But look, there’s hardly anything left… just a few stones piled on one another, plenty of tourists, strange Turkish men trying to sell programmes and postcards, oh and it’s a bit boggy!

Interestingly the reason the temple got into disrepair and eventually fell down was because Christianity took hold and people released actually there’s a living God, who doesn’t meet in elaborate temples but meets in our hearts, and they didn’t need to come and offer fertility sacrifices but actually Jesus was the perfect, all-sufficient sacrifice.

The point is, it’s a bad idea to start a cult, because it will just end up like this!

More from Ephesus to follow…

Apparently you look better in black and white?

I tried my best to make sure my wedding wasn’t too cliché.

I’ve complained on at least two occasions on this blog that weddings are generally the same and are far too cliché. I vowed that my wedding would never be cliché.

Unfortunately I opened the speech with “my wife and I” – which is as cliché as it gets, so I failed. But on the plus side it was a pretty good day… I should say “happiest day of my life”, but that too is very cliché!

Anyway, not a lot of note happened, but we did visit two very different churches which were well worth a visit…

In Bristol centre we visited Wesley’s Chapel, the oldest Methodist Chapel in the world! We had a look around, saw his study, stood in his pulpit, all in all it was a good experience to see a bit of gospel-ministry history.

We also went to a somewhat different church on the Sunday morning. Not in an old chapel, but in a school. We visited Grace Church Bristol one of a number of Sovereign Grace churches planted in the South-West/Wales.

We received a warm welcome and met with a guy who I remember from CU Leaders training, there was good coffee and a relaxed atmosphere. We moved in to the main meeting room and sang some songs… I was particularly pleased to have sung the song ‘All I have is Christ’, a song from the Looked Upon album which I love – possibly to be played during the signing of the registers!

Nathan Smith, one of the Pastors was preaching through Ephesians (which was good stuff). It was a church where I, as a conservative Anglican felt comfortable and at home. There weren’t any uninterpreted tongues (or interpreted for that matter) and the prophecies which were given weren’t about how the church is going to see revival but clear and simple encouragements for the believers there, which all goes against some experiences and stereotypes of charismatic churches… a gentle and sensitive display of a more charismatic practise. If you’re in Bristol do go and pay them a visit…

The first time I noticed this was at Addis Ababa airport where a large group of Chinese engineers (they had hard hats) was waiting to board a flight to another part of Africa (possibly Nigeria). This disturbed me, mainly because one of them spat on the marble floor of the airport – disgusting! I found a story in the New York Times reporting on China’s resource exploration of Chad, maybe they were on their way there…

The second time I noticed this was on the way in to the centre of Lilongwe. The Peoples Republic of China are building a new parliament building for Malawi, at a cost of around 2 Billion Kwacha (about £40 million). Now there are a number of questions that surround that…

Why did they need a new building? Couldn’t that money have been better spent? What are China hoping to gain from this? All valid questions, with the third question being most puzzling and concerning as China position themselves to have a potentially unhealthy influence in African politics.

There is another dimension to this story. This project is not providing massive employment for the Malawian people because the construction workers are Chinese, often Chinese convicts released from prison to work in Malawi, and with Chinese convicts bored in Malawi there have been reports of crimes including rape having been committed by them.

Is this a Chinese takeover? A solution to their overpopulation? A global search for natural resources? Whatever it is it strikes me as a development that needs to be watched with care…

But we saw something pretty shocking too… World Vision has been supporting the project and has provided a sewing machine and a maize mill to allow the orphanage to generate some income. I guess it’s like one of those alternative gifts you can give… how kind.

Unfortunately World Vision is seriously lacking in any long term vision, a Maize Mill requires electricity to run, so you would have thought that World Vision would have also provided a generator, or some solar panels, or connected them to the grid. As it turns out they did none of these things.

It would cost about £4500 to get connected to the grid, but even then, the orphanage cannot afford to pay the electricity bill, the ideal would be some solar panels so that they can have a sustainable electricity supply which doesn’t cost them to run. The orphanage explained that this maize mill had been sitting idle for 2 years.

We have been hoping that some local business leaders may be willing to provide some sponsorship for this project, however it would be nice if World Vision followed through on the half done job and provided whatever means necessary to get this Maize Mill up and running? If you know someone involved in WV, please ask them…

Well last night was fun wasn’t it? Waste of 90 minutes of my life.

Hey, Fab, here are two changes which would make England play better:

First – take off Heskey, now whatever you think about Heskey as a player, the tactics clearly aren’t working. He doesn’t seem able to link up with Rooney (which is a major problem). But more crucially having Heskey on the picture causes England to play long ball football, not pretty, so far not successful because the gap between forwards and midfield is too great. Even if Heskey can bring the ball down there’s usually little option. The change needed is either to go for a 4-5-1 with say Gerard playing off Rooney, or keep the 4-4-2 but try playing Rooney and Defoe instead.

Second – if you play a 4-4-2 you need some width. Last night Lennon didn’t seem to want to run with the ball, and there was no one down the left. Cole and Johnson, two of the most attacking wing-backs in the world rarely crossed the half-way line in anger. So, everything was aimed through the middle, where Gerard and Lampard under perform. So rather than sticking to Gerard-Lampard-Barry, and sacrificing your width, I would play Wright-Phillips down the right, Lennon down the left and probably Gerard and Lampard in the centre, add Barry into the mix if you play a 4-5-1.

I think these two tactical observations are hardly ground-breaking… Fabio must have seen these, so it’s bizarre that he didn’t address them. I wonder if it is fear… particularly on the width side… where were Cole and Johnson? Why did Lennon not run with the ball? Who was playing left midfield?

Fabio – change it! Maybe this guy was right…

There’s 3 ingredients:

• Sobo Orange (equivilant is Fanta I guess)
• Sprite
• Aromatic Bitters

So basically you’ve got a fizzy orange – you add about half and half of the Fanta and Sprite.

The key ingredient is this ‘Aromatic Bitters’ pictured right which gives the drink it’s flavour.

I’d be very surprised if you can buy it in your average UK supermarket, but you can certainly get in quite cheap online here.

Best served with a bit of ice and a slice of lemon.

Last year Bishop Hannington Church helped to pay for the roof (so that the building wouldn’t fall down), it was great to serve there. We ran 3 evening classes on Principles of Exposition, looking at how we can rightly handle the Bible, including stuff on Parables and Old Testament narrative.

We also visited for the women’s meeting, ran a marriage seminar day, and joined them for their Sunday service. For my part I taught on Bible Principles, Genesis 1-2 and preached on James 1. These were all translated into Chichewa, the local language.

My feeling was that the saying that the Christianity is a mile wide, but an inch deep is true. There’s a great passion for the Gospel, and there’s a great desire to be taught the Bible, but listening to some of the elders teach, it’s clear they really need training to help them rightly understand and teach God’s word… great to be able to serve them in that way.

Apparently it’s pretty embarrasing when you get it wrong and you offer your seat to a fat lady on the train, as this report from the BBC Website suggests.

If I do get a seat on the train, which is rare if travelling from New Malden, but common from Portslade, then my trick is to sit with head in hands, sleep or pretend to sleep… that way if someone who may be pregnant joins the train then it’s easy to pretend I haven’t seen them… no awkwardness, no need to move, and I don’t look like an awful man for not giving up my seat   –   does this make me a bad person?

Gordon looks unfavourably on the general state of preaching in American churches, I agree with his summary and am sure it is equally applied (as a generalisation) to many churches in the UK also.

He sights two main reasons why Johnny can’t preach. Firstly because Johnny can’t read (texts). Gordon suggests that our culture no longer values literature, to the point where we don’t really know how to read properly. Gordon argues that we should get back to reading classical literature to hone our textual skills, or at the very least put a lot more work into scriptural studies including Greek and Hebrew.

Secondly, Johnny can’t write! Gordon says with the invention of the telephone and the Internet that we’ve lost the art of letter writing, of properly constructing well organised text. He says that this means we preach in a poorly organised way too.

On the whole I agree with Gordon’s assessments. We do live in a culture where reading and writing in the traditional sense are devalued, and this does have a negative impact on the way we read the Bible and come to structure and deliver a sermon.

However, Gordon misses one key step. How then do we preach, into a culture where these things are true. It’s all very well to properly read and understand a Bible passage. It’s all very well to compose a well structured sermon, BUT… this is not what our culture is used to or values… I would say it’s the job of the preacher, as well as to understand the passage, and to construct a sermon well, to also communicate with the audience in a culturally ‘normal’ way. Good book, and good insights, but I think misses a logical conclusion to his argument.