The last meeting

Our last meeting was in a home and we talked about faith. We chose this to talk about because I thought it was the other end of 'fear'. We touched on the issue of prayer and unanswered prayer but we concluded that faith was not about faith in what God does, but in who God is. This was I felt a big issue. It was also an evening of personal reflection. In fact if there has been a running theme it has been that people have been able to say what they think and listen to what other people have to say and reflect carefully and thoughtfully. On this evening, one perosn in particular had much to think about re faith. Having talked about this and raised issues of crises of faith I used the topic at my next preaching engagement. I talked about the difference between faith that is stretched to the limit trying to reconcile faith in our beliefs and what sems to be overwhelming evidence of scientific 'fact'. It was a powerful service and many people thanked me for bringing this issue out 'into the open'.

As for not seeing clearly...a few weeks ago I suggested that we could keep in touch with each other via e mail or a web site but it wasn't well received. Not sure whether thatwas becasue we didn't know each other too well or they just didn't want to do it. I suggested that we could pray at the same time and we could have a particular time each day when we all knew someone else (me if no one else) would be praying. This was not warmly received, however this week it was suggested by someone else that we could do it. We set two times of the day - 8am and 9pm. I suggestged the northumbria community web site and their daily office. I'll find out tomorrow how we have got on with it. This group seem to be very reflective and so things suggested take time to be 'digested'.

My concern though is how does this differ from being a home group to a new experimental type of meeting. I think that it is a mix of those who like church and those who don't which marks it out as well as the openess and reflective nature. At this meeting we had two new people. If they come again I will know that we are still an open group accessable to those outside the group.

At tomorrow's meeting I was hoping to have someone from a muslim sect (Bah'ia) come to talk to us about how they live out thier life, outside formal structures. This was suggested by someone in the group who works with them. So far though finding a time where we can all meet is a real headache and so this will be postponed until a suitable date can be fixed. If we don't use the internet I'm not sure we can overcome this problem, but they want to meet up in person so until we can think of a solution...