Packing can be one of the most stressful things about holidays, especially if, like me, you like to be prepared for every eventuality. So we played a packing game where two teams had to pack an assortment of items into a box. The items included typical (and not so typical!) holiday requirements:

We had a variety of holiday prizes to be won:

Both teams managed to pack all 30 items beautifully. They have obviously had a lot of practice at this kind of thing!

Tonight’s family service looked at the holiday theme of ‘Home & Away’. We started with a treasure hunt for luggage labels on which were 24 facts about holiday destinations. (We aim to inform!)

1. Germans are the second largest beer consumers in the world, after the Irish, and in Bavaria, beer is considered a food, not a drink!
2. There are 3 main sorts of Belgian waffles.
3. Crete has the highest ratio of guns per person in the whole European Union. Although this is the case, Crete is still considered as one of the safest tourist destinations in the world.
4. There are over 2000 ports of call around our planet that cruise ships can visit.
5. Only 2% of Caribbean islands are inhabited. If you’re a loner, perhaps this is the place to go!
6. The history of the Caribbean has heavily influenced musical genres. Some of the more popular styles of music are reggae, calypso, reggaeton, salsa, (East Indian inspired) chutney & pan music. Pan music is made from steel tins or drums.
7. The Peak District National Park in Derbyshire was the first to open in the UK and the highest point in the Peak District is ‘Kinder Scout’ at 636 metres.
8. The North Bay Railway in Scarborough has what is believed to be the oldest operational diesel hydraulic locomotive in the world.
9. The UK is made up of over 1000 islands. Around 790 of these islands are located off shore from Scotland – most of these are within three main groups – the Hebrides, the Orkney Islands and the Shetland Islands. There are 291 inhabited islands in the UK.
10. The Lake District only has one lake (Bassenthwaite) – all the rest are waters (eg Coniston Water), meres (eg Windermere, Thirlmere) and tarns (eg Angle Tarn and Red Tarn).
11. The Vasco da Gama Bridge in Lisbon, Portugal, is 17 kilometres long, making it the longest in Europe.
12. Spain is famous for inventing the beret, the mop and Chupa Chups lollipops!
13. Ireland is the only country in the world which has a musical instrument – the harp – as their national symbol. The oldest known harp in existence is housed in Trinity College, Dublin. It dates back from at least 1300.
14. The Giant’s Causeway, situated on the North East coast of Northern Ireland, is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic eruption.
15. The world’s largest emerald (2860 carat) is displayed in the Imperial Treasury of the Hofburg (Imperial Palace) in Vienna, Austria.
16. The orange colour of the soil in Ibiza comes from the tannin in the pine needles that fall from the island’s many pine trees.
17. According to its mythology, the island of Corfu was named after the nymph Kerkira (the Greek name of Corfu is Kerkira), daughter of Asopos, with whom Zeus fell in love and brought to this island.
18. Mount Everest was named after Welshman Sir George Everest from Gwernvale, Breconshire.
19. The Cornish Pasty is worth £150 million pounds a year to the Cornish economy. Holiday makers eat over 5 million of them: that’s an average of 13,500 a day.
20. Tuscany in Italy has more UNESCO World Heritage cultural sites than Argentina, Australia or South Africa, and just one fewer than Egypt.
21. Mayonnaise was invented in Menorca by the Duke de Richelieu in 1756.
22. France attracted 79.50 million foreign tourists in 2011, making it the most popular tourist destination in the world.
23. Outside of London, Edinburgh Castle is the most popular tourist destination for overseas visitors attracting more than 1.2 million each year.
24. The Isle of Man takes its name from MANANNAN, a sea-god in Norse mythology. He protects the island by shrouding the place with a cloak of mist to protect it from its enemies, according to legend.

Once those facts were revealed, the next task was to use the letters on the back of the labels to reveal a topical Bible verse.

Working on the answers:

The answer?
“Our citizenship is in heaven.” (Philippians 3:20 TNIV)

Traa dy liooar? What’s she on about? Has she hit the wrong keys on the keyboard and produced gobbledegook for a blog post?!

‘Traa dy liooar’ is a Manx phrase meaning ‘Time enough’. It rather sums up life on the Isle of Man, I’ve found. There’s time enough for all kinds of things, a different pace of life, a different way of looking at things on an island 32 miles long and about 14 miles wide.

Life at home, for many of us, is lived prestissimo – very quickly. Life on the Isle of Man seems decidedly andante – at a walking pace (and my kind of walking pace, I admit – not exactly fast!)

I spent the week watching seals from the shore:

And they didn’t seem to be doing an awful lot, either!

I watched them from a boat as well:

I watched them swim effortlessly, suddenly elegant in the water:

I meandered through glens:

I gazed at awesome rocks:

We searched for pebbles to throw into the sea:

I went for walks and spent time gazing at the scenery:

Everyone has different ideas about the ‘perfect holiday’. Some people like action and adventure. Some people like sun and sand. Some people like history and museums. The point of a holiday, though, is surely not just the change of scenery or the chance to experience different weather! On holiday, we live at a different pace to usual, often deliberately slowing down and reflecting. There is ‘time enough’ to do this on holiday; often we feel there is not time enough to do this in our everyday lives. We need, however, to slow down enough on a daily basis to listen to God and to spend time with Him and His word. Nothing else will do. He is the bread of life to us. May we all seek Him and learn to live at His tempo.

In praying for our political leaders and for organisations working within the political framework in our country, we have in our hands a powerful weapon. One of the topics on the prayer list is the ‘hot potato’ of the ‘Gay Marriage legislation’. The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 received Royal Assent earlier in July (and is therefore now law) and the first same sex marriages are expected to be held early in 2014. For some Christians, this is discouraging news. However, we should continue to pray for God’s ways to be honoured.

There are provisions to protect churches and individuals who do not want to carry out these ceremonies in the Act. No religious organisation or individual minister will be compelled to marry same-sex couples or to permit this to happen on their premises. There is a clause in the Act to ensure no discrimination claim can be brought against religious organisations or individual ministers for refusing to marry a same-sex couple and currently it is illegal for the Church of England and the Church in Wales to marry same-sex couples. However, there is a strong possibility that interested parties may start campaigning for these protections to be removed and it is not clear if these exemptions apply also to registrars who may not wish to carry out these ceremonies because of their religious convictions. As we pray about this legislation, we can also pray:

1. for Registrars to have the same protection as church ministers and the freedom to decline to carry out these procedures.
2. that the protection for churches and ministers is not compromised and that there is no penalty (eg the withholding of grants) for those who do not wish to be involved in same-sex marriages.

We also need to remember ‘For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.’ (2 Cor 10:3-5 TNIV) There is a spiritual aspect to many of the laws in our land and we need to be alert to the spiritual consequences of legislation and to pray ‘Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven’ on a regular basis.

Dave spoke this morning on Luke 20:20-26 TNIV, focussing on the question as to what the Christian response to the government of our country should be. Since this is the prayer topic for August, it’s important to think about such issues, since often we feel very ambivalent about politics and what our response as Christians ought to be.

Spies were sent to keep a close watch on Jesus, hoping to catch him out by asking the question ‘is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?’ They reckoned this was a question demanding a yes/no answer and that either way would trip Jesus up. If he said yes, he could be accused of being a tool of Roman oppression; if he said no, he would be open to accusations of being an insurrectionist.

Jesus’s response was not yes or no, however. He asked about the inscription on a denarius coin and said, ‘Then give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.’

The question about the relationship of personal faith and politics has been asked throughout history. Paul tells us that the institution of human government (also known as the ‘state’) is a gift from God (see Romans 13:1 TNIV). Peter echoes these views in 1 Peter 2:13-16 TNIV. It’s easy for us to be cynical and doubtful about governments, but clearly there is a role for government to restrain evil: as Brooke Alexander writes, ‘The State is called upon to act as God’s firm hand, restraining…by effective force if necessary… the expansion of evil and chaos.’ It is not the State’s role, however, to try to renew spiritual life. There will always be a separation of State and Church because governments so easily step outside God’s intentions for the State, being made up of sinful men!

Just as Jesus didn’t allow Peter to use the sword (He gave that prerogative to the State), neither did He give the keys of the Kingdom to Caesar, but to the Church. If we are to follow what Jesus taught in this passage in Luke 20, then we need to respect authority in political matters but must also give to God what is God’s:

1. We should remind elected officials, by vote and voice, of their God-given duties when they fail to carry these out. If government fails to restrain evil, to preserve order, to protect the defenceless and to promote justice, Christians should speak out about these things. If governments claim power to dictate religious values or persistently violate the higher law of God, Christians have a responsibility to prophetically and strenuously challenge this.

2. Christians can render honour to God and improve the work of the State by stepping forward to serve in the public arena. Christians have been at the forefront of many campaigns to bring about change (the abolition of slavery, the gaining of civil rights, tackling pornographic and drug trades in many neighbourhoods etc.) God’s people, modelling Christ-like love and a persevering commitment to reason intelligently, to listen humbly and to exert creative influence through the political process, have the power to see change occur through their servant leadership.

3. Christians need to ‘come out of the closet’ about their faith. Will Durant has said, ‘The greatest question of our time is whether people can live without God.’ We need to speak out about our faith and not be intimidated. As columnist Michael Novak observed in Forbes magazine, “If you seek a sopiritual community, a link to a higher purpose, a renewal of the honest questioning and courage that are at the base of an ethic worthy of the human person, you don’t simply join a political party. You join… a church.” We have a duty to share Christ with others – not using the political forum as a place for insensitive Bible-banging, but understanding that justice, equality and reconciliation cannot be fully explained in humanist terms alone.

Here are some more of Igor’s holiday photos:

Igor in the ford at Glen Roy:

On his evening constitutional:

Igor travelling in style on the mountain railway to the highest point on the Isle of Man, Snaefell:

You can’t see the seven kingdoms today!

It’s cosier in the Summit restaurant!

We made it! (The things we do for the church blog…!)

What mist and wind? At Tynwald Hill, the same afternoon!

Tynwald Hill, home of the Manx Parliament ceremonies held on 5th July:

King of the Onchan postbox, as last year (in celebration of Peter Kennaugh’s gold medal at the 2012 Olympics):

They even painted the phone box gold!