She made a mask

Laura spent a good few hours making this mask over the half term break ... It's for her art project in school ...I think it's brilliant ..but I suppose I am biased :-)

A couple of days in the lakes ..

Had a week off last week with the highlight being one night at this bed and breakfast in Hawkshead . The lake district is a wonderful place especially at this time of year . However it does like to rain there :-)

Also visited Rob ( my nephew) who lives as a student in Blackpool . He hates the place and can't wait to finish his course this year so that he can escape . I must admit I do share his dislike for the place ..Blackpool does nothing for me ... anyway here are some pics..

Singing in the Bowness Rain !!

The Seagulls of windermere ..

Laura studies Wordworth's Grave

The Hills are alive with colour in Grasmere

Billy Bob & the Crew

It brought back memories ....

Last night Gill and I were treated to a trip to the Birmingham Hippodrome to see Willie Russells Blood Brothers .

A play set in 1970's Liverpool about twin brothers growing up, separated in different families and different cultural classes .

It brought back many childhood memories of dirty knees and games of "Cowboys and Indians" . I thoroughly enjoyed the evening, particularly the memories that it evoked . If you get a chance go and see it .

Coffee morning on tour

Yesterday some of the Coffee morning punters went on tour to see Doris ( the Lady in the blue top)

Doris left Wem in July to go and live nearer to her Son in Brampton near Cambridge . It was a great day out ...the food and cakes were especially good :-)

Visit from old friends ... or is that Ancient friends :-)

Chris & Brenda

Yesterday it was our great honour as a family to dine with the Cliff's . Chris & Brenda are good friends from our days at Wheelock Heath . They joined us for morning worship at Wem , which again was greatly blessd with numbers ...extra seats having to be put out for the fourth week running ...

Busy week ahead ....essays to write on top of the usual stuff ..

Not quite sure what they were getting up to here !!! Captions anyone :-)

A successful days conker hunting

We did well. Here is the evidence ............

Conker Hunting

Going on a conker hunt with Laura today ...I love conkers , there is something about the horse chestnut that compels you to go looking for them

Fascinating fact .....Ever wondered why they call it 'Horse Chestnut ' ? Apparently its because the empty shell often looks like a horseshoe ....So now you can sleep well at night having solved the mystery that I am sure has troubled you for years :-)

Danny returns

Dan the man is back
Danny ..Pastor of this church ...has made a welcome return to the blogosphere ...but will it last??Those who know him can leave a comment ...Do you think he will go the distance ???

Great night tonight at Senior YPF .... between Junior and Senior we had just under 80 young people ...Praying that all of them would have a faith that yields much fruit

Be Careful ..............

Joshua , the God fearing man who took over from Moses and led the children of God over the Jordan and into the promised land said this on his deathbed....

Joshua 23:11 ( ESV)

"Be very careful , therefore to love the Lord your God"

He tells us in that chapter to keep God's covenant , He tells us to cling to the Lord , he tells us not to step out of line by breaking God's Law ...

We all need to be very careful ....The dictionary definition of careful is

"Attentive to potential danger, error, or harm; cautious: was careful when crossing the busy street; gave a careful answer."

How attentive are we to the potential dangers that will harm our faith in Jesus Christ ???

Read and meditate on the last two chapters of Joshua click here God has spoken to me through them today and I trust he will do the same for you

Did you walk to work today ?

And I thought I had a problem with lazyness....

Shan't be having beef on Sunday then....

These cows need a spell -checker :-)

Hungry?

This morning I have been asked to do a school assembly called "Mind the Gap" .It's all about world starvation and how young people can make a difference by trying to bridge the gap between ourselves and third world countries .

Today 16,000 children around the world will die from starvation , thats one child every five seconds ....

Do we care ?. We should . Jesus said that we should " Love our neighbour as ourselves " . God instructs us to help the poor . As Christians we are challenged to be "Lights" in a dark world that is very self centred . With little sense of community

The problem is so big that often we shrug our shoulders and say there is nothing I can do . but there is , the smallest contribution can save one life .

Little things make a huge difference . There are lots of good organisations that are set up to help you help ..... click here for instance ..... why not buy a goat for a village for Christmas ...

Do it...... And save a life

Wheelock Re-visited

We all went back over to our old church at Wheelock heath last night . It was great to have fellowship with some old friends . Ben Griffin preached . Ben is a top bloke with a real heart for the gospel .

It's been two years since we left the church and to my shame this was the first time we have been back on a Sunday . Hopefully, if time and preaching engagements allow, we will not leave it another two years. Thanks to all who made us feel so welcome last night .

When You go to worship

When you worship God ( if you do worship him ) . How do you prepare ? Do you pray ? I read a prayer of Charles Haddon Spurgeon today ...That man knew all about worship .... Read an extract from this book with me

" Glorious God , it is the flower of our being to worship you;this is the crown and glory of life , to adore and worship the Life-giver from whom all good things come. Worship has often been to us as a bath in heavenly pleasure, and we have come out of it refreshed and comforted , blessed and filled with heavenly delight . Oh for the Holy Spirit's power to help us in worship now!. Breathe upon us , O Divine Spirit, and let that breath cause us to forget the world , but bring us into the fullest life in the contemplation of God and heaven ."

Now that is a prayer and a half from a man who had experienced the delights of true worship

Elder on the Run

One our church elders has escaped to China with his wife for a month ( a long way to go for chicken fried rice )

Steve is keeping us all up to date with his escapades via e-mail . This photo is one he took of the "Great Wall" on Monday ...














I am amazed by this wall ...thousands of miles long ...built to keep people out . It started me thinking about the walls we build to keep God out and the names we call them .

The great wall of health wealth and prosperity .... don't need God if you build this one ( or at least you don't think you need God )

The suffering wall .... the one that says there is no God because we suffer ( those who build this wall don't recognise that God knows all about suffering ...look at the cross of Jesus)

The religious wall .... the one that says I'm a good person I obey the rules ( most of the time ) I go to church now and then ...thats enough ( no it's not listen to what the Apostle Paul wrote in Ephesians "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast."
Faith first ...belief and trust first .....doing good works must always flow from that ..

Anyway I'm off to Go and knock down any walls that I have built that keep me from a life of faith and trust ...

If you can suggest any other walls that we build then give us all the benefit of your wisdom in the comments ..........

The Legacy of John Bunyan

I have been reading again some of the works of John Bunyan over the last couple of days ( for those that don't know he is most famous for having written " The Pilgrims progress".)

I love his writings , they may well be full of thee's and thou's ,written in the langauge of the 17th century but they are very compelling and applicable to our day and age .

If you get a chance pick up a copy of anything by Bunyan . He may be long dead but his written legacy lives on . A man who "Walked the talk" .

Back to the Grindstone

Today is my study day . For those of you who have forgotten , in my spare time I am studying for a degree in theology at this place via distance learning . I am just over half way through ...so it's head down and books out ...

Tonight at the YPF we will be looking at the question " How do I know God Exists " ...if that question troubles you then e-mail me and we will have a cyber converstation about it .... anyway back to the books ...but first I'll put the kettle on :-)

Oh and at some point today I really must do a little excercise ....

Ordination Here I come

Well its official , last night the members of the church voted me in as full time assistant pastor from January next year . .....cost me hundreds in bribes :-)

So there you have it ... Pastor Rob ...Rev Rob ... or big bad rob ( the latter description sits much more comfortably with me!)

The hospitality has gone too far !!

This morning when I came down into the kitchen I noticed a Frog swimming merrily in the dog's water bowl!! ..... now I am a great believer in hospitality but this is taking it too far ..;-)

Harvest Time a couple of Dodgy preachers :-)

Elvis
"The Tombstones" thinking about playing a medley fo their greatest hits .
" Gis A Kiss"


As a church we celebrated Harvest yesterday . Great Day . In the morning the church was full ( Again ) and then in the afternoon we had a time of worship on Wem Towns "Millenium Green" followed by a meal together back at church . Great day , great fellowship

The power of the cross.

Alistair Begg preaching at Mars Hill church Seattle click here and then click on watch now ( or download it via MP4 file) picked up from the resurgence blog ( link in the column on the right)...have a cup of tea or coffee to hand as it's 50 minutes long ..... but worth it .

No More Blonde Jokes !

I forgot to tell you that my wife in no longer Blonde ...anyone got any good brunette jokes ;-)

Asleep on the Job

Feel a little like this poor chap ...it's been a hectic few days ...but I shall have to wake myself up because the to do list is getting out of hand :-)

It's over ..

Our week of mission climaxed last night in our "Songs of Praise" evening in the school hall . Approx 300 towns folk turned up to sing and hear the Gospel , Roger Carswell spoke clearly, heralding the good news of Jesus Christ ( as he has all week) . Gill ( my better half) also gave her testimony .

On Saturday night John Mosey had been in town . A wonderful Christian man who told the story of how he coped with the sudden death of his only daughter in the Lockerbie air disaster in 1988.
John is a very honest humble man with a powerful message of hope and joy in the midst of much suffering .

On Friday Vinny Commons was over to speak to the youth . Vinny is a football coach at Preston North end with a real heart for young people . Many of the young people were affected by what he had to say .. ( Vinny is on the left of the photo)

The Lord has really blessed us this week . We have had great fellowship with Roger Carswell and Roger Carter . The gospel has been preached clearly . Souls have been saved , massive bridges have been built with the community and the members of the church are buzzing at its success ...

So Roger & Roger if you are reading this get your diaries out as we will do it all again in a couple of years time ..

Thanks to all who made this a mission worth remebering .

I wonder

"I wonder " thought Phil " Just where have all the grey hairs gone? " :-)

Enough to Frighten anyone away!!

As you can see from this photo of Eddie Roberts and Roger Carswell we as a church know how to invite the best looking speakers to our events :-)
The little fella in between Eddie and I is Roger Carter . Roger used to be a jockey but is now in full time Christian ministry . He is supporting Roger Carswell all week ...he is a top bloke .

Eddie ( Hard Man ) Roberts

Brilliant night last night ...Big Eddie came along with his bouncers ( 2 sons " The Double D Brothers ", his wife and a few folk from his youth work )

He was superb and had 190 folk spellbound with his story . Eddie had been a very tough nut in his younger days in Liverpool but the Lord had his hand upon him and eventually brought him to his knees in faith .
Great personal story. If your reading this Eddie thanks mate ,keep in touch .

No meeting tonight , we thought we would give old man Carswell a break ..but he will be back on Friday all guns a blazing

Hope to have a photo of Eddie to post later on ...the only problem is he is wanted by interpol ...so don't blame me Eddie :-)

Caption Competition

This is a pic from last nights Roger Carswell interview with Rosemary Conley
I thought I would run a caption competition ...here is one to start

" Please Please let me touch your knee Roger "

Have a go in the comments ...

Diet , Fitness & Jesus

Rosemary Conley was interviewed last night in our week of mission . She along with Fiona Castle on Monday was superb . Rosemary was converted at the age of 40 and clearly told us what a life changing moment that was for her and has continued to be .

Tonight we have a guy from my home town Eddie Roberts who used to live a life of crime ...should be interesting

Wedding Anniversary

Gill and I Celebrate 19 years of marriage today ...well sort of , I'm not really able to celebrate it because I am out at a WHY mission meeting tonight ... But I am sure we will find time later in the week ...in the meantime I am in the dog house :-)