Missionary Blogs

It's been a while but it's nice to see that Facing the Mountain has once again been featured on Missionary Blogs's Blog Watch as part of a feature entitled "Small Blessings?". Our featured post was Rough Night which we posted about some of our homeless Soup Kitchen regulars.

It's always a good feeling when one of your posts gets picked up in this way.

Huawei Schmawei

I'm not one for conspiracy theories and would side with David Baddiel who says conspiracy theories are "how idiots get to feel like intellectuals", and I certainly do not lean towards trump and his ridiculousness. However... I am beginning to wonder if there might be something in this Huawei stuff.

Now bear with me here as I explain...

We stream all of our TV and we do it on my PC in our office and cast it with Chromecast on to our living room TV.

Disaster In The Making

Paula received this from one of our church members this morning, she is a teacher in a local primary school in a poorer community.  It is one of many similar WhatsApp messages from her over the last three weeks about the appalling circumstances at her school.

The government are supposed to have given each school the necessary resources and training to enable them to open safely in the midst of this pandemic, as well as putting clear protocols in place in the event of any Covid-19 infections

Sadly the truth is something else as teachers like this are actually providing their own PPE, cleaning their own classes in their own time, as well as helping the children cope with the frightening reality of it all.

Lockdown Reading Part 2

It's been a little while since my previous post Lockdown Reading Part 1, but in that time I've red some great books.

I picked up Austerlitz in the second hand bookshop in Kalk Bay (sadly it closed down) and I wasn't disappointed. The subject matter is something I've read lots of; a man impacted by the Holocaust seeks to find the truth. The storytelling however, that's a whole different thing. No paraphrasing, no chapters, long sentences; one running to seven pages and all narrated by the author. A bit weird but an eminently good read!

I had never heard of Sebald before but I'll definitely read some more of his stuff based on this, though it's sad to learn that he died in a car crash in 2001.

Here's an older post from 2018 about books: Ten books

Another Book

You've got to love a freebie!

Courtesy of Discovery and my rewards points for exercising, I scored a freebie today from Exclusive Books. It should have cost just over a tenner so I think I'll help myself to another one next week.

Sweet!

The premise of this one caught my attention, it's about an unrepentant aristocrat in the time of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, he is placed under house arrest but has to live in the attic rather than the whole house.

I\m looking forward to reading this.

Going Solo

Wham once famously sang "Wake me up before you go-go, Cause I'm not plannin' on going solo".

At The Gathering we've tried working in partnership with the government, the opposition Democratic Alliance (DA), the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP), the Department of Social Development (DSD) and the South African Council of Churches (SACC), and each time we've been excited by the prospect only to get dragged down by slow moving cumbersome organisations with onerous expectations and criteria for any partnership.

It's no wonder churches choose to go solo. It's sad, but it's also very understandable.

Concrete Ceiling

If you only listen to or watch one thing on Black Lives Matter, listen to our good friend Dave speaking about his own experiences in the UK.

As white people we will never need our lives to be verified in the way that Dave and so many other black people have experienced at some point. That is why we are privileged and black lives matter.

#BlackLivesMatter

Sound Engineering

On Saturday I had the privilege of taking Joel through to Stellenbosch to my boxing buddy Conrad's studio where they were hosting a live concert to stream on Facebook.

Conrad is a well known and very gifted sound engineer as well as a performer and all round great bloke and he's helping Joel get a taste for sound engineering which is Joel's preference for next year.

The (Very) Later Years

Let me tell you a story...

Pink Floyd announced the release of their Later Years ensemble late last year saying it would be released on November 29.  Exciting times!

My lovely sister-in-law and family agreed to get it for me for Christmas and so began an almost 9 month saga that finally ended today when a courier handed me the parcel containing the LP.

Fathers Day

For all the dads out there...

No matter what your earthly father was like, your Heavenly Father is awesome.

Project Restart

Project Restart couldn't have gone any better for Palace as they comfortably saw off Bournemouth at the Vitality courtesy of a sublime free kick and a beautiful team goal.

My Palace made me proud as they supported Black Lives Matters on their shirt sleeves and their backs in place of their name,s and I love that they all took the knee in solidarity.