18 months ago, the wise and funny spiritual accompanier that I meet with from time to time said that I needed to start organising my sabbatical, due for summer 2025. She shared some very helpful resources from a different denomination to mine that she had drawn on for her own sabbatical. Of course I made... Continue Reading →
June is Myasthenia Gravis Awareness Month around the world. Last June, this annual awareness-raising month passed me by entirely because I was feeling great! This June, I marked it by having a flare up of myasthenia symptoms which I experienced completely out of the blue in July 2021. That first time was absolutely horrible. I... Continue Reading →
On Thursday we met with Rev Dr Ray Motsi, who is the President of the Theological College of Zimbabwe - which is co-owned by the Brethren in Christ and Baptist Union of Zimbabwe. (Themba said that Ray has been adopted into the Brethren in Christ because of his Anabaptist values!) Ray is also a cofounder... Continue Reading →
Today we headed to Mtshabezi Mission, founded in 1906 by BICC missionaries with firstly a church and then a school in the same year. Today Mtshabezi Mission is almost a small town - with a church, primary school, secondary school, hospital, and theological training college (Ekuphileni Bible Institute). 'Ekuphileni' means 'where there is life'. There... Continue Reading →
“Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu” (I am because you are. Literally - a person is a person through others.) Ndebele/ Zulu saying Today we met with the Executive Board of the General Conference of the BIC, and the Peace and Justice Committee. We had rich conversations with both groups of people - with the first our meeting... Continue Reading →
We arrived in Zimbabwe yesterday afternoon after a long plane journey, with stops in Addis Abba (Ethiopia) and Ndola (Zambia). I was prepared for the flight with multiple layers of clothes, eye mask, ear phones and Valoid (strong South African travel sickness medication that knocks you out!) so I slept/ dozed for most of the... Continue Reading →
We are frequently told that God is unchanging and immutable, the same yesterday, today and forever. But that was not Moses' experience of God that we find in Exodus 32. God was rightly ticked off that the people that he had rescued from Egypt had melted down their jewellery and made a golden calf that... Continue Reading →
I remember those very early days of breastfeeding my children. I remember the fear that would unwind in me when I could hear my daughter beginning to stir in the night, knowing that I would need to go to her and go through the excruciating process of trying to get her to latch properly. I... Continue Reading →
I have this dream about a table and a meal. (Or maybe it’s many tables and many meals?) This is a place where we can talk and eat and pray. Where we can be honest about our lives and our questions and our potentially heretical thoughts. Where we can struggle together. It is a place... Continue Reading →
Fellowship springs from a shared mission. Genuine community needs a ‘why?’ - a reason for coming together beyond the community itself. Communities that have a common dream, or a collective hope, are then bonded together in the pursuit of that goal. Some communities might journey together for a short time, some communities have to travel... Continue Reading →
stumbling hopefully in the right direction 