Word in season

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Two important and substantial aspects of sharing life together as a church community are:

• the centrality of God's word
• sharing times together outside of Sunday

Traditionally these have been met through emphasising personal biblical devotions and through small group ministry. Last year, for instance, we had a number of small groups (men's, women's, young adults') and we promoted the M'Cheyne bible reading program in conjunction with a sermon series on spirituality at the beginning of the year. And while the small groups are currently on hiatus we hope to ramp them up again.

However, quiet times and shared study of the Bible does not require a formalised program. And rather than re-invent the wheel, we thought we'd combine M'Cheyne with a leaf out of the book of New Hope church's Life Journal program.

Every person at Connections got a Christmas present this year - a small notebook and a booklet called "Connections@Home" which contains the M'Cheyne readings and some direction on how to go about journalling (which is what the notebook is for) as part of daily devotions - and how to share that with others.

The journalling method promoted is the "SOAP" method - write down a meaningful Scripture from out of the day's readings, some Observations about it and how it Applies to your life, and a Prayer about that application.

You can share SOAP together by getting together with people for a "20-20-20" time - spending 20 minutes reading the readings, 20 minutes journalling, and 20 minutes sharing and praying together.

A lot of our Connections people are now SOAPing and 20-20-20ing together. Twice a week I do my devotions outside a cafe in the main street of Somerset and it's fantastic to have people join me there.

God's Word is the stuff of life. I'm looking forward to our 2009.