Lord's Day October 19 2014

So we ended up in Edinburgh on the Lord's Day. I have heard many times of Charlotte Chapel (no doubt because this is where Graham Scroggie, Alan Redpath and Derek Prime ministered in the past). The current senior minister is a man called Paul Rees, originally from Cardiff. He and his wife are good friends of my sister-in-law and her husband so he heard that we were in town and very kindly invited me to join him for breakfast (I went for salted porridge as we were in Scotland, very nice. I'd had an Irn Bru the night before as I like to get the feel of a place). Paul grew up Brethren, came to London and attended St Helen's was a dentist then studied at Moore, Sydney and led a church in Spokane before coming to Edinburgh. His wife Shiona is Scots. He showed me the massive old St George's West which they have purchased and plan to move into (the present chapel is on something of a side street and the main auditorium is up a flight of stairs).

I'm not often in a large church. One is always impressed by how efficient they are getting people in and giving them coffee after, etc. It's like having a conference every week I guess. There was  an eight piece band in the organ loft who were good musicians and not over conspicuous though some of the song choices were a little weak I felt. The apprentice Ross led very well. The assistant Matt Round preached a very thorough sermon on Matthew 11:25-30, a bit too much to the will rather than the heart I felt. Everyone was very friendly and warm and welcoming. There must have been 600 and more of diverse ages and backgrounds. It was good to be there.

We had to travel back to London before the evening service so I downloaded a sermon for us on the train. People always speak well of the preaching of my former assistant Mark Raines so I got hold of his sermon on Proverbs 26, which he did indeed preach very well.

 

 

Lord's Days April 13 and 20 2014

I actually preached on the Sunday morning of the 13th. I got out of hospital on the 9th and then learned that I needed to report to the Heart Hospital on the afternoon of the 13th. We had booked a family holiday in Hampshire for the 12-19 with our boys and others. So I had a nice afternoon and evening down in Hampshire on the Saturday and then for various reasons we had our own service in the cottage (Eleri, me, the five boys, Sibyl (plus junior in utero), Eleri's sister, husband and son). At the last minute I thought of hymns and realised that we had enough devices between us to email or Facebook three hymns out for acapella use in the service. I preached on 1 Kings 3:1-15. After a quick lunch Eleri drove me back to London and to the hospital. No evening service for ne then (I think they  used stuff from Youtube to keep them in tune and listened to Mark Raines on Sermonaudio).

I believe my elder Robert Strivens and fellow minister Andrew Hill preached at Childs Hill. I am very grateful to them.

I had the operation on Monday 14, of which I remember very little thankfully and came home on Saturday 19. Both morning and evening I went to the Met Tab - virtually not literally, of course. Dr Masters has been unwell and so his assistant Ibrahim Ag Mohammed preached. He spoke on Matthew 28:6 in the morning on the resurrection and from Mark 5 and the raising of Jairus's daughter in the evening. The two services were identical in format, the evening on being evangelistic and shorter. Both services are solid, straightforward, heart warming and carefully though out. It was a joy to be "there".

I probably haven't looked properly but I could not see anyone else in the UK offering the same public facility - not even only in audio. There must be others I'm sure.

Robert preached again in Childs hill with Halbo Chou, assistant at Kensit Evangelical, preaching in the evening. Again I am very thankful to them and to those who have arranged this.