April 6th - Is there life on other planets? If so, did Jesus come to them too?
April 20th - Pat & Mandy special
May 4th - QuizAid (bring £2 for Christian Aid)
May 18th - Idols
June 1st - Film night
June 15th - Evolution part two
June 29th - Should we choose to enforce some Old Testament laws but not others?
July 13th - Barbecue
Summer holiday - Lock in?

In the garden of Eden, everything was marvellous. People lived closely with God. The world was perfect.

But after the fall, it all went downhill. As a result of our own choices we were thrown out of the garden, and made to live in an imperfect world, ruled by the serpent, full of war, sickness, sadness, disease, disaster, unfairness and treachery. God was suddenly very hard to hear.

Despite our best efforts, no-one managed to escape. We were all tainted with death, we belonged to the world.

Fortunately, God did not give up on us. He chose to send his Son, Jesus, to save us. Jesus came to earth as a helpless infant, born into a terrible society.

He grew up and began to teach about the kingdom of God; he showed us what life should be like. And he said that the kingdom was at hand - it was here now and it went wherever Jesus went. Jesus healed the sick, accepted outcasts of all description and opened people’s ears to hear God.

His followers were called to spread this kingdom too.

Jesus had to submit fully to the evil of this world, to take the worst that it could throw at him. He was betrayed and executed in the worst possible manner.

But, of course, this wasn’t the end. Jesus rose from the dead, and in doing so he broke the power of death over the world. Death no longer had to hold us; we had been given the key to eternal life.

Jesus returned to the Father, and left the Holy Spirit to guide us.

And this is where we are today in 2008. We live in a fallen world, but we are no longer imprisoned by it. There are pockets of the Kingdom of God everywhere. And it is our job to spread them. As we live our lives, we are called to draw people’s attention to the true order of things, to help their ears be opened. We are called to welcome all manner of outcasts, to work to make this world a fairer place.

This isn’t the end of the story, though. The Bible tells us how it will end.

One day Jesus will return in power to fight the serpent for the final time. The serpent will be thrown into hell.

And then Jesus will restore the world completely, and God will make his home with us.

"See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away." Revelation 21

This is the future promised to us.

In the meantime, however, we live in an in-between state. There are pockets of God’s kingdom here in the middle of the enemy territory. And we are called to live in these pockets, liberating people and releasing them from their captivity. We are not called to do as we like, just waiting for the end. We have to be active.

Last May we looked at some of the issues involved in byuying clothes that are friendly to the people who make them and the planet. You can read what we discussed here.

Tonight we reviewed how everyone had got on in since then.

Here is the report on the different high street shops, giving information about the working conditions of the people who make their clothes.

We then moved on to look at the problem of landfill waste. UK residents each throw away about 380kg of waste to landfill each year, compared to the 20kg per year of people in Sweden. We looked at how long different materials take to decompose naturally:

Styrofoam container > 1 million years
Plastic jug 1 million years
Aluminum can 200-500 years
Disposable nappy 550 years
Tinned can 90 years
Leather shoe 45 years
Wool sock 1 year
Paper bag 1 month
Banana peel 3-4 weeks

We discussed things we can do to improve.

1. Don't take carrier bags from shops - bring your own bag
2. Buy good quality things that will last and you won't go off
3. Recycle as much waste as possible
4. Freecycle - for giving away and receiving unwanted stuff from people in the area
5. Avoid plastic goods
6. Buy food with less packaging

Next time we will look at ethical food shopping...

Kaitlin Rose Fishburne arrived healthy, heavy (9lb8) and gorgeous at 8.05 on Friday 29th February. Susie and Kitty are doing really well.

There are some more photos on my Flickr page