Life goes on...

Leon in Edinburgh.

Theo in Christchurch

Edith in Auckland.

Grandchildren growing..
Hey look at the pictures above! Don't I have great looking grandchildren? Just boasting.
A good man died.
On October 24th last year I posted about a fellow Church of Christ minister and his autobiography. I heard news of Ron O'Grady's death last week. A summary of his contribution reads;

While a Churches of Christ minister he was ecumenical in both outlook & ministry, serving in a number of roles including  - National Council of Churches NZ,,Christian Conference of Asia Associate General Secretary, as well as the Director of the Australian Council of Churches World Christian Action (aid/refugees).

With a small group he founded ECPAT(End Child Prostitution in Asian Tourism),now End Child Prostitution,Child Pornography & Trafficking in Children,ECPAT - Child Alert,(NZ) & in Australia, ChildWise.

I am sad because while I could never be as influential as he was, he was a colleague with similar understandings about the faith. There are few Christian ministers around who I can readily identify with these days, now there is one less. But I am proud and pleased to have known and been influenced by him. 
A story... when I was a boy my parents looked after Ron's son for a few days. In preparation we were told to be on our best behaviour, we were to host a preacher's kid in the house. "No swearing or fighting, include him but treat him gently.. etc" Mum said to us. I recall we were playing cricket in the backyard with our new young playmate. We were on our best behaviour, being good sports and even bowling gently to this kid of a well known minister. Unfortunately a bowled ball evaded his bat and hit him on the shins. To our surprise out came a string of expletives we would not dear say within earshot of mum. We should have been sympathetic, and we were... eventually. The Brown boys who were trying so hard to be "nice Christian" kids, burst out laughing at this turn of events.  From then on we could relax, he was human too. 
Where do we fit?
We have been attending the local Presbyterian Church, but it is getting tough to go. They have a roster of visiting speakers and the week before last I nearly walked out! It was not that the man said something that upset me, it was more his attitude to worship. He was leaning on the pulpit chatting as if he was talking about something unimportant. He added a story just for entertainment value. It felt like he was just filling up the hour. I wanted to scream, "This is an insult to us and to God!" Last Sunday members of the parish council lead the service. They did generally OK with some welcome variety, it was the music more than anything that let them down. I can no longer identify with blood thirsty concepts of the salvation Jesus' brings and these old hymns centred on that. And, I have found, Presbyterians sing so slowly it is hard to sing. The thing that breaks my heart is that during our few weeks attending here there have been visitors who have walked in, just like we did, but they have not come back. Last Sunday we were sitting behind such a couple and you could see they just wanted to leave. I was so embarrassed. It feels like the Presbyterian Church hierarchy does not care what happens in this small outlying church, so long as somebody is there to fill in the hour. The Church deserves to die.  I had the same frustration in my own Church. Often the sound system farted and mucked up and the music was not all it could have been... but the leadership at one stage joked about the sound system when I raised the issue, and were not prepared to make a change to the music. They can put up with the farting, the mess ups, "It does not really matter." And younger folk we attracted left after a time. We live in an age of slick TV and public presentations that people get used to. "It doesn't really matter" attitude just will not cut it. It is blasphemy! I know of most of the Churches in Dunedin and don't think I can look forward to attending any. I know that if I keep going to the local one and keep coming away angry, we will eventually stop. Lately there has been census reports in the newspaper showing a decline in Church attendance. Thinking modern people would really struggle to fit into most churches... they deserve to die. 
The Jury's still out.
I am feeling washed out today, I guess still recuperating from last week's surgery. The jury is still out on whether it was a success, but I think things are improving. The medical people say, "Just because you do not have a scar and outward signs of surgery do not be fooled, you have had a serious surgical procedure and need to take time to recover."  I am not a patient patient.