In His Name
“In His Name”
John 17:1-11
This morning we hear a few words of the prayer Jesus offers for his disciples. He has just finished teaching his disciples a few last lessons after washing their feet in the upper room, where they had their last meal together. After these lessons, Jesus offers a prayer for them, the first half of it we read this morning, before Jesus heads to the Garden of Gethsemane where Judas will lead the soldiers to arrest him.
This prayer is full of wonderful promises and hope as Jesus awaits his arrest. “The hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you” he prays. He knows the significance of what is to come in his death and in his resurrection.
He continues, “Since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do.” read more…
Rebuilding Community: Part 2 – The Church
In my last post I talked about my frustrations with the local government sounding like it was giving up on keeping people around. Since then I’ve been busy. I’ve had a funeral for a 17 year old who overdosed on drugs. I’ve been to our annual meeting for the United Church of Canada in the Maritimes. Over both activities I’ve had many conversations about the state of our community and the state of the United Church.
Many of the church discussions I’m having are about the “mission” of the church. People are tired of seeing how the “same old thing we’ve always done” is not bringing people into our churches, and they are beginning to wonder what can be done to save them. This is encouraging as I am starting to hear terms like “evangelism” and “mission” and “outreach” start to be used.
When I look at the streets of my town, when I look at the hurt in the homes, when I look at the strangle-hold drugs has on our youth and young adults, I see we have more work than we know what to do with.
So where do we start? read more…
Rebuilding Community
Yesterday the CBC released the following story, Population decline a worry for Cape Breton. It’s a reflection on what we already know. People are leaving this area for greener pastures. There’s no work here to keep our young people and families.
But I have a thought.
What if there was another reason for them to stay? What if we had a strong, unified recreation department? What if we had local programs for families which would make CBRM a place they would want to raise their families in? What if there were plenty of activities for our children and parents which are easily accessed?
I look at the town of Windsor in the Annapolis Valley. A traditional farming and gypsum mining community which has also seen a very significant decline in population as the local industry has changed. There has not been lot of other work in the area. But it has worked exceptionally hard at drawing new families into the town, and it has worked. What was the core that I noticed?
Recreational opportunities for families.
All summer long there are camps and programs targeting child involvement. There is an easily obtained booklet that indicates the entire recreational opportunities in the area with detailed contact information for all ages. I know people who were looking to move back to Nova Scotia, and based on their research chose Windsor simply because it showed that it cared for families.
Yet here in Cape Breton we have our mayor tweeting helpful wisdom such as:
“CBRM Manager of Economic Development John Whalley identifies NS government as cause of CBRM and NS population decline”
How is this at all helpful? What government? The one in power now, the one two years ago, the one before that?
Where is the accountability that maybe we have a hand in the mass exodus from the island and the initiative to find ways to reverse the trend? Why not try something else instead of pointing fingers and assigning blame to others?
Windsor has seen a resurgence in local growth and new ideas and even jobs since they’ve been addressing the needs of families. Sure they have the advantage of being less than an hour from Halifax, but we also have attractive features here too that incline people to tell me, “I would love to move home if I just had a reason to.”
One reason is the ability to provide for their families. Start to address this issue and maybe the work will come as our young families full of ideas and passion consider coming back to a place they love.
I know it would have a big hand in keeping me from moving away should the opportunity arise.
Stranger Danger
“Stranger Danger”
John 10:1-10
Photo by costi http://www.sxc.hu/profile/costi
When we let children go out to play, or maybe when they start walking to school, what is one of the key rules we drill into their heads? “Don’t talk to strangers!” We want to protect our children. As adults we know there are some scary people out there, and we think they may have an interest in our children. There are stories of child abductions in the news far too often, and it scares us that this could happen with our own.
So we tell them to travel in groups, to stick to main streets, and we make sure they know the safe places they can go if they need help. We inform our children about how to make safe choices in the world and when we send them off, we hope it is our voice they listen to, and not the voice of people they meet on their adventures.
But of course, they get older, they get more independent, they make more choices for themselves. At the same time, it seems like the pressure is also turned up. Their friends start trying new things and want them to join in. Things that may not always be the best choice. As adults we know the dangers of drugs, we know the dangers of driving too fast, we know the dangers of going places where there could be problems. These temptations are not coming from the mouths of strangers, these are coming from their friends. Its’ harder to say “no” to friends. read more…
Lack of updates
Yes I know, I know… there’s been a lack of updates here again.
However, I did have a guest post over on Shape Of Their Light earlier this week on “The God Our Children Don’t Believe In” if you are interested. Go and check it out!