This week I have been in several new places and met various new people as well as get to know some people better. Last Sunday I went along to the opening service at St John's Anglican on Highgate for their new complex (very nice too!). Tuesday among many other things I got my haircut by Catherine at Roslyn Village. I conversation she shared how her partner ran a studio where he framed pictures. Ah! Says I I was looking for someone to do that here and had been wondering. I have a painting for an exhibition next month. Wednesday I met at St Lees someone who is looking to do some Children's event next April. We had a creative chat over a nice coffee. Thursday for an hour I was invited to bowls at Roslyn Club. A good bit of fun and chance to meet some folks and get to know others better. It was also another beautiful day which added to the pleasure. I also visited Knox Church as I'm preaching(!?!) at College Sunday when Columba girls and McGlashan boys and parents descend there. I previewed the dramatic dance about prejudice etc. So I'm going to follow up with something on labels and Shrek and the Gospel. Anyway, walking this labyrinth throughout the area has been interesting. It took me to reflect on places I would likely only walk past and never think of entering. But I continue to reflect on Colossians 3 "
Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ - that's where the action is. See things from his perspective." (Peterson trans.) So much can be around us or church and our little world, but I have been challenged to discover what is going on around Christ - the action is there and more I can begin to see from HIS perspective. For me this is highlighted in two ways.1) I had a long distance chat with a close friend in a situation. In looking at what was going on around Christ, it began to offer a new perspective and in a way was like seeing the 'quiet centre' in the midst of the storm. 2) with students today the theme coming through was the tension of being in pastoral situations where we become more conscious of ourselves and struggle inside for answers that we default to being rationalistic in approach and forget the person. In other words there are points at which, with best intentions, we bring the action around us. Hence, we fail to see things from Christ's perspective.
In many ways I may have drifted through the week, but I sought to reflect as I went,amidst all the other stuff I won't bore you with, on the
immersive places where people work, play, study, reflect, interact, learn. Even at the hairdressers a call came to cancel a hairdo. Turns out there was a pastoral conversation, the woman at thr other end had had a funeral of a grandparent. I also did go today and see about my painting being framed and had a good chat with Chris. All this is not so much about what was going on around me as I think I was caught up in and around where Christ was active. So who knows where these things will go in time.
Finally, Martin has been raving about Tim Lowly this week and so I too share him here. Go on the link and see more. It is iconic and invites you to reflect deeply. For me this image below spoke a great deal about some of these musings above. In particular the sense of humanity here that we can/cannot ignore to go through to the door and the light. Can we ignore even the most frail of persons and those least like us ? What does it mean to share Christ ? To speak of God in a pastoral context?
http://www.timlowly.com
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Lowly's "TDL" series comprises five material interpretations of a little girl lying prone on the gallery floor. Turned on her side, her head tilting back her lips parted, her arms folded awkwardly across her body, the image of the young girl reflects the physical incapacitation of Lowly's own child, yet becomes a symbol for all individual's physically challenge and seemingly separated from their environment" from review by
John Brunetti
Tim Lowly Installation Wheaton
