A Change of Venue

Our meeting for Grace Chapel was not held at the community hall last Sunday, as it normally would be. (Ok, so, "normally" is a tough word to use when there's no set building to meet in. The chapel congregation moves around as necessary, but they meet at the community hall a little more than anywhere else.) Instead, we met in a rather beautiful and ornate wedding hall nearby, and some of the hall staff joined our service. The plush carpets and chairs certainly gave the proceedings a different feel, but our service still incorporated the usual elements. We shared food before we began, which included some amazing curried rice balls, and spent time getting to know our visitors a bit better.

While it's certainly true that a good worship team of musicians and singers can lift the atmosphere of a service, singing together to an iPod is no bad experience either! Sometimes I wonder if denigrate the simpler styles of worship, whether it's recorded music or only our voices... We can only bring to God what we currently have, but as long as we do so with the right attitude of the heart then it doesn't matter if it's rusty vocal chords or a ten-piece band. Martin continued his message from 1 Corinthians 12:27-31, focusing particularly on the gifts of serving and administration, and then we spent a short time in prayer.

Although the venue may change, our final destination rarely does, and so we met at Tully's again after the service. There's something of a tradition amongst those who share at Tully's, which is that each one of the 'regulars' can ask one question of the visitors - it's like a kind of ice breaker. On Sunday night we had a chance to catch up with a couple of people who had slipped through the net on previous occassions, and our coffee-fuelled creativity came up with questions like "What three things make you sad?", "What person, living or dead, would you most like to meet?", and "What's your favourite Disney character?" Obviously our knowledge about each person increased, but perhaps not all the information was of great relevance!

- Jonathan