Day Five Worship Day

It's Day Five and we started the day in the best way--a fantastic, contemporary worship time in an old, old church building built in 1500s. When we walked in the building, we were greeted by Nick who said he hoped we enjoyed the experience, but warned us that the service today would be longer than usual as they were having a baby blessing. He left off the fact that we would stand for every song. But, we were prepared. After all, we have been in training for both for many years at WFR. Long worship services and baby blessings, no problem and, thanks to Gary Myers and Tommy Inman, standing for long periods of time--piece of cake. We successfully made it through both endurance tests and loved it. The people were warm and friendly, the music was uplifting, and the preacher was excellent. We had hoped to go to ACU's service at 9:00 tonight, but after walking all day, I had a headache that needed attention. We'll try for next Sunday.

I haven't said much about our flat, so I thought I would show you a picture of the outside of it today. With all the incredible old buildings in town, we got the one that was designed in the 1960s. I'm not sure that time period was the most creative in architecture history. It's more about straight lines and lots of glass. The back of our flat is solid glass, from top to bottom. Six long sets of plastic blinds are hanging over the windows in an effort to provide privacy. Of course, every fourth one is bend like a broken finger. So much for privacy. The good news is there's a beautiful, enclosed garden out back. It's a lot like our first home--a house trailer (now, the more politically correct term is mobile home) parked between the cemetery and meat packing plant in Searcy, Arkansas. The big difference now is I don't let the dishes pile up in the sink. It's not that I'm neater, it's just that as a newlywed I attempted cooking; today I don't even try.

Historically, today took us to two of the colleges that were used to film Harry Potter. The picture above is the cloister (a really long hallway) in the Magdalen College. The setting was used when students in the movie were seen walking around their school. One of the other colleges we toured is call Christ Church College. It's one of the biggest colleges in Oxford and really beautiful. We're not sure what part of it was used in HP; the literature just said scenes were shot there. The dining hall was replicated in Hollywood for filming. All the dining halls are similar with long tables for students and one table perpendicular to the student tables and raised on a platform for the faculty. If you saw HP, you are familiar with this.

The city is not very big and we're getting more comfortable with walking it or riding the bus. It's very much like NY, as far as it's a small space with a lot of people walking around dressed in black and gray. (2 papa wore a bright blue shirt today and he stood out like a sore thumb.) The buildings are tall with no space between them and the roads are tiny and curvy giving the feel of a back lot at Universal Studios. I keep waiting for someone to yell, "CUT!" Today would have been a good day to do that as we came upon a woman who had been mugged. She had a cut on her head and a policeman was tending to her. Another policeman was questioning a young woman who was pleading her case for knocking this woman to the ground. As I said before, the English sound so polite. Even the policeman questioning her sounded like he was asking her to tea. Oh well, we walked away so we don't know what happened to her.

As we watched the baby blessing today, we were reminded how grateful we are of our home church who have loved and supported us for so many years. What a blessing to see God's love acted out in the same way in Oxford as we do at home. People holding hands, praying together, laughing, blessing babies, making announcements about upcoming events, singing with hands raised, hugging their children--it's amazing--God's plan for Christian living is very simple and hard to miss if we just listen to His word.

"So don't lose a minute in building on what you've been given, complementing your basic faith with good character, spiritual understanding, alert discipline, passionate patience, reverent wonder, warm friendliness, and generous love, each dimension fitting into and developing the others. With these qualities active and growing in your lives, no grass will grow under your feet, no day will pass without its reward as you mature in your experience of our Master Jesus. Without these qualities you can't see what's right before you, oblivious that your old sinful life has been wiped off the books." 2 Peter 1:5

I hope you all had a blessed Sunday. Tomorrow is our first day at the college! Lots to look forward to.

Love you all.

Hugs, 2 mama