Yesterday and today I have been doing background work for Sunday's harvest thanksgiving, which is supporting both Operation Agri and Glasgow City Mission (GCM).  As part of my research I looked at the BMS website to find out the history of their mission links to Sri Lanka (going back over 200 years) and both GCM and LCM (1826 and 1835 respectively.  Perversely I learned more about GCM's pioneering work from LCM's website than from it's own, go figure; you can read about Naismith, Scot and founder of LCM here).

I really enjoyed what I read, sketchy as it was, and was reminded of the import of reading history which not only informs our present but has potential shape our future.

Good fun.  Why not go and read some church, denominational or mission history yourselves?

'Catalyst' as the name for a day conference is popular in Baptist circles just now.

In Scotland there is a day conference on human sexuality bearing the title 'Catalyst Scotland' and in England there are two one-day conferences (in Manchester and Reading) organsied by BMS called 'Catalyst Live' which will explore a whole range of topics with some top international theologians - Jurgen Moltmann for one.

I won't be going to the Scottish one, I am sure many people will, and will find it helpful, but it's not for me.  It's a topic I've wrestled with on and off for at least 15 years and eventually reached a place where I wasn't going to wait for my head to catch up with my heart.  If that makes me a heretic or doomed, well I'm in incredibly good company.

I am going to the BMS one, and I really excited about it.  Can't say more today, as I am one of five Baptist bloggers who have been invited to post about it, and my day is tomorrow.  Finding the links to the blogs on the Catalyst site demands a lot of digging, but you can find them here.  One blog a day for a week - so look out for mine tomorrow, here and there.

You can find out more about BMS Catalyst Live here.

Today has been a pretty busy day, with never a dull moment.  I have made reasonable progress in researching aspects of our Harvest Thanksgiving service for Sunday - hope everyone who attends finds it enjoyable and meaningful.  I have taken in a consignment of refuse sacks and waved off a baptistry on its journey back to Yorkshire!  In between I've enjoyed a home visit, written up some notes and answered a few emails.  None of this makes for entertaining reading but it is afterall the stuff of routine that we all face.

It's good to be back in harness, and good to have a more 'ordinary' week this week after the busyness and excitement of last week.

New working patterns that will be a bit more sensible and a little less kn*ckerating are being developed, so things are looking good.  (Just wish they'd bring back the spell checker on this blog platform!!)