Feeling fallow
September 20, 2008 at 9:31 pm | In Church Planting, books, family, personal | Leave a CommentFirstly apologies for the long silence – not felt that I’ve had much to say for a while.
This period that Ruth and I are in at the moment is definitely odd and cannot be prepared for. We used to be actively involved in our home church in Manchester, sometimes even over-actively so. Then we went to the rather artificial environment of Bible college for three years where we were stretched and very active, but the word ‘involved’ didn’t really fit as we were so temporary there.
Now we’ve moved to a new place again, with a different language and a different culture. I’m guessing that many of the frustrations we’ve faced, and are facing, are linked directly to a mild form a culture shock. (I say mild, as I still reckon that the Dutch are culturally as close to the British as you get.) However, the hardest thing to get used to has been the feeling of being useless. I don’t mean useless as in having an inferiority complex and feeling no good at anything, but more in that it’s hard to feel meaningfully useful because of the cultural and especially the language issues.
I had this realisation last week as I was rehearsing in my mind the upcoming visit of our church pastor here (our Dominee or Predikant). I was thinking back to all the things that I have been involved with in the past: the ministry experience, all of the gifting that God has given me, my passions for God’s church, and then wondering what happened to all that stuff. I haven’t really had an opportunity to put any of that into practice now for at least 15 months, and some of it for more than 4 years.
Delft, Zuid Holland
And being generally generally unaware of my background emotions (yes, I’m a bloke!) I haven’t really noticed that I’m kind of grieving the loss of all this stuff, albeit temporary maybe. I realise looking back on things that giving out, ministering to people, using my gifts, etc. is really a huge part of my existence.
I remember trying to explain to people before we moved out here that we wouldn’t be doing much for the first couple of years in order to acclimatise, absorb the culture, learn the language and settle the boys in. Indeed, to put a spiritual spin on it for people, it seemed to make sense to liken it to Jesus’ early years before he started his main ministry phase. I did this mainly because I anticipated that people would be excited for us and might be looking forward to some amazing stories of conversions within weeks. Naturally I wanted to avoid any disappointment on their part.
Yet what I hadn’t bargained for was how darned hard it was going to be for me! Now spare getting the violins out just yet, because I still see the huge value in taking this time to focus on acclimatisation. For example, my Dutch language is coming along very well now and I should be graduating from my course in a few weeks. But when will we be able to actually start feeling useful again?
Hopefully, in a few years time I will be able to look back and see even more sense in this time…
P.S. Still dipping in and out of the same book (The Forgotton Ways), might finish it later in the decade!
Inappropriate phrase of the week
July 4, 2008 at 8:08 pm | In personal | 1 CommentJust thought I’d share this one with you…
We had friends round for pancakes last night. They were asking if we had any romantic comedy DVDs, to which I replied (to the wife), “Yeah, sure, feel free to have a rummage around in the drawers any time.”
If you’re a native English speaker you will understand why I went a rather bright shade of red! (If you’re not, have a look here.)
Latest Newsletter
June 15, 2008 at 11:30 am | In family, personal | Leave a CommentJust a quick note to say that our latest newsletter has (finally) been published and is now available for download here.
Why do I go to church?
April 24, 2008 at 9:13 pm | In books, church, family, personal | 1 CommentWhy do I go to church?
I was pondering this question the other night as I was supposed to be going to sleep (when I seem to do much of my meaningful thinking!). I know I have said in the past that ‘going to church’ is a bit of a misnomer as you and I are the church and we merely go to an organised worship service on a Sunday morning. But that aside, what actually gets me out of the door on a Sunday morning to often cycle through freezing cold rain with a bleating family alongside?
Well I came to the conclusion that it is a mixture of factors, with various levels of sense:
1. I’m a Christian and that’s what I’m supposed to do, right? I would probably feel guilty if I just sat at home, though I might avoid this if I spent 10 minutes reading my Bible. Heck, I would (and may even in the future) preach on why it is important to be an active member of a church community. So hadn’t I better be there?
2. What else would I do on a Sunday morning?
3. I’m a missionary and I guess our supporters kind of expect us to be pretty regularly attending a church.
4. I’m intrigued to see how the Dutch people ‘do church’. It’s actually a vital part of my cross-cultural learning and will influence later what we do (and also don’t do) as church planters.
5. Sunday services are an opportunity to worship together, although I must admit I have very seldom felt that I have had a meaningful encounter with God in such a context for the last four years. A very sad admission.
6. Sunday services are when we share fellowship with other. This is one area where our current church is pretty hot. The after service atmosphere is buzzing and many people stay and chat for quite a long time. People have introduced themselves to us virtually every week that we have been there.
7. It is a chance to learn about God, normally via a sermon. Having been a Christian most of my life and going through Bible college kind of spoils this part of a service as most of it you’ve heard before. The last three churches I have been in have had very different sermon styles. One was short and sweet and very variable, though generally mission oriented; one was very Bible-centric and academic; and one was much more lifestyle orientated than expositional.
There are probably more reasons. All this said, I generally find Sunday morning meetings stressful and usually sit there wondering what on earth I am doing there in such a weird environment, so utterly different from the culture that I live in for the other 95% of my week. Surely there’s something wrong there? To my mind church absolutely must be culturally relevant; not totally shaped by the culture, but at least reflecting it generally. I’d rather hear Coldplay in church than another 19th century dirgey Dutch hymn! (By the way, are there any Dutch-written hymns in a major key?)
Just plain cynical? No, I try to keep myself from that and reflect on how I would do things differently. Yikes, soon I’ll soon be trying! I’m currently reading a top book The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church by Alan Hirsch (also co-wrote The Shaping of Things to Come, a recent classic) which is helping me in my thoughts for the future. I’ll report back in more depth on this book at a later date.
Why do you go to church on a Sunday morning?
Corporate speak
April 22, 2008 at 8:01 pm | In general, personal | Leave a CommentYou can tell that I work for a large multinational company.
Today I had a department informational meeting where the personnel department (sorry, Human Resources) were explaining about ‘personal career path development plans’ and how we had a target to meet on how tidy our office is. But the clincher for me was when they were describing how another large British multinational that mine has just bought out was going to be incorporated into the organisation. Naturally, there will be redundancies as you can’t have two large R&D departments without overlap. But in this politically correct age you can’t call these redundancies ‘cost savings’ – they’re ’synergies’! Wow – well I was convinced. Maybe I’d feel so much better if they let me go because my departure would be a synergistic benefit.
After gleefully signing up for the corporate ‘code of conduct’, I escaped at the coffee break, fearing that I was in danger of an early dismissal from loud snoring…
A pleasant surprise
March 28, 2008 at 8:18 pm | In family, personal | Leave a CommentI got a phone call from the job agency this afternoon. I fully expected them to say that I had not got the job that I had an interview for a couple of weeks ago. My interview was very brief (Approx. 20 mins.) and I had already heard that the company was continuing to interview new applicants. Imagine my surprise then when I was then asked if I was still available and interested, and when I could start.
So, I go back to the agency next Tuesday to sign my contract and I begin next Thursday, working 3 days a week (Mon, Tue & Thu).
Aaarrrgghhh!!! Do I really want a job??? I’m kind of enjoying being a free agent and maybe doing DIY jobs around the house isn’t so bad… Help – I haven’t had a proper job for 3½ years, and I’m back in the corporate multinational chemical world. Still, at least I know that they are a very reputable company as they used to be one of my suppliers in my former working life.
My job is as a REACH co-ordinator with Akzo Nobel in Sassenheim. It’s largely an administrative role, working in English (but in a Dutch-speaking environment), liaising with the company’s suppliers to ensure that they will be adequately complying with the new EU REACH regulations (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals). I have no idea how much I will enjoy the job as I’ve never done mainly admin before, but they wanted someone with a background in chemistry. Anyhow, it will give me much more opportunity to use and improve my Dutch (the main purpose), bring in some cash, and the contract is only for 12 months anyhow.
Praise God for his surprising, but nevertheless perfect plan!
Easter Day celebration?
March 28, 2008 at 7:57 pm | In church | Leave a CommentI was chatting with a friend today about our Easter Sunday church service at the Nederlands Gereformeerd Kerk that we both go to. During the service we sang many songs celebrating the resurrection of Jesus and the words ‘celebrate’, ‘jubilate’ and ‘joy’ were used repeatedly throughout the service. We both remarked that we found it odd that as we surveyed the congregation the overwhelming majority of people were singing with their arms folded or behind their backs.
Is it only Christians who can turn the highlight of the calendar into something which quite literally bore more resemblance to a funeral than a party?
A cure for insomnia
March 24, 2008 at 9:06 pm | In Church Planting, church, emerging church | Leave a CommentIn 2007 I wrote a paper – Lessons fom the Divide – for my theology degree based around two authors (Brian D. McLaren and D. A. Carson) writing about the Emerging Church. I have also linked in the theme to church planting.
I would welcome any comments.
Some Northern grit
March 24, 2008 at 8:11 pm | In family, mission, personal | 2 CommentsI reckon that I’m allowed to be honest about things on this blog, what with being a Northerner (from somewhere North of Birmingham, England), call a spade a spade, etc. Actually, Ruth and I were discussing this sort of thing last night. She is reading a somewhat useful book written by the wife of a fairly well-known American church leader. But Ruth was describing that reading the book is a bit like watching a Hollywood film. The author is trying to be fairly honest, but doing the usual ‘author thing’ of skipping over the usual crap in our everyday lives and ending up painting a rather glossy looking US family with their plastic smiles and living the American Dream, in a Godly way of course. So I will try and avoid this nonsense in my blog and leave the make-up off.
So now time for some real life crap. I’m bored. Yes, that’s right, I’m bored. But aren’t I one of those saintly missionaries who has faithfully obeyed God’s call to move abroad to spread the Kingdom in a heathen land? That’s all technically true. But right at this moment I’m pretty fed up. The kids are off school and driving us potty; the weather is freezing cold and wet so no-one wants to go outside; I only have two evenings a week where I get out of the house and meet other real-world people at my Dutch classes; Ruth is still waiting for her own course to begin; the only DIY jobs left in the house are the ones that I was leaving until last because I don’t want to do them; I need to rebuild the back wheel of my bike in the freezing cold; the part-time job that I had an interview for two weeks ago is still interviewing new applicants, indicating that I’m not the one they were looking for; the list could go on…
Yesterday we were so bored that we bought a family ticket for the bus and stayed on it for a full hour until it got to the Hague, went to McDonald’s for a hot chocolate, then caught the next bus home to kill another hour! I think I must have missed the lecture at college where we learned that cross-cultural mission can be tedious, for weeks at a time as well.
Anyhow, having got all this off my chest and foisted it on you all, I feel much better now, thanks! I now see a break in my clouds and can remember again some of the many blessings that God has poured on me. It was great to focus again yesterday on the resurrection of Jesus and remember what is at the heart of the Christian message – that God is alive and kicking and busy today transforming our world.
Thanks for tuning in.
P.S. Ruth and I are meeting with the Director of the boys’ school tomorrow. He and some others started a church in his home near us about a year ago and we wanted to exchange our stories and visions. Hope to report back here soon.
A necessary visit to a psychiatrist!
March 17, 2008 at 1:34 am | In personal | Leave a CommentTags: Samuel, school
Last Friday Ruth and I went to visit an American child psychologist in The Hague as we had been referred to her by our school in Leiden. The basic idea is to get Samuel assessed in his mother-tongue (English) to determine his basic learning abilities (i.e. WISC IQ) and behaviour in both school and home. The school can then have a better idea of (a) how to help Samuel best, and (b) see what external help they can get for him in school.
We had a very encouraging meeting and were very impressed with her knowledge, professionalism and understanding of our situation. Is was also comforting to know that she is a practising Christian and so we didn’t have to go through the usual lengthy explanation as to why we have moved to Holland.
So the outcome of the meeting is that she will arrange to visit Samuel in school in the next week or so to observe him in his classroom. She will also take him out of his classroom and do 3 or 4 sets of 90 minute tests on differing occasions. Another day she will visit us after school at home and stay for evening meal. This should be an experience for her as some of you readers will know that Samuel’s behaviour at home is totally different to his consistently placid school behaviour! All these meetings and tests and the report will take about 6 weeks, but at the end of this process we should know more about Samuel’s educational abilities than we’ve learned over the last 6 years!
The school have already indicated to us that Samuel is not ready to move up to group 6 (UK, year 5) even though he is already a year below his age group. (We kept him down a year when we moved because of his obvious language barrier coupled with his educational difficulties.) However, the psychologist will be strongly recommending that Samuel moves up into group 6 as she has read many reports from other countries that clearly show that holding children back has no long term benefits and merely damages self-esteem. Fortunately for us, Samuel has not yet worked out that he is a year older than the rest of his classmates!
One of the current unknowns in this process is the cost involved. It’s going to cost about €1100 (£850) which, considering the amount of time spent and the detailed report, we consider this to be very good value. We do not know if our health insurance will pay out for any this yet – they were very unhelpful on the phone (as they always are!). Although English speaking tests are usually not covered, the psychologist said that she will help us in any way she can to get at least some of it claimed. Most kids get their tests done in Dutch via the usual school system and the Ministry of Education pays for it.
So, we shall see what happens. It is great to know that we have both God and a good professional on the case, and she has said that she will help us and the school get the resources that we need.
All prayers welcome!
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