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Sleeping through the Storm

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T his sermon was first preached at our Sunday morning service in 23rd February 2025. The gospel was Luke 8:22-25. I hope you enjoy reading it! I love a nap. I don’t just love it – I’m pretty good at having a nap too. Honestly. if napping ever becomes an Olympic sport, I’ve a really good chance at representing the country. Let me tell you some of the places I’ve had a nap: On a cold, hard bench outside Sydney airport in Australia. Not so much a nap that one as an attempt at a night’s sleep – I had an early flight the next morning and didn’t think it was worth booking a hotel, as I could get a few hours in at the airport. No-one told me the airport closed overnight until security came along and kicked me out! Not my most comfortable night’s sleep, but I still managed to get an hour or so in. In the middle of a packed, very noisy pub during the 2007 England-France Rugby world cup final, head down on the table, snoring away. I’d honestly not even had that much to drink! On the Berlin unde...
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Haikus

These haikus were written for our monthly poetry night at the Barking Dog in Urmston. A haiku poem (if you're not quite sure) has three lines with specific syllables in each line: 5-7-5. Ideally, the last line should provide a sense of closure to the poem. I hope you enjoy reading mine! Counting One, two, skip a few. Ninety nine and 1, 0, 2... Never could do maths. California All the leaves are brown  And the sky is also brown  This is some weird shit. Japanese Appropriation  Bonsai Yakuza Kamikaze Satsuma - Haiku abuser Poetic Frustration  The perfect haiku Lies just beyond my mind's grasp. I wrote this instead. Dirty Haiku A Sunday night film  Yes, Detective Callaghan, I do feel lucky. A Haiku for the Morning Maybe one day soon  I'll get up in the morning  At a time I choose? Valentines Day  Valentines Part I How do I love thee? Let me count the many ways : One, two... yeah - it's two. Valentines Part II Roses are not red  Not these flower...
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Time and Tide

  This poem was one of two written for our monthly church poetry group at St Michael's. The theme was 'time'. This one is a bit less bleak than the other! Time and Tide The old boys sit on the bench by the sea, smoke fags and shoot the breeze. The north wind blows salt from the surf in their eyes  and ash falls unnoticed on their knees. They talk of the times and the girls they had. They eat chips and mushy peas. They talk of more recent heart pains and aches, of strokes and lung disease.  The old boys shuffle their shoes in the sand then stand with aged ill-ease. They nod, and turn and wander off. Time, gentlemen, please.
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Out of the Window

This poem was one of two written for our monthly church poetry group at St Michael's. The theme was 'time'.  Out of the Window There was a day  When Time did not so much run away   As fling wide the window  and hurl itself out, head first, without a care for the fall or how long it would be  before springs and cogs and oil  spewed out across the road, causing cars to swerve; with Time, instantaneously suspended; unable to move at any miles per hour. It had been fun. You were supposed to fly. From that moment forward,  hours lasted for months. And years went by before I could gather a sentient thought. The very essence of my world captured in a freeze-frame of perpetual collision. These words mean nothing now: After, Then, Next . If, Tomorrow, Soon. There is no  Now ; There is only  Before . Now, my wounds will not heal. I am greyer; that much I know. I see less well. Am I older? How could I be? I hear the tick, tick, tick... But it is a...
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