May

Hi, its crazy that I only have about one plus months left or Relay. Here’s a snapshot of what I’ve been up to:

Southbank:
-At Southbank we just had the second to last CU meeting of the year. next week is a bank holiday and the week after they are having a barbeque at the house of the new chaplain who has proved to be a really good resource and support for the CU.
-last week as one of the CU members is really keen on handing out tracts and always pushing for us to be doing more evangelism (which is great), I designed a tract for the CU, and we cut them up together to be given to friends, hall mates and coursemates, hopefully leading to conversations.

- As many of the students from this year won’t be around next year we’re trying to build a committee from what we have and this is encouraging and exciting- two have already said they will come to FORUM (a training week for CU leaders at the end of summer).

Kings College, Guy’s campus CU:
-I just got back from their last CU meeting of the year as well, and will be going away with them for their end of term weekend away in Kent. Wes and I will be leading a seminar on International students which I’m quite looking forward to doing.

Lucy-
Lucy is the Taiwanese student I’ve been meeting the whole year to study the Bible with.
This has been really encouraging as she’s been really eager to learn, and has gradually made our meeting a regular occurrence whereas at the beginning it was hard to find a time to meet as she was always very busy. Now I’ve met socially with her as well with some of her mainly international friends. I had her over at Easter time and cooked steamed fish for her!

New Word Alive
I went to New Word Alive for the first time as a steward. I enjoyed working but meeting students from other regions and not feeling as though I had a ‘Relay-worker’ relationship to them as we were serving as stewards together. And although it was hard work, it was a bit like having time off relay so I could go back again with a fresh perspective. It was also great to meet and catch up with other relay workers from other regions, and nice doing type of job I’ve done before but with Christian leadership and Christian workers and really appreciating the difference in work atmosphere.

Other news
There are three of us relayers in London, Joe, Liv and I. And we’ve recently started doing some of our study days together, organizing study days (/afternoons/mornings) in Joe’s or my flat that involve a simple soup and bread lunch, some discussion of study and work in general and also of course some studying. It’s been nice to have that peer interaction, to be able to discuss things which we are all studying or things which we are engaging with in the week.

On this note, in my elective study (four hours of study per week on a topic which I’ve chosen as opposed to core study which is on theology that has been already set out for us) I’ve been studying economics as I’m really interested in kind of development issues, from living in a part of the world that interacts with and is geographically close to areas of great poverty.

In the next final couple of weeks my elective study time is to be used in thinking about film narrative in a ‘Christian’ way- in the broadest sense. I think that God is the best storyteller and want to use the Bible as an inspiration for creative work to prepare for the future, to be able to integrate my faith with my work. the plan is to read a book called ‘Imagine’ that I’ve heard good things about, and to write a script for a five-minute drama.

Snapshot of other reading (I recommend both these books):

Future:
-this Friday we have London UCCF team day at which I’m preparing and leading the Bible study for.
- Guy’s houseparty this weekend
-In two weeks I’m going to Relay Three, and will need to prepare a three minute presentation of my relay year there
- meeting up with the new Committee members of Guy’s
- Next week we want to organise a social for the new potential committee for Southbank a mixture of fun, getting to know each other and also some essential business, so pray that everyone can make it for that.
-After Relay three there is a joint team couple of days time with other regions which is the last sort of final thing of the year!
-Personally I’m moving to Hong Kong after Relay to work for a friend making videos- Leaving on the 14th July so will soon have to make preparations for moving.

Pancake Week

This week has been really good, text-a-toastie on Friday was very encouraging with about three new students participating who hadn’t been to a Christian Union meeting. We moved to a different set of halls from last time and maybe getting texts was a bit slow-going but it was a good bonding time for the CU outside of the regular meeting. Its been encouraging at a time of the year when CU numbers usually drop due to more time pressures to see CU numbers at Southbank going up. On Monday I had the privilege of leading a Bible study from a series going through Philippians which had been my previous study response (almost every month we do what is called a study response based on what we’ve been studying. This can be an essay, a reflection, a Bible study, or a good answer to a conversation topic that might come up relating to the topic).

Thought of the day:
I’m putting all my efforts into trying to be normal yet relishing the fact that this is different from most people who are putting their efforts into being different, standing out, and therefore I’m being different.

Was thinking about how this might relate to the kind of thoughts about trinity that are talking about diversity and unity coexisting within God. As humans we all want to a certain measure to be the same as everybody else but at the same time we want to be unique and different. We strive for unity as well as diversity at the same time.

Mini-update

The plan is atm to do more mini-updates rather than few and massive ones. Things are settling down slightly- over the last weekend was FORUM London which is a training weekend for new CU leaders. The main theme of the talks and weekend was that Christian leadership craves first and foremost character, and other things are secondary such as charisma, telling funny stories etc. I think the message was quite freeing as well as challenging. The freedom of not being amazing in the eyes of the world’s ideas of leadership but still the points about what good character actually looks like challenging for all.

I enjoyed my responsibility of leading a small group that discussed after each talk the most- it was amazing to see how a group of girls who essentially started off as strangers to each other were so free to talk about how they were personally affected by the talks and there was a real spirit of honesty.

Pray for:
-Southbank- doing another text-a- toastie tomorrow (people text a question about God to a number and members of the CU deliver a toastie and the answer to that question)!

Just to say thanks…

Praise God that this week I’ve managed to raise what I need for the rest of relay, and thanks for all of those of you who are being a part of that! This Monday I was thinking about recent events that have been happening- will update more on this later. Basically some more of the puzzle pieces seem to have fallen in place in a way which makes me feel that I should have had more faith in God working all along.

I decided that God is teaching me faith by not giving me what I needed and things I wanted straight away even though He could. Ultimately training me for that long-term heaven-eternity perspective He wants me to have. And after I decided this and did think- I have more confidence in my God because he’s brought me this far and where I’ve trusted, he’s responded.

Then the next day I randomly checked my Finnish bank account- which I haven’t checked for three months as I basically emptied it and have nothing that should be going in. And I had 250 pounds of tax rebate that I’d had sitting there since December!

And so I started adding up my finances in my head while cycling home- and it all seemed to fit together whereas before it had not. and I came home and worked it out three times over still not being able to trust my own calculations. And now Kevin has sent me my finances in a spreadsheet titled ‘Sadie P&L’ that looks ridiculously professional which equals to professional accounting in my view and the conclusion is that I am in the green- I have what I need. So I sit here chuckling to myself as I look at my ‘net income’, ‘stats’, ‘expenditure’, ‘lumpsum income’ and ‘prospective income’.

Please pray:

- For next week which is South West mission week- against spiritual attack, for energy and motivation, and most of all that people would come to the events, hear the gospel, trust in Jesus as their saviour and have their lives changed!
- For Southbank as they are forming plans for the future- for unity, good communication as there are so many different cultures represented that we want to include successfully. For the leader that has just stepped forward, for her personal and spiritual growth, and for Southbank leadership to be present at the upcoming ‘Forum London’ which is a training weekend for CU leaders that has proved to be a foundational experience for many CU leaders.
- Pray for Guy’s as their committee is changing over now. Pray for a renewed vision and purpose with the new leadership. Pray that what needs to be passed on will be and what needs to be renewed will be.
- And praise God for the Relay worker from Northern Ireland who survived a plane crash walking away essentially unharmed after they prayed as a team for safe travel before he left.

I’m getting into the Christmas feel

Here is the video I’ve edited for the carol services that are happening next week! Thought I’d share:

http://player.vimeo.com/video/17211198

Are you invited? from Sadie Granberg on Vimeo.

Third month of relay

This month is when everything has really kicked off and everything has been quite busy and we had a helpful session about dealing with busyness which I’m trying to absorb slowly. (but I’m too busy!) I think one challenge I’m finding is that I think I can do more than I can and I need to allow myself to work not so much so that I can spend time with other relationships which is what tends to go out the window first. So now I’m trying to plan ahead a bit more and schedule in time for non-relay people.

What has happened:

I did my first ever talk at Southbank on being passionate about unity- talking about the trinity and how unity is essential to God’s being, represented by marriage, and by unity in Christ’s body- therefore it is something beautiful, God-like and something to be passionate about and really to strive for. I felt it went okay, got some good feedback. It was terrifying to do but I’m glad that I’m being challenged in this way and hope to do more. This really got me thinking about the fact of speaking truth which is a very UCCF thing but not one I’d considered before. I thought about how much info I get from talks and how sometimes it is important to say stuff and be proactive about it for example in conversation rather than always waiting for that moment when the key question is asked.

I have started two one-to-ones with students and we will be studying through Luke together which I have been studying with Wes my supervisor in our one-to-ones. One is with a Taiwanese girl at Guy’s and the other with a girl at Southbank.
This has also been scary but I think its good practice for the future to be able to know Luke really well and to have studied through the Bible with someone before. If I were not doing this program maybe it’s something that I would never do… I would probably still think its a good idea though.

Learning: about God’s sovereignty over creation, sin , man and about the authority, necessity, and sufficiency of scripture.

“He is before all things, and in him all things hold together” Colossians 1:17

UCCF stuff happening- UCCF have been uniting the CU’s around London to prepare for a combined mission week next year and also a combined carol service on the 3rd December. I’m helping to edit the publicity video for the carol service so will hopefully be posting that up soon. the theme is around Luke and pigeons- pigeons because one of themes in Luke is outcasts and people who don’t belong receiving the gospel.

Personal:
Was in Rwanda for my friend’s wedding sponsored by my parents which was quite an amazing experience! Kevin’s parents bought his brother a flat and so I’ve been involved in getting furniture for it but that has been quite stressful so will try to avoid that in the future. Have been cycling as much as I can and last week I ventured into central London and went to Bond street and team day by bike. I was able to do this thanks to a cycling lesson I took offered by Southwark council that was actually really helpful.

prayer points:
-Praise God that I have two people who are both eager to dig deeper into the Bible with me! pray for them and for their studies.
-For Southbank as they are making decisions about building a committee for after Christmas- that the right people would step up to the task and that they would be blessed, encouraged, challenged, and supported. Also to pray for unity within the CU, that they would work hard at being united in order to show Christ!
-Praise God that I have plane tickets to go home to HK for Christmas and my whole family will be there as well!
- Pray that I will continue to depend on God as I have started and to continue to live by his grace.
- Pray that I would be able to balance time with my friends and with work and not let either suffer, and to have wisdom about this.

Relay One, Forum and Grudem

Second Relay update!

So much has happened and I want to share but the longer it goes I think the more intimidating it will be to write, so here goes! Have now been relaying for a month, and its been really good. We started off with two weeks of conference, relay one and Forum and the highlights of this were really the teaching which was all about grace. grace grace grace. (repetition for emphasis, trying to give a feel of what the teaching was like)

2 Corinthians 12:9
“‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

I feel that this is incredibly freeing, its not about me and my performance in any way, in fact when I’m not good enough that’s a good thing! I felt that if I don’t learn anything or accomplish anything this year than having really learned about grace and the need to incorporate grace into our lives on a daily basis has been worth it, worth doing the entire program.

In the middle of Forum I went back to London to graduate. Having been for two weeks at conferences where everybody was really friendly and there was an atmosphere where I felt like I could just talk to anyone regardless of prior relationship, I then applied these principles at my graduation ceremony. I ended up telling the Goldsmiths warden about UCCF, relay and the Christian Union at Goldsmiths which he seemed at least politely very interested in!

Other highlights have been that I’ve started cycling! this is quite amazing for me because I have attempted to start cycling for the past two years without success. My new second-hand bike:

I won an ipod shuffle at London Southbank’s fresher’s fair in a competition. This involved driving with a car simulator a car in the most economical way! I never win driving games and I never win things like ipods either so this was quite amazing.

The study has been a real blessing as well. In my personal study I’ve been learning about the gnostic gospels, about how the New Testament canon was put together, and about the trinity from Wayne Grudem’s book; Systematic Theology.

My foot is there to attempt to give perspective to the size of the book

Which leads me to share a video I’ve just discovered of some previous relay workers and how they feel about systematic theology. What I love about the relay program is one line in the booklet introducing what relay is which says (it could be a disclaimer): “relay doesn’t take itself too seriously”. Enjoy.

Apparently this is what we have to look forward to in Relay two- the karaoke competition which we have time specifically scheduled to prepare for!

First Relay update!

The first update:

I have not yet decided how much detail to go into so will need feedback on whether you are bothered to read this or not.

Hot and sunny

I have just got back from amazing holiday in a sunny hot country (the USA) to cold, wet England and will be going on the first relay training camp next week! My first (actually second, but first sounds better for emphasis) official relay purchase has been a pair of wellies! I’m updating about these because not only are they awesome, but I bought them for half of the price which was already reduced using Hong Kong haggling skills! (They were discoloured slightly and I have now realised that they are different sizes as well!) The point of talking about this is not again because they are awesome (they match the dress I was wearing to the shop) but I feel like maybe its a small example of how God has been taking care of me in a tangible way.  Other ways have been through random people offering to support me who I’ve barely asked because I’ve been too terrified to, which has meant that I’ve managed to raise half of the 6500 pounds I will be needing for the year. A lady from church offering to show me the bike routes to where I’ll be working this Saturday, and I am being lent an SLR camera on a long-term basis!

They match the carpet!

I read or heard somewhere this last week that faith means to keep on believing in the Goodness of God, that God is good and wants good things for us. I feel that perhaps this is one of the challenges presented by relay,  and that something small like finding a pair of boots that I like which even match the carpet in my room but are also a good price that I can afford is a testimony to the fact that God is good and wants good things for us!

I’ve just moved house, and am in the process of unpacking and getting organised. It has rained more times than I want to count since I’ve been back (I am happy to be back, just need to give a weather update!). Will be living within walking distance of church which is awesome, and one of the first tasks in my new place was to bury a rat in the garden!

I am oscillating between feeling like I’m not quite sure what I’ve gotten myself into and fear of the unknown/ uncertain future and excitement at the new challenge/adventure ahead.

Pray that I would be able to face my fears, settle into my new home and that God would prepare a way for me with people he wants me to meet, situations he wants me in and circumstances where my abilities will meet needs.

End.