Wow we are home… to come home has always been a wonderful experience for me. I can remember going back home when I was ‘away’ at College. Back home to Orkney. I can also remember the many times driving back, crossing the bridge over the river Mole to go back to Cobham when I had been travelling. I have always loved travelling, but have always enjoyed home more than all the travel.

So here we are home. Palma de Mallorca, Calle de Servet, 6. A day of heavy rain and the putting together of the next podcast. I am planning a number on Dispensationalism: won’t be too easy to do (been working on the script for the first one) as there are so many facts involved. But it has to be done… how damaging I wonder has that theology been?

Escapism. Not just the ultimate of ‘Jesus take me out of here’, but an attidue of God will always be somewhere else other than where I am. I will always need to be going somewhere and will never be satisfied.

Evil world. Don’t expect too much. Oh and be proved right when things go from bad to worse – is that a legitimate exercise of faith?

Being certain over what the Bible is ambiguous over (such as the coming of antichrist) and lose sight of what the Bible is clear over: the kingdoms of this world becoming the kingdom of our Lord and Christ.

Yes, coming home. I wonder if God is still looking forward to coming home? I have always loved it, and I suspect he is looking forward to that day.

So check out the recent podcast – and also go to the notes I put the script up there and there is space to interact with that.

Sitting in San Francisco airport having been in the USA for 8 days. Here are a few short comments (I might make a few more in a later post… and then again this might be it!)

Great to connect with Rich and Lindy Oliver, guys from the north coast who travelled down to be with us, Mahesh and Bonnie Chavda, Bill and Benni Johnson. A privilege too to be with people at Family Christian Center who serve so faithfully in so many practical ways.

We met so many too who will be looking to make a home in Europe. I am sure these next 4 years will see thousands relocate. They have to come with humility, be willing to be hidden. Not networked because they are part of something, but many interconnecting networks that have been shaped relationally, by the faceless ones. What a future… more and more saying goodbye to the construct.

Challenges too in the mix… challenges for me, and bigger challenges for Gayle who has been outside the construct-side of church for some 5 years.

I was certainly able to download some stuff that runs counter to the ‘left behind’ emphasis so prevalent in USA; challenging the clergy / ordination paradigm; the problem (or solution? hey, what about octuplets that were born in the US – a sign of new beginnings?) of the white house, and countering it with the problem or solution being in the body of Christ.

Challenges too – the passion for Christ and the supernatural amidst great humility, maybe best exemplified at Bethel, Redding.

Then so much sight for Spain while here and we will be off more than once to the place of Christian entry to the island when we return. Power issues have been one of the main things God has raised for us in Spain: lots more on this in due course.

Spain a bridge that Paul was aiming for – a place of turning for apostolic mission… so yes, that about sums it up. Greatly impacted while here, but focused on what we must do.

God has spoken to us. Connect with a huge vision – his; then we can play a small part. No need to try and be big.

Here is an exciting invitation from Greg Valerio to come and celebrate the Celtic Easter date at Whitby – will be the first time that will have taken place since 664AD.

Celtic Easter Celebration

As many of you will be aware on the 27th April 2008 a small group of us from the south coast met on Selsey beach close to Church Norton at sunrise to break bread, pray to together and to celebrate the Celtic Easter. Our motivation for doing this was in recognition that God is moving again in our land with fire in a similar way to our indigenous fathers and mothers of old that lived under the Celtic rite.

On that morning we called for the wild fire of heaven to burn again in our lives and in these islands that we live on. We recognised that the institutional control that has so dominated and stifled the work of the Holy Spirit in the church in this country is starting to unstitch and that God is breathing a new freedom upon his people. It was a call to the margins, where the land meets the sea and where the mountains meet the sky, a recognition that we are called to dwell in the deep intimate place with the Trinity and to allow God to have full and unfettered control of His/her people once again. No conditions, no agenda, no control, no programme, just the wild love of God burning in our hearts.

The location for this event was important to us. Church Norton near Selsey was an HQ of Wilfrid first Bishop of Selsey and Chichester. It was Wilfrid who despite his schooling in the Celtic way under Columba at Iona, following a pilgrimage to Rome, fell in love with the grandeur and institutional organisation of the Roman Church and returned with the mission of subduing the Celtic Church’s uniqueness and freedom by bringing it into line with the Roman Rite and the rest of what he called Christendom. In AD664 at the Synod of Whitby the Celtic Churches unique personality in God was usurped by the Roman tradition and their spirituality was all but suppressed. This suppression was manifested in three distinct ways.

• The celebration and dating of Easter. The rhythm of the Celtic Churches unique spirituality based on the Desert Fathers was marginalised by the institutional structure of a more Diocesan rigid model.
• The tonsure (haircut) of monks. The roman rite had the hair cut with a bald crown in imitation of the crown of thorns whilst the Celtic rite had the hair cut over the crown from ear to ear and shaved forward and long at the back in the way of the bards and druids.
• The segregation of the monasteries and abbeys, those under the Celtic way were free to be mixed sex as well as single sex. Hilda of Whitby famously hosted the Council that oversaw the undermining of her unique mixed sex community.

We felt called to stand on the same beach that Wilfrid did and declare we are returning to the ancient Christ centred rhythm of our islands for the sake of the future of these islands. This was both a symbolic act of solidarity with our ancient history and a cry from our hearts for God to move again with wild Holy Fire in our land. This standing together was not about being Celtic, it was about recognising that Jesus must be at the centre of our lives. This is about Jesus in the raw, not a dilution of Jesus through the Institution.

Easter 2009

In 2009 the Celtic Church would have celebrated (as many of our brothers and sisters will in the east) Easter on the 19th April. I am delighted to say that English Heritage have agreed to a celebration within the grounds of Whitby Abbey on the morning of the 19th April starting at 9am.

Therefore we are calling for all our friends in Christ who have journeyed together and those who are yet to find each other in the presence of God, to celebrate, perhaps for the first time since AD664 on this site, our love of Jesus of Nazareth and all that he did for us, his resurrection on Easter morning, break bread and to call again with one heart, one spirit and one voice for these Islands on the western edge of Europe to blaze again with the glory of God, for the angels to ascend and descend at will and for his Kingdom to be manifest in our lives without control. The Spirit and the Bride say ‘Come’.

Below is part of a prayer I wrote for our time in Selsey this year 2008. I believe its point is obvious.

Father Son and Holy Spirit,
Today we call for

Inspiration over Institution
Boats over buildings
Poverty over Riches
Creation over concrete
Intercession over liturgy
Common sense over dogma
Imagination of bureaucracy
Music and Psalms over Noise.
Prophecy over preaching.
Mystery over certainty

Father Son and Holy Spirit,
Today we call for

The unblocking of ancient wells
The wild fires of heaven to burn in us brightly
For angels to be ascending and descending
For signs and wonders occurring
For the air to be thin where we place our feet
For the Holy Fire in the land to rise again
And for us to live where the land meets the sea
And the mountains meet the sky.

I therefore invite anyone with whom this message draws a resonance to join us at 9am on the 19th April 2009 Whitby Abbey to break bread, worship, pray and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Spectators and those with a religious spirit may find this an uncomfortable morning.

Practically English Heritage has agreed to open the Whitby Site from 8.30 in the morning. There will be an entrance fee of £4.25. The public will be allowed onto the site from 10am so they are free to join us if God has not finished with us.

If you are planning on coming please reply to greg.valerio1@virgin.net so I can let the staff at the Abbey have some idea of numbers.

Please forward this to as many people as you believe would be interested, All are welcome its our future.

In Christ Jesus,

Greg Valerio

We are discovering a few things about the festivals in Palma. Animal blessing on Jan 17 (festival of  Sant Antoni, the patron saint of animals); Fiesta of Sant Sebastia, the patron saint of the city, which is then celebrated on January 20th each year – he was credited with saving the city from the Plague. This, one book says, is to also bless the demons!!! They parade giants, demons and dragons in this parade.

We are away for this festival – so another year…

So last night had to move the bed – rain through the roof. Met the owner today and have a reduction on the rent for the months the builders are ‘renovating’ next door. Looks like the cold snap is coming to an end. We have also been able to open a bank account, shop in Ikea and get things we need so slowly things are shaping up.

Looking forward to getting to grips with living here. I think patience is needed and prayer for connections.

I have recorded two more podcasts so that feels good – they will be uploaded in the next few days.