I got new shoes today… finally! Brand new pair of yellow Chuck Taylor All Star Converse… so beautiful. They make me happy… yellow makes me happy… it reminds me of summer and joy.
In other news, all the Paris pictures I plan to upload are now on Flickr. I have some exciting news on the photography front too, but I shall save that for later, keep you guessing!
Originally uploaded by ubercherryred ♥’s you.
Today my ‘big bro’ Ally got married to his beautiful cherrysimbo…
CONGRATS!!!
I’m back in Ireland for a week or so leading up to Easter. It’ nice to be in the countryside again 🙂
Thought I’d share a picture from a few days ago in Glasgow… the weather has been beautiful lately…
Oh and, a huge hat-tip to an amazing friend of mine, no names mentioned, but they bought me a new book the other day… a lovely suprise blessing.
Last Monday I spent some time in the Louvre, as I mentioned in an earlier post. There are some more pictures from my Paris trip, some Louvre ones too, on my Flickr now.
One of the sculptures I was captivated by is “PsychĂ© ranimĂ©e par le baiser de l’Amour” by Antonio Canova. (I get the feeling I like Italian art more than any others?)
This sculpture by Antonio Canova recreates the moment at which Psyche awakens from her deathly sleep by the kiss of Eros. The dynamic sculpture conveys a deep sense of love, passion and energy as Eros sweeps from the sky to awaken Psyche from her slumber. Psyche throws up her arms elegantly to receive Eros’ kiss.
There’s more background information on this sculpture here.
Technorati Tags: Louvre museum, Antonio Canova
Ally sent me the link to this article the other day, saying I’d enjoy the read…
“God, give us a vision for a new kind of world. We grieve, we honor, we condemn. But we want to move through that. We want to have asked the hard, hard questions. But we want to move though that too. And we want to be people of a dream, which we believe is your dream for the world. But then, God, we want to move past that. We want to move to action. … God, what would this look like? Show us millions of different ways to bless — to bless in such a way that it would literally shake the foundation of the Earth and capture us with this kind of dream. … Please, God, open our eyes.“
[Rob Bell]
Technorati Tags: Rob Bell, emerging church
But everything inside you knows
Says more than what you’ve heard
So much more than empty conversations
Filled with empty words
And you’re on fire
When he’s near you
You’re on fire
When he speaks
You’re on fire
Burning at these mysteries
Give me one more time around
Give me one more chance to see
Give me everything you are
Give me one more chance to be… (near you)
[On Fire – Switchfoot]
This song holds double meaning for me… if you know what I’m saying.
Last night I went to see Amazing Grace at the cinema with a crowd of folks. The film tells the story of William Wilberforce and the fight for the abolition of slavery.
The film is incredible… you must go see it! There were several moments during the film where I had a tear in my eye. Ioan Gruffudd gives a stunning performance as Wilberforce, not least of which of Wilberforce’s faith. It’s hard to imagine that Gruffudd can’t have been impacted in so manner by it.
The film sparked some thoughts for me, I’ll share later when I’ve had time to process them a bit, but for now… just go see it OK!!
Technorati tags: amazing grace, William Wilberforce, slavery
[Les Mystères de la Passion du Christ by Antonio Campi]
I stood staring at this picture for a long time on Monday morning. I went to the Louvre Museum on Monday, which is amazing… the place is huge and you could easily spend a whole day in it.
I don’t know what it is about this picture but I just couldn’t pull my gaze away from it…
On the contrary, I want the kids I love to follow Jesus because I genuinely believe following Jesus is the best kind of life. Eternity aside, I want them to be transformed by the Gospel right here and right now, for their sakes and for the sakes of all the lost and broken people out there who need them to start living as Jesus’ disciples. After 
all, the sooner we all start following Jesus by feeding the poor and freeing the oppressed, the sooner God’s will shall be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
[Bart Campolo]
One of the books I read while in Paris was Organic Church by Neil Cole. The basic premise of the book is that the way we do church today is quite often contrary to what Jesus taught, and that we should be “growing faith where life happens”. It was a quick read (read it in a day), here’s some thoughts…
“We want to lower the bar of how church is done and raise the bar of what it means to be a disciple.”
[One of the goals of CMA]
“Someone once said that we shape our buildings and then they shape us.”
Cole makes this statement in one of the chapters, which reminded me of conversations we had at the Soliton sessions (here and here) last month, where I first heard this idea. It’s something I’m thinking about at the minute, I don’t think I’ve got very far with it but I’m mulling it over. I read somewhere about how one of the reasons churches need to spend so much money on buildings etc is because we have increased our need for private spaces. We no longer live with the hospitality that allows our homes and our buildings and our personal property to be used for public/corporate worship etc. What would happen if we opened ourselves up again and regained such a deep sense of community that we allowed anything of our to be used in/for church meetings? There will probably be more thoughts on this later!
“Men are looking for better methods; God is looking for better men.”
[E.M. Bounds]
A reminder to live fully for Christ… nothing else matters. We pray for his will in how to build the church, for how to do so many things for him (which isn’t a bad thing), but how much time do we spend praying that God would mould us into the leaders he needs us to be? What if, for example, our churches aren’t growing because we aren’t leaders that are growing enough to shepherd them?
“Many take Christ’s words and apply them backwards. They teach that if you have position in the Kingdom of God it is important to lead as a servant. But Jesus meant us to see that those who first serve are indeed the leaders that others will follow.”
“Instead of drawing people out of community and robbing what community already existed, Jesus’ plan is to inject the Gospel into an existing community.”
This sentance is a good indication of the contents of the rest of the book – instead of creating highly engineered church environments where people can come to do life, we take church to the places the people already are.
“Many of us settle for lesser lives, for stories not worth telling.“
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