Pennsylvania…
Pennsylvania
Willow Grove the Adventure
Welcome to WordPress.com.
and the blog of Anna May and Jim on their adventure to New Jersey.
Preparation.
Why?
I am interested in how people’s remarks have an impact on you: sometimes immediate; sometimes delayed!
Friends have been commenting on our impending visit to New Jersey and two reactions seem to the fore; namely,
- What an exciting opportunity; and of course it is with a chance to visit New York (I’ve never been there, though Anna May has) and Gettysburg on which we had a talk recently at Rotary. And
- “We admire your courage; undertaking this at your age” – well I suppose I will be celebrating a BIG birthday (not 21) while in Scotch Plains.
Reflecting back on my life, I am very conscious of the number of times I’ve stumbled, as it were, into circumstances, and only later seen clearly God’s Hand at work. Maybe I need my ears syringed or my eye’s tested!
Well, this is, in a way, no different.
One question, in particular, from Pastor Cynthia and the Willow Grove Search Team has kept ‘floating about’ – What will YOU bring to the party?
Despite my natural Scottish reticence, I knew there was something, which I tried to articulate, obviously with some success!; but modesty held me back as I don’t see myself with any outstanding talents, just a run-of-the-mill minister, doing his best; but, at last, with ‘ears syringed and new glasses’, I do see a pattern emerging – The Celtic Tradition and God’s Call.
As I’ve prepared, I’ve seen ever more clearly and heard ever more strongly that I have a significant part to play in this great adventure; this voyage out of the boat.
The Focus.
As for Pastor Cynthia, the focus has been an island off the West coast of Scotland that George Macleod called The Thin Place – Iona. A tiny island where Saint Columba first, literally, got out of the boat in the 6th Century and started his search for The Holy; a search that runs as a common thread all the way to today.
James B. Watson
14th February, 2012.
