Down-to-earth Worship and Pastoral Ministry

A marvellous morning's worship at Bogwulf Baptist Chapel.

For the last few months I have been struggling to explain to my little flock that the full name of the church is due to a spelling mistake - that we are Fundamentalist Baptists, not Funambulist. And today, praise be, they have seen the error of their ways! They have not actually gone so far as to take the tightropes down - they are not completely convinced yet - but they have at least spent the entire service at ground level. Friends, you have no idea of the joy that it is to conduct a service without the need for a safety net or balancing poles. And the ladies are finally wearing something more becoming for worshipping Christians than sequinned leotards.

Before leaving for her holiday, Eileen came over to taunt me over last week's service. She claims that a number of members of my congregation fell asleep during my sermon - an unwarranted claim. They were merely in deepest meditation over the spiritual truths that I was uttering. However Dougal was so deeply moved by the words I uttered that he fell from the high wire and crashed onto the pew below - although I am sure this is not why everyone agreed to sit in the pews this week.

But I was truly impressed with the response to my call for people to come forward for prayer this morning. Kayleigh and Kylie, the young  singers in our music group, have both passed their pastoral ministry training courses in the last week on a residential at Hope Springs Bible College. And today I explained that they were prepared to offer prayer and counselling ministry to anyone which wished to receive it. Truly I have never seen such a flood forward of young - and not so young - men wishing to receive personal ministry. The so-called "Archdruid" next door, who wonders why so few men are interested in the emotional, touchy-feely, feminized worship that she provides, will hear all about this veritable outbreak of masculine spirituality. I will have to ask Kayleigh and Kylie to provide ministry on a more frequent basis. Although Marjory has assured me that I personally would not benefit from their assistance.