The demolition crew dismantling our former chapel building are a friendly bunch and very graciously allow me on site pretty much whenever I want to in order to photograph the process.  Although due to my holiday I missed the "window" to get inside the shell and take pictures, there is still plenty to see despite the larger machinery having arrived on site to demolish what 134 years ago was a brand new Baptist day school backing onto a brand new church.  In the photo the school part is now almost gone leaving a big hole into the former sanctuary.  The vestry, complete with its evil 1950's wall paper is still (at the time of the photo) extant and just behind the arm of the digger.

This afternoon I was visiting one of my ninety-somethings who has recently been in hospital and she was recalling how her grandfather had remembered the 'old' (wooden) chapel that stood on our grave yard and had attended the Baptist school when it was a shiny new - presumably state of the art - place.

This picture - downloaded from the web where it had been uploaded from some archives held my my folk - shows what school looked like in 1913 - hard to imagine how they fitted so many children in such a small space as it was, but they clearly did.  Hard, too, to imagine that in this photo are parents of some of my older people.  Seemingly, before free education exisited,  people paid 1d a week for reading and 1d a week for writing (no record of what they were charged for arithmetic!) so it was hardly a cheap option for miners with large families.  Running costs were subsidised by an annual 'Sermons' Sunday.

The advent of free state education meant the Baptist school closed fairly soon after the opening of this shiny new building... and the rest, as the saying goes, is history.

This week is final preparations for our annual Pentecost Party - something we began four years ago and which now seems fairly well established as a Churches Together outreach.  In the next day or two I must dig out my face paints, the giant jenga and various other outdoor games in readiness for Saturday's community fun day part of it.  I must also purchase birthday candles and balloons for the Sunday open air service - that and prepare a series of short reflections including how being "spirit-filled Christians" will impact our voting in the upcoming elections!  (I have to say I was pleased when Last Sunday's intercessions touched on this thorny topic!).

I do enjoy this weekend - it is hard work for sure, but it is always rewarding.  There is something special about seeing people enjoying a free lo-tech afternoon of fun and games, and of hoping like crazy that Sunday will be dry for the outdoor service!

Of course, Pentecost this weekend means Trinity the one afterwards - which sees D+1 join with us and an Easter-tide promise to be kept to arrange the chairs in a triangle!  Hey ho.

Whilst walking the West Highland Way we passed through a place called Tyndrum.  It is almost a bend in the road, though has a fairly new municipal cemetry with exactly one grave stone to date!  Significant is that it consists of three shops - a little general store, a place called The Green Welly Stop and another called the Real Food Cafe.  The last of these was where we ate one evening, and it intrigued me more than somewhat - essentially it is an ethical chip shop serving the usual range of deep fried fare but with a conscience.  All the hot drinks are fairly traded, the disposables from sustainable sources, the fish, potatoes, meat etc. locally and/or organically sourced.  They offer gluten free batter for those who need it.  Central to the cafe are two high, communal eating tables where diners sit together to enjoy their repast.  Fresh water is freely available in jugs filled at a nearby butler sink.

The story of The Real Food cafe us told in panels on the wall - how a failing Little Chef restaurant was bought up and redeveloped as the fulfilment of a dream of a couple; how the dream was captured by those they employed and how when one of the owners died suddenly the dream was sustained by those who shared it.  Maybe there's a parable in there somewhere?

I certainly enjoyed my pie and chips washed down with lashings of tea and followed with a chunk of  homemade flapjack.  Should I be up that way again I imagine I'll stop by because there's something intrinsically yet intangibly good about ethical fast food!

There is, so I discovered, a doggerel song sung by Kenneth McKellar, which extols the virtues of the West Highland Way.  The song may be far from great poetry, but the walk traverses some magnificent and diverse countryside as it winds it way from Milngavie (or Kelvingrove if you do the southern extension first) to Fort William.

Someone hearing I was about to attempt this walk wished me well on my 'Long Walk Through the Midges' and despite various assurances that May in Scotland is dry and midge free, I got wet and bitten in equal measure!  It was a great time out from routine: time to "not think", time to "not do."  It was good to walk with a friend I have seen little of for some time and who knows that part of Scotland reasonably well, having moved there a couple of years back to be nearer her parents.

Navigationally, it was the easiest walk I've ever done - wide paths and good way-marking throughout made it impossible to get lost and the diversity of walkers from many nations ensured some entertaining conversations and we enjoyed nicknaming the various walkers we met, overtook, were overtaken by, and then overtook once more.

I could spend a lot of time listing visual highlights - the acres of bluebells, Loch Lomond in the sunlight, Ben Nevis almost clear (just a whisper of cloud grazing the summit) meandering rivers or brooding clouds over Rannoch Moor - but to do so would need greater poetry than I possess.

Lots of great moments, lots of stunning scenery, way too much to eat - and now lots of socks to wash!  Overall a great week away and a much needed rest.

Because I'm on holiday next week I am trying to prepare the sermon for when I return.  I have now realised I misread the week number as per the lectionary (not that anyone will know) so have been working with 1 John 5:1 - 6 and John 15: 9-17 and intending to do some explorations about love, noting that in 1 John believers are children of God and in John 15 friends of Jesus.  After three abortive attempts I had lunch, and realised part of my struggle was that 1 John 4:7-20 kept sneaking into my mind.

So here's the conundrum.

1 John 4:7 - Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.  Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

So far so good.

1 John 5:1 - Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who who loves the father loves his child as well.

So which is it?  Is it our love that makes us children of God?  Or is it our faith?  Or is it the wrong question? (undoubtedly!)

I think I'm going to add the 1 John 4 passage to our set of readings - though I'm not sure my task will be any less of a struggle - and maybe try to tease out some of the implications of the conundrum:

1 John 4: 20 - If we say we love God yet hate a brother or sister, we are liars.  For any of us who do not love a brother or sister whom we have seen, cannot love God, whom we have not seen

Faith is as faith does... which after all is my central Bible verse in paraphrase!