I guess there’s a bit of India in my blood. My grandfather served there in the British army in the days of the Empire and so my father came to be born there and spend the first nine years of his life living in this great nation.

When World War II came around my father enlisted with the Royal Air Force and spent those six years in India. He was stationed just outside of Calcutta as there was perceived to be a very real threat of invasion by the Japanese.

So I was raised on stories of India and dreamed of visiting the country one day. My mother even served up her own version of Indian food from time to time, so I aquired a taste for that very early in life.

Little did I know that the time would come when I would have the opportunity to teach and encourage hundreds of Indian pastors and that I would be making the trip an average of twice a year. Thankfully the 14 hour flight from JFK tonight is a world away from the troop ships my father travelled on for weeks.

India is a great country. It’s politically stable, economically strong – and getting stronger – and there is a lot of religious freedom there too. The people are gracious and very friendly and it is a privilege to share with them a bit of the little I have learned on my journey.

I will post here as often as I can when I’m away, but if you click and find no update, please take a second for a quick prayer that my efforts will be helpful in building God’s kingdom.

Here’s an interesting website – you can check what song was number 1 in the charts the day you were born … unless you’re as old as I am. Their records only go back until 1952!

Who Was #1?

A few weeks ago I bought the DVD of Simon & Garfunkel’s live concert in Central Park somewhere around 1926, so we could take a look at it as I went into this morning’s teaching.

Unbeknown to me at the time, the band was already playing with it and they did it live on stage this mornng instead of using the DVD. Ray Pensivy did the lead vocals and he rocked. The guy is brilliant, but in addition to applying his natural genius he had practised like a madman all week.

What a voice, what a song, what commitment to excellence.

And why preach from a song?

Here are the lyrics -

When you’re weary, feeling small,
When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all;
I’m on your side. when times get rough
And friends just can’t be found,
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down.
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down.

Sail on silvergirl,
Sail on by.
Your time has come to shine.
All your dreams are on their way.
See how they shine.
If you need a friend
I’m sailing right behind.
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind.
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind.

If you can’t preach from that, you should go get a job selling used cars instead!

When some moron pulls alongside you at a light putting out enough decibels to make your car vibrate and shrink the remnants of his own brain, there’s one thing for sure – what he considers music is probably not a song someone will still be singing forty years from now.

But back in the world of quality music, I am surely not the only person whose most played song dates back to a duo who only sang together for a brief period in the 60’s, but whose work lives on.

Yes folks, the time has come … this Sunday in our Finding God On Your Ipod series, I finally get to talk about my favorite song – Bridge Over Troubled Waters by Simon & Garfunkel.

Our worship team will be doing the song and then I want to look at what it says about the person we follow and how we should be doing that. Back in my religious, against-everything-that-moves days, I would never have dreamed I’d be able to listen to Simon & Garfunkel in church.

I love Christianity that’s real!

Got home at about 4.00 this afternoon – left Florida as the temperature was getting back up to normal for the time of year and the sun was shining in a clear blue sky. Why couldn’t it have done that for the past three days???

Have a number of things to take care of over the weekend in preparation for flying to India on Monday night. That will be a longer trip of course, but thankfully Delta has recently introduced a direct flight that only takes 14 1/2 hours from New York to Mumbai. It will be at least six hours shorter than past journeys which always included a layover in Europe, either in London, Frankfurt, Milan or Paris. The first three were tolerable – great capuccino in Milan airport – but my thoughts on having to spend any time at all in France have been aired here before!

Gill is staying with our friends in Florida over the weekend and then she flies over to Texas to spend some time with Jonathan, Donna and the grandchildren while I am away.

For the uninformed, travel is not exciting, romantic or any other adjective except plain tiring!

Always wanting to learn from others, I visited a large charismatic church near here last night to see what they’re doing and how they’re doing it. I also thought it might be good to be in a service on Thanksgiving eve. I may have got that bit wrong!

Wandering into the sparsely populated sanctuary, it was hard to see why they’re building a new facility next door to seat at least a zillion people. But the pastor later explained that this day’s service is always very thin. I guess that figures – most people are at home baking pies, stuffing turkeys, tidying away the toys and hoping Aunt Sue won’t live up to her threat and bring her newest balding, burping boyfriend over for the celebratory dinner.

Of course the only problem with most of the faithful having other things to do on this particular Wednesday night was that it fell to the few who showed up at church to “do something special for Thanksgiving” when the offering came around. Seems they just had something like a million cubic feet of concrete poured outside and we were being handed the check. I did my bit but didn’t honestly feel too obligated.

During the opening praise and worship the music minister encouraged everyone to gather around the front of the sanctuary “where the glory falls first”. I guess that like me, a lot of the people knew that was theological nonsense, so were slow to move. But when the pastor chimed in and summoned them with “church, let’s gather at the altar”, they dutifully responded. I stayed on the back row.

It was an interesting night. The sermon had a good outline – I may steal it one year if I need a Thanksgiving sermon – and the heart of the message seemed to be that if we were really thankful we would be clapping louder. A lot of clapping went on, so I think most people made the pastor happy. I went to the bathroom and then wandered outside to call Texas and see if Jonathan was home from the hospital – he was.

When I got back in some people were jumping to their feet as well as clapping and the pastor now seemed really happy.

They’re certainly attracting a lot of folks to that church at weekends. Their flavor is clearly popular.

I may be biased, but I do like our flavor at Church At The Movies.

I like to think I’m as American as the next person, despite the fact that I’m still a newbie, having taken the oath of citizenship just six years ago. However, I must confess that when Thanksgiving comes around I still feel very much an outsider. I guess because I haven’t done this holiday all my life, I really haven’t been able to get into it properly, but for all of you for whom this is a special day in the year – Happy Thanksgiving!

Though I don’t quite get it, I’m happy to go with the flow. So I’m currently watching the rainy Macy’s parade and will later eat some turkey, watch some football and enjoy the relaxation of a quiet and thankfully warm day in Florida. So have a great time with the folks who are special to you.

Thanks to those of you who were praying for Jonathan’s surgery today. As I mentioned last week, the surgeon thought there could be a problem with his gall bladder and so opted to remove it. Turns out to have been a very educated guess as it was enlarged and had adhesions, showing a long-term problem.

We’re hoping this will cure the pain he has been experiencing for the past three months and enable him to focus on fighting the sarcoidosis which is thought to be the main issue.

He and Donna have had a very demanding year, but have handled the pressures admirably, while seeing their own faith strengthened and being supported by a great church family at Preston Trail Community Church.

It’s the time of year when I’m trying to finalize the plan for where I feel God wants us to go in teaching during the first half of ‘07.

I learned from my Pentecostal roots that I’m meant to stand up, rely on the Holy Spirit and say whatever he sends into my mind. However, it didn’t take too long to realize that the Holy Spirit can speak to you six months ahead of an event, can guide your planning, give you insights, stir you up, so that when you actually stand in front of people what you are saying is not only inspired, but it’s informed and organized too.

So I’ve been thinking about sex.

I know that a number of pastors I respect around the country have done series on the subject in recent months, though I have not really entertained the idea myself – either because God didn’t want me to or because I was chicken!

Reading an article on the plane yesterday, I was reminded of how silent the church is on a subject which is a gift from God and that Hollywood and half the so-called civilized world has corrupted. It prodded me to think what a disservice I do to people I am resposible for and care about when I leave them without solid Biblical teaching on such a vital subject.

So brace yourself for ‘07. It’ll probably upset some and it will be R-rated (I mean that – no kids whatever allowed in), but I will definitely bite the bullet and align myself in a modest way with the apostle Paul who talked about not shrinking from declaring the whole counsel of God.

Here we are in Florida to spend a couple of days over Thanksgiving with friends near Tampa and the temperature right now is 46, though that’s 40 with windchill!

Could someone please advise the Florida Tourist Board that this is not what the average visitor is looking for when they are trying to escape fall in the north east!