A busy, productive, warm summer.

The kitchen work at Café Forever can be very repetitititittitive and requires somebody who has ENDurance. It is a job that takes a huge amount of internal peace because every meal is judged by the eater, and if it isn't good people will generally let their dissatisfaction be known. I have worked in the kitchen at the cafe and I know how much stress this causes because you want people to enjoy their meal, you want them to come back, you want to be considered good at your job! Andrew Dimon has done this work faithfully for 3 years and now he has moved on to youth work at his church in Watford. His enthusiasm lifted our spirits on days when we were down and so we are sad to see him go. On the positive side.... Gabby has started with us and she is already proving to be a capable and loveable member of staff - even more so because she made my favourite - Spicy minced lamb! Gabby is Hungarian and has already been asked for goulash by one of the customers, which she produced. Come in and meet her. 

There a a large number of new visitors to the Café and City of Peace, and some returning one's; J_ who has a fear of leaving the Island and is in a difficult, often violent relationship - returns now daily, K_ from the US who has arrived and is here for about 9 months, with us for Sunday service. And then we see people like B_ and A_ who we have known for a long time becoming more frequent of their visits to City of Peace, taking part in post sermon discussion. one issue that is regularly being looked at is marriage, many occasions of people struggling here. Amazingly St Lukes Shadwell is staging a marriage course at a nearby pub. I have spent considerable hours with a friend who is having a difficult time in their marraige as well as depression.

Flavour of the month!

It started off a very warm summer and by the school holidays Natalie had already begun her maternity leave and I began taking half days as our children and the pregnancy where a bit tiring. We went and visited the Olympic swimming pool which is now open to the public, visited Eltham palace and all sorts of close to home/hospital type of things. It is very frustrating having a 16 day late baby! In the days before Ella was born the girls where entertained by our church friends as Natalie and I were in the hospital quite a bit. It is a huge thing the way the church becomes our children grandparents, uncles, aunts -  a great opportunity for any church to show love. Colin and Daphne are two friends who have become attached to our church even though they live in Bournemouth! They kindly gave us a short holiday break shortly after Ella was born. She is now 8 weeks old and has a very loud voice on her, very cute and Lisa is besotted. For the rest of the holidays we were able to do more interesting things. My mum, uncles family and cousins came to visit us, and one day I had both my parents at my house!

We have had so many people visiting us for dinner/lunch at our house, it is a lot of fun, particularly when you get new people in (but with a new baby it is also exhausting). A friend who has been on the periphery for a while - he is sceptical about our beliefs -  finally came to visit as a result of his daughter playing at our house - he ended up staying for dinner having just dropped in to collect her - it was a great evening. The next day his best friend came to visit him and told how he had been converted to a believer after having seen people dabbling in occultic practices! Amazing orchestration of events.

Coming up:
1. We have another weekend Church visit to Oak Hall.
2. Possibility of hosting Ballet classes at Café Forever.
3. Door into the back garden in January.
4. Christmas services and events.
5. Developing our allotment and the relationships there.

Global News effects us locally

There are so many huge and depressing news stories in the world at the moment, I am sure I need not mention them all, but I do sometimes feel that my life's problems are mere trifles in comparison. 50 years ago communication was a lot harder. I wouldn't have had an audience who could read my words all around the world unless I was some sort of journalist writing for 'The Times'. Nowadays I can write and you can read in seconds of me writing, and you can send what I have written to others. This is a great big bonus for news agencies who can disseminate stories rapidly. When I worked for Sky News internet communication was in it's infancy and TV was the big channel. The challenge was to be first with the most accurate news, and I have to commend the journalists and producers who did and still do an amazing job. Problem is there are now so many different sources that there is a lot of opportunity for opinion, propaganda and lies. It can easily become confusing as to which side you should support. It is interesting how, in the Bible, a lot of the time the good guys turn out to be the bad guys and the bad guys turn out to be the good - King Cyrus of Persia, Rahab the harlot, and King Saul. All the way through the Old Testament the drive is for the promised King who will restore everything. But in the NT, we see Jesus fixing people's lives on an individual level, their personal stories are important to Him.

I am busy reading a group study book by Neil T Anderson called "Experiencing Christ Together" for couples. It is so far excellent, I purchased it in response to a number of struggling marriages in our community and a prompt from my wife who suggested that we need some form of marriage support in the church. One thing that I believe for sure is that if we lift up Jesus to those who want help, they will find it. Family is a beautiful thing and I hope that we can rescue some.

At Café Forever we were looking for a replacement for Andrew who will be leaving us at the end of August, and were found by a lady by the name of Gabriella, from Hungary, who is transferring to us from Café Eterno. She will be starting on the 6th August. She seems like somebody with a lot of character and enthusiasm. We have been told that the doorway into the garden is being put on hold - it may be coming at the end of the year. We have been asking for a door for a long time. I continue to hope that it will come this year. Meanwhile we have tidied up the garden and I have planted a little grass. I do not have the energy to cement the area, nor the time available and I figured it was the easiest thing to do.

Towards the end of school term I went on a trip with the nursery class to 'Old Macdonalds Farm'. The excitement of a 4 year old getting on a bus and going to the top floor is such a great thing to witness, I had the charge of Lisa and a friends daughter - they both sang all the way there. It was a stifling hot day and many of the children fell asleep on the bus on the way back. It is a great opportunity to get to know the parents and teachers better. I chatted with Lisa's teacher, Amanda on the way back. She is a believer who has been on a mission trip to Kenya, and has worked for Café Eterno and Departure and knows Lynne Van Der Meer! It is great to know that this lady will be educating my daughter for another year. I also took Hannah to her sports day and came second in the fathers race, only being beaten by her teacher! These events are so great to attend and it is so good that my work allows it. I only wish more dad's would be able to do the same.

Tough topic for Henk

Another combined church fun day this time organised by St Luke's Milwall. 2 days before Tom's wife gave birth and so I took his children with mine so that their parents could get some rest. It was a lot of fun and there was a huge variety of things to do such as, a massive Jenga tower, a bouncy castle dragon, water balloon volleyball and free food! The sunday was a joint church service where Henk Bouma gave a sermon on Caleb's inheritance - a difficult topic given world events.

The school holidays are upon us and already there are a number of children who are wandering around with nothing to do but mischief. It is really difficult to live in the inner city as a child. When I grew up we had a huge walled back garden with a swimming pool. We were able to play safely and invite our friends around to join us and make noise and nobody was bothered. If you live in an apartment open spaces are at a premium, quite often guarded by the biggest bully which leaves you with choices - don't go, or go, join the bullies gang, or go and challenge the bully. It's really tough for these kids and so often they avoid the normal places and end up in other places, perhaps where they are not wanted. As they come without their parents they tend to repeat the process wherever they are, establishing their own gang that protects the little spot of terrafirma. One case of parental neglect I would not be able to share as the child is then put at risk, but we will try to get involved and encourage that child and their parents. We do have the benefit of the local park- St Johns Park café is managed by a team from Café Forever, and there are activities there throughout the summer - we believe Jesus needs to be in the park. Some parents can be too protective, preventing their children from going outside. This is also not very good because they need the fresh air, they need to play with others and how much good can you learn from an Xbox? I think mostly they fear damage to their reputation rather then the safety of their children.

At the moment we are awaiting our 3rd child, she is now 8 days overdue. The other two were also late and so we aren't surprised. The problem is that I cannot make any serious appointments with anyone - I have to largely do what I can day by day, which is a little frustrating, and it is also very uncomfortable for Natalie.

We must not become fixated on the world and it's problems, God isn't, we can lift up our prayers about the struggling marriage next door just as much as we can pray for the people of Mosul. The demands of news agencies to focus our attention on certain parts of the world is quite new, but everyone of us lives in a neighbourhood. Quite often the thrust of these stories is to get us to hate a certain group in our community, yet they may be as divorced from that as we are. If we take our eyes off loving our neighbours and ignore their needs because we are fixated on some story on the other side of the globe we are missing the point.