Creativity Challenge!
The start of this term has provided us with alot of challenging areas to think about, pray about and work through. A lot of the teaching has been around how God has shaped us, gifted us and living out the purpose He has for our lives. What a challenge ...it's hard enough trying to work out what we want to do with our lives in the future and on a daily basis ! However, one thing we took away with us from this teaching was that God will reveal all things to us in His timing, as we walk with Him - we don't have to know it all now (phew!). The teaching sessions helped us to understand how God has made us all unique - introverts, extroverts with varous different personality/character traits - we have strengths and weaknesses, but God uses them all for His Glory! The teaching sessions were very liberating; instead of us being critical of ourselves, judgemental or envious of others, we can celebrate and enjoy our differences.
After a disastrous navigational error (on my part) of getting to the wrong school to help with a lunchclub 
(which I was going to glaze over, but noticed David Pawson had mentioned it in his blog - cheers David! ), we then managed to get to Rendlesham Forest with our lovely FORM photographer (Graham Allen) and enjoyed a walk, some tree scrambling (thats my term for trying to climb unsuccesfully), and photo shoots. Helen was so impressed that she had finally brought the appropriate footwear (wellies, as apposed to flipflops!), until she tried climbing the trees!
Andrea Skevington, member of St. Johns and author of the new Lion Children's Bible, provided us with a day at her house where she spoke to us about the creative ability that God has given all of us and how we can nurture that - we all had a 'go' with creative writing and it was great to see the different styles of writing. Claire wrote the most wonderful lengthy peom in 15 minutes (how did she do that!!), and others wrote funny scripts, dramatic/heartfelt stories (some long and some short), but it was lovely to be able to all have a go, even if some of us are creatively challenged!
This Monday our very own Dave Gardner gave us some teaching on how we can incorporate disciplines into our daily lives - he modeled a 'quiet time' for us and then spoke about the 'Rule of Life', a simple but effective way to look at what we do, how that compares with what the Bible teaches us and a way to re-examine it periodically with someone else (a friend, a mentor etc). This was a effective simple tool that will help us determine if we are living a balanced Christian life (not fogetting the season that we are in, ie family, retired, etc). In the afternoon, Graham House, spoke to us about the two aspects of Baptism : water and the Holy Spirit, which opened up to a good group discussion.
On a personal note, I am really enjoying co-ordinating FORM - so many people are supporting me in this role by offering/providing some wonderful teaching, great ideas, voluntary help with fundraising, huddle leaders, mentors, providing outreach projects and sooo much more....
Will blog again soon, Tracey 