Tim Abbott

CYO Open evening poster

    CYO Open evening poster.jpg, originally uploaded by timabbott.

With thanks to Amy for the layout and writing.
And sirwiseowl for the Coffee and cake image (that dude's got some awesome photos)

Not at the Youthwork conference

So many people have posted about going to the Youthwork conference in Eastbourne that I feel compelled to let you know I won't be there to meet up or buy you a coffee because we're looking after this...

GSUS Live is a mobile RE multimedia classroom that gets students thinking about how the teaching of Jesus still relates to the situations faced by teenagers today. It's making a huge impact with students and staff and this weekend we'll be overseeing it's move from one school to another, ready for next week.

However, Kat and Laura from Collective will be at the Youthwork conference so please look out for them on the Innervation Trust stand and say hi!   

Synchroblog: Church and Money - What if we had nothing

As an inter-church organisation we depend on gifts from individuals and churches to keep going, a bit like most missions organisations, whether at home or overseas.

We're so grateful to all those who give, one way or another, to enable us to continue to take the good news to young people in schools and elsewhere. But it becomes too easy to slip into thinking that if we only had "... this much more giving" we could do "... so much more." This may indeed be the way of God for us, new supporters that enable us to employ more youth and schools workers and undertake new projects to reach more young people, so we are unlikely to stop inviting people to give to sustain and grow this ministry.

But here are a couple of challenges that I never want to lose sight of;

What if our income has reached a practical maximum? Is our vision limited by what we can afford to do, or is it big enough, creative enough and trusting God enough to go beyond what finance can achieve and into what people, energised by God, can achieve.

And what if we had nothing. Would the vision within us still burn so brightly that we would find a way, somehow, to continue to do the work we do. Herein lies the ultimate challenge to stay close to the vision that guides us and the God who leads us. And it has nothing to do with money.

Check out other fine SynchroBlogs on the subject of Church and Money here:

The Check That Controls at Igneous Quill
Pushing The Camel:  Why there might be more rich people in Heaven than in your local Church at Fernando's desk
Sally Coleman at Eternal Echoes
Lord, Won't You Buy Me a Mercedes Benz at Hello Said Jenelle
Zaque at Johnny Beloved
Walking with the Camels at Calacirian
Greed and Bitterness:  Why Nobody's Got it Right About Money and The Church at Phil Wyman's Square No More
Kirk Bartha at Theocity
Money and the Church: A Fulltime Story at The Pursuit
But I Gave at Church at The Assembling of the Church
Moving Out of Jesus Neighborhood at Be the Revolution
Money and the Church: why the big fuss? at Mike's Musings
Coffee Hour Morality at One Hand Clapping
Bling Bling in the Holy of Holies at In Reba's World
Magazinial Outreach at Decompressing Faith
Money's too tight to mention at Out of the Cocoon
Bullshit at The Agent B Files
The Bourgeois Elephant in the Missional/Emergent Living Room at Headspace
When the Church Gives at Payneful Memories
Who, or What, Do You Worship at Charis Shalom
Greed at Hollow Again
Silver and Gold Have We - Oops! at Subversive Influence
The Church and Money at Khanya

Examen lite

As part of our rhythm of prayer this term we're ending each day with a kind of "Examen lite" about 10 minutes before we finish. This involves each person sharing one thing they're grateful for and one thing they'd like to pray for. Then we each pray. And that's it.
As well as the obvious spiritual benefit, it also has a sacramental benefit in that it reinforces the fact that we're called to work as a team and it also declares an end to the working day.
The obvious corollary is to do a similar thing at the beginning of the day, which we occasionally do, but probably not enough.

Lexden prayer room

This morning, for our weekly team prayer time, we went along to the 24-7 prayer room at Kingsland Church, Lexden. There's a town-wide 24-7 prayer movement here in Colchester with prayer rooms popping up every now and then in a wide variety of different places. Being a town-wide ministry we really value these opportunities to get out and pray with and for other churches and parts of our town.

For me, God spoke much through Isaiah 37, and particularly this verse:

This year you will eat what grows by itself, and the second year what springs from that. But in the third year sow and reap, plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

South Park character generator

Today's coffee break entertainment - Create your own South Park character.
This is doing the rounds here like wildfire - we love it!! Thanks to Kristian for spotting it.
This is me.

Collective weekend

This weekend I'm off to Frimley with Collective for a promotional weekend at the church of one of the team.
I'll be there to do the sound for them as I'm the only one available. It means I get to hang out with a 20-something girl band all weekend. It's a tough job but someone's got to do it.
I may try and sneak in some much needed reading time for the Missional Leadership course. Back on Monday.

Ministry review day

Yesterday we had a ministry review day where we reflect on and pray over all that we are and do as a team. The first day of the school holidays is absolutely the best time for this because with the school term behind us and no deadlines looming for a couple of weeks the pressure's off and our memories are fresh. Being natural born activists, this is a good thing.

Planning these sorts of days is always a bit of a balance between getting the structure right and allowing people space simply to be themselves and to allow God to speak so, if it's any help to you, here's what we did.

After sorting out a bit of tea and coffee, we started the day by spending some time alone with God, each of us finding a quiet place somewhere in the building.
Next up, we each shared about one thing we're grateful for and one thing we're not so grateful for. Not only was it helpful to hear other people's thoughts, but we all found these questions a bit challenging in a good sort of way - precisely what the day is about. This led on to a question about the best and worst aspects of our organisation which is obviously quite a vulnerable question to ask. I wasn't expecting any bombshells (if I had I would have spoken to people individually on a previous occasion), but I felt it was important to encourage people to be honest about any failings they were aware of.
We then spent some time praying over all that we had shared.

As part of our review I wanted to challenge us all to think beyond the constraints of our current ministry focus. To do this we deliberately stated and then challenged some of the underlying assumptions and main features of our ministry. This allowed us to explore how we might reach young people if these assumptions or features changed radically or even no longer existed. For example, if we were not able to work in a local school, or there was no viable church that could meaningfully work with young people in an area and at a time when we were seeing real breakthrough.
As we were about to break for lunch, worship drummer dropped in, just in time for us all to pop round to the local chippy. Eating together is an important team activity!

After lunch we got into big-paper-and-pens mode and wrote down everything we are doing, trying to do or thinking of doing. This really was one of those 'try it and see' activities because I wasn't quite sure where it would go. Having filled the sheet of paper we prayed silently over it, then went for a walk together round the estate. This not only helped to prevent that after-lunch lull where everyone dozes off, but also allowed a fresh freedom to chat generally about the ministries we're all involved in, away from any hint of structure that may be, or appear to be, imposed by walls and chairs and paper and questions.

Once we were back from the walk we looked again at all the things written on the big sheet of paper and prayed again that God would direct our thoughts and focus our priorities. Out of this time came a startlingly clear sense of overall purpose and a number of specific words about things we should be doing and, more to the point, things we should be calling time on. It was as if the words on the paper had suddenly achieved a three dimensional quality, with the most important standing taller than the rest.

After a quick review of any resources or training needs we concluded with a final round up of things we each needed to do in response to the day and then prayed together.

One amazing day

Today has been an amazing day. Highlights include...

1. Standing at the back of a school hall while our new schools worker, Tom, and a local youth worker took an assembly. I can't quite put into words how I felt, but for me it was a supremely significant moment as I saw the work that I had fulfilled for over 10 years released into the hands of others.

2. Helping a group of Year 9 students (in the same school) to think about the choices that people make in sexual relationships and being both heartened and seriously worried by some of their answers. We got back to the office and prayed.

3. Having my son Dan join us (for the first time) for two question and answer style RE lessons with Year 8 and Year 10 students in the local Grammar School and hearing him talk so confidently about his faith and gaining the respect of the students.

4. Helping with a youth cafe that started as follow up after a mission over a year ago in the first school mentioned here and seeing the transformation in the lives of so many of these young people, some of whom come from quite chaotic or unsympathetic backgrounds.

Next week we're involved in a mission in a small town and its secondary school which is apparently stirring up the churches there to plant a new expression of church for young people.
And we've just had an invitation to do an assembly on the stopthetraffik campaign from a school we haven't been able to visit for over a year.

This is a great job! Just thought I'd let you know.

UPDATE - 10 March: whilst all this was going on other team members were also having amazing days - Amy's blog covers some of the other great stuff that God was doing among us.

New team worship day

Today we welcomed Tom into the team as our new Schools Worker. Because of this we'd slightly delayed our annual new year week of prayer to be able to include him. When we're all in, there are now eight of us including, this morning, our part time finance manager.

The programme for the day started with lectio divina looking at the story of Jesus calling the fishermen (Mark 1:14-20). This took longer than anticipated (which was great) because of the insights that people shared and the prayer time that flowed out of it. There followed a tea/coffee break and some social banter!

For the main part of the day I wanted each member of the team to be able to tell a little of their own story of faith, along with their own personal sense of vision, so far as they were able to articulate it. After each person had spoken we prayed for them, sharing any words or scriptures. The question I asked was:

Why are you still a Christian?

On the face of it this is a very scary question. But the point was to get past a basic re-telling of our 'testimony' which can often focus on 'how I became a Christian' and get people talking about the reality of their life today and their sense of the place of God in it all. The resulting humility, honesty and openness deepened our understanding of each other and created some important moments of prayer, the prophetic and of real pastoral interaction.

We finished the day with a very simple breaking of bread and open prayers of thanks for the work of Christ in dying and rising for us.