At James’s baptism last night, Garry asked the question ‘What’s your profession?’ Most of us are often introduced to others by our name and profession (‘This is Garry; he’s an engineer’), and so often our identity is bound up in our jobs (nurse, teacher, shop assistant, lorry driver) or roles (parent, grandparent, husband, wife.)  There is another meaning to the word ‘profession’, however: a profession can tell you about what someone feels, believes or intends to do. As Christians, we are making these kinds of professions all the time and in baptism, we declare (or ‘profess’) that we are followers of Jesus Christ.

In everyday life, we make professions all the time. For many, there is a belief that God does not exist and that science has proved this. Science cannot prove the spiritual, since it only deals with the material world, but one of the proofs of God’s existence is in the transformed lives of people from different times, countries, cultures, backgrounds and circumstances, all declaring that God’s love and life have transformed them. At a baptism, we declare our belief in the transforming power of God to change the direction of our lives entirely.

Another profession is that the Bible is a fairy tale, written by men with no more worth than any other book. Christians believe the Bible is God’s word, that it is historically accurate (corroborated by other sources such as the Papyrus Anastasi 6 which talks of the ‘Semites’ coming for water and grain, just as the Old Testament testifies to the Israelites going to Egypt during a famine or the 1906 archaeological discovery east of Ankara that the Hittites really were an ancient people as described in the Bible.) It contains statements which made no sense at the time of writing (e.g. about the valleys of the deep oceans in Job 38:16 when ancient society believed the ocean bottom was sandy and saucer shaped), but which have since been corroborated by scientific discovery. Statements about the numbers of stars being countless (Gen 22:17) have also been demonstrated through modern astronomy. Christians believe the Bible is God’s inspired word to us and gives us direction and helps us to understand spiritual truths.

At a baptism, we are professing faith in Jesus Christ, the One who came to save us from our sins. As we are immersed in the water, we identify with His death for our sins and wrongdoing and as we rise from the water, we identify with His resurrection from the dead. Many people may believe Jesus was crucified, but to believe in the resurrection is to believe in a God of miracles. The Bible confidently affirms this miracle, reminding us that the Jewish authorities could not produce Jesus’s body to refute this claim and that the lives of fearful disciples were transformed by His appearances to them. We are excited to have the opportunity to tell others that God forgives our sins, that we have decided to follow Jesus and that our obedience to Him is shown in getting soaked through baptism! (see Acts 2:38)

This is our profession. What’s yours?

All the Advent sheep are now out in shops in Bolton-on-Dearne, Thurnscoe and Goldthorpe and all the leaflets have been distributed to local schools (Robert Ogden school leaflets will be given out early next week.) Please do encourage people to get involved in this trail, where the names of the sheep are filled in on the leaflets for the chance to win a wonderful Christmas hamper (kindly sponsored by the Co-op in Bolton-on-Dearne) and a knitted sheep. The prize draw will be made on Saturday 15th December at the ‘Churches Together’ Christmas Sheep Celebration (between 2 and 4 p.m. at the Salvation Army) Come along to that meeting to take part in craft activities, bun decorating and to find out the role of sheep in the Christmas story. We’ll be singing Christmas carols, having a puppet story and learning more about the significance of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Don’t forget also the baptismal service for James, which will be on Saturday 1st December at 6 p.m. Join with us to rejoice with James as we celebrate the new life God has given him and pray for him as he continues his Christian journey. Refreshments will be served after this service.

Advent starts officially on 2nd December, so do join us on Sunday for our services (10.30 a.m. and 6 p.m.) which will focus on the theme of hope.

We have received a newsletter from Fredrick and Reeba this week and are thrilled to hear that the new church building will be opened on Friday 21st December. Here is an extract from the newsletter:

“We are so glad to inform you all that our church construction is progressing well and ahead of schedule. By God’s abundant grace and by all your prayers and love, we could complete the plastering work for the interior and exterior walls, main door frame and outside window frames, plumbing and sanitary works; only the fixture works need to be done.”

Flooring, wiring, fixing doors and windows and painting still need to be done and finances are still needed for this, but Fredrick is confident all will be finished for the official opening.

As Christmas approaches, the annual street children feeding programme and Christmas Gospel ministry are going ahead, with sketches, songs and plays about Jesus teaching the children the truths of the Gospel. Please continue to pray for this ministry, for Reeba’s tailoring ministry and for Fredrick and Reeba, their three children and Fredrick’s mother, who is doing well.

Watching 4FontTheatre set up for the ‘Job & Jingle’ show was an education in itself. First of all they brought in huge poles which had to be screwed together:

Then various bits of carefully painted polystyrene had to be attached to the poles in order to make the castle:

All the castle parts had to be slotted into place before the castle could be opened and closed successfully:

All this construction made me think about our Christian lives and how we need to have a framework and solid foundation on which to build. We need God’s Word to give us direction and to hold us together, shedding light on our path as we walk. We need the conversation of prayer to satisfy our need for communication. We need the sacraments, especially Holy Communion, to direct our gaze constantly to the cross of Christ, to remember afresh all God has done for us in Christ Jesus. We need the fellowship of the saints to encourage us and to broaden our ‘tunnel vision’ so that we learn to see the world through God’s eyes.

What was truly amazing to me about the set of ‘Job & Jingle’ was that it could be packed away in a transit van in less than an hour. It’s a fully portable set, built by the cast members, so that this show can move around the country. We too need to have portable lives, solidly built on the foundation of Christ Jesus, fully aware that wherever we go, His Spirit goes with us and we are His ambassadors, carrying the presence of God with us.

 “So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, ⁷ rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.” (Col 2:6-7)

After months of preparation, 4FrontTheatre arrived in Goldthorpe today, and what a blast we had! I’ve now seen the ‘Job & Jingle’ show three times and I’d happily sit through it again. It had such a positive message about both the meaning of Christmas and the joy with which we should celebrate the birth of Christ.

This morning, the team set up at Goldthorpe Primary School. It was amazing to see poles and polystyrene transformed into a palace!

Later on, they had to set up at Goldthorpe Pentecostal Community Church, where the carpeted stage almost meant the palace didn’t stay intact throughout two more shows!

The show told the story of a competition to find ‘the best Christmas ever’ and the rivalry between the friar, Job, and the court jester, Jingle.

Our thanks to the team and to all who helped today. Thanks to the Salvation Army for feeding us throughout the day:

Thanks also to all who helped to set up and to tidy away today and to the two Goldthorpe Primary Schools for allowing us to share the show with their pupils.

I used to work for someone who regularly said that ‘change is here to stay’ and who would remind us that change is inevitable in life and so you needed to get used to it! Attitudes to change vary greatly, largely because we all have different personalities.

Some people love changing things: hairstyles, clothes, furniture, houses, cars. They are always up for change. They embrace change with fervour and excitement, enthusiasm and optimism. They love the challenges and the sense of opportunity and freshness which change brings. These people are very often eager and keen to do things differently and are impatient with routine, finding it boring. They are often pioneers and visionary people, always ready to move on. If they see a door, they want to open it and run through, even if they have no idea what’s in the room behind the door.

Some people find change much more difficult to manage. They like routine and predictability; they find constant change challenging and are maybe much more apprehensive about change. They worry about what will happen when things change, perhaps even finding some truth in the proverb ‘better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know.’ These people are often a little bit reluctant to change and can even be pessimistic about it. If optimists are like Tigger in the ‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ stories, people who find change difficult are more like the donkey Eeyore. If they see a door, they will probably want to know what’s behind the door before they will consider opening it, let alone going through it.

Many of us are perhaps somewhere in the middle between these two extremes. We are open to the idea of change and perhaps excited about some changes, but are perhaps a little bit nervous about big changes. We might hesitate at an open door, but we’re not going to rule out going through it; we just need a little bit of encouragement and reassurance.

We can be sure that God will only allow change into our lives for our ultimate good. All change can be used by God to draw us closer to Him and to move us further forward, even the changes we perhaps would not choose for ourselves. Paul found that even closed doors were simply signposts to the correct open door (see Acts 16:6-10). We can be confident that God will open doors for us in His time and in His way and that change will lead us forward: as Stephen said recently, ‘Onward, Christian soldiers, marching on to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before.’