Away in a manger

The Christmas season has involved several surreal new experiences, none of them unpleasant (!). Collecting money with the Salvation Army band in Oxford Street was great fun, although after an hour and a half of standing on a cold street holding a bucket my muscles had pretty much seized up. It was fun watching all the shoppers, though, being asked for directions (I don't know where ANYTHING is), occasionally having a brief chat with passersby, shoving my bucket through a cab window to receive a contribution from the driver! The most surreal moment was when a bright yellow bus emblazoned with the Corona beer logo pulled up directly beside the Salvation Army band (there was a set of traffic lights there), complete with man in Corona beer bottle costume dancing on the upper deck of the bus.

On Saturday we had 'Christmas on the Farm', an outdoor nativity held at the city farm in Stepney. All the characters (shepherd, wise men, innkeeper etc.) were played by adults except for Mary and Joseph, played by two children, and baby Jesus, played by a doll. I was the angel. We arrived several hours early to set up, only to discover that there were three very large, aggressive-looking pigs in the pig shed which was supposed to be our 'stable'. I volunteered to jump over a fence with a bucket of pig feed to lure the porkers out while two of the menfolk swiftly placed a bit of metal fencing over the entrance. Unfortunately, during our lunch break the pigs broke back in, so we repeated the operation and put Joan on pig watch. It rained all day, which put a bit of a dampener on things, but it was still a good laugh and the people that came seemed to enjoy it. Many people see Christmas on the Farm as their bit of 'church' for the year.

In the bleak mid-winter...

Man, it's cold! I really don't cope well with cold. Or heat. Basically, it's hard to get the temperature right for me. Maybe I have bad circulation... Anyway, Christmas is fast approaching and I have been preparing some advent worship for our small group of Sunday morning worshippers (we had an amazing 14 for worship last Sunday - we were quite overwhelmed!). Every year I tell myself I will buy a Christmas CD and every year I forget until it's far too late to bother. But this year I have discovered the delights of fast and cheap mp3 download, with the excuse of Sunday worship to prepare for.

The really weird thing is that even though I have heard the same carols and the same Christmas story every year for as long as I can remember, and have believed it for the last five years, this year I am finding myself very moved by the whole thing. I was watching a film version of the nativity story on my laptop in the Idea Store (library to you and me - I did have the headphones on, by the way) and found myself blubbing in public - most alarming. This morning I have been trying to plan a simple act of worship for advent based on Christmas carols and have found myself in tears once again. The following carol starts me off crying every time - it's my favourite:

In the bleak midwinter
Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen,
Snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter,
Long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold him,
Nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away
When he comes to reign;
In the bleak midwinter
A stable place sufficed
The Lord God almighty,
Jesus Christ.

Enough for him, whom Cherubim
Worship night and day
A breast full of milk
And a manger full of hay.
Enough for him, whom angels
Fall down before,
The ox and ass and camel
which adore.

Angels and archangels
May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
Thronged the air;
But only his mother
In her maiden bliss,
Worshipped the Beloved
With a kiss.

What can I give him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb,
If I were a wise man
I would do my part,
Yet what I can, I give Him —
Give my heart.

Beautiful feet...

"Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"

Romans 10:13-15

This passage expresses the passion which drives me. 'How are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard?' Though most of the people we meet in our everyday lives here in the UK have heard of Jesus, very few really understand what Jesus is all about, or who he is. For older people there is so much baggage - memories of being bored in church, headlines about child-molesting priests. To younger people, Jesus just seems completely irrelevant. And many younger people (say, 40 and under) grew up while church attendance was steadily declining, and quite possibly were never dragged to Sunday school and may know very little about Jesus.

This is where proclamation comes in - proclaiming the good news. But this is tricky. How can you proclaim if people don't want to hear? Do you just do it anyway? Hence men standing on street corners with loudhailers, large posters at train stations with Bible verses (King James version, of course), leaflet drops, door knocking. I have great respect for anyone who goes cold-calling for Jesus - I have spoken to people for whom this approach has borne fruit. Praise God. The very thought of it makes me cringe in horror. I may be an in-your-face kind of person but I can't bear in-your-face evangelism. But at least door-knockers and street preachers have a sense of urgency! (that is a quotation from someone but I can't remember who...Shane Claiborne??).

The area I am working in does not lend itself to the above approaches. My part of Tower Hamlets is over 50% Muslim - door knocking and large posters with Bible verses in my area are simply going to wind people up. The Alpha Course, fantastic though it is in some contexts, works best with people who already have some basic knowledge of Christianity and want to know more. If you have no idea that Jesus might be relevant to your life, you aren't going to go on an Alpha Course.

So much of the work I am doing would probably be described as 'incarnational', based on the fact that Christ was incarnated into our world - he 'became flesh'. 'The Word became flesh and lived among us' - in the same way, incarnational missionaries seek to live among people and 'proclaim' Christ with their lives. So I am running a reading group for people with mental health problems (we read fiction, not Scripture); helping to promote a mentoring project for women recently arrived in the UK (mostly Bangladeshi Muslim women); working as an assistant to a university chaplain, which largely involves serving food to people, chatting, and washing up. I am very conscious that my life does not have a holy aura most of the time. Do people see Jesus in me? What a terrifying question. I find this verse from Philippians immensely comforting:

For it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Philippians 2:13

Newsflash: Emma expresses an opinion

Strange though it may seem to people who know me well, I actually tend to hold back from expressing strong opinions when I'm in 'work' mode. I trained in the Alpha school of evangelism which emphasises listening, accepting, asking questions and not imposing your own views.

However, this evening I was at a volunteer training session and was chatting to one of the other volunteers about my work doing street outreach to women involved in prostitution. The other woman said: "Oh that's interesting, I've been involved in researching government policy on the sex industry; some people argue that it's a valid choice for women and a paternalistic government shouldn't assume that choice should be taken away. What do you think?" Now, if someone asks you what you think at Alpha, you're allowed to say, although I would tend to go gently when expressing opinions which are likely to be controversial. Granted, I was not on an Alpha course, but I was still a missionary talking to someone who I am pretty sure was not a Christian, being asked a question about an area of ministry I feel passionately about. Normally I would start a long conversation, find out more about the other person's point of view, express my own thoughts with much hesitation and clarification... However, the person running the training had just started to say "If you're all finished, could you please look this way...," so there was no time for beating about the bush, and so I said: "I think it's sick and wrong."

Many, if not most, issues are open to various interpretations, and I usually find I can sympathise with people's views even if I don't agree with them. But when it comes to issues like this I really think our society has gone mad. I love the women I meet who are involved in prostitution, and I know God loves the men who pay as well, but the practice of prostitution itself is surely just plain evil.

Reflections after first night of street outreach

It is nearly 3am and instead of trying to sleep, I am blogging... head very full, need to download (or upload, depending on how you look at it!).

Spent four hours doing street outreach in East London for the first time. Chatted to women involved in prostitution and some drunk homeless guys. One of them got a bit affectionate; luckily we were able to back away and laugh it off. Gave out lots of tea, hot chocolate and condoms, and loads of chocolate bars. Called an ambulance (another first). Spent some time in A&E. Saw a punter, a perfectly normal, nice-looking bloke. Weird. Felt scared walking down dark streets, crossing the road to avoid groups of lads. Ate a bagel with pickled herring at 2am. Feet hurt now. Up at 9.30am...

Too busy not to pray

I have been feeling ill at ease recently, and I think I have located the source of my problem. It is so easy in Christian work to get very busy very quickly, doing lots of things "for God" but not actually involving him in the process. To make things worse, I am one of those people who struggles to still her mind for any length of time. In recent weeks I have taken to playing solitaire on my laptop while watching telly - I am so fidgety I can't even give a TV programme my full attention! I can sustain praying silently and alone for all of about 90 seconds before my attention strays elsewhere. One approach which has worked for me in the past involves producing a collage to represent a passage or verse from the Bible, the idea being that it gives my hands something to do while, in theory at least, my mind is listening to God. Another possibility is that I drag myself out of bed half an hour earlier and walk five minutes down the road to the university chapel where Jenny the chaplain prays every morning with anyone who comes. If anyone is reading this, please pray that God would help me wake up...

"I am the vine, and you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me." (John 15:5)

Candle wax, money and driving in London

I now have a PAID JOB, which is very exciting. I am assistant to the chaplain at Queen Mary, University of London (see my blog post on the best sign ever), 10 hours a week. The concept of being paid for Christian work is a new and very exciting one for me. On Wednesday I spent a fair portion of the morning trying to get candle wax out of a red carpet using an iron and some kitchen paper...it does work.

This week I have also experienced driving in central London for the first time - a nerve-racking experience. I never know if the other drivers are madmen or if I'm in the wrong lane... I drove a mile down the road last night (it was dark and I was ill) and it took me 25 minutes. Would've been quicker to walk.