New growth and a spectacular sunset...

Another sunny day after a slightly worrying start!! Yet I was able to spend all afternoon in the garden reading and making the most of the rays!!

As the afternoon progressed I suddenly realised that the big tree at our gateway which had been bare that morning now had some very big and quite prominent buds.



A little later I moved to sit under the tree and looking up I could see a few little green leaves starting to appear.



This just amazed me that I had been able to see the progression actually happening...from bare to buds opening and leaves appearing in the warm spring afternoon sun...quite literally God’s handiwork in creation in action.

In the early evening I thought I would take a drive into the Mournes visiting some of my favourite places along the way. I drove out through Bryansford, past Tolleymore, past the Trassey track, up on to the road leading to Spelga Dam past Fofanny Dam. As I drove along here I couldn’t help but smile as if I’d been in a car with my Dad I would have heard that usual tale of how my Grandfather had transported all the electricity poles out along this stretch of country many years ago when they were first putting up the lines. A little piece of family history! As I got closer to Spelga the sun was starting to go down behind the mountains, blazing gold out across the countryside...just stunning.




Parking up on the road I walked for a few minutes up the slope to try and get a better view...I found me another rock and took a seat to watch as each moment the Greatest Artist changed the magnificent picture before me.

Beach...

Another stunning day...I could not have hoped or imagined that the weather would be this good and I have definitely picked the right time to come away!

So what did I do...I went to the beach of course!!! Murlough to be precise...



It was a little windy and chilly even though it was so sunny but you gotta take every chance you can get living in Northern Ireland!!! Here I played around a little with my new mini tripod but it was too hard to see anything as the sun was just too glaring...but I don’t think I did too badly!!




When I couldn’t take anymore of the chilly beach I just made my way back through the sand dunes!!




Then back to the homestead via Mauds and the library!!!

Back at the house I tried out some more tripod shots, so here’s my rock where my nightly star gazing took place!!

Time to Retreat...

I‘ve decided to spend the next few days staying at our little house in Newcastle, on the coast just past the Bloody Bridge. The weather was amazing today and I’m looking forward to just relaxing, chilling and taking some time out.

Right from the moment I drove into Newcastle I could just feel myself relax. I just love the view you get of the Mournes as you approach the town from Murlough. I don’t think I will ever get tired of that view – it takes my breath away every time and today was no different, it was stunning with a slight heat haze hovering over them. Any time I’m away and I think of home that is usually the image that comes to mind first, there’s something almost steadying or grounding in that view...for me anyway, a little piece of my homeland.



Although it does still make me a little bit sad when I drive past our old caravan park which is now covered in house's...so many memories of fun times there all dug up and covered in bricks and mortar...but they still remain where they are important in my head and in my heart.

Then as I drove through the town out towards the harbour with the window down there was a briny, seaweedy smell that was actually really fresh...maybe different...or else the sun just makes everything seem so much better!!

I love looking at the stars in a clear night sky and here the sky is so so clear at the minute. At home you can’t get the full effect of the stars because they are dulled by the street lamps, so when I went and sat on my rock staring up at the black night it looked like there were thousands more stars than usual. It was awesome. Sitting there on my rock with the distant sound of the waves crashing on the rocks, the wind idling in the leaves of the trees beside me, the occasional bleating of a nearby sheep and the vast expanse of the starry hosts above me. I could see the odd aeroplane pass over silently obviously miles above, the constant flash of the lighthouse at St John’s point, the plough...the only constellation that I can recognise and even a shooting star. Brilliant!

He Has Risen

I really like Easter.

I think I would even say that it is my favourite time of the year - yep even more so than Christmas!

I had quite an odd conception of the period of time between Christmas and Easter when I was younger. It was like we prepared for Christs birth in December and then all of Jesus' 33 years and the entire gospel message fit in to 3 or 4 months depending on when Easter fell. After that there was some kind of Summer-y abyss when nothing happened!!

I guess in a way that is where we are in present days...in that summer-y abyss but we live in hope, hope of the return of the one Who Has Risen and it is only because of that fact we have any hope at all.

So yeh, Holy Week leading up to Easter Sunday is my favourite week of the year and it was celebrated wonderfully this year throughout the Lisburn circuit. It was particularly interesting to be part of a Passover/Seder meal on Maundy Thursday when all of the elements of the meal and their significance were explained as we shared in it together, this was significantly brought to a close by sharing in communion together, the Christian Eucharist or Love Feast which Jesus asks us to do in remembrance of Him and which He shared with the 12 disciples at his final Passover meal.

Good Friday seen the carrying of the cross up Bow Street by the leaders of the main city centre churches. I had intended to get some pictures of this but as soon as the procession led by the cross began to move the heavens opened soaking everyone but the message of the cross was still proclaimed and celebrated.

The celebration that I look forward to most of all is the dawn rise service at Hillsborough Lake. As much as it may surprise many people I enjoy getting up really early to go and worship the risen Lord as the sun rises up over the lake. It may be cold, it may be damp and there may be lots of little flies eating you for breakfast but for me there's just something really special about being there to greet Easter morning and I don't think my Easter would be the same without it.

Then there was our Easter celebration service, a service full of life and Joy as well as a few surprises - especially for the young boy who had an egg smashed over his head by Rev Brian!!! Fair enough it was an empty shell but i'd have loved to have seen his face if it hadn't been - he was surprised enough as it was!!!

Brian shared a wonderful poem with us that really captures the essence of Easter....

Because He is Risen

Because he is risen
Spring is possible I
n all the cold hard places
Gripped by winter
And freedom jumps the queue
To take fear’s place as our focus
Because he is risen

Because he is risen
My future is an epic novel
Where once it was a mere short story
My contract on life is renewed in perpetuity
My options are open-ended
My travel plans are cosmic
Because he is risen

Because he is risen
Healing is on order and assured
And every disability will bow
Before the endless dance of his ability
And my grave too will open
When my life is restored
For this frail and fragile body
Will not be the final word on my condition
Because he is risen

Because he is risen
Hunger will go begging in the streets
For want of a home
And selfishness will have a shortened shelf-life
And we will throng to the funeral of famine
And dance on the callous grave of war
And poverty will be history
In our history
Because he is risen

And because he is risen
A fire burns in my bones
And my eyes see possibilities
And my heart hears hope
Like a whisper on the wind
And the song that rises in me
Will not be silenced
As life disrupts
This shadowed place of death
Like a butterfly under the skin
And death itself
Runs terrified to hide
Because he is risen

By Gerard Kelly

All of this is possible because He is Risen...because Christ died for each of us...but rose again conquering the grave. The service was closed in sharing the Eucharist and a rousing version of 'Thine Be the Glory' (prompting another childhood memory for me. My Nanny would have taken me to Newcastle Methodist on the odd occasion during 'caravan season' and i have a distinct memory of singing this song one Sunday morning after they had shared communion and I was convinced in my innocence and naivety that the words were 'Risen Concrete Sun'!!!) but there seemed to be a real sense of pure worship and expectancy and so may we take that attitude of worship and expectancy out in to the 'summer-y abyss' knowing our Risen Lord walking by our side.