I wonder how you picture the eschatological banquet?  Christmas dinner on an enormous scale?  Thanksgiving gone global?  The best curry night ever?  A perpetual Communion service?

I am wondering if the meal I'm cooking tonight might qualify?  I have vegan friends to entertain so my menu reflects that.  As the weather this morning was grim, it is comfort food - ironically now it is a pleasant evening.  It strikes me that, allergies and intolerances not withstanding, my menu could be served to people of any faith or none, and would be equally acceptable to carnivores, veggies or vegans.  The only people who could be offended ideologically would be strict teetotallers, as I use marmite in the main dish.

By the wonders of Alpro soya cream and vanilla flavoured soya milk I am serving...

'cream' of parsnip and apple soup

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vegan cottage pie with fresh vegetables

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apple flap* with vegan custard

I will enjoy it anyway!  Would be a good eschatological meal should said event take place in winter!!

* apple flap is essentially an apple crumble where the topping is a flapjack mixture

Today I had what my appointment schedule termed a 'weekly review' - not bad as I'd just had zap 19 of 25.  It was all a bit something and nothing, which is probably why they don't do it until this stage in the treatment.  Essentially it involved me being asked how my skin was reacting - and being reminded I would have a perfectly square exit burn on my back (I do - I checked) - and how the fatigue was (generally not a problem so long as I drink gallons of water and keep active).  To be fair, had there been any significant skin reaction, the radiographers would have picked it up and dealt with it by now.

Anyways, I will be 80% done tomorrow with only one more week to freedom.  Hurrah!

Along the way I have met so many wonderful people, and know that even as I reach the far side of the 'river' next Wednesday others still have this journey ahead of them.  If it's your thing, please pray for A who will have her final dose of chemo pretty much as I have my final dose of nuking (I think one day earlier) and who has had a far rougher time with it than I did.  [As I type that I realise I know two A's currently going through chemo, so maybe pray for both...]

So, this morning's service went quite well, and people graciously engaged with the stuff I offered.

I had assumed, wrongly of course, that one of the hymns I'd chosen, being of Scottish origin, would be known by my folk.  It is a beautiful hymn from Iona that addresses one of life's great taboos: death.  It combines firm Christian hope with honest human fear, and although there is one line I do not understand (about angels treading on dreams) well worth sharing...

1  From the falter of breath,
    through the silence of death,
    to the wonder that's breaking beyond;
    God has woven a way,
    unapparent by day,
    for all those of whom heaven is fond.

2  From frustration and pain,
    through hope hard to sustain,
    to the wholeness here promised, there known;
    Christ has gone where we fear
    and has vowed to be near
    on the journey we make on our own.

3  From the dimming of light,
    through the darkness of night,
    to the glory of goodness above;
    God the Spirit is sent
    to ensure heaven's intent
    is embraced and completed in love.

4  From today till we die,
    through all questioning why,
    to the place from which time and tide flow;
    angels tread on our dreams
    and magnificent themes
    of heaven's promise are echoed below.

John L Bell (born 1949) and Graham Maule (born 1958) © 1988, 1996 WGRG, Iona Community

Yesterday the instructor who usually takes my exercise class was unwell and had arranged for someone else to cover.  As it happened, I was wearing this tee-shirt:

She read it said, 'so are you a preacher?  It transpired that she and her husband are 'between churches' at the moment and just might come along to the Gathering Place at some point to try us out.  Wow!

This got me thinking... I have met more people outside churchy circles in the last nine months than the last nine years (well more like eleven years but it's not as poetic to write!)

One of the unexpected blessings of the last nine months has been the wonderful people I've met - professionals and patients - and the fascinating conversations I've had.  I have always been open about what I do/am but have never rushed to elaborate.  The genuine interest people have shown is amazing, as are the questions they ask.  From the people who asked about my sense of call, to the secular-Hindu who spoke of being an 'old soul', to the Penty woman who tried to evangelise me (!), to the professionals who understood how my job impacted my 'journey' through treatment...

Don't get me wrong, this doesn't act as an explanation for what happened, or a purpose for it, it is just one of the amazing ways in which hope (see post below) triumphs in adversity if only we have eyes to glimpse it.

PS Looking at this photo taken in March it is amazing how much my hair has thickened up!

This weeks sermon prep has been a disaster!  This good idea of balancing 'hope and fear' has proved difficult to work with and it's been hard find anything useful to say that would last more than two sentences, not because there isn't loads you could say but because I can't make it work.  However, in my reading I found this little sentence in some writing by Jurgen Moltmann:

Enthusiasts and Baptists in the sixteenth century looked for the dawn of the eschaton by actively seeking to transform their oppressive present.

Jurgen Moltmann, entry for Hope in A Dictionary of Christian Theology, London SCM Press, p. 272

You need to appreciate that 'Enthusiasts' were those who saw themsleves as having some sort of special indwelling of God's spirit (I know nothing about them, but maybe they were the Pentecostals of their age?) not just people who were 'keen' or 'eager'.

Sixteenth century Baptists risked persecution, arrest, execution and ridicule to practice their faith.  What Moltmann is saying is, I think, not that they hoped (wanted) life would be better for themselves, though undoubtedly they did, but that they lived the hope (eschatology) they had.  Life must have been incredibly frightening for those early Baptists but their hope shaped their day to day living.

This is a 'now and not yet' theology in which communities of faith can be an anticipation (advance glimpse) of the eschaton as they anticipate (await) its fulfilment.

Ultimately then, it is our hope that sustains through our fear.

But if I said just what I've written it'd be an awfully short sermon!!! 

I hope what I say makes sense and that people glimspe the hope that we try to live and which inspires our living.