Goodbye.. we've found a new home

amywatsonblog is closing down.
If you have stuck by me and are still reading this (!) then my thoughts can now be found at www.amywatson.wordpress.com.

Amy

Call to prayer/did you hear????

The line between prayer requests and gossip amongst Christians can be a small one. Too many times havI heard 'I shouldn't really be talking about this, but so that you can pray...'. I've even used the excuse myself sometimes.

On Premier radio's HipRock show yesterday they asked for prayer for someone in the secular music industry for what they're going through at the moment. I was intrigued and pleased to hear this, but it made me wonder;

Can we, as Christians, avoid gossip about the celebrity world, and yet pray and care for the lives of these people?

Tom touches on the idea of the church and the celebrity world here.

Finding Focus

This blog and me have drifted apart recently. I'm trying to find both time and the focus to return to regular blogging. Please be patient with me!

Our Dad

If you were at Soul Survivor 2005 and cool enough to hang in Cafe Uno you would be familiar with "Our Dad". They are a fantastic jazz/funk group that have the ability to turn old tunes into instant classics.

They have their tracks on their MySpace and a Facebook group too. Check them out and boogy yourself silly. "This Little Light of Mine" can never be the same again...

Soul Survivor 2007

This August saw me and two leaders take three of our group down to Shepton Mallet for (the very muddy) Week B of Soul Survivor. This was my first time as an 'official leader', which meant I got the luxury of my own tent and an air bed (I love my job).

Once again God did many amazing things. All three of our group responded to worship and prayer time. The teaching this year was very relevant to all three of them, with one of our group especially benefitting from the Soul Sista seminars.

A key difference this year was in the ministry time. This year everyone was encouraged to pray, as opposed to just the enabling team and 'anyone who's prayed for people before'. The effects of this were very noticeable, including my group who had all expressed concerns that they didn't know how to, and had never, prayed for someone before. I do not know what brought the change but it is certainly one for the better and has strongly encouraged our group in their own prayer life and to pray for one another.

Twenty20 Finals Day

Saturday I drove up to Birmingham with two other cricket supporters to watch the Twenty20 Finals Day at Edgbaston.

Me and Chelle decided to make fools of ourselves and turned up as a superhero and a lifeguard. Thankfully, our costumes were pretty tame compared to others (i.e. the leprechauns) but I got a number of compliments on my cape.

The atmosphere was buzzing, and being a neutral venue there was equal support for all four teams.
We chose to support every team except Kent - who won.
Never mind. We were treated to watching many big name players (Flintoff, Murali, Anderson, Malinga) and a stunning final game which went right down to the last over.

Highlights include:
Fred getting his wicket (brilliant to see the big man back in action)
Lanky the giraffe getting hit by the ball
Mclaren's hat-trick
The mascot race
Some Aussie letting themselves be known with a green and gold flag and the entire crowd bursting into England 'Barmy Army' chants.

"We're not going to be walked over..."

BBC report on a 16 year old Christian girl who today has taken her school to court over her right to wear a chastity ring.

The school are saying that this ring, part of the "Silver Ring Thing" campaign, is not essential to her faith, and that they ban all jewellery. She is saying that they are discriminating against her Christian faith.

The title is a quote from her interview. She said she wants to show that:

"Christians will stand up for their faith, we're strong
and we're not going to be walked over".

I do not know exactly what I think on this. I have two initial thoughts:

1. It is great to see a young girl talking about her faith and her belief in no sex before marriage on TV
   
2. Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek. How does this apply to "not being walked over"???
   

CYO Web

After much hard work and long hours from the legend that is Tim Abbott, the CYO (where I work) web site is all shiney and new.

You can see the finished product here: www.cyocolchester.org.uk

You can also check out what I actually look like...
though why ruin the perfect image you have created????

Jesus Camp

My good friend Tom had us watch the movie "Jesus Camp" Monday night at Uni. The documentary focuses on the work of Pastor Becki Fischer and her "Kids On Fire" camp in Missouri. In this hour and a half we see kids as young as 6 speaking in tongues, preaching, praying aloud to God and repenting on their knees. None of this is bad necassarily, but it is the method's to which they are brought to these situations that is worrying.

We see a Mother teaching her son that science doesn't prove anything, laughing at the 'stupidity' of the Big Bang theory. One girl , 9 years old, talks of her fear of "dancing for the flesh" when she should only "dance for the Lord". The kids are told what a great Christian leader George Bush is, and pray over a cardboard cut out of it, and that if Harry Potter were real and alive he should be killed.
So much of this seems to be forced on the kids and much of what they say seems to be repeating what they have been told... not their own words.

The makers of the documentary apparently are not Christians, and this can perhaps be recognised in how some things are handled in the film... but what intrigued me most was the inclusion of a Christian radio host and his comments on the camp. Here, another Christian view was supplied, opposing of Fischer and others like her. I thought it was interesting that the documentary makers should wish to include this view... not a neutral commentary, but an opposing one. And yet, they could have easily found an atheist to argue against it... instead we had a man speak of God in a loving way, with genuine concern for what was being done by those who claimed the same faith as he did.

We eat ham and jam.... and SPAMALOT

SPAMALOT
King Arthur and the Knights of his very very very round table are sent by John Cleese a.k.a God on a quest to find the Holy Grail. Along the way they encounter the Lady of the Lake, Knights who say Ni!, Taunting French Guards, visit Camelot (what happens in Camelot... stays in Camelot) and narrowly evade killer bunnies.

This show is amazing. Brilliant. I laughed every single moment, with tears streaming down my face. Even the opening music finds space for a gag or two.
The cast were simply amazing. Hannah Waddingham, playing the Lady of the Lake has the most stunning and versatile voice I have ever heard, and Simon Russell Beale as King Arthur was a comedy-timing genius. The whole cast were great, doing a very good job of tackling around 50 characters between 6 of them!

The songs were inspired, with some classics including Knights of the Round Table and Always Look on the Bright Side of Life (sung twice!) and The Song That Goes Like This is the most amazing Andrew-Lloyd-Webber mocking song ever written.

It was amazing day. The weather was gorgeous and the shopping time beforehand was spent in the wonderful Covent Gardens. Me and Chelle caught the eye of a very cute violinist, before being asked to model for Vidal Sassoon... my self esteem has never been so high!

Just a great day, which all of us enjoyed and will always remember.

So, I leave you with these final thoughts:

Your mother is a hamster and your father smells of Elderberries!
Now go away... or I shall taunt you a second time.

Facial flaws or fantastic features?

Discovered this site a little while ago
Portrait Professional
It's a dowloadable software for editing and air brushing photos. The idea is it "improves" your face, having been 'trained' with 'examples of human beauty'. The website provides examples of what can be achieved and, to be honest, it's scary. The subtle differences in the photos (they show you the before and after) mean that the tinyest alteration can change the entire make-up of a face. What struck me about it was how similar everyone's face became -large eyes, perfect teeth, flat skin and heart shaped faces. It took all the 'characteristics' out.

Jane Fonda was once quoted saying:
I don't want my wrinkles taken away - I don't want to look like everyone else.

I love to paint. And most of all I love to paint people. I love the challenge of capturing that person and the fantastic feeling when one line or mark suddenly creates the likeness you have been searching for. I wonder if God sees us in a similar way... he sees all those small things that make us... us. He celebrates our differences (as expressed in the Bible many times). So should we. I am distinct and unique and I want to keep it that way! I would hate to remove those certain marks that capture me!

Imagine trying to Photoshop a Monet landscape in the hope to make it look like a photograph. Ridiculous right? You'd remove all the marks, lines, textures etc that make it recogisable as a Monet....

As the song says:
If everybody looked the same, we'd get tired of looking at each other.