10 Things people want for Christmas

1. My two front teeth (Spike Jones and the City slickers)

2. You (Mariah Carey)

3. A Beatle (Dora Bryan)

4. A real good tan (Kenny Chesney)

5. My girl (New Edition)

6. My daddy (Buck Owens)

7 A hippopotamus  (Gayla Peevey)

8. A banjo (David Myles, Santa never brings me ...)

9. Peace tonight, peace for all (Brian Wilson, What I really want ...)

10. A sable, a '54 convertible (light blue), a yacht, the deed to a platinum mine, a duplex and checks, decorations bought at Tiffany and a ring. (Eartha Kitt, Santa baby)

Jonathan Miller Clive James

Jonathan Miller and Clive James both died this week. Both men straddled the intellectual and popular divide and had a wry sense of humour. Further both were
1. Described as polymaths
2. Cambridge graduates who were involved in the Floodlights
3. And the Edinburgh festival
4. Wrote about Freud (James just an essay and Miller a whole book)
5. Presenters of TV programmes
6. Smokers
7. Professed atheists
8. Both took first degrees outside the arts (Miller medicine, James engineering)
9. Both had CBEs
10. Stephen Fry says they were heroes of his growing up.
Both were slight outsiders in that Miller was Jewish and James Australian.

James once interviewed Miller. See here. (Taste warning).

They seem to have dabbled in a any number of occupations

James (b 1939)
1. Literary essayist
2. Folk music lyricist
3. Novelist
4. TV critic
5. Translator
6. Poet
7. Memoirist
8. Journalist
9. TV presenter
10. Actor

Miller (b 1934)
1. Medical doctor
2. Satirist
3. Drama director
4. Opera producer
5. Artistic director
6. Musical director
7. Collage artist
8. TV Presenter
9. Actor
10. Writer

PS I notice there is a longer serious interview between James and Miller here.

Another chance to hear ...

The radio broadcast I did with Janet Mefferd some time ago on the book about conscience Candle in the wind is available once again. See here. It is the first item on the programme here. Enjoy.

Death of Jonathan Miller

We hear that polymath Jonathan Miller has died. I found myself sitting next to him at the British Library once and resisted the urge to graffitti his notebook when he left his space for a while. His views on atheism can be found in a 2007 article here.

How modern life works Part 94

Adam Boulton took a moment before introducing a Sky News segment to apologise for the all-male panel, noting that all the parties put forward male representatives. This included the Green Party, which then boycotted the panel because it was all male.

(From today's Times)

Day off Week 48 2019

Pretty typical week off this week - reading, walking, Private Eye, TV, etc. I read most of Mission at Nuremberg which I started reading a while back then put down but took up again recently having read the HHhH book. The whole Nazi era is endlessly fascinating and there were things here I did not know or had forgotten. I read a much shorter book on similar lines by F T Grossmith many years ago. This is a larger book that gives you the whole of the life of Major Gerecke the Protestant chaplain as well as plenty of other material on the history of chaplaincy, Lutheranism, etc, etc. The writer is lucid and fair minded but liberal in his theology. It is clear that several Nazis made credible professions of faith and some refused to believe but it is hard to be sure what to make of it all. In many ways Gerecke's pastoral work was similar to that of any other pastor.

Lord's Day November 24 2019

Good congregations again, especially in the morning. We had some visitors and lots of regulars. I was glad that someone staying with us who speaks Parsee was able to converse with our Iranians, who were out in force. A Filipina lady came for the first time but she had to leave promptly. We were singing happy birthday to our oldest member (83) during the cuppa after. Two ladies leave this week for India and Jamaica. We won't see them for several months. I was particularly encouraged in the evening to have someone there who has not been with us for a while. I didn't think the sermon (from the end of Matthew 27) was quite there. I did better in the morning finishing Acts. I have now preached all the New Testament. There was time when I might ave considered that an achievement. Now I'm thinking how much better it could have been done.

Preview Meeting November 24 2019

10 writers with appropriate adjectives

1. Aesop - fabulous
2. Homer - epic
3. Thomas Malory - legendary
4. J R R Tolkien - fantastic
5. Edgar Allan Poe - terrific
6. Lewis Carroll - wonderful
7. John Grisham - definitive
8. Khaled Hosseini - splendid
9. F X Toole - knock out
10. Ralph Ellison and H G Wells - both out of sight

Day Off Week 47 2019

Unusual day in some ways. At the start of the day I discovered that the grinder on my coffee machine was not working. Being unfamiliar with the machine I ended up spending an inordinate amount of time on it. I got it working in the end, however. Time was also taken up with a little bit of blogging and such like. I read E T A Hoffman's famous The Nutcracker which I had never read before. I saw a little collection of three fairy tale type hard backs in a slip case produced by Harrods in a charity shop the other week and bought them. Later in the day my wife called me to say Wales were on TV (in Welsh if you understand me). So I watched the latter part of the game. We beat Hungary 2-0 to qualify for the Euro finals next summer. That is only the third time that Wales have qualified for the main rounds of a competition. All credit to Ryan Giggs the manager. The return of Aaron Ramsey was decisive it seems.

In Writing 134 - Latest IW Now Out

In Writing 134 is now out

10 Invitations from the Bible

1. An invitation to cleansing Isaiah 1:18-20

"Come now, let us settle the matter," says the LORD. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword." For the mouth of the LORD has spoken. 

2. An invitation to satisfaction Isaiah 55:1, 2

Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you will delight in the richest of fare. 

3. An invitation to seek the LORD and call on him Isaiah 55:6-9

Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon. "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."

4. An invitation to be healed of backsliding Jeremiah 3:22

"Return, faithless people; I will cure you of backsliding." "Yes, we will come to you, for you are the LORD our God."

5. An invitation to return to the LORD Hosea 6:1

"Come, let us return to the LORD. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds."

6. An invitation to rest Matthew 11:28-30

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." 

7. An invitation to discipleship Mark 1:17

"Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will send you out to fish for people." 

8. An invitation to refreshment and refreshing John 7:37, 38

On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them." 

9. An invitation to fruitfulness John 15:4

Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

10. An invitation to fellowship Revelation 3:20

Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.

Lord's Day November 17 2019

Good congregations once again morning and evening, helped by visitors. (The presence of just two families in the evening meant an extra 12 people, more or less doubling the congregation). I preached from the last chapter of Acts in the morning and the end of Matthew 27 in the evening. The subjects of common grace and the burial of Christ are unusual subjects but worthy of being dealt with on the Lord's Day. E had communion in the evening and that went off quite well, although I could have made  a better hymn choice. I felt particularly full of the Spirit in the morning but less so in the evening.

Midweek Meeting November 6 and 13 2019

 

I see I've let another two of these pass without comment. With another due tomorrow that's as far as behind as I ever get. There is no loss of enthusiasm on my part or that of the few that attend. We have carried on looking at the first chapter of 1 Timothy and calling out to the Lord in prayer. A baby has been born to members and that was something to give glad thanks for. Nothing remarkable to report but then so often it is like that in the Christian life. We plod on. Numbers vary, of course, but not radically.

John Ceiriog Hughes

Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

I just watched a programme about trains in North Wales. One place they ended up was at the grave of John Ceiriog Hughes (1832-1887) in Caersws, He wrote his own englyn as an epitaph

Carodd eiriau cerddorol, carodd feirdd,
Carodd fyw'n naturiol;
Carodd gerdd yn angerddol;
Dyma ei lwch, a dim lo


He loved musical words, he loved poets,

He loved to live naturally;

He loved a poem passionately;

Here is his dust, and no messing.

See grave here