My official report on the Baptist Assembly in Scotland is published in this week's Baptist Times, or you can read it at the BMS website here.  Hope you find it of interest.  Normal drivel will resumed shortly.

... by Revd Malcolm Duncan and shared at the Baptist Assembly in Dunfermline.

Although I lifted this from the BUS website where no such statement is made, it is almost undoubtedly copyright, so please treat with appropriate respect.

We need healing, Lord!
Our spiritual myopia
Is eroding our vision
of a bigger plan.
So the inevitable
Collision
Of our church Utopia
With the limited
scope it has
Is making us
more comfortable
than we should be.

Our ground is getting
smaller,
So we get a bigger crowd
but on a smaller space
And we make the music loud
enough to drown out the cries
of the broken
and the poor.

Bigger congregations
won't answer segregation.
Locking ourselves in prayer
won't show that we care.
Enjoying when we meet
won't change the street.
Becoming more respectable
won't change the spectacle
Of communities that need
Hope infused
Sin refused
Tension defused
Satan confused
Saints enthused

We need healing, Lord.
New eyes to see
New ears to hear
That You are here!

Faith to believe that You win.
Courage to push the envelope
Until You envelop
People
Streets
Communities
Towns
Nations
Continents
And turn the world
Right way up.

We don't need bigger buildings
We need bigger hearts.
We don't need to increase our capacity for seats,
We need to increase our capacity to love.
We don't need more blessing
We need to be blessing more.
We don't need more grace,
We need to be more gracious.
We don't need more of God,
God needs more of us.
There isn't an answer around the corner
We are the answers hiding in a corner.
God doesn't need to fit into our plans
We need to fit into God's

And His plan is change from the inside out.
Hope from the foetus of faith
To the adulthood of the Kingdom
Courage that pushes us out
Birthing pangs that scream a declaration
Through the heavenlies
HE IS HERE.

God won in the Jerusalem dirt
When Christ was planted
Like a seed in the ground
Beside Golgotha's mound
And three days later
The Seed pushed through the earth...
The plant has been growing ever since
And we are now its seed
Called to germinate
To propagate
To profligate
The Gospel.

God wins.

One of my blog-pals (i.e. a blogger I consider a friend even though I have not met them in the real world) Perpetua has nominated me for the Versatile Blogger award.  I am secretly quite chuffed she thought of me, however I'm not sure I qualify, not least as the majority of people I might choose to nominate have declared their blogs as 'award free, tag free' zones.  However, it's a bit of fun, so apart from the nominating I'll join in... if you happen to be a blogger and you fancy joining in then I'm sure you can self-nominate!  Basically you have to declare five quirky things about yourself (however you define quirky) so here goes...

1. I wear snowman socks in summer; indeed I wear snowman socks all year round if they happen to be the next pair to come out of the sock drawer.  Spotty socks, striped socks, socks with cows, socks with cats, you name it, I'll wear it... preferably not too much pink it has to be said, but I enjoy silly socks.
2. I like walking in the rain without a coat or an umbrella and getting absolutely soaking wet... then I go home and have a nice hot shower to warm up again.  Not something I do very often, usually if I'm out in the rain it's because I'm going somewhere, so I need to arrive dry and presentable.
3. I talk to the television/radio.  This is probably a sign of insanity, but I blame it on living alone (apart from the recently moved in cat).  I have no compunction about telling announcers the are wrong, correcting grammar, pointing out inconsistencies or offering my opinions.
4. I am currently on a quest for soya-lecithin free fairtrade chocolate.  Since deciding to eliminate foods high in phytoestrogens from my diet (since research suggests they abrogate the Tamoxifen) I have only found two chocolate bars that are safe to eat... Cadbury's Twirl and Cadbury's Flake, neither of which is Fairtrade.  Other quirky aspects of this mean I no longer eat sage or flax seeds!
5. I occasionally bemuse people by demonstrating degrees of ambidextrousness (is there such a word?) by doing tasks with whichever hand is closer.  But my oddest quirk is using a potato peeler in my right hand then chopping up the spuds with my left...

I'm not sure if this makes me versatile, quirky or just plain weird - but now you know!

Today's PAYG was the parable of the lost sheep from Luke's gospel, one I have preached on many a time, and have indeed noted the risk the shepherd takes in leaving the ninety nine to fend for themselves in order to search for the one.  What struck me in listening to the relfection was not the ideas - they were famialir - but the language of recklessness, which seems to fit with the concept of outrageous generosity.  I wonder what might be the reuslt of us recongising God as reckless, and then seeking to 'go and do likewise'?  Hmm.  Big challenge.

An email today confirming my graduation date from the University of Manchester, and the 'degree I get in my forties'.  So 16th December, just three days before my 49th birthday, I will be prancing about in MPhil robes being, as far as I can ascertain, the only person ever to get the degree I'm getting as the programme closed to new entrants and I took the exit qualification to ensure I at least completed.  I recall when I signed up for this thinking I'd have a degree in each decade of my adult life and wondering what my fifties might herald in terms of learning and growing.  I guess opting for an MPhil now means that if I stay NED, there is still the potential for a PhD in my fifties...  We'll see.

Anyway, for now I am very grateful to the secret benefactor who has offered to take me to graduate, and look forward to the pre-birthday present of a day in my much-loved city of Manchester.