As it was Ruth’s 21st birthday on the 21st, Ed, Nat and myself decided to have a surprise party for her on the evening of the 19th. I first went round to Emma and left my keys with Nat. I then went out to a nice restrunt with Ruth and we had a great time. I had some salmon which was really really nice. We then walked back to mine where the others had got a cake and some baloons. Ruth was very surprised and hadn’t expected anything; so it was funny to see her expression.

On Friday, I went to Harry’s which as usual was fun. I met some guys from Taiwan there. I practised a little of my rusty Chinese and then we discovered that a Chinese pop song which we had been taught to dance to on ISEC was quite popular over in Taiwan too. The people I was talking to knew the song but didn’t know the actions so I was able to teach it to them and they held Mary (who was also at Harry’s) and myself in much respect! Everyone came round to mine afterwards for some food

Saturday was Ruth’s 21st. About 20 of us went out to Pizza Express and then invaded her rooms afterwards. A small group stayed round until about 1am talking about the historicity of Genesis 1-3 and various other problems with the passages.

Monday, I went to rev and then afterwards I went to join in with a surprise party for Joel (one of the guys I was in China with over the summer). His friends had planted a party hat in one of the draws in his room. They then got his sister to phone him and tell him to look in his draw, at which point he found it. Meanwhile, we had all grouped around the entrance to his room and when his sister told him to go outside we all started to sing happy birthday to him. He seemed rather surprised, even though within the CCCF everyone seems to have a surprise party on their birthday.

Today, I had lectures and then went to RTSF. In the evening, I went round to Ruth’s and she cooked for me. We then went to Jonathon’s 21st party. Loads of people were there whom I hadn’t seen for a while so it was good to catch up. The best present he got had to be the book of Genesis as enacted by lego figures. Would make for an interesting CU bible study…

Now that I’m back in Cambridge, I seem to have the opposite problem with my blog: I’m so busy seeing everyone that I don’t have any free time! Friday, I spent most of the time with Ruth; and similarly on Saturday we started to do some work. Sunday, I went to church as usual, and then in the afternoon, Vera, Natalie, Patrick and Chris Rice came over for some afternoon tea. On Monday, I worked, and also saw Tabs, David, Rachel and Christina. In the evening I went over to Ben’s for a nice catch-up as I’ve not seen him in about 3 months. I also had a supervision with Carlton-Padget on the authorship, location and date of Mark’s gospel. The rest of the week has also been spent working, although lots of other people have popped round to say hi. I went out for a meal with the CU last night too, and it was good to spend some time bonding with the CU guys. We’re going to be doing Genesis 1-12 in Bible Study this term, which is always quite fun.

Now it’s not normal for me to have any political views whatsoever (unlike the plethora expressed on Sam’s blog, and to a lesser extent on Jim’s) but the treatment of Iran is really getting me worked up. I saw an article on the BBC News website today in which Blair and other UN leaders are threatening Iran because they have resumed nuclear research. This complacency by the UN seems remarkably similar to the cartel of countries threatening Germany after the Treaty of Versailles, and that, as we all know, lead to the second world war. Perhaps they are just looking for an excuse to invade Iran as they did to Iraq.

But more than this, it is totally hypocritical for some set of countries which have nuclear weapons (or the ability to get them from countries which do) to prevent other countries from trying to obtain similar technology, especially if it is for peaceful means as Iran claims (not that I really believe what Iran says anyway). Why do they have the right to say what country can research what area of science? How come they are the ones who will use the knowledge “sensibly” whereas anyone else will not? It is just bullying.

I guess this is just another example of abuse of empire which we see throughout history, and which the Bible warns against. Paul tells people to submit to the governing empire, but reminds all those in it that they are put in place by God and should act in accordance with that. History teaches us that empires rise and empires fall (for example, the Babylonian, Persian, Assrian, Egpytian, Roman and more recently the British Empire). There is nothing that the US or any other empire structure can do to preserve its status; eventually it will collapse as the tide of history moves onwards. To have the immense privilige of empire is to have a massive responsibility to those who are under you, and more importantly to those who are threatened by you. Surely, when the next world super-power comes along (probably China), the way in which the west has respected or threatened the rest of the world during its’ tenure of world domination will be reciprocated in a large degree by it.

The sermon on Sunday evening seemed to go ok; a number of people talked to me afterwards and said they found it useful. I was really nervous, which apparently showed, although my message was not obscured by that, apparently. Praise God! I’ve put the text of my sermon on this website.

I saw this funny proof of global warming on Katie’s website. A sad but true remark on modern clothing.

I’ll be coming back to Cambridge on Friday – yay!

How boring I hear you all say; Mark hasn’t updated his blog in weeks! Well, I’ll be back in Cambridge soon and then there will probably be something to actually blog about. I’ve spent most of the time since Christmas at home. I’ve been practising my Greek, researching resurrection and the afterlife, and writing a sermon about China which I am to deliver tonight. Scary!

However, I did spend 6 days in the far North of England with Ruth and her family. It was good fun; we watched a lot of films, did quite a bit of work and also went for a nice walk/sledging in the snow! Apparently there wasn’t any snow in the south. hehe. I got on quite well with her family, and even Barney, their dog, wasn’t as ferocious towards me at the end of the week as he had been.

Just to wish Happy Christmas to everyone; sorry I’ve been soo lame at writing cards this year. I got this from a friend, which was rather amusing:

From us (‘the wishor’) to you (hereinafter called the Wishee) please accept without obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, politically correct,
low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the relevant winter holiday described by the Wishee as ________ (Wishee to complete: hereafter to be referred to as ‘the relevant holiday’), practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice / secular traditions at all (delete as applicable) and a financially successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2006, but with due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures or sects and having regard to race, creed, colour, age, physical ability, religious faith, choice of computer platform or dietary preference of
the wishee.

God bless!

After persistant nagging from several people, I finally gave in and signed up to facebook. My profile is here. If you feel so inclined, please add me as a friend 😉

Wow, it’s been a long time since I last updated my blog, but that’s because it’s been a long time since much happened which was worth blogging about. Pretty much every day, I’ve been getting up and studying most of the day. I’ve been translating a lot of Greek, doing the occasional bit of paid work, reading some commentaries on books of the Bible and doing quite a bit of other reading for my studies.

However, yesterday I got all boshed up and went to Basingstoke as my eldest cousin, Jonathan, was getting married. The service itself was quite good fun; the church was very charismatic so they prophecied over the new couple etc, but there was a good blend of the old and the new songs. We then went down to the basement, where we had mini mince-pies and drinks. We stood around chatting to various relatives that we don’t see too frequently, and then after a few hours came back up to have some food. Then there were the speeches etc and we finally left at about 9pm.

We took a family photo of us all dressed up, but because the background was quite boring I decided to put us in a Chinese sunset.

I’ve just got home. I’m getting really bad at keeping people updated on this blog. I’ve had quite a busy week doing lots of work; mostly dissertation work (translating the Psalms of Solomon from Greek into English). Also seen quite a few films and went out for Nat’s second party. I had a party of my own on Monday night, where we watched a French film called Taxi – very very funny.

Wow sorry for no update for ages; I have had quite a manic week. I’ve been writing some of my dissertation (now up to 6000 words or so), a sermon for the preaching class that I go to, and also been trying to see everyone before they go down for Christmas.

On Tuesday evening, there was the CICCU carol service. I went to the 10pm one by Jonathon Fletcher. It was quite good, although he is very Cambridge and quite academic so it was more logical arguments than passionate proclamation, which is the style that connects with me the best. Spent the rest of the evening chatting to friends until quite late.

Wednesday I got up late and so missed all of my lectures. I lead the Bible study at CU which seemed to go ok. Sarah, one of the reps, was having her joint birthday party afterwards, so I went there for a bit and saw Tabs and Zish. I then went round to Emmanuel to see Ed, Nat, Ruth, Dave etc and we saw Charlie and the Chocolate factory. It was quite a good film although very strange and creepy in places!

Thursday evening I went out to Pizza Express with about 30 people from Emma to celebrate Natalie’s 21st (even though it’s not until next weds). It was, as expected, really good food and nice to meet lots of other people from Emmanuel. Went back to her floor afterwards and had quite a good party going on until about 2am.

On Friday, Ben arrived from America to see some of us. He was the leader of our China team in the summer. We had a recruitment drive in the afternoon which was quite sparsly attended although the people who came seemed very keen. I then went off to have a supervision, which went quite well, and then in the evening, Mary, Lauren, Anna C, Widge, Ben and myself had a chinese at mine. Joel came round a bit later and we sat around until about 12:30 chatting about things. I then remembered that I had to write my sermon to give at preaching class in the morning, so I was up until about 2am on that. I then went to bed and got up at around 7 to finish it off and print it out etc. It seemed quite successful and I learnt a lot. Scarily enough, I have to do one at St Nix on the evening of Jan 8th about my experiences in China. Should be fun anyway.

After that, I came back and some of us went out to have a full English breakfast with Ben and Andrew (who’d just flown in from Vancover and is headed back to HK on Monday) at Tatties. We talked about the future of the China programme and then came back to mine. Everyone left about half one and I slept for a few hours and then did some more work on my dissertation.