We were off-line for a short while this morning! Most disconcerting - suddenly I realised all the things I do that depend on being in connection with the wider world.
On Sunday, among other things, I was preaching at the United Welsh Chapel, at their united service with the Korean congregation who meet in their building. This entailed the sermon being translated sentence by sentence. To facilitate this, I had sent the script to the assistant pastor, who had trnaslated the whole thing and had it in front of him on the screen of a lap-top. Which ran out of battery power half way through. And so he had to find the cable and get things plugged in and get restarted. While he was doing that, I made some inane comment about there being a sermon illustration in the middle of it all.
Both things together do suggest an illustration. One of those really corny ones, abou needing to be connected into power to function, and something in that about prayer and faith and so on.
And that is true. But it has also got me thinking a bit further about it all. For the connection to the web is going to be effective, it is only because others have already put material out there for me to access. And - and I feel on more secure ground here - to plug into the electricity supply is to be in touch with a whole community. After all, electricity always "existed", but it was only as people learned how to harness and control it, that we can have the access and the use that we have. And nowadays it is only as people support and organise the supply - to say nothing of creating appliances that exploit the electricity, and so on - that the electricity is of any "use" to us; the power is available.
And I guess that's more helpful in thinking about prayer, faith and the life of a follower of Jesus. We do need to "power" of the Spirit's presence in our living. But this is no individualistic perception. Just as the electric power that allows our lives to function is a product of community, so we do not pray alone. We pray in the footsteps of those who have gone before, and leave us hints and teaching about how to approach God, we pray together with those who live in the Spirit, and we pray in the faith that we are part of the whole people of God for all eternity.
And the call remains; prayer, whatever form it takes, and however badly we do it - it matters!

I had an interesting conversation last week. I was visited by the "Seionr Policy Officer (Social Cohesion) for Camden Council. He is relatively new to the post, and is visiting folk in the faith communities around the borough. We had a fascinating conversation, and made some interesting plans. We will hear more in the next few weeks about plans to get people interested in caring for our community together to meet each other and learn together - and perhaps even get ourselves organised. I enjoyed the discussion, and I am looking forward to seeing what happens next.
But it has also started me wondering. What is "social cohesion" and is it something we have anything to contribute to the seeking for it?
I understand the need for finding ways to live together, especially in a complex and large city like ours. I know that we need to get to know each other, so that we can understand and "interpret" our differences and own our similarities. I know that - as members of the majority community - we have the responsibility to lower our drawbridges so that others are welcome.
All of that seems to me to be self-evident and Kingdom based.
But what else is going on in the idea of social cohesion.
The Home Office definition is this;
A community in which

• there is a common vision and a sense of belonging for all communities;
• the diversity of people’s different backgrounds and circumstances are appreciated
  and positively valued;
• those from different backgrounds have similar life opportunities;
• strong and positive relationships are being developed between people from
  different backgrounds in the workplace, in schools and within neighbourhoods

I wonder what, in our life together, will help to strengthen this - and what, in the ways we normally live, might undermine this? And I wonder how we might sustain a distinctive Christian voice, with due humility and integrity? I don't have any answers yet - but I hope, as the meetings develop and as we begin to explore things we can do together, I might begin to find my way towards some.

This weekend we hosted the London Baptist Association AGM and seminars on Saturday. On Sunday, there was also a celebration service, involving the commissioning of new district ministers, and thanksgiving for our regional minister, Pat Took, who retires from that role in the autumn.
I was able to go to the AGM, and it was a good experience. Things are hard in the LBA, as in so many organisations at the moment. The work is growing, and the resources do not always keep up. And so there needs to be a significant change in the way things are organised. The full pattern is not yet clear, but one of the changes that will affect us most is the reorganisation of the subdivisions of the LBA. At the moment, the LBA is divided into districts which work on a sort of spoke pattern. This means we are part of the Northwestern district - a very friendly and welcoming community reaching from the centre out to Harrow. But there is now a change coming. There is going to be a "central" district - a kind of hub for the spokes, I guess (is that metaphor working?) And, we are as central as they come.
So, in due course, we will be trasnferring our immediate relationships with other Baptists from the northwestern district to the new central district.
And for most of us, to be honest, this will make little or no practical difference.
And I believe that that is pity. Because the other thing that became clear at the AGM, and the attendant seminars is just how exciting and creative Baptist life is in various parts of London , and how much we miss out on by not being involved and being connected to what is going on.
There are churches of all sizes, shapes and types; churches caring for refugees, churches opening up their buildings to welcome children before and after school, churches in which congregations show an even richer mix of home nations than our own, churches meeting in all sorts of venues, and meeting all sorts of needs, churches with the energy to go out late at night and offer friendship and protection to people struggling to get home after a late night, and churches offering on-going and deep support to people in all sorts of crises and long-term difficulty. Churches, in other words, just like us. And getting to know them, sharing stories, resources and encouragement could only be blessing for us all.

The intention of this blog is, among other things, to take events that happen through the week, and ask what sort of theological, pastoral or perhaps just amusing (sometimes) insights, might be gleaned. If I am to reflect on what dominates the life here this week - it is the drills!!! Just outside my study window, two very large drills are breaking up the concrete that has formed the foundations of the portacabins that have been there for the last nearly four years.
And they are noisy.
And they make the floor shake.
And despite well-meaning suggestions that I might work somewhere else - preferably in another building! - it's not that easy. I have all my books here, and various other resources I need for bits of work (not least the computer!), and not knowing that this onslaught was going to last so long (three weeks so far, and counting...) I have made various appointments that will be complex to change. So, I am making the best of it, and trying to live with it rather than against it.
And - being a pious sort of thinker - it occurred to me as I battled with it this morning, that the effect of the drills on my mind, heart and sense of well-being is close to the effect that we sometimes experience in relationships. There are those on whom I know that I have the same effect as these drills - I irritate, and annoy, and get in the way. (And it may even be that there are some people who have that affect on me!)
But the drills outside my windows are there for a purpose, and are to make the street better. They are breaking up the hard concrete, and opening up a space that has been closed and shut off for too long. Once they finish, there will be space and beauty and a place for people to live and move and have their being.
Could it be that in being a "drill" for some people, I am offering the same possibility? Could it be that those people who "drill" at me are actually breaking up the hard dead places in my life and heart, and opening up my capacity to love and live and respond? Might it be that one of the reasons Jesus calls his followers into community, without, apparently paying attention to whether we like one another, is that we all have these concreted over paths, and we need not just the gentle brushing of a broom, or the affirmation and comfort of people we agree with and who like us - but also the drill, the breaking up, the discomfort - and even the overwhelming domination of our thinking and feeling - of the "drills" to open our lives to grace and hope.
I hope so!
In the meantime, I am investing in a large pair of earplugs..... and if I look a little harrassed in the next few days, it's all this noise!

I was just glad there was somebody else who thought it was funny. As part of the new construction at the back of our building, there is a great deal of drilling going on at the moment. Noisy drilling. Indeed, very noisy drilling! And there I was, sitting reading one of the great doctors of the church on the importance of silence in the nourishment of our life of faith, and relaitonship with God. Sitting there, trying to read, rather, since the noise of the drills actually made it impossible. (Especially, in order to enhance our concert on the coming Saturday, a skilled technician was in tuning the organ) Silence was definitely not my experience that day - nor, if I am honest, most days sitting the in study here in the church.
I found the argument of the early theologian compelling however; St Ambrose wrote
For there is but one true teacher, the only one who never learned what he taught everyone. But people have first to learn what they are to teach, and receive from him what they are to give to others. Now what ought we to learn before everuything else, but to be silent that we may be able to speak?....it is seldom that anyone is silent, even when speaking does him no good....This is why Scripture is right to say "A wise man will keep silence until the right moment."
There is an important place for silence in being with God; taking time, as we say in the introduction to Waiting Prayer each Tuesday afternoon, to pay attention to God paying attention to us. It is all too easy to lose sight of this need, or to reduce it to a luxury to be laid aside in the face of more pressing need of things that must be done. But in silence - our silence from speech, but also the silence of at least not seeking noise - radios, music, all the toher possibilties of filling the silence - in silence, there is the possibility of hearing from deep within us that still small voice of love and transformation.
But of course, if our life in God can only survive in silence, separated from the demands of interaction with people, undertaking life in the midst of other lives - and even alongside the drills, traffic and all the other sounds of the city, then it is no life in God but simply fantasy. However, it is also true that a life in God that has no hidden place, no stillness and quietness that allows hidden things to grow can also become a fantasy. Finding that balance is never easy - and surrounded by drills it is particularly hard. But as a congregation, one of the things we can offer each other is the encouragement to look both for quiet places, and for those places of engagement - all of which are God's appointed meeting moment.