God's compensations

If all my days were summer, how could I know

What my Lord means by His, "whiter than the snow"?

If all my days were sunny, could I say

In his fair land He wipes all tears away?

If I were never weary, could I keep

Close to my heart, "He gives His loved ones sleep"?

Were no graves mine, might I not come to deem

The life eternal but a baseless dream?

My winter and my tears and weariness,

Even my graves may be His way to bless.

I call them ills, yet that can surely be

Nothing but love that shows my Lord to me.

Desert Trek 2010

Desert Trek was great. I really enjoyed the time to reflect and spend unhurried time talking and listening to God. It has been hard to replicate this in my life at home, especially as I have been sick. We were blessed by great weather. The camping, company and walking was fantastic.

In the end we had 27 participants, which was far beyond my expectations, and logistically much bigger than expected. I think that everything came together well though.

There were 3 themes to the trek; solitude, silence and prayer. Solitude being not retreating from life but connecting with God, silence as listening to God and prayer being praying from the heart. It has been a real highlight of the year so far. If we had 27 this year, how many will we have next year?

Desert Trek 2010

In July we are going to be running a desert trek. A desert trek is a chance to get out into some of the landscape of Broken Hill, to do some walking, camping and reflecting. It is in the spirit of the desert fathers who stepped away from the demands of life in order to connect with God. There will be times of silence, solitude, teaching, reflecting, sharing, walking, sitting around the campfire and enjoying the outback. We will be roughing it a bit, there will be no plush accommodation. We will visit a property "Sturt's Meadows" where we usually run our desert camps as well as the Mutawintji National Park.

The Trek is for anyone who wants to walk closer with God. It is for those who have been connected in with The Broken Hill centre before and would love to tune in again and it is for those who would like to do so for the first time. It is for those who love to walk in the bush and know that God can be found in a deeper way in those rugged high places.

The dates of the Trek are 5th-9th July. Yes it will be cold, but great for camping and sitting around the fire at night.

More details will follow, but I wanted to give people a chance to pencil it into their diaries now. 

I especially encourage the Broken Hill alumni to come along and bring someone with them who they have been wanting to get to Broken Hill but needed an excuse. I will need a couple of helpers too, so if you are wanting to serve in some way that would be great.

Here are some picks of some of the places. Yes, there is sometimes water, but too cold during July.

Reflections from Colossians

There is tremendous power in the gospel to transform. It has the power to undo us and then reform us into something knew. The gospel message is what this world needs more than any other. It is the only one that can set us free and freedom is something that we desperately need.

To be free

to see the morning light

the day reborn aright

all my hopes and dreams

rewoven at the seams.

Essentially the gospel boils down to three truths 1. That there is a God who is in charge, that he is loving and caring and desires what is best for us and his creation. The world is not here by accident or chance but created by an intelligent being who has a purpose and a plan 2. That there is a problem with people. We are lost. There is both good and evil in all of us. Essentially we are in the darkness. We are our own gods deciding for ourselves what is right and wrong and it is not going well. 3. Jesus is the light of the world. It is in him that the solutions are found. He is the only one who can deal with the problem of evil and somehow this happened through the cross. He can lead us out of darkness and into the light. It is in him that we can start again, to be renewed.
This message is very powerful and has the capacity to change people forever. It did so with me.
do you believe it?
do you speak it?
are you proud of it?
are you living it?

knowing

I feel the wind of change blow through me as if I was not there,
watching the sun set from behind through deep set eyes
wishing for a better point of view.
To question things that have no answer
to feel the melancholy of the long dark night
where hope is just rationality that brings no comfort to my soul.
Who am I to feel this way?
What is my place and what is my name?

There is only one who knows and sees what cannot be seen,
whose breath itself is behind the wind.
He who flung the sun and stars into space
and gave them names that no one knows.
There is a light that penetrates the darkest day
with a question that needs no answer
where a song beyond explanation soothes a troubled mind
Who am I that he should notice?
who whispers quietly my name and guides me to where I am to be.

Committed Company 2010

What will be the shape of the committed company in Broken Hill this year? We will be a little smaller with the Wagstaffe's moving on to Dubbo to work at the Burrabadine school. At the core there will be the Skinner's and the Walkers. Connected in with us will be Kate Bain coming from Newcastle where she has been on team. Kate is a music teacher and a friend of the Walker family.
David Rozali and David Orozco will arrive at the end of February. They are coming to be mentored in leadership by myself this year. Dave Rozali has been on team at Strathalbyn and comes from West Timor. David Orozco has just finished first year in Swan Hill and comes from Mexico.
Still not sure what the year will look like yet, but that is part of the beauty of what we are doing. To follow the threads that God unravels in people's lives. Not through ability, but availability "for without me you can do nothing" Jn 15.

Blue gum forest part 2

Eventually we reached Junction Rock which was the junction of three tracks (one of the being blocked by the landslide). It was good to be past the downhill section and the map showed only one steep bit. it is often the case that the flat sections go on longer than you expect and it was a welcome relief to reach the campsite at Acacia Flat. Perhaps due to the weather we found the campsite empty and we were able to pick out the best campsite. I am pretty fussy and I always think that there might just be a better option around the next corner, so I had to look everywhere before choosing.

The views are pretty stunning at the start of the walk, but the highlight for is the campsite. Stunning Blue gums tower above you, straight as an arrow, tall and majestic against the sky. They really are amazing trees and it is no wonder that they needed protecting from logging as they would have made terrific timber. It was really quite enjoyable to set up camp at a leisurely pace, cook tea and enjoy each others company. We slept in the tent as it had rained during the day and sure enough it rained through the night. It is not a bad tent by mountain designs, with good ventilation and plenty of room for gear in the 2 vestibules. It doesn't have good access in wet weather though and would be very hard to cook in when the weather turned really ugly. Once you are in though it is pretty snug and would handle a fair bit thrown at it.

After a nights sleep (not necessarily good as I never sleep well on the thin mat) it was time to assess the options. Millie's feet were pretty sore, so it was best to get out by the quickest route and then get the car if necessary by finishing the rest of the walk on my own after dumping the packs. The quickest way out was up Perry's lookdown, fairly steep, but shorter and nearer than the other options. It suited me as it meant going through the rest of the blue gum forest along the way.

The walk out was pretty hard, although I surprised myself in feeling fitter than I thought I was. I did feel the extra weight that I was carrying that had grown as the walk progressed in order to make Millie's job a little easier. Probably only fair for me taking her there in the first place. It was good to get to the top and the views along the way were fantastic. Always seem to be better than when you drive there. I was able to get a lift to miss the road bash and then walked and ran the last section from Pulpit rock to Govett's, a good little walk in its own right that I don't think I have done before.

I was hoping to finish it off with something at the Wattle Cafe in Blackheath, something of a tradition, but unfortunately it was closed. I had the best ever steak sandwich there on my way back to Bourke after being in India (it might have been a craving from a meat deprived diet!).

So, did Millie enjoy it? Yes, despite the pain. Will Millie do it again? Yes, she says she will. Perhaps a bit of an easier one next time.

Blue gum forest part 1

For a long time now I have been wanting to introduce Millie to an overnight bushwalk. In October we organised the kids to be looked after with the grandparents and headed into the Blue mountains loaded with gear. I wanted to walk down into the Blue gum forest in the Grose Valley near Blackheath. I had good memories of the walk from years before, although I couldn't remember it in much detail. I did have some advice that it might be a bit hard for a first walk, but I thought that it would be ok.

Our plan was to park the car at Govetts Leap (a leap is a name for a waterfall) and then walk around to Evans lookout and down into the Gross Valley. Unfortunately the track was closed due to a landslide, but we didn't find this out until we had reached Evan's lookout. It was a bit discouraging getting back to the car for lunch 3 hours later only to be beginning the walk. I tried to be positive about the experience as it was a really nice walk, but I am not sure that Millie was convinced.

The walk down Govetts leap is quite steep and a bit slippery, especially with a heavy pack. You can just make out the path along the cliff in the photo below. It really is a long way down and when you get to the bottom of the falls you are only at et beginning of the journey downwards. Unfortunately I was carrying a bit more than I normally do and the constant downhill was really playing with my knee. MIllie was getting very sore ankles from her boots, which were not worn in properly. No amount of first aid work was able to stop the pain so it was pretty difficult going. I have to say that she did quite well despite the pain. There were quite a few times where I questioned the choice of walks. The difficulty of the walk into blue gum forest is that you need to walk back out. There is not other way out but to climb out one of the steep ascents. I did wander how it was going to be possible to do it in her condition.

homesick

"For men are homesick in their homes,
and strangers under the sun...
but our homes are under miraculous skies
where the Yule tale was begun."

G.K.Chesterton

justice

We live in a country which nobly tries to perpetuate justice through the legal system. While there are many issues with such a system it does do well in ensuring that people are justly tried without prejudice or partiality. One of the repercussions of such a system is that people who should be convicted are not because of a lack of evidence or incorrect procedure, even if it is clear to everyone that they are guilty. The alternative though would be to allow justice to be administered by those who believe they know the truth, or worse by those whose prejudice would cause the 'truth' to be fabricated or twisted.

There are many examples in other countries where people are unjustly tried for their religious beliefs or for their political convictions. There are also examples where local courts made up of elders in the community function well. I would hazard a guess that these systems do not work any worse than a highly centralised legal system. In the end any legal system depends on the integrity of those involved.

Recently we experienced the nature of the law much more intimately when four juveniles broke into the house that we had been moving out of and proceeded to ransack and vandalise it. There was not a great deal of damage, it was just destructive. Thankfully we had a lot of people to help clean up the mess and finish packing up our stuff. A good thing about it was that it sped up our move, although we still have a lot of boxes to sort through.

One of the things that I learnt about the legal system in this country through the incident is that you can't commit a criminal act if you are under 10 years old. Is it true that you can't commit a criminal act under 10? Of course not. In this country though there is no accountability for such an act if you are under 10. Now I am not recommending that a child under 10 should be put through the justice system, however to have a situation where there is no accountability at all is only going to produce negative results. Surely parents should have some accountability for the actions of their children. Knowing about the family situations of children who are often involved in these actions it cannot be left up to the good will of the parents.

For me it was not hard to forgive the children that were involved. It was easy to see that they were victims themselves. Even though I could forgive them logically, I still felt a lot of anger towards them because of what they had done. Emotions are a tricky thing and they are not dismissed easily. it is important not to dismiss them or cover them up but find a way to express them.

One thing that I have learnt through experience is that God brings good things out of bad. I was able to meet with two set of the parents and talk with the children involved. I had a good time talking with one, prayed with them and shared with them about God's goodness. The boy came around and helped me clean up the yard. The family is struggling but was upset about the actions of their son. At first it didn't seem much use in seeing the other family as they are in a very broken situation, but I knew that God wanted me to see them. About a week later the mother came and saw me after the school presentation night and apologised for what had happened. She said that they were going to be getting counselling for their son and really appreciated me coming to see them.

I don't know what will be the outcome for those families, but what I do know is that God has already been bringing about goodness through this whole thing. At the very least the boys have been on my mind and I have sent up many prayers on behalf of those families.

"In all things God works for the good of those that love him and have been called according to his purposes." Rom 8:28