+ Happy New Year!
Tomorrow is New Years Eve, 2007 getting nearer!

Been nice to spend a few days chillin', catching up with friends etc. The diary for next year is filling up, so good to get some down time.
Christmas was good, nice to not be cooking this year! Got some good pressies, including a blender thing which has been the source of some fantastic smoothies over the last few days. I've been a fan of Innocent's drinks for a while, but this is somewhat cheaper.

I won't mention the cricket - disaster for England.

Guess this will be probably the last post here for 2006...

*Happy Christmas!
It's Christmas eve!
Have a great Christmas.
Christ the Saviour is born!

Church in London
The Economist magazine comments:
"Christianity is collapsing everywhere except London"
Nothing "new" in this article - but interesting to see it picked up in such a magazine.
(HTto Jonny)

Tagged
Lots of these tag/meme things going round. I generally ignore them - I can hear my mother warning me about chain letters!!
But Amanda tagged me a while back, so here we go:
One word answers to the following:
Yourself: Pete Lev
Your girl/boy friend: Sooz
Your hair: Shaved
Your mother: Outspoken
Your father: Generous
Your favourite item: Cars
Your dream last night: Random
Your favourite drink: Tea
Your dream car: Mercedes CLS
The room you are in: Lounge
Your fear: Dogs
What do you want to be in 10 years? Me
Who you hung out with last night: Friends
What you're not: Administrator
Muffins: Choclate
One of your wish list items: Book
Time: 12:34
The last thing you did: TV
What are you wearing: Clothes
Your favouite weather: Spring
Your favourite book: Bible (!)
Last thing you ate: Sweets
Your life: Busy
Your mood: Festive
Your body: OK
What are you thinking about right now: This
What are you doing at the moment: Blog
Your summer: Hot
Best part of your life: Everything

Think I'm supposed to tag some other dudes:I'll go for Volland & Duley

Scooby in mourning?
Scooby might not be so chirpy today after the death of the second half of the legendary animators Hanna Barbera (BBC here). They were creators of the TV of my childhood - not just the dog-father Scooby, but also such delights as Hong Kong Fuey, Yogi, etc.
The only rivals on my childhood TV were the British classics made by Film Fair.

Isssues in Youth Ministry
Check out Tim's series of posts by various people on "issues in youth ministry and what needs to change".
So far Ian is the sole UK voice, looks like there may be 1 or 2 others, but still worth looking at. (I was invited, but until now have been consumed with other things. Maybe I'll think about this over the next couple of relatively quieter weeks).

Relief?
I posted off my first assignment today (for my Postgrad studies in Leadership, Renewal and Mission or LRM). My work is done - all I need now is for the Royal Mail to deliver (this story is a bit worrying in that regard!).
So I can put the books about preaching back on the shelf. What was my conclusion about the importance of preaching in contemporary society? A kind of "maybe" but not in the way it was and lets get creative. It took nearly 7000 words for me to get there though! (I'll post a link to the paper in time if you're keen!).
The next module I'm doing is "Leading, Menoring and Accompanying the Emerging Church". Looking forward to it a lot. I'll be doing the second compulsory LRM module in 2008.

Update
Jason sums up the preaching thing very well in 5 points here

Worship...at Tesco?
I was in one of our local Tesco supermarkets today when I was struck by the music they were playing.
The usual mix of carols and Christmas songs is strange in itself - jumping from blatantly Christ-focused carols (and the dodgy ones about Jesus "no crying he makes"!) to Jingle Bells etc. But today in that mix was a full on gospel choir version of Oh Happy Day! Just struck me as wierd that some offices are banning tinsel and trees, but Tesco pumps out a song about Jesus washing our sins away!
And in a multicutural part of West London, where no-one seemed to bat an eyelid!

Christmas is coming...
Must be getting near Christmas as I did my first carol service today.
It's an annual "gig" where I go and play piano for a local church, for carols, kids songs, OAP's etc.
As always it was a creative/chaotic/moving/holy occaision!
The pastor gets the members to share short testimonies they've written that somehow relate to the usual Christmas readings. Powerful stuff - and means there's no need for a preach as the Gospel has already been heard so strongly.


Switched to Blogger Beta today. Seems good so far!

And I discovered some interesting stuff on Andrew's blog about some Germans who vistited my home church a couple of weeks ago (see here and here)

The Discussion goes on...
The discussion on training/JNC/Youth ministry etc. continues on on the Youthwork Discussion Forum.
I posted my take on some of this stuff a couple of weeks ago here.
One thing that struck me in this whole debate is that I rarely hear such discussion about adult ministry. We may value counselling or social work qualifications, but we have other criteria for selecting church leaders (ministers). Why when someone is a minister focused on young people does the water get so muddy? I know some people will cry "dualism" but it seems to me there really are 2 distinct roles or callings: those called to work as youthworkers who are Christian and who's passion is driven by God (to whom JNC would be most helpful) and those called to be spiritual ministers, pastors to youth (to whom theological training is priority). Both need each other and to learn from each other. But they need training with seperate emphasis.
But then I may be wrong...

Tags: youth ministry

Weekend
Great to get a weekend off before the Christmas stuff starts, although generally this time of year gets a bit quieter work wise (no-one wants to worry about youth ministry at Christmas!).
Friday was an attempt to get Christmas shopping done - we started but by no means finished!

Saturday and Sunday we went to Gloucester to catch up with the Vollands. Michael used to do youth work in West London, but is now an Anglican Ordained Pioneer Minister commmissioned to do a "fresh expression" of church in Gloucester city centre. Good to see the family and hear about what's been going on.
It was also fun to worship at Gloucester Cathedral. Not the usual Baptist Sunday morning that's for sure!

We also attempted to watch the movie Shop Girl. To be brutally honest, if you get the chance to see it don't bother. Really not a good film.