christians standing in a human chain around Muslims in order to protect them while they pray. It was taken by Nevine Zeki. If you want to send a message to Muslims around the world, how about more like this rather than threatening to burn the Qu’ran, calling them names or lumping them altogether. We often read of how Jesus associated with those who he was “not supposed to”. It seems the Christians in this picture are following the same pattern and I am proud to think that I am part of their family.

Convenience is the anti-thesis of security

Part of my job is to do with security of websites and their underlying infrastructure. I’ve long held the view that the anti-thesis of security is convenience. Ask anyone dealing with computer system security and chances are they’d agree it’s not a good idea to let people choose their own passwords or pin numbers. There are factors such as the importance of what you are protecting that come into play but in general if you let people choose their own password they’ll go for something which is easy to remember and therefore guess or work out. Pin numbers will be the same: if they can get away with it most people will keep them the same on every system. Convenience for the person undermines security of the system. As this photo proves (I couldn’t find an attribution for this by the way so if it’s yours let me know).

But it’s not just security that suffers by convenience. I appreciate I will sound like Monty Python’s old Yorkshire men (“You tell that to kids today…”) but the truth is that we live in a world where convenience is the key. E-mail, Tweets and Status updates are pushed to mobile phones, bookings are made online or by SMS — preferably on the way to the venue and wireless internet connections are left unsecured and open because it’s easier that way. The phrase of our times seems to be “Can’t be bothered” (or a more colourful alternative) not because of apathy but because of pseudo-laziness. I say pseudo-laziness because this isn’t us not wanting to do something, it’s just us not wanting to take too much time or spend too much effort on it (which I suppose is laziness then). Some believe this is all a product of our drive for an instant world, I think it’s about convenience: you buy a new gadget and you want it to be charged already not wait for 24 hours, joint electricity and gas supply deals are sold not only because of cost savings but because it’s more convenient to deal with one company (until you actually have to deal with them then it’s anything but convenient!), people are encouraged to spend rather than save for things (presumably ‘spending’ on credit) and instead of buying your shopping “when the shops are open” it’s more convenient to dodge the shelf-stackers in the wee hours. I appreciate that there are good reasons for some if not all of these but the truth is that, to take 24 hour supermarkets as an example, once the store is open 24 hours it’s not just those who can’t get to the shops in normal hours who use them. We live in a world driven by convenience and whilst it can be both a nice thing and a dangerous thing it is not something that is likely to change.

Inconvenient truth?

It’s important to remember then that it is into this world we Christians are bringing our message. Our message which can sometimes make “store up your treasures in heaven” sound like “save for a rainy day”. A message which we too often present as “Thou shalt not” instead of “Have real and eternal life, more and better life than [you] ever dreamed of”. So what do we do? In a world which says “I can’t be bothered” how do we present “Love your neighbour as yourself”? Can it be that the Christian message is behind the times in ways we hadn’t considered before? Do we need to present it in ways which make it more convenient for people? In truth we already are. Fresh expressions, Messy church, Street pastors are all excellent examples of the Church making itself more accessible and removing the obstacle of inconvenience and they are not the only ones. But is this enough? Is it enough that organisations, churches and groups run these kind of projects or are we in danger of segregating the Church into the old and the new? Many studies have been made and papers written about the problems with running alternate ways for people to “do church” with many very clever people warning about the dangers of ending up with two “congregations”.

It’s up to us

But there’s something which keeps nagging at me. Whilst all these activities, projects and groups are great let’s not forget that many of the key moments in Church growth have come when God moves individuals to (for want of a better word) witness to those around them. This is important to remember. If the world around us is living by “Can’t be bothered”, the only way for me and you to teach them the importance of “Love your neighbour” is to do it. If the culture of saving seems foreign (no matter how good the advice) then the only way for us to demonstrate “Store up your treasures in heaven” is to do it and show it as it is: building for both now and the future. I am sure there are those who will disagree with me but Christianity is not about making God convenient, it’s about living as citizens of Heaven here and now: making God accessible through Jesus, through our words and actions. It’s about being inconvenienced ourselves so that other might experience life-changing grace. Yes it may involve changing our ways but the Church is all about change (despite the picture we present), it’s a “building” that is built of lives, hearts, hopes and love. No building remains the same while it is under construction so yes the Church must adapt, change and grow to keep its arms open to everyone but it’s not the building which lives but the stones it is made of – aka us. It’s been said that Christianity is supposed to be caught not taught and that you may be the only Bible people ever read. Now if you ask me both of those already sound like a convenience.