Story Chicago

by | Sep 14, 2009 | Faith

Blogging has been a crazy journey of the years, but one of the consistent things about it that I love is the connections. I’ve been reading Ben Arment’s blog for years, and more often than not it inspires me, challenges me, to step out of my comfort zone and really pursue the dreams God’s put on my heart.

Story_Poster

Ben has been putting together this unbelievably awesome looking conference, Story, over the last while. It’s all about how we experience and communicate the Gospel, and man… the talent involved behind the scenes alone makes me want to be there, never mind the presenter line-up!

There is such a pull to this idea of story in my life, that I can’t quite understand how/what to do with it yet… but let me say, if I had enough spare cash for a flight to O’Hare, I’d be at Story.

Find Me Here

by | Sep 9, 2009 | Photography

I’ve really enjoyed getting my (photography) work out there a bit more, as terrifying as that is. I realise I haven’t really blogged much about these things, but there are a few places you can find me currently…

‘Where Your Heart Is‘ specialises in wedding favours, and a few months back I did the photography for the site. You can also find me under their ‘featured artist‘ section at the minute.

Big Mouth Coffee is, of course, my local coffeehouse… and a few of my photographs are adorning it’s walls currently. I’m also featured on their brand new website here.

I’ve also just booked my first wedding photography gig… really excited about pushing myself creatively and can’t wait to get stuck into it! I’m also utterly terrified, but I think that’s a normal part of the process!

[Beware: shameless plug coming up]

You can check out more of my work on my website, www.emmaboyd.co.uk, and hire me by dropping me an email.

Rob Bell :: In Conversation

by | Sep 8, 2009 | Faith, Travel

I was at a couple of Rob Bell’s events at Greenbelt, ‘Drops Like Stars’ and ‘In Conversation’. Despite the huge queues for Drops Like Stars, it was worth it. I knew roughly what he would say, having read the book, but I like watching how he presents things. It’s one of the reasons I enjoy his books so much: he writes the way he speaks.

The ‘In Conversation’ piece was really interesting… I’m interested in what happens when it’s unscripted, when you’re put on the spot and it’s just a dialogue between people rather than a full-on presentation. A couple of things he said stood out for me.

“The point of the church is to break our bodies and pour ourselves out for the healing of the world.”

I’ve heard him speak about this before, but it gets me every time. I wonder what it would look like if we really started to live that out? In so many churches I fear we’ve turned communion back into this religious ritual, rather than it being an everyday occurrence. Wasn’t that the point initially? It’s bread and wine.. it’s whatever you’ve got to hand, that everyone has access to, and it’s not kept just for the religious people. If the Eucharist truly is the Good Gift, what does it mean for us to be a Good Gift to our communities? We become the body, that was broken, and we become the blood, that was poured out. We break ourselves & we pour ourselves out… on their behalf.

“Every little bit of hope you stumble across is real.”

This phrase just grabbed me. Hope is real. Hope is not a myth.

Anyone else there? What did you think?