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Showing posts from January, 2016

Why we chose to go public with our grief

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Miscarriage, still-birth and early infant death are not things we like to think about, let alone discuss openly and honestly. Sometimes grief and loss is unavoidably public with the death of a member of your congregation or a grandparent. Perhaps someone has been battling a terminal illness for a while. However, sometimes it is all too easy to bottle up the pain and sadness – especially when it is a loss to do with early pregnancy complications. My wife and I have found it common practise amongst our friends that it is accepted in today’s culture not to tell anyone about your pregnancy until after the first scan at 3 months. Mainly due to the risk of complications, so no one will know if you have suffered a miscarriage if it were to happen in the early stages. We decided right from the beginning that we would not do this. If we were pregnant, then we would let people know, regardless of the stage of pregnancy. Why should we hide our pain if something were to go wrong? Were we sh

Worship Setlist for the New Year

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As we enter into a New Year it is an obvious and natural position to ask God what he has in store for the coming year for you personally, and for your church. When selecting a setlist of worship songs for my church, whether it is for a special New Year's eve service where we welcome the New Year in together, or if it is just the first Sunday of the New Year when the whole church is gathering together, I think it is important to ask God if there is a specific song he has in mind for the coming season for your church. This song could be along the obvious lines of 'New Year = New Season' with a sense that we are moving into something new with God, we are progressing in our relationship with Him and becoming more like Him as we grow together in Christ. However, this is not necessarily the case. This year, for 2016 I believe God is moving my church through a transition. A time of pruning has begun and in the coming months we will need to navigate this change and challenge