A minor inconvenience…

In an unusually early dry spell Paihia’s summer visitors are showering all our water away and the Council has totally forbidden all use of hoses. Gardens and lawns are just dying all over town.

Our shower is over the bathtub so we are able to bucket out our used water to a hastily-purchased drum outside. From there we can run it to our little vege patch and so far everything is holding up pretty well.

But on the bank below the house we’ve discovered one of our big rhododendrons is badly stressed and wilting. Years ago I installed a large drum underneath the house to divert grey water from the shower to the newer shrubs down the bank. The system hasn’t been used for ten years so yesterday I reinstated it.

There’s a light scotch mist this morning, so with a bit of help from the buckets the veges will probably survive the current dry spell with less inconvenience than most. Of course, this untreated grey water must be only a very temporary solution. And where would we be if the water supply that we still enjoy for showers and washing and cooking were to fail completely?

Like all of life, everything is temporary. It shouldn’t take a bit of a water shortage, never mind a Haiti earthquake, to remind us of that…

Time for a New Freezer?

Our freezer is nearly thirty years old. It still works well but we have been made to feel anxious by claims that modern freezers are so much more economical.

Yesterday I saw exactly what we needed in Farmers' sale. It would fit in the same space and do the same job. It boasted the usual coloured sticker on the front indicating what its power usage would be in a year. Now that was interesting…

Some time ago I blew $25 on a power meter. I’ve had it hooked up to the old freezer for a few days and I’ve found that it actually uses much less electricity than the same size new model.

I expect the difference is because the new one will be frost-free and is more environmentally sympathetic. But on grounds of just doing the job and power usage, the old one will probably stay there for a bit longer.

That’s what Local Shared Ministry is all about in a small congregation - achieving what needs to be done in mission and ministry for an affordable cost in talents and available resources.

Where are the words

Looking at Marco Dormino's dramatic rescue photo I am reminded that I haven't put up a post on the Haiti disaster. I suppose that the enormity of this level of human suffering is impossible to respond to adequately with just words.

Certainly the tragedy has been on our minds. Helen drew us into it in some well-chosen words in the intercession on Sunday morning.

From our plenty, we will try to give generously and sacrificially to the needy and those who are making supreme efforts to support them. It may be enough or it may not. But we and many from the whole human family will do what we can.

And we who live in the "shaky isles" may perhaps say to ourselves, "There, but for the grace of God, go I". It's not good theology, of course, but perhaps it's a reminder of our frailty in the face of nature.

It's agapanthus time again in our part of the world.

In every direction these vigorous plants hold up unstable clay banks and are an easy fill for large blank spaces. They provide a solid mass of lush green all year. And just now they are a mass of great blue or white displays everywhere you look. They make the heart leap with joy, I tell you.

Ah, yes, but in the north, agapanthus are not so popular with officialdom. They grow so fast and so rank that they smother most of our tiny indigenous plants in the margins of our native bush. Their seeds are spread by birds and grow anywhere at all. They haven't been damned as "noxious" yet but they are definitely on the Dept of Conservation's "not wanted" list. Please, DOC say, don't encourage them in our district.

Sad, isn't it, that something so lovely to look actually doesn't make a totally positive contribution to our community. Appearances don't count for everything, in flowers. I wonder if that's true also for congregations...?


PS: We have agapanthus on our bank but we will "head" the flowers as soon as they start to droop, to stop the birds getting at the seeds..

Godwits and LSM

I received a wonderful book for Christmas.

“Godwits” is the full story that was inspired by Godwit E-7 who in 2007 was satellite tracked on the longest migratory flight of any bird. Flying non-stop for over a week, she came from Alaska straight down through the Pacific to New Zealand. Phenomenal.

Newly raised youngsters take off from the tundra first, in groups of up to a few dozen. They make the trip on their own and their parents follow a few weeks later.

Now, wait a moment. How do the youngsters know where to go? How, in fact, does any migratory species know where to go? A fascinating experiment half a century ago showed that two factors are at work in migration navigation. Migrants are apparently guided by a simple sense of direction as if by a compass. But they are also guided by experience of “landmarks” remembered from previous journeys. Older birds will amend the “compass” route according to their previous experience and knowledge of conditions.

The young godwits out of Alaska don’t have this advantage. They make their first incredibly long flight with not much more than a sense of direction. Yet they wind up on the same beaches their parents left half a year earlier.

Congregations that are charting revolutionary journeys in Local Shared Ministry have to make their own maps. The traditional guidance of conventional congregations is no longer appropriate for them. They know their journey will occasionally be a bit scary. Sometimes they will wonder why they travel on this route. They often wonder where they will end up.

But there is a confidence that comes with experience and a conviction that drives them forward.

Ships tall - and small

This morning we watched the annual tall ships "race". We caught the 11.30am ferry to Russell and cruised right through the middle of the assembling fleet. We stayed on board for the return trip at noon just as the race began.
Some race! You couldn't see the start line for the mass of craft. Two of the four square-riggers didn’t start with the other hundred or so cheerful participants, most of whom didn’t qualify as “tall” by any normal standard. But when "Spirit of New Zealand" and "Soren Larsen" got started they soon left the smaller craft behind – something to do with waterline length I think…
Who cared? If you couldn’t tell serious participants from fun-loving spectator craft it didn’t matter in the slightest. The day was brilliant and the little family ships had as much fun as any of the bigger corporates. It seemed like everyone who could put together a boat and a crew was out there for the trip.
And, about now, even the very smallest and the slowest of them is getting to the finish line back at Russell.
It’s not how big your craft is or how many were on it but just that you did the distance. A bit like congregations, eh?

Oh, yes, another notice...

Returning the motorhome from Christchurch to Auckland a few days ago we planned to visit the seal colony near Westport. But when we got to the entrance we were confronted with this notice warning of all kinds of dangers ahead.
Now we had no children to keep with us. Did the notice mean we couldn’t enter? Well, we took our courage in both hands and went in without children and no disaster fell upon us at all.

Perhaps the notice didn’t quite say what it intended… I guess it’s another “We heard what they said but we know what they meant” things. How often do I communicate stuff that has to be filtered and processed before people catch my meaning?

Happy Holidays!

One of the members of our congregation at Russell put this notice on the church to try to spread good cheer a little more widely than usual.

Today I an told that a passer-by has added:

TO OUR AGNOSTIC FRIENDS

MAKE UP YOUR MIND!

I can think of one or two categories of other friends, too. Perhaps they will make their own claim to a place in the sun. Meanwhile, it seems our small, small congregation of three to five at Russell has achieved a fully interactive churchfront!

"Dear Family and Friends.."

Fifty years ago a dozen of us who had just entered the Methodist ministry agreed to write to each other, at least at Christmas.

Not all of us kept it up, but Bev and I soon developed a wider Christmas mailing list. We rejected the Christmas card option and put the money saved into the Christmas Appeal. We distributed brief duplicated accounts of our life during each year. We’ve kept them all and they were enormously useful when I commenced to write my life story.

Today this kind of exchange of news seems to have become an international custom. The technologies of Xerox, Fax and E-mail – not to mention other more complex internet mysteries – have made our circle of acquaintances larger and our world smaller.

In the coming years Bev and I may not have the opportunity of renewing many friendships face to face. Advancing age, declining health and environmental awareness will limit our ability and willingness to travel very far overseas. But once a year it’s a pleasure to share a little of our life with upwards of 300 households and to read of theirs.

Christmas blessings to all!

PS I wonder when this custom began...?

Flying High?

As we sat at coffee recently we spotted a Mynah flying to and fro inside the airconditioned building.

It flew a large figure-of-eight loop from one end of the entire mall to the other. Every 30 seconds or so it returned in the same circuit over our table and on again. There was no way out. Worse, there was nowhere it could land to catch its breath – the building was no doubt designed that way. All it could do was fly round and back, round and back.

I guess it probably came in at ground level, looking for crumbs under the tables. Maybe the pickings weren’t much good, or perhaps it got frightened. But once it took off, it could only fly upwards under the lofty ceiling.

I was struck at first by the bird’s determined persistence and its energy, but then by the pointlessness of its effort. For all the distance that it flew, it was not getting anywhere. So much effort, for so little.

There seemed to be a bit of a moral in there for me, someplace. About keeping my feet on the ground, I suppose. All the energy I can muster isn’t going to do me or anyone else much good unless it is expended in the right context. Of course I aspire to the heavens. But I need also to be firmly earthed.

I hope it hasn't been said of me that I am so heavenly minded I am no earthly use...