Cor Deo

A copy of a piece for our Church Magazine.

            The 20^th June 2013, my last day of Cor Deo, was one of mixed emotions.  Having spent the last 20 weeks with 8 other keen Christian men, living, working and playing together brought us all very close to each other.  We could share our hearts with each other, our disappointments and joys.  I have never had such a close relationship with any other Christian man.  It seemed strange as we said our goodbyes, knowing that the following week, we would not be meeting up again.

             Looking back over the 20 weeks, how can I sum up the experience.  One of the key aspects of Cor Deo which had attracted me was their stated aim that they exist to multiply believers “after God’s own heart."  Jon had been on the course the year before and had found it helpful, and I had always wanted to have this kind of mentoring experience.

           My longing and struggle has always been to have a deeper relationship with the Lord, and I felt that this time would be a help to me as I transitioned back into life in the UK.

I wasn’t sure how Peter and Ron would react to my desire to join them for this year’s course.  However, they were very gracious about it, and so I turned up at Ladyfield church in Chippenham for 9:15 a.m. on the 19^th January, not quite sure what to expect.  There were 8 of us ‘students’, Peter Mead, and Ron Frost, as well as David Searight who had just arrived from the USA as a mentor trainee.  The 8 of us were from a wide background of experiences and ages.  One had given up his job to attend, several others were in between jobs, one was a church pastor, and one was looking for further training prior to returning to Italy to begin a church plant in Naples.  It wasn’t long before we were beginning to know each other and by the end of the 20 weeks, we were all very close.

What did the programme each week consist of?  We met Tuesdays to Thursdays.  We started the week sharing our experiences of what God had done through us, or things we had been involved in over the weekend.  Also prayer requests were shared and we then had a time of prayer.  We then did an over view

of the whole Bible, on Wednesday mornings we had in depth studies in Johns Gospel and Hebrews when we used sheets with the passage on to mark up to aid us in noticing what the passage was saying.  On Thursday mornings we looked at Church history as a way to understand how our theology was influenced and developed, and how this affected the Reformers and Puritans.  We looked at different theological streams, and how each affects our responses and behaviour.  We were also encouraged to do Bible ‘read throughs’, which we did with a partner.  The purpose of this was to allow God to speak to our hearts as we read chunks of His word at a time.  Just about all of us had done at least one read through of the Bible by the end of the 20 weeks.  In fact it was interesting to hear one week how one of our team had got together with a number of others one Saturday and read through the whole New Testament in one day, reading a chapter each in turn from first thing in the morning until late at night!  If God has given us His word why don’t we read all of it and hear Him speak to us through it?  We also had a project to work on throughout the weeks, and on a Thursday afternoon we had mentoring time when we discussed our projects.  This was a most valuable time and was very instructional.  I learnt a lot through this process of discussing the project.  We also had  two book reviews to give, and both my books were helpful and challenging. 

So what next?  One thing that can benefit all of us, is to do a ‘read through’ with a partner.  We don’t need to go to Cor Deo to do that.  It involves reading through the Bible and underlining verses that speak to you, or strike you as being meaningful and helpful.  Then once a week, meet up for an agreed time.  Begin by sharing how the week has gone, and then take about 10 minutes each and share the verses with each other without comment or explanation.  You may find that 10 minutes is not long enough to cover all your verses, but that is ok.  Just share what you can in 10 minutes.  Afterwards, if you want to share something from your ‘read through’, that’s ok too, but not essential.  Then close the time with prayer.  If anyone would like to do a ‘read through’, I am looking for a ‘read through’ partner, so please let me know if you are interested.

I can thoroughly recommend that the time spent doing a Cor Deo course will not be wasted.  If you want an appetiser they do offer one week intensives at various times throughout the year.  Ladies are welcome at this time too.  If your are interested, the website is: http://www.cordeo.org.uk/.

First Impressions - a visit to Prague end of March 2013.

            It was lovely to have the opportunity to visit the city of Prague, filled with so much history and tradition.  We were visiting our son and daughter-in-law, and that always makes visiting a new place easier. There are always interesting things to take in when visiting a new place, and so I thought it would be interesting to record our impressions of our visit.

            The first thing you will have to face is travelling on the ‘wrong’ side of the road, unlike in UK or Japan which is on the left side of the road.  You will need to make sure to look left when crossing a road, and if crossing from the tram stop, look the other way.  It took awhile to get use to that, and so to make sure I didn’t get knocked over by a car, I looked both ways at first!! 

            Getting around Prague is reasonably easy on the tram, metro or bus.  You need to buy a ticket before you get on the transport system.  You can buy tickets from a dispensing machine at certain locations, and you buy by the hour rather than the destination.  They have 30 minute ticket, 24 hour ticket, 76 hour ticket, etc.  When you first get on the tram or bus, you need to activate the ticket in a slot on the vehicle.  If you ride without a ticket, or an expired ticket, and the conductor comes round to check on your ticket, you could end up with a hefty fine.  However, having a ticket does mean you can get on and off a tram, or metro underground train, or a bus at will, so does make travelling around easy. 

            There was some snow about when we were there.  The city council has a very efficient snow removing team on the job very promptly.  They clear the pathways so they are not generally slippery, and roads are soon cleared, and traffic does not seem to be unduly hindered. 

            Having a meal in Prague also had some things which were interesting to say the least.  The first, is that they will often bring a little basket of bread or rolls, which in some restaurants you will pay for if you eat the bread.  The other thing was that as soon as you had finished your meal, they removed the plate.  This was different, and not quite sure what the reasoning may be behind it.

            In one café, we ordered our drinks, and I had a milk chocolate.  The others had various kinds of flavoured tea.  My milk chocolate was very thick, and while I could drink it, it was easier to drink with a spoon!  I think this was just this particular café as in another café it was more how I would imagine it should be. 

            Tipping was different.  I paid for the meal with cash, and they just assumed that all the money I had given was for the bill and tip.  Fortunately, it wasn’t a lot more.  Apparently they round up the tip by 10%, and so must have assumed that was what I had given.  Life is different in different places!

            We were in Prague just before Easter and there was a lot of evidence of how they celebrate it from painted Easter eggs, Easter bunnies and other Easter paraphernalia.   Lots of churches too, but how Easter is actually celebrated or remembered, I am not quite sure. 

            The public conveniences while available in some of the more prominent tourist locations do require a coin, either a 5 or 10 koruna coin will be needed.  Sometimes MacDonalds can be used without the coin, but the MacDonalds in Wenceslas Square require a coin. 

            The people are not very friendly, and very rarely greet you when out and about.  This, we were told, is probably a hang over from the communist regime time, when you didn’t trust anyone.  Also at Tescos, the lady on the till was quite impatient not giving one any time to pack your bags before the next persons shopping was coming through.  But there were also some nice people too.  The guy at the pottery shop that we popped into was very friendly and chatty. 

            It would seem that a lot of people shop on a daily basis for their food items.  So you get strange looks if you are carrying the weeks shopping home on the tram. 

            Prague is a very beautiful city with a lot of character.  The buildings are very interesting, and there is a lot history to many of the sites that one visits in the Old Town, or on the Castle grounds and Cathedral.  Lots of statues of different individuals, and ornately decorated buildings.  The parks too were nicely kept, and a pleasure to visit.