long week, old friends and planning

I have a day off tomorrow and I can hardly believe it!! I am going to meet up with someone I haven't seen since about 1994. Katy used to live next door to us and she got married this year, so it will be lovely to catch up with her...

I have also been 'finding' old friends on facebook as well this week, which is lovely.

It has been a long week though and very busy, too busy to think at some points, however it has been good and I think we are going to have a good year. I think it will be busy and there will be some tweaks to make but on the whole it will be good. The one thing that will be important is that space is made for reading and preparing thoroughly...

Dates for when I will be preaching and leading services went into the diary this week, scary....

why?

I have been part of the 'church' now for a very long time... different traditions, different places, but it never ceases to amaze me how people treat each other!!

I am not talking positively here, I am talking about how people treat each other with a lack of respect.... I am not talking about people who are well out of order... I know that sometimes the person/people are well out of order and really need to be told that they are out of order. But I guess what I find hard to reconcile with kingdom values is why individuals find it necessary to try to stop the work of God using God as an excuse. - for instance I don't think we should do such and such and I feel God is telling me that is the case.

I also find it hard to reconcile how some individuals seem to think they own the church.... where is the loving attitude that Jesus himself talks about.

I know we are human, but that is no excuse for the way some people behave towards each other, and this is the same in class as in church!!

the past two weeks have been slightly manic, to say the least!! freshers week with other things going on in the evenings. It was then my birthday, followed by first week of teaching for this academic year...

Today we had a visit day which meant I was in work again, and we interviewed 7 students and had a chat with another 8!! It was lovely to meet so many potential students and their parents and to hear their stories of how they have got to the point where they are coming to see if our course is for them.

I love the process as we get to chat to parents/friends as well as the students and get to hear some of their stories as well.... I guess I am simply passionate about individuals stories and their journey of faith.