average christian guy

An Outrageous Plug

If you are in the Edinburgh area you will find this particular post of interest.

The company I’m working for recently launched a firm called Expediens which is a lifestyle management service. Expediens will do anything for you to reclaim the time which you spend on errands, bookings, household tasks and to do lists.

What’s even better is that membership is now free.

Everyone has tasks they wish they didn’t have to do or would rather spend that time doing something else. If you are in the Edinburgh area head over to the Expediens website and sign up! It’s free to do so, there is no monthly contract and you can book as much or as little as you want.

http://www.expediens.com

A (not so brief) Interlude

Apologies for the impromptu abense of posts - this definitely wasn’t meant to happen!

To fill you in I have plans to relaunch this blog in the next few weeks. It will have a much clearer sets of goals and hopefully the material will be much more applicable to the blog’s title. I have been writing so there is material to be posted.

So until then thank you so much for following the blog. It has been a real learning experience and it is one I hope to continue very soon.

Guy Stuff - The Response

After a whirlwind of comments and an unprecedented number of hits it appears that the topic of “Guy Stuff” has struck a chord with my readership! It has been interesting discussing this issue further with people. More and more I feel that this is an issue which needs to be addressed and the flurry of activity following Sunday’s post clarified that thought.

What has been most interesting is the number of women posing questions on the topic. Far be it from me to try and diagnose the reasons behind that, it could simply be more girls read my blog, but I can safely say that isn’t the case. (As much as my ego would like to believe it)

Where do I go from here?

The end of term is rapidly approaching which means I will be home visiting family for the Christmas period. I plan to use this downtime to write, hopefully, the bones of the various posts around this topic and start to publish them within a week or so. They will be staggered with, what I hope to be, at least a modicome of consistancy.

So keep your eyes peeled, feel free to continue in the comments section and be sure to let me know your thoughts.

Guy Stuff – The Series

It is often brought to my attention that I have, for some reason, named this blog “average christian guy”. Once this has been decided upon as a topic of conversation questions arise such as, “what exactly is an average christian guy?” and “what exactly makes you average?”

All very valid queries.

I am however going to disappoint by not answering these questions, there would be no enigma otherwise, but rather write about “guy stuff” – more specifically stuff that relates to Christian guys. The “average christian guy” hasn’t written a great deal on issues relating to the average christian guy.

I’ve had a number of conversations with close friends recently about the lack of guys in church. By that I don’t mean the lack of numbers but rather the lack of initiative, involvement and inspiration these guys have to serve in church. There are issues guys need to deal with, I doubt my writing will solve the problems, but by at least talking about them we can start the process.

This will be a series of sorts, not overly planned and probably quite sporadic.

Here is where you come in.

I have a few topics on my mind I will write about but I want to know what you want to read. Simply leave a comment, it can be anonymous if you wish, and suggest a topic. Part of me wonders “what the heck am I doing?” by straying into this territory but, hey, let’s see what happens…

Guys – What issues are you dealing with? What is holding you back from living out your God given potential?

Girls – What is it about Christian guys that bugs you? What issues do you think are holding them back?

Edinburgh Churches

Whilst watching the Liverpool Vs. West Ham game this evening at a friends said friend was working on a blog post which equated churches in Edinburgh with Premier League sides.

If Edinburgh Churches were Premier League Teams…

Worth a look if you are in anyway familiar with the Edinburgh church scene!

The Medium and Message of the Gospel

You will notice a poll to the right of the page, feel free to take part.

It’s incredible to think about how many ways we consume media. On an average day it’s not uncommon to listen to the radio, watch television, read a newspaper, listen to your iPod, read a text on your phone, browse the internet, glance at a billboard and read a book. That’s possibly before you even get to work in the morning!

Let’s say for the sake of argument you come across the same piece of information via each one of those mediums - what effect does it have on you? If I read about an album on the internet it probably won’t have the same effect on me as if a friend of mine texts saying “buy this album - it’s incredible!”. Let’s pretend I view the music press as a bunch of pretentious, hyperbolic wastes of space (truth?) but I happen to rate the taste in music my friend has. The text obviously has more weight. An extreme example I grant you but a valid one nonetheless.

What about the Bible?

Do we take the message of the Bible more seriously depending on how we consume it?

Just Christmas

Today Morningside Baptist Church is relaunching its Just Christmas campaign.

The concept is a simple one - spend half your normal Christmas budget and give the other half away to those that need it. Really simple and incredibly effective.

In the UK we will spend approximately £36 billion on Christmas this year alone, even in the midst of economic downturn. Do we really need to spend anywhere near that much?

At MBC we partner with OM in India and the Dalit Freedom Network. Last year we raised enough money to pay for a school and to put over 150 kids through an education - but we know we can do more.

Check out the website and consider donating but more importantly find out what is going on at your own church and get involved. Perhaps you could start your own Just Christmas campaign?