We got back from Spring Harvest this afternoon - or Sprung Harvest, as Mr C likes to call it, I’m not quite sure why. It was a very interesting few days. I learned lots of things and was reminded of some things I’d forgotten which I really needed to remember, so it was all good, as they say. One of the things I learnt was how to live with a nine-year old boy for five days without completely losing the plot, which was also a valuable lesson!
I now have to sort out (i.e. write quite a lot of) the church magazine so it’s ready for printing on Wednesday morning. I’ve written a bit about Spring Harvest for the magazine, so I thought I would share a version of this here, as it sort of summarises what we did on our (sort-of) holiday:
”In the week before Easter, Mr C, K, D and I attended one week of this year’s Spring Harvest event in Minehead, Somerset. This year, the theme was “Route 66” – looking at the Bible and how we can apply it to our lives today. Basic stuff, you might think, but I’ve found that the speakers and teaching at Spring Harvest have a way of making you think about things in a way that you might not ever have done before. (This coming from an ex-theology student!). [One of the things I really like about Spring Harvest is that you have to go there with your brain fully turned on.]
We looked at the Bible in four different ways: as a sonnet (God’s love poem to us), as a symphony (the Bible being made up of different types of writings), as a screenplay (the Bible as a “chain of interconnected stories” focussing on community and drama), and as a streetmap (something that guides us on our way – some people argued that a sat-nav might be a better analogy!). We also spent time looking at “tough texts”; those parts of the Bible that we perhaps don’t like to think about too much [or, alternatively, spend far too much time thinking about], like the genocides described in the Old Testament, or the things Paul says about women and the church in his letters.
As well as looking at the Bible specifically, there were also sessions about such things as marriage, [family life], women and the church, men and the church (!) and a series of workshops about music in the church [and leading worship, whether in terms of being a 'worship leader' or being part of a choir or music group], which I found really helpful and interesting.
We all really enjoyed the week and learnt a lot, some of which we plan to share with you over the next few months, via the pages of this magazine. Watch this space!”
———————————————
I may also try and use this blog to reflect on some of the things I learned about. One of the problems with something like Spring Harvest is that it’s quite easy to be enthusiastic about things when you’re actually there in the midst of everything and everyone around you is being enthusiastic and interested (and interesting), but it’s more difficult being enthusiastic and making the time to think about (and hopefully act upon) the things you’ve learned once you get back home and ‘normal life’ begins again. Anyway, if I try to share some stuff here perhaps that will help me process it, as well as being of interest to readers of this blog – apologies if it’s not!
Yes, it would be interesting to hear about the four different ways of looking at the Bible and also what was said about the difficult parts, which tend to put people off. Sounds like it was a good few days, very inspiring