30th January A right old bunch of fives

A bunch of Fives #2 – Quandiallacandleco 

I'll be glad to see the end of this month as I feel a bit punch drunk to be honest. Firsty there have been five covenant services to conduct at which we renew our promise to look out for and then join in with whatever God is already doing. 

And whilst is always a good service to lead it is also a challenging one for everyone sharing in it. Especially following on from the cancelation of the 1st one at the beginning of January due to snow, I still have one more to go this Sunday. And whilst some people might think just repeating a service at five different places over the space of a month is actually less demanding than doing five different services, it doesn't seem to be the case.

Then there have been five church council meetings to conduct, each with their own celebrations, concerns and causes of inertia within the life of five very different churches. And stumbling from one to the other, all in the space of a month never leaves enough time to deal with what one meeting has decided before the agenda for the next one is looming on the horizon. Thankfully there have been no major points of contension....fingers crossed.

Lastly, and certainly the most draining, have been the five funerals that I have taken since Chrismas. Now I know some of my ecumenical colleagues are used to take one funeral after another but I can often go months without taking any. Suddenly there have been five, four of which have involved long standing members and big players in the life of their espective churches. And whilst it is always a blessing to be able to conduct these services, they are emotionally exhausting.

And I haven't even mentioned the most tiring of all, trying to get TOM to actually focus on where we are going on our upcoming holiday rather than spending hours following either the path of planes or the adventures of ship we will be travelling on.

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