Well, been back for a couple of days now and I have to say I am still (after 18 years) not a fan of ending summer holidays with a return to school. Over the last couple of weeks of the holidays I was becoming more and more convinced that I shouldn't be a teacher. I put this down to the traditional worry about the exam results etc but that idea hasn't gone away completely yet. It's 18 years since I started teaching and other than a small break in 2008, it has been almost continuous. I like to kid myself that I ran away from some ministry role to become a teacher but I don't think that it true. I certainly didn't ever aspire to be a teacher. Still, what else can you do with a degree in history? That was my approach. Now, the interesting thing here is how much God has blessed my life as a teacher. It has allowed me to meet people who have had a massive impact on my life. Colleagues, friends, pupils and parents. God has taught me that no matter what I do with my career he is there to support me. I remember when I had to leave teaching briefly (some difficult circumstances made me want to get out of a job I wasn't doing well at all in that place) finding it increasingly difficult to see where I should go. I felt like I was singing the clash song, 'Should I stay or Should I go' it was that difficult to decide to resign or not. In the end, there was a clear message from God that I just needed to make a decision and He would support me in it. I did and he did. The thing is, I really get a feeling that he wants me to become more than this. I think there is a call to more full time service for God. What form though? It clearly isn't youth ministry (which I rather foolishly thought it was back in the late noughties). Pastorship? Dunno. Ordination? Again, I dunno. Maybe it is a call to more personal commitment. God knows (literally) that there are certain sins I am constantly struggling with and maybe I need to focus on them for a while and see where I end up.

My lovely wife was skimming through the channels on the TV the other week and came across this song by Michael W. Smith. It really is fantastic and has helped me in some of my personal worship times recently.

I was on Facebook earlier today. One of the posts directed me to have a look at Chris Tomlin's new song. I have to say, it was a very powerful video

I have been on summer holiday. It is, obviously, one of the best times of year for a teacher. Six weeks off for me to spend some time with God, my wife and my kids. It was supposed to be us going to visit both sets of grandparents but unfortunately illness made that impossible.

Instead, there has been a lot of DIY and a lot of reading. I have been working my way through some books by Nick Page. I like his books and have had two that I had been trying to finish for a while. One was called the Dark Night of the Shed. It is excellent and deals with the Mid-Life Crisis and how Christians are meant to respond.

However, one in particular I had not finished from ages ago.It is called God's Dangerous Book and it is the story of how the modern Bible came to us. It truly is fascinating. I knew a lot of the stuff but it was great to fill in many details.

The Bible hasn't always been readily accessible. For many years, and to its eternal shame, the church has tried to keep scripture out of the hands of the people. It is dangerous you see. It tells of a radical love. It tells people that their lives needn't be a constant life of pain and inferiority. It tells of the freedom brought by Christ's redeeming act on the Cross.

People have striven and died for the right to have scripture in their own language and in their own hands.

I finished the book on my tablet on the way home from Wales his week. We had been to see my parents and we tried to pack light. I left my bible at home. I took just my phone and tablet with their apps.

Now, please don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with a Bible app. In the modern world they are great and they are certainly a way of getting scripture into the hands of people for whom a hard copy would be impossible to obtain. I have used mine this year and am 220 or so days into my Bible in a Year. It is great.

However, when I got home late on Wednesday evening, I had to reach out for my bible. I had to touch it. I spent some time reading it on Thursday. Page's pages had taught me that holding a bible is a precious thing. It is a simple thing but it really is precious.

I love my Bible and through it I know that God loves me, totally, amazingly and for free. That's why it is dangerous, When a tyrant tells you that you're worthless, the Bible tells you that you're worth everything. When the world tells you that you are alone, the Bible tells you that's a lie. When the government says this is the way it should be, the Bible says no, it really isn't. That's why it's been banned and why we need to protect the right of people the world over to have it when and where they need it.

Been away for ten days. Didn't take bible with me. Really missed having one to hold and read. Apps are great but the real thing can't be beaten. I'm so grateful for my bible

A photo posted by Derrick Roberts (@aberchristian) on Aug 11, 2016 at 12:42pm PDT

Yesterday I went back to St. Mary's for the first time in years. This is the church I started going to after I became a Christian.

I became a believer at University and when I went home for the holidays it was to St. Mary's I went.

It has always been a somewhat high church. The services are very formal and not what my Evangelical nature loves. However, God has taught me so many things at that little church.

He has taught me humility. He has taught me not to judge. He has taught me to relax and enjoy my time with him.

I love that place and pray for it often.

Going back yesterday was such a great thing to do. It was lovely to be back in the Anglican fold for a little while. That denomination has so much to offer the world.

There are some cracking worship songs out there.  There are some awful ones. Some of the stuff from For King and Country really move me closer to God. Chris Tomlin is a powerful artist.

Then there are ones like 'Jesus is my best friend'. I know it's a kid's song but so many Christians hold on to that 'truth' rather too hard.

Yes, Jesus is my friend and he is the best one I have.  However, he's also so much more than this. You see, I don't think that we, as a church, really see the full potential in our relationship with Christ and we don't put it through our worship properly either.

One of the things we are often guilty of in our worship is docetism. This is a heresy. Simply put it means not accepting that Jesus was ever fully human. He was merely a God playing at being human. An easy way to see if anyone has any latent docetic tendencies is to ask the question 'Did Jesus use the toilet?' Watch people as they think about it and they'll give away that Jesus wasn't a fully human person.

He was though.  Philippians makes this clear when Paul says

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:  Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;  rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!
Philippians 2:5‭-‬8 NIV

Christ was fully human. That's why he knows exactly what we feel when we feel things. It really is a central part of what we believe about Jesus. He is not a superhero. Someone who is a meta human or a transformed human. Neither is he one of those superheroes like Batman who were normal humans. Jesus had no advantages and no special skills. He was as human as you or I.

Another reason why I don't like the 'Jesus as superhero' idea is that I don't like superheroes. That's not exactly right, what I don't like about them is the trope that they have to be flawed. Spiderman is bitten by a radioactive spider. The X Men are 'mutants'. Superman is an orphan.

I resigned myself to never being a superhero long ago. I've got both parents, no significant role model has died in front of me, I've not had a major accident etc. I'm a bog standard normal person. Much like Jesus (one of the very few ways I am like him).

Jesus wasn't flawed and wasn't special in any way. He was a normal, fully human person. He felt the way we do, he ate the way we do and he went to the loo the way we do.

It was precisely because of this that he was able to take our place on the cross when he died in our place.

I've been on holiday in Wales for a couple of days. Really saw the beauty of my old home village on our second night here.

I had to go to the shops in the late evening. I wanted to go and stand at my favourite place in the world to look at the scenery. It was as stunning as I remembered but the sun was setting and it gave a lustre all its own.

On the way back from the shops it was impossible to go far without having to stop and look.

Sometimes (and all too infrequently) it's like that with God. In the mundane and familiar there is a power that seeps out. God is a magnificent God who does things with beauty and power. But he's also a God who knows you intimately and loves that knowledge of your routines and your likes.

So there I was looking down Coronation Street (yes really) and I felt his presence with me.

As synapses fire and spark I find myself wondering about the Celtic concept of Thin Places. I shall investigate ...