Many thoughts

We had a very special day on Tuesday. We spent Monday night in Reading with Richard's parent ( I drove over to Reading, mostly in the dark..bbbbrrrrrr), and Tuesday morning reasonably early we went to London. We went to the Friend's Meeting House, opposite Euston Station. It's a place where Quaker's meet. It wouldn't be any good for me, I fear....Having to shut up for ages....
Anyway, Tuesday was the Anual meeting for the Grace Baptist Mission. At the meeting new missionaries are introduced etc etc. It was eeehhhhhmmmmmmmm, interestinggggg.... most of it.... There was one young lady that is going to France to work amongst student, she was expremely impressive! It was obvious that God's Hand was on her! I don't know how to explain what we all felt, and others too... She was aglow, alive, humble, thrilled, excited, amazed..I don't know.. She was as those missionaries you read of. In her talk there were no glib jokes, no attempts to entertain th ehearers and keep their interest at all cost. There was no presumption, no wild dreams, no claims. There was none of the other: I'm so going to make a difference...I'm going to be so Christian that a revival will be the result of me just turning up....
Just humility: Why me, Lord...? But if this is Thy will, then I will go...

We are hoping to go to her leaving sort of service, 19th November in Ramsey.. To read a bit about this remarkable person, see UFM Prayer diary, October 22nd.


Stuart Olyott preached in the evening, very powerfully and very challenging! About differnt vessels in the Master's House, and being a vessel meet for the Master's use... Or being to dirty to be of any good....

Anyway, it was a very good day, very, very challenging!

Then today, Thursday, I had my theory test, and passed.... So that is al least one hurdle out of the way! I had one mistake, so it wasn't too bad, although I'm still annoyed about the one mistake of course...

Dentist...

I went to the dentist this morning... And seeing I'm not keen on mornings, nor on dentist, it was not a very good combination.. Although negative and negative make a positive in maths....

I went, thinking he would carry on with an awkward filling, but no, he decided to take another one out... Sigh.. Let now that one tooth be the only healthy one in my mouth! I mean not the tooth itself, that was falling apart, he had it out in next to no time, ut then the roots... I was in a sense glad the find out I had such healthy roots... Anyway, it took him a long time, and I think he is probably just as exhausted as I am. What a job! Teaching isn't everything, nor is nursing, but being a dentist.... I'm glad I didn't feel attracted to other people's teeth and mouths...

So in a minute I'm going to have a short rest, read my huge book, and relax! Later this day we, well, I am driving to Reading (of course with Richard next to me...)... I hope the size of my face will have come back to reasonal proportions by then. well, it feels as if it is huge! If only the size of my brain had increased at the same rate....! But I feel as if my brain has been numbed at the same time....sigh...

The book I'm reading is very interesting! It is an autobiography of a Russian pastor. Very interesting! It descibes his conversion, and how half a month later he is imprisoned for 5 years... No Bible, no teacher, no other Christians.. But wherever he goes, he spreads the Gospel, and sees people converted, even really 'hopeless' people, like guards etc. Very interesting! He is so ful of joy and grace, that whoever he meets knows that he is different. He is only 21 at the moment where I'm reading, he was 20 when arrested... Even really rough criminals defend him, and protect him, make sure he gets food etc. Amazing the way God works!

So I'm off to read on! It's slightly tedious, as he descibes every day in detail: his food, who brings him water etc etc... But it does mean that all 'small' miracles are descibed as well! The sad thing for many of you is that it is written in Dutch... :-) The title is: The Happiness of a Lost Life. Author is Chrapov.

SRA...What is that..?

I just want to write a bit about the young people's evening we went to in Holland. They are organised by an organisation called SRA, Stichting Reformatorisch Appel.
As quite a few churches in Holland are hyper-Calvinistic, this group of youngish people started organising evenings where they invited pastors to come and bring the Gospel. Unfortunately, being young, they were't that tactful about it, and it caused quite a stir... That seems to have died a bit now, and the evenings are getting more balanced as well.

We went to the meeting in Hardinxveld-Giessendam (a mouthful, especially for English mouths, we found..). There were at least 200 people there, mostly young people, but also some older people. The pastor that spoke that evening had as theme the Need for Self-Examination. He was very good, quoting Ryle, Spurgeon and Bunyan, to Richard's delight... Very strange to hear Ryle speaking fluent Dutch...

The set up of those evenings is that a pastor or Theological student preaches or lectures, then there is a break, after the break the pastor will answer questions. You can hand your questions in, or put your hand up. One girl asked how to come to Christ, another one had a question about assurance..
It was really good to be there, and the lecture was very helpful too. We went with my younger sister who regularly visits those evenings. For those of you who can cope with Dutch, the SRA website has the lectures on there, as well as other lectures. It's worth learning Dutch for!

Back from Holland

We came back from Holland yesterday afternoon. We have had a great time! One of our friends got married, and since we were over for the wedding anyway we decided to stay a few days extra...
When we arrived it was midsummer! More than 20 degrees! I regretted having taken only one t-shirt!
The wedding was great, I hope to write on that a bit more later on. We did quite a few things, we went to a Monkey Zoo called Apenheul. That is in the same town as my parents live, so we went there by bike...
We also went to some young people's evening, where a pastor came to speak on The Importance Of Self-Examination.
On saturday we went to an Museum in the open air, where they have old Dutch buildings etc, where you can see how they lived, worked and played.

And of course we went for a long bike ride with my parents. Problem is that round Apeldoord it is quite hilly... Long slopes, gradually going up and up.. It seemed endless! We were both quite out of puff by the end! Fortunatelly the last bit went really steeply downhill, so we were home in a flash! My poor legs did feel very tired though.. I'm not used to it anymore! I'll have to get one of those hometrainers I think, and practise...!

We travelled by coach, it was a good thing that we were there quite early so we could choose our seat..! That meant we had some space for our legs, as Richard has quite long legs.... But we made it, and as I'm still a bit frazzled, I will write a bit more another time!

Salisbury Conference

Saturday was quite a busy day! We went to the Salisbury Conference, a annual conference held at Emmanuel Church in Salisbury set off early, Fatbaptist decided not to come with us, as Mrs B. came with him as well. Mr Johnson came with us, which meant I couldn't drive.. Maybe just as well...
We got there in good time, had some coffee and a wander round.
The conference was excellent! Very challenging!
Pastor Malcolm Watts gave the first address, which was more the theological basis for the Sabbath being on Sunday, the usage of the term Sabbath, Lord's Day etc.
The second address was by Dr Robert Oliver, about the Lord's Day in the 17th century, and all the problems they had, and how that relates to us today.
The last address was by Pastor John Thackway, about the practical way of keeping the Christian Sabbath.
It was a good day, although very challenging! I felt quite pricked about various things. But it is always good to be challenged and the accordingly change your life! It most clearly showed that the Sabbath should be a delight to us!
We did have a good day yesterday, with a challenging sermon in the evening about forgiveness. There is quite a lot of hurt around, and are we prepared to forgive, whether asked for it or not..?

Anyway, today I changed a few things on the school's website, mainly the background colours.. Do have a look, and leave your comments! Constructive criticism is always welcome! I changed our logoto autumn colours... See if you like it, it might me harder to read the website, but anyway, I'm sure people will cope. I just found the whole thing a bit boring!

I prepared my cooking lessons for this week. They are having a break from the little test I do every week with them... It's just that there isn't anything to ask really this week, because of the food we made last week... We are having spinach this week... mmmmmmmmmmm........