Thanking God for 2010

I was sorely tempted to run a series of posts this evening, but I thought otherwise, because on a day like today, it’s all about relaxing. There is still enough time to reflect on the year 2010 and without going into great detail my recollections are as follows:

January: Having moved to Little Hulton at the end of December, this month saw me finally say goodbye to working at the North Staffs YMCA. On the blog I did the Law & Order series based on The Ten and I was pleased with how that went.

February: This was a very difficult month for me personally – not having a job and adjusting to life in Little Hulton as well as being flexible around Authrine as she struggled in the latter stages of her pregnancy. It is interesting to note how I maintained content on the blog during this time including some mini-series including the Exit Strategy Interview which was therapeutic for me and starting off the larger Is This What I Believe series. It was also during this month that I started a small audio series for a friend’s radio show, which is something that I hope to develop further in 2011 … but more on that next year.

March: God blessed me with a job for which I remain hugely thankful. Having work definitely helps set the mind in how to provide for the family and take care of those responsibilities. March is the month of going through Proverbs and that proved to be a very useful, inspirational and edifying process. It was also the first month that I had an entry in every day of the month which was a target of consistency I was hoping to reach.

April: This was of course the month of Zoë Anya Cheryse Dryden. After several days delaying her entry, she finally made her debut on Saturday 10^th April much to the joy, delight and relief of her parents and older sisters. So there was more family pressure with added responsibilities, yet in His faithfulness and the love of the 4-time mother I was able to maintain consistency with the blogging and having another pleasing little mini-series in the Quality of the Man – which I’ll hopefully update as I learn more.

May: If it was all about the new born in April, Abigail’s birthday and my Mum’s birthday had May covered. As Abigail turned 4 years old she continued her unwanted record of celebrating her birthdays living in different homes. Along with April and May, the Lord allowed consistent daily blogging during May and I was grateful for that as well as starting a series on my growth in learning about family. I started reading material from Frank Viola which rocked my spiritual world whilst correlating well with some changes I was going through, anyway. This month also ironed out some inconsistencies in the workplace which helped, although events were to transpire to change all that!

June: It was going too well. Got a job, settled in what I was meant to be doing in the job, getting some sort of routine in the new place, just looking to fit some other stuff in – but oh no. Time to move again – that was the essential decision we had made by the end of the month! This was also the month in which my beloved and I celebrated our seventh wedding anniversary.

July: Having just begun to recover from one traumatic upheaval of moving, we now embarked on another one that took us to our current place of abode. Thankfully He allowed us to get in safe and sound. Unsurprisingly the regularity of blogging suffered this month though I wasn’t to know just how much it would be affected in the four months after. New place, same job, different style. I was thrust straight in, but God gave grace to flex around it and settle there eventually. In other news, this was also the month in which Walter Hawkins passed on.

August: This was a month of further transition from the actual shift of property to now getting the family settled into the area and all that came with it. Work was still providing insight in how God works in this area much to my pleasure and I believe His glory. The blogging took a major hit as a result. I don’t regret it. It’s just one of those things and it was a good time to also be reminded of what are the essentials in life. Authrine reasserted herself as one of those essentials as she celebrated a key birthday in her life.

September: Dad had a special birthday this month and I was glad to pay tribute to him, whilst my sister also celebrated her birthday and wouldn’t be forgotten either.. Among other things that took place this month – the girls starting their new school and us finding out more about Bletchley, something happened to really disrupt the blogging. The house was burgled and among the items stolen was me mobile phone and me laptop! Not the most pleasant episode, but again a chance to say thanks to God that it was just goods taken and not lives. The timing could not have been more apt as it happened just as it appeared as though I would get back in the swing of things following the upheaval of the new home! Just before I was sent on enforced vacation from blogging I did manage to post a number of tributes given to the great Walter Hawkins.

October: There may have been a severe famine of blogging – only a few entries over the month, but I was still alive and active and really settling in especially at work where I was happy to take on some more responsibilities. This month is always significant as the birthday of my dear brother and I did what it took to recognise this crucial day. At long last the laptop was not only recovered from the people who had it, but it was returned to me to be able to get back to blogging and did I ever express gratitude for that!

November: I got back into blogging with a vengeance including a report on a return to Stoke-on-Trent. Upping the ante to not only blog every day but blogging twice a day developing a morning music/video slot and a longer reflection section for the evening. It was something I was messing with earlier in the year, but everything was right for that to become a part of me regular discipline in life and get the writing out of my system and online. I was able to give God thanks for my own birthday – hitting the crucifixion age of 33! Speaking of crucifixion I gave reason for the death of something close to me and the birth of something new at last. Without claiming anything special I also had the impression that at last we were beginning as a family to settle down in our new area.

December: So rounding things up we come to this month and it was one of rest and reflection as I was able to take half the month off with a holiday – which was great. I’ll share more on how I spent in an upcoming entry. The month was significant for me in choosing to turn the negative in a positive and spend it reflecting on who Jesus is – that was a good steer for the month and kept focus. Again with the birthdays, Deborah’s happened recently as did a special princess. Among them all, however, was the 5^th birthday of me blogging and I was happy to celebrate that in style … by blogging. So with the year winding down I was able to finish even stronger than I’d started in so many ways.

A Year In Blogging: So in looking back I realise that I’ve written quite a lot this year – more than any other year since I started blogging. I’m pleased with most of what I’ve written. It’s not been Shakespeare, but I’m pleased both with the growing consistency and quality – it is something I wanted to achieve at the start of the year and seeing progress, it’s something I’m committed to practising even further. Of the many blogs that I’ve posted I wanted to give ten in 2010 as a sample of what I’ve enjoyed writing about best this year – those five in no particular order are:

Missing the Point (03/11/10) – How it is crucial that Jesus Christ is the point of everything we are as followers of Him (gladly reinforced recently).

Nothing Beats Marriage (27/03/10) – A piece in thanksgiving to God for the concept of marriage.

I Digress – The Sin Condition: Prone To Wander (04/03/10) A companion piece to Missing the Point looking at how easy it is to be sinful.

I Struggle With This One (06/11/10) – Owning up to the struggles that marks the Christian journey and embracing it not as an end in itself but something that stops us from claiming completion or complacency in the journey.

Everything (12/02/10) – Reflecting on that place when you don’t have anything and you realise how Jesus means everything.

The Death of Christopher Dryden: Crosswords at the Crossroads (23/06/10) How the gospel means the end of me and the beginning of Jesus in all things.

So Jesus, What Have Your Done For Me Lately? (18/12/10) – Reflecting on the human condition in discipleship through the lens of a key episode in Jesus’ ministry.

The Truth That God Loves (16/05/10) – Addressing Christianity from a different perspective exploring it against its common expressions.

Bad Times As Good Times In Disguise (17/03/10) Looking at what the world and religious orders have told us about ‘bad times’ in contrast to what God says.

Because Who’s Worth It? My Problem With Self-Esteem (07/06/10) – An impassioned plea to get priorities right when we consider the human problem and divine solution.

Thank you Lord for all that’s happened in 2010 – to you be the glory, honour, power and glory now and forever.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Jesus Is … All

Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all. (Colossians 3:11)

There is the ‘What Can He Do For Me’ approach to Jesus – bread for hunger, water for thirst, light in darkness, friend in loneliness, king for leadership, and so on.

Yet relationship with Jesus is more than that. When Jesus takes residency in a person, that life is completely taken over. Old habits, former characteristics are subject to the new owner. So everything is about Jesus – He is in charge of everything because He is in everything, because He is everything.

As that sinks in a dramatically different way of understanding Jesus begins to make the changes.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Revelation: Dealing With The Enormity Of Jesus

One of the words that has really had a new meaning to be over the year 2010 is revelation.

I got a hint about it in 2008 when I had the reassuring word given to me that the last book in the Bible isn’t actually written as a scary apocalyptic novel to graphically tell me the end-times.  This was news to me, because I didn’t dare try and get my head around the book for all its imagery and bloodshed and that kind of stuff all of which required an understanding of allegory and other brain tasks that I didn’t have the time for.

The deal with the last book of the Bible was in the title itself – it is about the Revelation of Jesus Christ.  So if all I got stuck on was scary apocalyptic pictures of the end times, then I had missed the point.  Likewise if I was caught up in the picture of heaven, then I had missed the point.  Likewise if I was stuck in what happens in the judgement, then I had missed the point.  A bit like the poor Pharisees had missed the point when they came across Jesus Himself.  A bit like some of my poor expressions of following Christ has missed the point in the light of who He is.

That brings me back to that word – revelation.

You see, missing the point of Jesus is very easy in Christendom.  Let’s have a look – healings, miracles, doctrine, prophecy, ecclesiology, liberal/conservative, institutional/organic, mission, leadership, male-female relations, spiritual gifts, evangelism, social action, culture, tradition, Bible versions, denominations, the various ministries – choir, youth, singles, mens, womens, etc.  That is just the tip of the iceberg and that is more than enough for anyone to get bogged down in the stuff of Christianity and completely missing the point of Jesus Christ.  Of course as you’ll note, all of those things are hinged on a … revelation of Jesus Christ!  Yet it is simple to side-step the revelation to get into the minutiae of the things of Jesus Christ.

So in thinking about Jesus being the beginning and the end – the sum of all things if you will – I am all the more determined and motivated not to get side-tracked.  As people consider resolutions for the new year, I’m caught up with a resolution that permeates every minute, hour, day, week, month, year and decade of the new life.  I want to know Jesus Christ – and Him alone – all the more.  I want to delve and live by the revelation of Jesus Christ, through His Word and His Spirit in all life from beginning to end.

I am reassured to know that this will take eternity and it is why it is a joy to be on this journey of faith getting to know Him who is literally eternal life.

Just blogging.

That is all.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Jesus Is … The Beginning and the End

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. (Revelation 22:13)

It is huge to consider Jesus as the Beginning and the End.

This claim establishes Him as being there at Creation and then at Culmination, but note it does more than that. His claim is not to be there at the beginning and the end, but to actually encapsulate and embody what was at the beginning and what was at the end.

He started it – He completes it – the it in question is everything of worth and note that is.

That is huge to consider.

That is who Jesus is.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Deborah At Six

Deborah Dryden, my firstborn, is 6 years old today.

Birthdays are a great time to celebrate God’s goodness in life and act as a milestone to measure just how far we’ve come and how to still make it is a tribute to God’s grace.

For example I was reflecting the other day how gospel legend Fred Hammond is now 50 years old! I mean here’s a guy whose music has shaped a lot of my life and now the guy has hit half a century! What is that all about? What is that saying? Well one thing it is definitely saying, just like my firstborn turning 6 – time is moving on.

I am so happy to see Deborah reach this age. It doesn’t seem all that long ago when the little girl celebrated her first birthday in her little seat and everything. Last year she obviously hit the big five and that was an achievement. Yet here she is now taking another step in her development and I couldn’t be happier.

She brings so much joy in my life with the way she smiles and can laugh at the issues of life. Very recently she showed just how much she’s grown by getting higher answers in another episode of Family Fortunes which of course is the best sign of maturity.

She’s also developing her sense of humour – get this. Here I am as her loving father as the clock turns to midnight and she is finally making her way to bed as the day becomes the 29^th. (It’s holidays so they can stay up that much longer!) I’m tucking her into bed and so think it’s only appropriate to remind her of the story of how she came to be all those years ago.

Me: So not long after you came from your mother’s womb I was holding you gently in my arms and singing the lullabye of your name to you. As I sang you soon went to a blissful sleep.

Deborah: Yes Daddy, you’re sending me to sleep now.

What a cheek – what a girl. Surely this is another sign that the end is nigh!

Things are different for her again as she hits six, she’s in a new location and now she has two sisters to look out for with Zoë coming on the scene. She’s dealing with these changes very well and is a beam of refreshing simplicity when things could easily get all confused.

No, she’s not the perfect girl – she still cries at the drop of a hat. Then again I had a problem with the crying deal for years, and I didn’t turn out too bad. (Hey, I didn’t, I don’t care what the psychotherapist says!)

As she embarks on this the seventh year of her existence, my prayer is that she will go on from strength to strength growing up as a girl who knows how to have fun in life and becomes even more aware of God who makes her who she is.

In the meantime I celebrate her birthday and enjoy the party that is going on even as I type where she of course is the centre of attention, and rightly so. As long as I get the cake with the icing, I am not complaining.

Thank you Lord, for Deborah Christina Dryden.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Jesus Is … King of Kings

They will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful. (Revelation 17:14)

Royalty, majesty, kingdom and authority.

There have been so many empires from the Ancient Egyptians through the Babylonian, Greek, and Roman ones. Each known for an emphatic rise, each known for a dramatic collapse.

For all the intimacy we share with Him, Jesus’ mission was to establish the everlasting kingdom, the rule of Deity that would never fall. As the Lamb He Himself takes the place far beyond any feeble human effort at authority. That at His name even kings shall bow and confess Him to be the ultimate in royalty, majesty, kingdom and authority.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

 

Christian Comedy? You Must Be Joking

This morning I put up the fact that Jesus is a brother and with it a clip from a Christian comedian.  So it behoves me to share a word on my views on Christian comedy.

Sometimes I think the church tries to imitate with the thinking that if it does then it will keep people in church.  So there’s a whole kind of church culture going on mirroring the world’s but slapping a ‘Jesus’ on it, so as to differentiate it.  I get the impression that policy is flawed for a whole heap of reason that I won’t go into in this entry.

Balancing that out, however, sometimes I think that a view on being a Christian sees you as somehow being a freak where if it has the very whiff of something that you see ‘in the world’ it must be ungodly and avoided.  The cinema question is a good example.  I grew up with the thinking that it was ‘a sin’ to go to the cinema, even though the films that were first shown on the cinema would be watched at home.  It was crazy as though the devil only watched the movie at the cinema, but wouldn’t at your home because it was ‘holy ground’!  As if!

God has given us all things to enjoy and laughter is one of them.  There is a lot in life worth laughing at without it having to be crude, mean or derogatory.  An expression of joy is laughter, so it’s only fitting that gifted communicators can make the most of the laughs.  People want to laugh, let them laugh.  I’m not completely sold on Christian comedy, even though a very dear friend of mine is a comedian who does ‘gigs’ in churches, I’d even imagine he sees himself more as a comedian who happens to follow Christ, rather than a Christian comedian as it were.

Despite not being completely sold on it, I recognise its merit and like anything done well I appreciate it when it is of good quality, which is why I had no qualms putting that clip on this  morning.

Whilst finding the one for this morning, I also came across this one and wanted you to watch it to see what I mean about quality – this dude does it as a ministry for purpose.  It is laughs and it serves, I have a lot of respect for that.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Jesus Is … A Brother

For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.” (Hebrews 2:11, 12)

He is not just a friend, He is a brother.

There is so much a friend will do, but blood is thicker than water and because of His blood we are considered brothers.

As a family affair He is ensures the welfare of His brethren so that everything He gets, they get. Like a proper big brother, He will not allow anyone to disrespect the family members, neither will He allow anyone to be endangered for long. Rather He will be there for comfort and guidance.

He does all to ensure that He keeps it in the family.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Dreaming About You

Dreams.

As with a lot of elements of spiritual living they can be dismissed wrongly, or exalted wrongly. Does God still speak through dreams? Yes. Does God want to make a big deal of how He speaks through dreams? No. The big deal is what He is saying in the dream and what of Him we get to know through the dream. Jesus is the only way the messenger is just as important as the message. Other than that we are grateful for the means, but more grateful for the essence of Jesus in the message.

So what about dreams?

I had one recently.

Someone was praying about some weekend event, some church function that would go on from Saturday to Monday. Someone was asked to pray about it.

Some of these prayers can be rather lacklustre and formulaic. Not so much a prayer as a list of things that you want God to do a bit like God is Tesco.com and you put in your order and wait for the delivery.

This prayer, however, was a heartfelt desire for God Himself to motivate, be the centre of and be exalted in every activity of that weekend’s conference. The length of the prayer wasn’t the issue, the intensity and fervency of it was more important. The person praying asked for the agreement of those around, but by the time it was in its flow it was as though it was a one-to-one conversation where God directed it with spontaneous and impromptu requests and insights. By the end of the prayer those in attendance were more in tune with the necessity of Jesus in everything than ever before.

Beyond that, everything else didn’t seem to matter.

It was just a dream, and yet …

Just blogging.

That is all.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Jesus Is … The Bridegroom

And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. (Matthew 9:15)

He is a love story.

There’s the salvation bit. There’s the family reconciliation bit. All crucial parts to be taken into account, but there is also the element of a love story.

Jesus buys back His Bride, he spends time adorning and nurturing her in preparation of their great day when two becomes One.

His Bride is the Church waiting in great anticipation for His return for the culmination of that they have worked on together.

To miss this part of who Jesus is, misses an essential element of who Jesus is and why He has come.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd