I clicked on this from another blog...with reservations and some amusement!
Following are the top three results of your Spiritual Gifts Test:
Score Spiritual Gifts Scripture Reference
100% Teacher Hebrews 5:12-14
78% Music 1 Corinthians 14:26
78% Mercy Luke 10:30-37
These gifts exceed the normal ability level of an individual that may come through life experience or knowledge. In fact many refer to these gifts as a "supernatural ability" vs. "natural ability" that a person may posses.
Everyone has God-given talents, but He also bestows supernatural abilities to those believers who will give themselves over to His Spirit. These individuals are used for ministry in His Kingdom to help members of the body of Christ. They are also used to extend the church’s witness and ministry into the world.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Saturday...
Well...we have a SORT of a sermon written for Peter'n'Paul, I guess.
This has been a good day too, lots of sun, HOT outdoors, cool in my office, hurray for Venetian blinds, I say.
And this morning before it got hot, the Rambler went off and delivered the Opening Prayer at the handing-over of NINE NEW HOMES to happy families -- this was the outcome of this year's WomenBuild by the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity. Three triplexes. Most exciting. They have replaced a dreadful tenement and nest of criminality in an inner city neighbourhood.
And the Rambler wore her Hot Pink Hard Hat -- woo hoo!
This has been a good day too, lots of sun, HOT outdoors, cool in my office, hurray for Venetian blinds, I say.
And this morning before it got hot, the Rambler went off and delivered the Opening Prayer at the handing-over of NINE NEW HOMES to happy families -- this was the outcome of this year's WomenBuild by the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity. Three triplexes. Most exciting. They have replaced a dreadful tenement and nest of criminality in an inner city neighbourhood.
And the Rambler wore her Hot Pink Hard Hat -- woo hoo!
Friday, June 27, 2008
A good, good day
..despite having two elderly parishioners in the Coronary Care Unit, and another in a second hospital, none of them doing really all that well. Much sadness in anticipation.
But I have had e-mails today from members of Vestry and other volunteers in the parish of MH & U, and I am gratified and humbled.
New Vestrywoman who is a librarian has run to earth all the specifics of the permissions we need to purchase in order to play and sing (and, naturally, reprint) certain favourites of our praise band. And she has communicated her findings, LUCIDLY, to the rest of us.
'Nother Vestryman, our IT Guy and Sultan of Scrounge, has located a techie friend willing to do some installation of cables, resuscitating our most unsatisfactory door-monitor-cum-alarm system.
Volunteers are surrounding and assisting our refugee family, who have "issues" -- health, education, language...and reporting their doings, clearly and succinctly.
Youth leader, wrapping up the year's work, has written an excellent report for distribution.
Volunteer parents continue to work BY CONSENSUS, without hierarchy, to put together a teaching schedule for Summer Sunday School.
As of the end of May we are in the black. This is unusual, and VERY comforting.
I have a doozie of a wedding coming up tho' -- the couple are just fine, but the friend-of-the-family clergyman they invited to share the service is going to have some trouble adapting his mind to what we'd like him to do. The bride is saying, "If we had known how much we would like your way of doing it -- we wouldn't have asked him AT ALL--but now we're afraid of hurting his feelings"...I had to phone him last night and tell him we'd like him to read the prefatory harangue, and lead the prayers for the couple. Funny dialogue.
Offsite Clergyman: "And...the talk? the address?"
Rambler: "Actually, the couple have asked ME to preach at their wedding."
OC: "Well, but, I have known the bride since she was just a little girl. Didn't she tell you that?"
Rambler: "As a matter of fact, she did."
OC: (huffing somewhat) " I do hope that there will be some opportunity for me to Say A Few Words to the couple."
Do you suppose I have the 'nads to suggest sweetly that he might well do so -- at the reception???
I am keeping in mind that our INTENT here is not to disconcert the bride. I shall practise winking at her, in case of tense territorial moments.
But I have had e-mails today from members of Vestry and other volunteers in the parish of MH & U, and I am gratified and humbled.
New Vestrywoman who is a librarian has run to earth all the specifics of the permissions we need to purchase in order to play and sing (and, naturally, reprint) certain favourites of our praise band. And she has communicated her findings, LUCIDLY, to the rest of us.
'Nother Vestryman, our IT Guy and Sultan of Scrounge, has located a techie friend willing to do some installation of cables, resuscitating our most unsatisfactory door-monitor-cum-alarm system.
Volunteers are surrounding and assisting our refugee family, who have "issues" -- health, education, language...and reporting their doings, clearly and succinctly.
Youth leader, wrapping up the year's work, has written an excellent report for distribution.
Volunteer parents continue to work BY CONSENSUS, without hierarchy, to put together a teaching schedule for Summer Sunday School.
As of the end of May we are in the black. This is unusual, and VERY comforting.
I have a doozie of a wedding coming up tho' -- the couple are just fine, but the friend-of-the-family clergyman they invited to share the service is going to have some trouble adapting his mind to what we'd like him to do. The bride is saying, "If we had known how much we would like your way of doing it -- we wouldn't have asked him AT ALL--but now we're afraid of hurting his feelings"...I had to phone him last night and tell him we'd like him to read the prefatory harangue, and lead the prayers for the couple. Funny dialogue.
Offsite Clergyman: "And...the talk? the address?"
Rambler: "Actually, the couple have asked ME to preach at their wedding."
OC: "Well, but, I have known the bride since she was just a little girl. Didn't she tell you that?"
Rambler: "As a matter of fact, she did."
OC: (huffing somewhat) " I do hope that there will be some opportunity for me to Say A Few Words to the couple."
Do you suppose I have the 'nads to suggest sweetly that he might well do so -- at the reception???
I am keeping in mind that our INTENT here is not to disconcert the bride. I shall practise winking at her, in case of tense territorial moments.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
reflections
This morning we had a very large memorial service here. The man who died was raised in this parish ... baptized, confirmed, Sunday school, Scouts... and his younger sister is still a staunch parishioner, and the wife of another staunch and active parishioner.
so far as I can tell, though -- neither the widow nor the daughters of the "decedent" are parishioners anywhere, or ever have been.
But they wanted a memorial in the church, because it's so bee-you-tee-ful. And it is, that's quite true.
There is no point in asking them what hymns they would like -- "hymns?" or what Scripture they would like read -- "oh we have such a nice reading right here" and they come out with some ort or shred of A Course in Miracles -- half-a-teaspoonful of Plato mixed with a gallon of swamp water.
And does anybody else have this problem -- people who ask for a church service such as a wedding or a funeral/memorial and then approach the whole thing from a kind of PICNIC mentality..."well we'll have to bring some matches to light the candles, and we'll have to decide where to stand, and what happens next, and who should do what"...
I had one participant, wannabe participant, drifting about the place half an hour before the service, waving a box of fireplace matches and saying, "could I light that tall candle, you know, the one with the design on it, could I light it now?"
Fireplace matches, I ask you...
It's a trivial thing but it's a symptom...to them, this is "just another rentable hall." And I am the catering manager.
I am discouraged and depressed.
so far as I can tell, though -- neither the widow nor the daughters of the "decedent" are parishioners anywhere, or ever have been.
But they wanted a memorial in the church, because it's so bee-you-tee-ful. And it is, that's quite true.
There is no point in asking them what hymns they would like -- "hymns?" or what Scripture they would like read -- "oh we have such a nice reading right here" and they come out with some ort or shred of A Course in Miracles -- half-a-teaspoonful of Plato mixed with a gallon of swamp water.
And does anybody else have this problem -- people who ask for a church service such as a wedding or a funeral/memorial and then approach the whole thing from a kind of PICNIC mentality..."well we'll have to bring some matches to light the candles, and we'll have to decide where to stand, and what happens next, and who should do what"...
I had one participant, wannabe participant, drifting about the place half an hour before the service, waving a box of fireplace matches and saying, "could I light that tall candle, you know, the one with the design on it, could I light it now?"
Fireplace matches, I ask you...
It's a trivial thing but it's a symptom...to them, this is "just another rentable hall." And I am the catering manager.
I am discouraged and depressed.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
A motto for women...
This came through a week or so ago from a good friend, and it tickled me.
You should live so that whenever your feet hit the floor in the morning, Satan says, "OH SH**, she's awake."
You should live so that whenever your feet hit the floor in the morning, Satan says, "OH SH**, she's awake."
Monday, June 23, 2008
Rest eternal...
In memoriam, this morning...
George Carlin -- I still can't think of his portrayal of Al Sleet, the hippy dippy radio weatherman (on "W - I - N - O -- wonderful WINO!!!!!"): "Forecast for tonight: DARK"...without laughing out loud.
also Cyd Charisse. Turner Classic Movies showed The Band Wagon this morning, and I stayed home and watched it. Legs all the way down to the floor, wow.
Bless them both.
George Carlin -- I still can't think of his portrayal of Al Sleet, the hippy dippy radio weatherman (on "W - I - N - O -- wonderful WINO!!!!!"): "Forecast for tonight: DARK"...without laughing out loud.
also Cyd Charisse. Turner Classic Movies showed The Band Wagon this morning, and I stayed home and watched it. Legs all the way down to the floor, wow.
Bless them both.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Vacation company.
One of the joys of these driving holidays in the mountains is getting into truly quirky bookstores -- I have a fondness for Bacchus Books, whence I never come away without something of value. This trip, it was a Carol Shields title I'd never seen before, "A Celibate Season" -- a novel in letters, which Shields co-wrote with...somebody else...(blush to say I've forgotten the name). Highly entertaining, I recommend it.
And I had taken along a satchel full of miscellaneous theology, of which I really read only a part of Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Melody of Theology: A Philosophical Dictionary" -- very stimulating it was, too, and satisfyingly opinionated without being cranky.
In some ways it was a very Mary Oliver-ish kind of vacation trip - lots and lots of deer, herons too, and even four bears -- had there been any owls or foxes visible, it would have been just about perfect from the point of view of her bestiary. I had with me one volume of her "New and Selected Poems" (or "Selected and New," I'm not perfectly sure!) -- and this was the one that hit home most powerfully.
Grass
"Those who disappointed, betrayed, scarified! Those who would still put their hands upon me! Those who belong to the past!
How many of us have weighted the years with groaning and weeping? How many years have I done it how many nights spent panting hating grieving, oh, merciless, pitiless remembrances!
I walk over the green hillsides, I lie down on the harsh, sun-floavored blades and bundles of grass; the grass cares nothing about me, it doesn't want anything from me, it rises to its own purpose, and sweetly, following the single holy dictum: to be itself, to let the sky be the sky, to let a young girl be a young girl freely -- to let a middle-aged woman be, comfortably, a middle-aged woman.
Those bloody sharps and flats -- those endless calamities of the personal past. Bah! I disown them from the rest of my life, in which I mean to rest."
And I had taken along a satchel full of miscellaneous theology, of which I really read only a part of Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Melody of Theology: A Philosophical Dictionary" -- very stimulating it was, too, and satisfyingly opinionated without being cranky.
In some ways it was a very Mary Oliver-ish kind of vacation trip - lots and lots of deer, herons too, and even four bears -- had there been any owls or foxes visible, it would have been just about perfect from the point of view of her bestiary. I had with me one volume of her "New and Selected Poems" (or "Selected and New," I'm not perfectly sure!) -- and this was the one that hit home most powerfully.
Grass
"Those who disappointed, betrayed, scarified! Those who would still put their hands upon me! Those who belong to the past!
How many of us have weighted the years with groaning and weeping? How many years have I done it how many nights spent panting hating grieving, oh, merciless, pitiless remembrances!
I walk over the green hillsides, I lie down on the harsh, sun-floavored blades and bundles of grass; the grass cares nothing about me, it doesn't want anything from me, it rises to its own purpose, and sweetly, following the single holy dictum: to be itself, to let the sky be the sky, to let a young girl be a young girl freely -- to let a middle-aged woman be, comfortably, a middle-aged woman.
Those bloody sharps and flats -- those endless calamities of the personal past. Bah! I disown them from the rest of my life, in which I mean to rest."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
