What annoys us doesn't annoy Jesus, and what annoys Jesus doesn't annoy us.

From a recent survey:

Modern life is a daily struggle. Here, according to a poll of 2,000 Britons for Nurofen Express, are the top 50 most annoying things about it.

1. Your laptop/computer freezing
2. PPI calls
3. Slow Wi-Fi
4. Being stuck in traffic
5. People who take up two parking spaces
6. Public transport delays
7. Junk mail
8. Waiting on the phone for the doctors

I think we'll stop there because I've already cried myself completely out. Waiting on the phone for the doctor? Well, it's a close call compared to dying of Ebola because there isn't a doctor for miles, and no decent road to carry any traffic to the nearest hospital (read adapted shed). It's simply tragic.

Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its mould, says Romans 12. If these are the things which really wind us up (I'm talking to Christians here, sorry if you're not one, please bear with me) then we have genuinely lost the plot. Clue: what is Jesus most annoyed about? Probably nothing that's in our top 50.

What annoys us doesn't annoy Jesus, and what annoys Jesus doesn't annoy us. And it should.

Who/What Are You Following?

Remarkable story:

67-year-old Sabine Moreau originally planned to drive 38 miles to Solre-sur-Sambre in Belgium to pick up a friend from the station, the Daily Mail reports, but when her sat-nav decided to take the scenic route, she ended up some 900 miles away in Zagreb, Croatia.

Such was her faith in the sat-nav, she failed to realise she had driven through six countries with different languages on the road signs. She stopped multiple times to refuel and, incredibly, even parked up in a lay-by for a few hours to sleep. When asked whether the length of her journey seemed strange, Moreau said: "Maybe, but I was just preoccupied... I was a bit absent-minded as I had a few things to think about, I suppose."

It's too nice a day to spend ages on a computer unpacking this particular parable......

Slaves to the Smartphone

for most people the servant has become the master. Not long ago only doctors were on call all the time. Now everybody is. Bosses think nothing of invading their employees’ free time. Work invades the home far more than domestic chores invade the office. Otherwise-sane people check their smartphones obsessively, even during pre-dinner drinks, and send e-mails first thing in the morning and last thing at night.

This is partly because smartphones are addictive: when Martin Lindstrom, a branding guru, tried to identify the ten sounds that affect people most powerfully, he found that a vibrating phone came third, after the Intel chime and a giggling baby.....

Ofcom, Britain’s telecommunications regulator, says that a startling 60% of teenagers who use smartphones describe themselves as “highly addicted” to their devices. So do 37% of adults.Read the full article here. It paints a grim picture of blurred boundaries between work and leisure, compulsive behaviour and a deluge of junk information.




Partly out of technological laziness, partly through being a tight-wad, I don't have a smartphone, or even a useable mobile. I spend enough time checking messages when I'm at my desk without doing it everywhere else as well. And when I'm in a meeting with someone who's phone is on, there's always the nagging sense that their entire world is in their pocket, jabbering to interrupt you, I'd much rather we were able to give each other our full attention.

How do other people manage their phones, or do the phones manage you?

An Apple A Day Gives the Gospel Away

ILoved
IBorn
IFall
IMmanuel
IKneel
ISaved
IGlad

All through one app (amazing prince of peace).

Digital Nativity

After yestedays Social Network Christmas, looks like Mary has discovered Google Maps and Joseph has got to grips with some of the apps on his Iphone. I like the donkey at the car hire firm.



thanks to Dave on Facebook for this one. Shame it turns out to be an advert.

PS I'm sure there'll be a thoughtful post up here one of these days, hang in there..... But you may have to wait until after the Christmas Linebacker.

Iworship

I knew there was a use for these things. Ht Garibaldi McFlurry

An Apple a Day Keeps the Mattress Dry

I'm not entirely sure why lots of people are walking around holding incontinence pads to disguise their identity, something to do with Apples.


Cartoon by Dave Walker

Please Tell Me This Isn't True

From Evangelism UK

Gospel sent by blue-tooth?
A device that can send Bible text and Gospel messages to anyone within 100 yards, won an award at the Christian Resources Exhibition recently. The Gabriel Communicator, said the Church Times on Friday, can 'send evangelistic text messages to unsuspecting passers-by'. Good source of information is the original CRE notification:

http://www.creonline.co.uk/news/1078.htm

No, no, no, NO, NO!!!! This is the worst idea in Christendom. Has anyone thought how the 'unsuspecting passers by' are going to feel about getting 'evangelistic text messages'? Are they going to get down on their knees in the street, or just decide that Christians are annoying interfering prats who bombard you with stuff you've not asked for. This is a rubbish invention, and if you use one anywhere near me then I will personally baptise it for you.

What would Jesus do? Not this.

Am I Missing Something:?

This from the Christian Resources Exhibition website:

Gabriel Communicator Sparks New Generation Of Mobile Evangelists
24 January 2008
A new device that could spawn a generation of mobile evangelists will be unveiled at the Heart of England Christian Resources Exhibition next month (21-23 Feb 08).

The tiny Gabriel Communicator from Txttouch, which can be placed in a backpack or handbag, uses Bluetooth technology to beam text messages to all mobile phones within a 100-metre radius.

'Bible verses or even digital gospel tracts can be sent to local mobile phones from this device.' explains Txttouch managing director Nicholas Maguire, who has been involved in Church leadership for nearly 15 years. 'This is a culturally relevant way to contact people regardless of their age.'

Ok it may use up to date technology, but that doesn't make it culturally relevant. Unsolicited texts and emails are a great pestilence to mobile users, and all the more irritating if they turn out to be Bible verses rather than a free muffin at Starbucks. THIS WILL PUT EVERYONE WITHIN 100 METRES OFF CHRISTIANITY and once everyone twigs to what's going on, look out. I wouldn't want to be surrounded to a depth of 100 metres by people I'd simultaneously ticked off all at the same time.

Avoid this like the plague. It will not make you a mobile evangelist. It will make you a nuisance.

We are the Middlemen

2 or 3 things in the last day or so have made me think about how we handle information:

- talking with Bob and Mary Hopkins from Anglican Church Planting Initiatives in Sheffield yesterday, a consultation morning on our thoughts on growing new churches in Yeovil. It was good to have 2 people who knew most of what there is to know about church planting in the UK and could distil it and relate it to what we're thinking about here

- an item on the Today programme about a new book called something like 'how to talk about books you haven't read'. It's premised on the fact that there are far too many books to read, and that it's possible to have a conversation about books you've not read by knowing a few basic things about them. In fact, key in the title of most popular books to the web and you can get a plot summary, or at least dig out a couple of helpful reviews, which will help you to bluff your way through most cheese and wine functions.

- the same principle applies with films and TV - there are several sites devoted to keeping people up to date with the latest plot developments in TV serials and soaps, and the plot of most popular films is up on Wikepedia within a week or so of them being released.

- in the work I do as a missioner, I've taken to producing an occasional mission digest, 'Biscuit Tin', for the deanery. The basic idea is to distil the stuff that's coming out in books, research, mission thinking etc. into an edible form for folk who aren't going to read through Mission Shaped Church (read it in full via the link) or the latest research from TEAR Fund.

As information increases, the need for information middlemen, brokers, increases too. For those who want to stay abreast of what's going on (an increasingly exhausting task!), we need someone else to break it down into digestible form. This is what newspapers and TV have been doing for us for ages at a general level, but the sheer volume of information means that it's harder and harder to know something about everything, or even to know everything about something.

The internet has also broken the dominance of the secular media over news, so that if you're fed up with turning on the radio every morning to hear about the latest stabbing, it's now much easier to find news and content to match your interests and to avoid the depressing catalogue of death and violence that mainstream news editors seem to think we want. Bored with your newspaper leader columns? Well there are 100,000 bloggers every morning with a take on current events, go take your pick.

The other option is to opt out completely. There's a great Christian tradition of this, from Anthony of Egypt onwards, and it's a voice that needs to be heard. Todays news is tomorrows chip paper, todays blockbuster movie is tomorrows discount DVD, but the word of the Lord stands for ever. Perspective is important.

Where do Christian communicators fit into all this? After all, our congregations increasingly have access to all this stuff, so there's less and less a place (if there ever was) for the preacher/vicar as the sole interpreter of the world to their flock. But many are also lazy/pressed for time, and there is a role for someone to edit, distil and interpret; to call people's attention to stories that are significant, or which help us to focus on particular issues (hence the previous post on Clarkson and risk). Maybe it has to be a team game: bloggers and preachers nearer to the rapid response end, and theologians and mystics taking the longer view. Wisdom and discernment are gifts to the whole body of Christ, and when Paul says "we have the mind of Christ", he doesn't mean that lots of little individual Christians know what Jesus thinks, it's a corporate image.

Which links in to mentors and wisdom, which I'll post on in the next day or so.

a bit of a relief

Had a momentary panic over the weekend when I was told I couldn't sign in to my blog to update it. Blogger (the hosts) have been taken over by Google - you know, the people who won't allow folk in China to do a browser search for 'democracy' - and I mistyped my email address when signing up to continue my account. For a few weeks that seemed ok, and I woudn't be getting any unwanted emails from Google either. Trouble is they discovered the email didn't exist and wouldn't let me get at my posts. All is now resolved.

So, a few links to be getting on with:

There are some blogging awards on the go at the moment - I have no idea whether these are the blogging Oscars or something completely worthless, but the list of nominated religious blogs is here: http://www.bloggerschoiceawards.com/categories/14
If nothing else, it answers the question about what all those Catholics who no longer go to Mass are doing with their spare time, as virtually every blog in the top 30 seems to be RC. MadPriest, one of the blogs linked here, is in the top 20 at time of writing.

http://learningmastery.wordpress.com/2007/04/11/presentations-that-dont-suck/ is a good place to visit for some online conversation about use of Powerpoint and presentations during sermons. As a church which is starting to get into this, and having spent most of the last fortnight lugging my laptop around Yeovil, it's quite helpful.

http://starttheweek.typepad.com/stw/ is a mission blog I visit regularly, and usefully it's updated at the same time every week. 2 really interesting things on it this week - at the top is a big plug for 'Back to Church Sunday', happening this autumn, then part way down some comments on some recent research by TEAR Fund which (the headlines reported) showed that 3m people might come to church if they were asked nicely.

The comments in question remind us that this means that about 45m people therefore wouldn't come to church if they were asked nicely (and also would need to be asked by a good friend or family member), which raises a lot of questions about whether 'Back to Church' is the right message or not. Someone else wondering aloud about that is Alan Hirsch, a pioneer thinker in the emerging church movement.

Finally, Venn that Tune, a series on someones blog, for those of you who like music and mathematical diagrams. Can't remember if I've linked this before, but he's put some new stuff up since then anyway.....