Northumbria Community

  • Increase font size
  • Default font size
  • Decrease font size

Tennis

Blog posts - Roy Searle's blog
E-mail Print PDF

May 17th

It is so good to be back playing tennis.  I have put on half a stone since this time last year.  One week of tennis and 2 lbs have come off easily.  The Bible says that physical exercise is of some use and I know this to be true.  I love tennis because it is good calorie burning and helps with muscle toning.  It is less demanding than the contact sports that I played so much in my earlier days.  I did have a game of football six weeks ago and during the game I was very pleased with my endeavours; pacing myself, showing the flare that once characterised my game, with a good turn of pace and an eye for goal, I even scored one which might have made goal of the month had it been televised.  I came off the field with some appreciative words from some considerably younger team mates and respectful glances from the crowds on the touchline (all five of them!)  A warm glow of satisfaction radiated throughout my being.  They say pride becomes a fall!  The next morning, I have never felt so stiff and locked up in my life!  For the next two days I hobbled about sounding like a creaking gate.  A timely reminder that enthusiasm needs to be tempered by wisdom and the memories of former glories on the football pitch cannot guarantee anything but a health risk and lengthy recovery periods when playing football in your fifties.  Tennis is considerably more gentle on the body and with the good friends I have at the club it is a very enjoyable way to pass a couple of hours getting fit and I actually think that I am playing as good at tennis now as I have ever played.

< Prev   Next >
 

Newsflash

On Sunday the 13th of February 2011 the words of the day 13 meditation were read aloud for the first time in our new 'Nether Springs' at Acton Home Farm. How apt and moving they were as we sat and prayed after this long journey home. This was the first day that the Community had been able to gather at our new Mother House, and the story of Achsah and Othniel was a clear reminder of God's faithfulness and provision for us as a Community after the turmoil of leaving Hetton Hall. 

Day 13 Meditation - Achsah and Othniel

And so it was that Achsah kept urging Othniel her husband
to ask from her father a field.
She lighted from off her ass, and Caleb said to her,
'What is it that you want?'
And she said to him, 'Give me a blessing,
for you have given me this dark, desert land;
now give me also springs of water.'
And her father gave her the upper and the nether springs.
Judges1:14-15

One of the things that many people have commented on is how well the familiar and the new have blended together, Acton Home Farm feels like home. But it's more than this, it also feels like a place of renewed purpose for us where the 'monastic' and the 'missional' sit closer together, as we begin to explore afresh the five monastic disciplines that underpinned our life at Hetton Hall: Worship, Work, Study, Solitude and Community. The physical move to Acton Home Farm is now complete, but the transition into this new chapter of our Community's life is still continuing as we build on the foundations of old, and seek God for his purposes for us in this wonderful place. 

At the rebuIlding of the Abbey on Iona, George Macleod prayed a prayer that voices our prayers:

It is not just the interior of the walls, it is our own inner beings you have renewed. We are your temple not made by hands. We are your body. If every wall should crumble, and every church decay, we are your habitation. Nearer are you than breathing, closer than hands and feet. Ours are the eyes with which you, in the mystery, look out in compassion on the world. So we bless you for this place, for your directing of us, your redeeming of us, and your indwelling. Take us 'outside the camp', Lord, outside holiness, out to where soldiers gamble, and thieves curse, and nations clash at the cross-roads of the world... So shall this building be justified.

The sounds of saws and hammers are giving way to the sounds of chapel bell, prayers and laughter. Come and join with us as we seek God and build a new home together.