jonnybaker

signs of the spirit

signs of the spirit grace tomorrow night

i absolutely love dean's photo that he has used for the flier

off to nick cave tonight which i'm looking forward to...

new movies for pentecost

we have added three movies to proost for may. they are all movie loops
flames flickering
eagle in flight
and incense smoke rising

you can preview them in the movie player on proost. my personal favourite of these is the smoke movie created by mark waddington which we have used loads of times over the years at grace.

wallpaper for the soul...

spirit of life - worship trick 3 series 3

i did say a couple of weeks back that i'd say more about the experiences on the dekhomai stand at the mind body spirit festival. however as i have thought about it they all relate to stories of people i talked and prayed for or did the jesus deck with so i decided not to say more. other than to say we had a great time and sensed god with us. it was wonderful to be there on pentecost sunday rather than in a church meeting.

david has asked me a couple of times now in comments what my thinking is regarding the work of the holy spirit and praying for people to receive who aren't christians...

I am interested in your experiences of praying for people to receive the Spirit outside of a Christian context. Some would say that faith would need to come first. However I was filled the Spirit first - albeit in a Pentecostal prayer meeting - even when I wasn’t sure I believed all this Christian stuff.

i haven't totally thought this through but it's been my view for years that life is a gift of the spirit as is every breath we take. god loves all people so why wouldn't god be present outside of our "christian" context with people bringing the healing of creation wherever with whoever? but i guess a longer answer might be in order. the best book of theology on the holy spirit in my view is jurgen moltmann's spirit of life and the follow up source of life. on saturday we had a grace spirit service and for it i wrote a responsive piece  of liturgy. the responses are from the first verse of the hymn breath on me breath of god. the lines are all quotes from moltmann's source of life but reworked as directed to god. i think this is as good as i can do in the time available. if you can pray this prayer it makes perfect sense to be joining in with the healing of the spirit of life at mind body spirit. at grace we had to cut a few things out so this piece of liturgy didn't actually get used. i have left the instructions for kite making in at the end as this is what followed in the service.

spirit of life

your breath of life fills the whole world and holds all things together.
if you withdraw your breath everything turns to dust

breathe on me breath of god

you are the source of life that brings life to the world, whole life, full life, unhindered, indestructible everlasting life

fill me with life anew

the life of your spirit which christ sends into the world is the power of the resurrection which brings us new life

breathe on me breath of god

the sending of your spirit is the revelation of god's indestructible affirmation of life and marvelous joy in life

fill me with life anew

jesus where you are there is life. where you are sick people are healed, sad people are comforted, marginalised people are accepted and the demons of death are driven out

breathe on me breath of god

where your holy spirit is present there is life.
the powers and energies of eternal life are experienced.

fill me with life anew

the mission of your spirit is a movement for life and a movement for healing which spreads consolation and the courage to live and raises up what wants to die.

breathe on me breath of god

we affirm and love life so much that we protest against death and all the powers that disseminate death.

fill me with life anew

help us to join with your comforting of the sad, healing of the sick, welcoming of strangers, and forgiving of sins.

breathe on me breath of god

send your spirit so that this world should not perish but live

fill me with life anew

spirit of the new creation break into the here and now bringing foretastes of the age to come when all things are made new, and creation is set free from the powers of death

breathe on me breath of god

spirit of god renew the face of the earth

fill me with life anew

give us hearts of flesh for hearts of stone

that we may love as you would love
and do what you would do
amen

we will make kites to fly in the wind as a sign that we want to place ourselves in the flow of the wind of god's spirit to join in with the spirit of life's bringing life to the world. the kites will be different as are the gifts of who we are and the gifts we have been given. feel free to write on your kite any reflections or prayers as you place yourself in the wind. though one kite is small together the kites will fill the skies with movement and colour, energy and life, a celebration of the spirit.

spirit

spirit, originally uploaded by jonnybaker.

three candles at grace spirit last night. more about that later...

spirit

because we have our main grace once a month, although pentecost sunday was last weekend we are celebrating the coming of the spirit next saturday, june 9. i enjoyed pentecost sunday more than ever this year because i was praying for people on the dekhomai stand to be filled with the spirit or to be healed which seemed an entirely appropriate way to pass the day. anyway here's the info on the next grace...

come and breathe in the spirit of god

for pentecost

come to think of it (thanks cheryl)

pentecost grid blog :: revisited

a few people were wondering what the pentecost grid blog :: was all about. part of the idea was that after it you can type pentecost grid blog :: into google and see a range of reflections on pentecost from round the world and hopefully a bunch of creative ideas as well. having had a quick trawl through i think jonathan finley's video is neat. i also love josh's digital flame and suspect his video is brilliant but i couldn't work out how to see it... (update: have just checked back and it is now here ).

i am making the pentecost grid blog :: worship trick 25 so that i have a record of it - i think it's a neat concept (you may also remember the advent grid blog)

it wasn't part of the grid blog but the story that i liked was every tribe and tongue

Technorati Tags: pentecost, worship tricks, alternative worship

pentecost grid blog :: retro reading of acts 2

i said i'd take part in the pentecost grid blog :: but ended up visiting my new niece liza which was of course a wonderful thing to do on a day that celebrates birth (of the church). on the way back i suddenly remembered it was pentecost and i hadn't blogged. i was musing on what i might post for pentecost and remembered this old cassette tape tucked away upstairs that i made for grace several years ago.

it's very simple - a reading of acts 2 over a music track. the track is universal horn remix 96 by jmj and richie from the album freezone 3 - hope they don't mind me using it but it is a few years old now anyway. to do the reading i sampled my voice on an old roland js30 sampler. i then assigned the samples to different pads (you can tell this was a few years ago) and as the track played triggered the samples live. that was how i got the mix of voices at the end of the track. anyway i dug out a cassette player and worked out how to turn a track into an mp3 and have uploaded it for you to listen to. it is about 6mb and decidedly low fi in quality but it has a certain something still. see what you think - acts.mp3

even though it's retro the track is still worthy of being a worship trick i feel - no 24

pentecost grid blog :: is a global blogging event where bloggers all round the world are blogging on may 15 with the title pentecost grid blog :: in their post so that they can all be tracked. no doubt bob will compile a list of entries he knows of soon...

Technorati Tags: pentecost, worship tricks, alternative worship

join in the pentecost grid blog

if you are interested join in the pentecost grid blog.
tallskinny explains all
it's bob's idea