The eagle-eyed will have spotted the "just giving button" underneath the celtic cross on my sidebar.  I have just signed up to take part in a 20 mile walk for Breast Cancer Care at Scone Palace in June.  I totally understand that some readers are bored to the back teeth with this whole topic, but I have signed up because this is a genuine challenge for me... Before cancer I could have walked 20 miles without blinking, doing Ben Nevis two years ago showed me how much that has changed, and put me off trying anything substantial until now.

I'm not looking for huge sums of money, it is just as much about proving to myself I can actually walk 20 miles.  Borrowing an idea from someone else,  I am inviting people to nominate a track for my MP3 training playlist and sponsor me 1p per music-second.  I will then purchase the downloads and add them to my MP3 thingy.  So what do you fancy?  Classical?  Pop?  Sacred?  Something else?  The choice is yours!

One of the challenges I set myself for Lent was to post pictures that in some way symbolised or suggested 'hope'.  This one was taken three years ago when I was starting to get out and about after my cancer surgery and was enjoying the heralds of spring that are crocuses/croci (either is correct, all depends which etymology you favour).  If I'm brutally honest, I was far from convinced that I'd be here three years later, but that thought no longer filled me with terror, I simply learned to enjoy the 'here and now'  in a far more immediate way.

I am told by one of my neighbours that the crocus bulbs were planted to commemorate the Women's Suffrage Movement (centenary was 2008, which sounds about right) and the colours of purple, white and green were highly symbolic within that movement.

Whatever the back story, and whatever else this planting signifies or symbolises, the way these seemingly fragile plants burst into a carpet of colour, lenten violet mixed with festal gold and white on a green ground of ordinariness, shouts 'hope' and 'life' more eloqently than I ever could.

Today's PAYG is one of the best reflections on prayer I've ever listened to.  Unhurried and uncomplicated, it simply asks the right questions and opens avenues of thought...

Listen to it here

As I was preparing for yesterday's sermon, one of the many things that struck me about the recorded temptations of Jesus was that it began with self-doubt, a questioning of identity... If you are...  My light bulb moment was when I imagined the thought running through Jesus' mind, "Am I who I am?  Am I the Son of I AM?" and the way this temptation is a cruel parody of the self-revelation of God to Moses that I AM who I AM; I will be who I will be.  "Am I the son of YHWH...?"  "Am I I AM?"

Probably everyone else has spotted that and played with the idea yonks ago, but it was new for me.

Today I saw this photo meme thingy on social media which shows scant knowledge of the scriptures (don't recall Jesus saying this) and possibly misses the whole I AM (ego eimi) thing let alone what YHWH tranlates to.  Or perhaps it's so subtle I missed it!!  It made me smile, and hinted that my thoughts on the tmeptation were probably not so wide of the mark!

The people who lead our evening services are once again using the CTBI Lent material as a jumping off point for our musings and worship.  Two weeks in, and I am very much enjoying what we have shared, which is refreshingly different and deeply challenging.

The first week we were invited to think about our finanical resources in the light of the parable of the sower.  Although this was not the intent, I found myself wondering what it might mean if I saw my money as the 'seed' and what it would mean to emulate the sower who broadcast the seed knowing that not all of it could or would yield a return.  I think that maybe such a view is quite liberating - allowing us to 'scatter' some of our wealth in less 'productive' areas of life without feeling guilty.

This week we were invited to use the parable of the tenants in the vineyard to reflect on our attitudes to the money we have.  A question that struck me especially was 'in what way or for whom is your bank statement good news?"  It's a fantastic question, and one that made me think very hard (last month's is mostly huge outgoings to hotels, tourist attractions and shops in New Zealand, though there are assorted planned and spontaneous charitable donations, gifts to others and payments for basics.)

I find myself wondering, then, how to hold these two thoughts together... like the sower to cast my resources widely, knowing that not everything will 'work' and to do so in a way that is as good news as possible for those who need to hear good news.

Good news for the shareholders of airline and hotel, supermarket and chain store

Good news for the manufacturer of packaging and product

Good news for grower...?  Well I hope so

Good news for the coffee shop, the cafe, the book shop, the charity shop

Good news for the public transport provider and taxi driver

Good news for the employees or volunteers...?  Well I hope so

Good news for the charities I choose to support

Good news for the university bursary schemes and religious organisations

Good news for the students, the misison partners...?  Well I hope so

Good news for my conscience, my pleasure, my health

Good news from my choices...?  Well... I hope so

I hope so...