The beautiful Bride arrives

SO here is the late Katrina Boucher...who was in fact early!

All I can say is stunner!

I feel so blessed to have Katrina in my life now. She gets me. She knows how to handle me. She laughs at me and she builds me up. Katrina has taught me to let things go and most importantly to not cast things up. She is so forgiving and kind - she needs to be married to me!

So may I present to you the new Mrs Patterson...

Great is thy faithfulness

What do you choose as an opening hymn? I love the words to this song. Its a declaration of God's goodness. Nowadays songs are mostly written from our self centredness, it's all about how we feel and what we are going thru. This tune lifts the spirits because of who God is.

So glad to have Rick leading the praise at our wedding. We didn't know how this song would go down, cos it is kinda slow and there is normally an organ playing, but the voices were raised in adoration. So thanx to Dave, Buff, Rick pictured with 'Little and Large'. Also to Sarah for doing powerpoint!

The big day

Here I am. Tuesday 22 April 2008. I got my best man, Charlie and my grooms man, Phil by my side. 2 amazing guys. What an amazing day. This was taken by the very talented Andre Alves Areias. Nice one Dr Dre!

6 distinctive features of Mission

Reading thru the life of Hudson Taylor. He set up the China Inland Mission (CIM) and here is his 6 distinctive features, which I think are still applicable today:

1. Missionaries will be drawn not from any particular denomination but from all the leading Christian churches - provided they could sign a simple doctrinal declaration (How could we agree on that??)
2. Missionaries would have no guaranteed salary, but trust in the Lord to supply their needs. Income would be shared. No debts would be incurred. (But thats not practical!!!!)
3. No appeal for funds would be made.(He must really take his faith seriously!!)
4. The work abroad would not be directed by home committees but by people on the spot, in the field (people who actually know what is going on)
5. The activities of the mission would be systematic and practical. Evangelism would seek to establish footholds in strategic centres
6. The missionaries would wear clothes from the region and worship in building built in the style of the area (geared to the times, anchored to the rock!)

Food for thought...

Rambo

Talk about a good boys night out! Went with Pete Comfort and Jonny to watch this epic! You know what you get with Rambo, but even this was too much. Some really interesting thoughts came to me during watching this.

First you have the missionaries going into a country to help yet they cause a lot of problems. It made me think. These missionaries were warned to not go in, yet they went in. Was it obedience to God? Was it to ease their conscience? In the film it is actually quoted that there were doing an honourable thing. One of the mercenaries said he was the devil doing what God couldn't do. So going in as outsiders, does it help or does it cause more problems. Also, watching LOST with Katrina and the episode we watched last night 'Stranger in a strangeland' was about how Jack walked among them but wasn't part of them. It can have good effects, like with Hudson Taylor gaining the respect of the Chinese, but it can also be harmful. I know I'm mixing fact with fiction even fantasy but an interesting point I think!

Second you have the pure brutalness of this movie. I asked Pete how this got made and even passed. But this actually happens in Burma. It is horrific, but this type of stuff happens. I don't know if Sly was trying to make a political point or a moral point and if anything is going to happen about this but its mad, worse its evil and is anyone doing anything about it? The way movies go as well, we are manipulated by the director, writer, music so we actually want the good guy to go get the bad guy, so here we want Rambo to go get some revenge in the only way Rambo can! But who is good then and who is bad. Is it justified Rambo killing everyone cos they are bad people. A verse that kept running thru my head was from Romans 12 v 19 "It is mine to avenge, I will repay, says the Lord". But can we wait for judgement? Is it fair to let evil continue and even prosper? That passage in Romans 12, do not repay evil for eveil but overcome evil with good - is it practical? Is it philosophical? Can ideas like that actually work in the real world? And again I know Rambo aint real but stuff like tis actually happens it the world, so my question is how does the Jesus follower respond?

Thirdly you have some pure cheese in quotes from the movie "It is better to die for something than live for nothing!" Oh yes! Come on! You got to love it!

Childlike faith

Just finished reading this book. Its good. Easy read. Thought provoking.

Galatians 2 v20

Can't get this verse out of my mind. It's a constant challenge to everything I do, say and think

Lava Lamp

Found this cool prayer tool on emerging church website and it actually helped me focus and pray more - cool!

Lava lamp prayer

Tony the Tiger

Got to reading this book over the weekend, my good friend Shaun leant it to me, as someone had leant it to him. Didn't realise tho, that this guy is actually called 'Anthony Anthony'! Reminds me of Gary Neville's dad, Neville Neville. (And apparently the United team of the 90's had Gary Pallister's dad - Alistair, Steve Bruce's dad - Bruce, Peter Schmeichel's dad Michael...)

But the book and the life story of Tony is amazing. I must admit there is something about the Far East - I'd love to walk alone the Great Wall of China, and there is something appealing with their culture and heritage. I love watching martial arts films and everybody loves kung foo fighting, fast as lightning ha ho ha (doing the dance!)

I also have something deep down within that is attracted to such a disciplined life, being flexible, fit, controlled....I am so lazy and very indisciplined/undisciplined. What struck me (Judo chop!) was when Tony talked about the way of Kung Foo compared to Jesus saying "I am the WAY..."

So all these years I've been intrigued about the way of Kung Foo, (never done anything about it tho!) yet have I been following the WAY of Jesus. The Bible in a year has just started into Mark's gospel and the first chapter is full of kick ass action:

Jesus baptised, tempted, starts preaching, casting out demons, healing people, praying, healing some more. Brilliant! That's the WAY of Jesus my master, and I want to be about the WAY of my master.

Rumour has it that Tony is coming over the the Celebration of Hope event in April, or he is being recorded to do a video clip. Apparently he loves Northern Ireland as a guy Michael Wright from Belfast led him to Jesus when he was in prison in Cyprus. Amazing story and again I encourage you to read this book.

An idea

So reading thru Starving Jesus, Craig and JR encourage the reader to do something - not copy them but do something. Apparently they always get people asking "What should we do?"

So we've been thinking about this in YFC and Steve and myself have started workin towards doing a prayer tour of Ireland. One of Steve's goals is to get 32 drop in centres in every county in Ireland. This summer we got 12 Canadians coming over to do something. SO we thought if we could match that maybe with 12 Irish people, could we hire some RVs and travel round Ireland for 2 weeks and just pray...

JR and Craig fasted and preached and cuffed themselves to a pew, which is very Jeremiah/Ezekiel/prophet like - I love it but like I said don't want to copy these guys.

I think in YFC we are in a new period so we got to pray, seek God, see where God is working and then join God's work. This nation will become a sending nation again, but we got to start doing stuff and get serious. This is step one.

Now we have had one door close after approaching Motorhome Ireland but maybe we can get a couple of mini buses, travel round and sleep in churches. We just want to pray with people, as if that isn't enough! God will do stuff and guide us on the way. So we are looking for churches throughout Ireland who would like 24 people to come pray and encourage them at the start of July this summer.

Step two - promoting it and getting the word out!

Live Simply

So started going thru this 10 week or should I say 10 chapters on a Monday night with Katrina, Dave, Heather and Nevaeh. It's really challenging and has all the charts and tables to impress Dave and myself.

Its very practical and here are 5 simply things you can do right now:

1. Think of a neighbour or friend who needs some help, whether financially or in some other way, and do something to meet that need this week
2. Set aside 2 half hour periods during the week when you can have some space for sitting quietly
3. Go thru your clothes and give away anything you have not worn in the past year
4. Look at the amount of packaging involved in the food you buy and work on reducing it to a bare minimum
5. Do not use your car this week for any journey under 2 miles
   

Starving Jesus

Sometimes books just come along at the right time. Dave Currie is like my local library as he is always giving me good books to read - so thanx Dave.

I'd seen this book about and heard about it, especially when Craig was over with XXXChurch.com in November, but don't know why I didn't read it then. You know when you read, and you're like, "I should read more, rather than sit and waste my time on Football Manager..."

Anyway I'm nearly finished the book so will blog later what really inspired me, but really want to encorage people to read this