Allie-G's

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a turtle named Hope and a self portrait.

I am back drawing again!

For best part of three weeks I just couldn't draw I have really been struggling. Often I see images when I read bible passages. that is what inspires me but the last few weeks I have consistently drawn a blank, almost literally. Its been a heavy going three weeks but finally we have some drawings. I am hoping the biblical imagery will follow!

 A Turtle Called Hope

So imagine my delight when I put pencil to paper and a turtle appears ( water colour pencils.) I don't know what made me draw a turtle but I did. I love drawing beaches. they are lovely I've learnt you leave a gap between the sand and the sea and it looks like the foam of the surf.

A self portrait.

My last attempt looked a lot like Rachel from friends, not really sure about this one - the glasses are wonky and it still doesn't look like me perhaps we are getting better- although I doubt it. I think its because I am no good at observational artwork, I can't copy I never have been able to, writing or  pictures I just can't do it. Still its drawing which excites me!

Art work and Gifts.

I thank God often for my imagination for the fact I can draw things and write stories. I love to be creative. I couldn't think of a time when I didn't enjoy it. we all have different talents. Mine is not for observational artwork but the joy in drawing. and who knows one day I might be able to draw something really brilliant. 

what-chya listening to.

Yesterday I realised I suck at evangelism, we are told to go out an make disciples and I ask God for opportunities but when they come along I just bottle it or sound like a weirdo and I am not- well not much. but I just can't bring myself to shove God at people. I don't think God is like that

So I am sitting on the bus last night to meet my friend for a chat and some chips - Girly night in. I'm sat on the back seat on the left hand side doing no harm to anyone listening to my music I have a mixture of secular music, Musicals and Christian music on my Mp3 player when this guy, well Lad, appears and asks if the middle seat is taken. Its empty and I don't know the people on the other side. so I quietly say no. I don't know why I attract weirdos but I do sometimes they are good sometimes not so much.

"what-chya listening to?" he asks.

I tell him Chris Tomlin or Matt Redman. I couldn't remember which wrote the song I was listening to.

" Never heard of them, can I have a listen?" he asks.

I explain to him that they are Christian singers and he probably wouldn't like them or the music.

He asks again so I offer him a pink ear bud.

"you're right" he says after 10 seconds " I don't like it."

he tells me he is going into town to the pub and then he asks me what I do so I tell him that I work for a church- kind of like a intern. He asks me if I want to be a priest which I laugh off. I explain that I don't know what I want to do.

" so why are you into all this God stuff then if you don't want to be a priest." here is the killer question. If I was a better Christian or an evangelist I would have said something more profound but I pitched for the truth " Jesus is my best friend I just want to serve him." nothing about the Cross nothing about anything more.

" do you believe God is your father?" he asked. I blanched.
"in a spiritual sense yes. Course I have an earthly dad but he is my spiritual one."

Then he told me his age and his name and got off the bus.

I kind of think that its going to be like this though. Little odd snippets of conversations, no one stands on the corner with a bible any more and those that do get funny looks and ostracise the church more ( in my opinion). Its not the done thing, I hope I intrigued him enough to find an Alpha course. But it will probably be forgotten after in a night in the pub. Maybe God is giving me practise or opportunity I don't know but what I do know is this real grass roots evangelism is messy and perhaps I shouldn't be too hard on myself. After all I came out of the conversation looking human not judgemental or worse superior perhaps that is not bad for a beginner....

The Great British Nomad

A Place to call Home. 

In the last 5 Years I have had  8 different Addresses and by the end of Today I will have moved 10 times. (The other two were moving back to my parents) To some people this might not be a big deal but for someone who until they were 19 had only had one address, and in many ways it never feeling like home, its still kind strange to be packing and moving again. 

There is this great thing I keep getting told about being in your twenties that you should write your address in Pencil. Moving this much doesn't bother me any more its part of my calling. To move, to experience a different environment to get settled one way and then have to adapt to change. Knowing that work is a 12 minute walk away and tommorow it will be a 30 minute walk away is something that you get used to and I am glad that life isn't stagnant. 

Everything in me wants to settle. Human nature makes us want to settle to find one place that we can call home and live there and not have to think about it. Addresses are written in marker pen. I guess we can get like that with our faith too. We get comfortable and cosy, we know what we can do and we resist change and challenge in our lives because they are not safe. I know I did. 

It took me about 6 times of writing my address in pencil to realise that its only an address its only the subheading of that chapter of your life. The address written on the bookplate is Beloved Adopted Daughter (Allie -----) C/o Heaven by invitation of Jesus Christ. My home address is there and it has been my whole life. I think the reason God has made me move so often is because he knows I couldn't get this otherwise, I have to know that all earthly addresses are transitory but my home is in him. 

This comes entirely from the practise of surrender. Surrender to him really does sound like we've given up because in the earthly meaning of the world it is cowardly its giving up on something because you don't have the will to fight it. I've realised over the last five years it brings total release, it is a daily and hourly choice but its worth it. Its courageous its choosing not to settle in the earthly to make the most of your circumstance and not be bothered about what is your current circumstance but where your home is.

Its just not about the dress...

The Bride of Christ.

As a church we are supposed to be Christ's bride waiting for his return to come and get us. So what kind of bride are we supposed to be? The beloved of Christ it is hardly befitting to be a bridezilla is it?
On occasion I think about my wedding day what it will be like waiting at the back of church for the music to start walking forward into a new chapter of my life. Its in all probability a long way off for me, but the whole paraphernalia that goes with weddings intrigues me and fascinates me and I am not the only one just remember how 2 years ago the royal wedding captured imaginations all over the world. The whole Engagement to wedding to marriage interests me being a bride means more than being a fiancée but not as much as being a wife it is a very transient state, in human terms you are only a bride for a day there is an intrinsic immediacy about being a bride it only lasts a set amount of time. the bible does not say we are Christ's fiancée neither are we yet his wife as a church we are his bride.

It got me thinking you know, what are the qualities of a good bride therefore what should we be doing as a church to be a good bride? I am going to explore two of these qualities that really hit me recently which inspired this drawing.

Brides are Beautiful;

There is something about a bride on her wedding day whether she is  my big fat Gypsy Bride or Catherine (Kate) Middeton she somehow not just looks beautiful but almost ( in worldly terms that is ) defines it, in one of my favourite films  27 Dresses Katherine Heigl plays the serial bridesmaid. and she and James Marsen's character discuss the favourite moment at a wedding they both say its the groom's face when he sees his bride for the first time. Brides are beautiful, they are worth looking at. In 1 Peter it tells us that ' true beauty does not come from outward adornment but from a quiet and gentle spirit which is precious to God ( 1 Peter 3:4). As a church we shouldn't be flashy in our faith just quietly and diligently serving him and furthering his kingdom in our communities that makes us a beautiful bride.

Brides are expectant/ anticipative; 

Brides know what they are waiting for even if they don't quite know exactly what it means in real terms . They are expectant and anticipative because they know that life as they know it is about to change. in our modern world of co habitation we have in a way lost this element. Most modern brides know what living with their husbands will be like, this is not the case in Jesus day or even 70 years ago. Now it seems it is the exception and not the rule. Marriage is a public declaration of intimacy and togetherness, In many cultures marriage brings an elevated status to the woman. I'm not saying that is right or that it is wrong for us to be co-habiting in the modern age although I do know of some churches ( not one I have been to I might add) who won't marry couples who live at the same address. All I am saying is we know what is coming its all in the bible we don't know the full extent of what it means but we do know it will change everything.

Go on be beautiful - we know what... well who... we are waiting for.

Let's put the Christ back in Christmas!

First week in December - time to get out the Christmas Decorations.

So all across Britain baubles are being dusted off, the old nativity set on mantel pieces above fires,attics being raided for tinsel and other such things. Everyone sings the same songs - white Christmas,Rudolph and of course Santa baby. Somewhere in the mix is the carols: silent night and the like, amongst them is away in a manger sung as if you were five again and an angel in the school's nativity complete with tinsel halo and cardboard wings. An excuse to share those old Christmas stories: we've all got those stories the one where at nursery school; I aged four was Mary and  somehow I swapped Joseph's half way to Bethlehem because the boy supposed to be Joseph wanted to be a shepherd. Everyone has their Christmas traditions and who are we to argue with them but the oldest of them all somehow gets sidelined.But amongst it all; there is two thousand years gone, there is one dirty manger, teenager mother and one sleeping baby who would one day change human history forever Christ is missing from Christmas. 

Thing is so many people use it as an excuse to have a party and to give stuff to people to send cards and sing the same songs. Few might venture into church because that is what they do and grandma likes it so why not. But all to often Jesus is forgotten, he's just a bauble on a Christmas tree. so many people gloss over the Christmas story, its just the same as singing bring us some figgy pudding or  a cracker or card part and parcel of a holiday To them he will never be more than a baby in a manger - another old bauble on a traditional Christmas. He will forever be 'the little lord Jesus asleep on the hay'  what happened to the big lord Jesus hung on the cross? Why is it so easy for people to accept the harmless baby and not the man saviour? Its almost like Santa just another magical part of a secular holiday - a baby was born to a virgin two thousand years ago so what?

Jesus is not a bauble, and he's not just for Christmas.

 My favourite story as a child was Ballet shoes by Noel Streatfeild: its a bout a man whom almost by accident adopts three girls for his Niece and then disappears travelling, the book charts the course of their lives whilst he is away at the end of the book he comes home ( after not having said how long he would be away) to find three teenagers standing awkwardly in the hallway and when he asks them who they are and they say Pauline, Patrova and Posy his response is ' but you were babies, I collected babies." to which one of them responds ' But GUM, babies grow up.' I think its something people often neglect about Jesus; as if as a baby he is something of an ornament; babies have no opinions except for feeding times and nap times (none of these the gospels record) Babies are safe, babies are understandable. A baby isn't religious or going to say anything to push you out of your comfort zone.

But in viewing Jesus this way they are missing out, missing out on a man, the son of God who lived as he loved who showed us how we could live then died so we could have eternal life. He is the Christ, 700 years before he was born they knew how and where he would be born and even who his earthly parents would be. So this year its time to say he's not just for Christmas he is for life and For life.  Don't just see the a baby in the manger - see the man on the cross and the man risen who wants to have a true and meaningful relationship with you. Put the Christ back in Christmas. 

Grainy black and white or in super High definition

Same Jesus. 

This passage in Hebrews really strikes me, not because of my fondness of the Vicky Beeching song. Jesus is the same always he was in the past and he will still be in the future. I am afraid to say that I struggle with this! how can Jesus always be constant?

Being rather fond of the past and interested in science fiction of the future, This image of Jesus being constant interests me. It only takes a rudimentary study of history for anyone to discover that nothing except natural laws stays the same even when it seems so for as anything in its first era it is new then it is accepted then it is old. things have their lifespan. Jesus had a lifespan.. He was born he lived and loved he died he rose he's now with the father. So here is the kicker St. Paul how is he the same forever? what kind of Constancy is he trying to say here? His Grace? his love? his character? his nature? all of the above? but hold on a minute Paul is talking in a post resurrection world, Jesus has already risen by the time he is writing this.

As humans constancy is comforting we live in an ever changing world. God himself is Constant- he has to be because he is God, it would make much more sense to say God is Constant. perhaps he is alluding here to Jesus' divinity that as part of god he is therefore of God's nature. To me this passage is comforting not bceause of the constancy of Christ itself  but the fact that therefore the Jesus in the Gospels is the same Jesus we can know now. My sheep know my voice... this makes the word of God all the more important because it is a window on Jesus Character in the Gospels and God's character. This is why the image I had for this passage was that of the bible the king James Version of the past, the message version in the present and the tablet version in the future, because ultimately there is prayer and there is God's Word, to truly know his nature.