A Cardiffian Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Things have been getting very Christmassy here in Cardiff for the last couple of weeks. This year seems to be the busiest Christmas I’ve had in years. Seriously. I’ve had what seems like a million and one things to try to remember in the last couple of weeks and in the next couple of weeks? We get a list of extra dates each month which is usually only half a page. This month? It was a page and a half. Most of the dates had my name against them too.

Recently, my busyness has been down to an essay and a presentation due on the same day (Thursday just gone). As part of our training days, we have a write one essay per term on what we’ve been studying as well as doing one or two presentations to the rest of the interns. The essay was alright, but what I most enjoyed was the presentation.

Each of us interns had to do two presentations on stories from the Bible- my first was on Cain and Abel what feels like a lifetime ago now. This week, I had the (perhaps somewhat dubious?) honour of being the last person to present on this module. My presentation topic? The Resurrection.

Now, waaaaay back when we first started, we were given the option of choosing the stories we wanted to present, and me being me, went and picked two of the hardest stories on the list. Why? Why? My reasoning was that I wanted a challenge. As the date for this presentation drew nearer though... panic began to set in.

Talking about the Resurrection is something that you cannot get wrong.

By all accounts I shouldn’t have found it so hard to work out what I wanted to do. The Resurrection is something any Christian surely should be able to talk about at ease – it is the very centre of our faith. Yet, trying to work out how to present it in a new creative way, that would speak to my audience, seemed ridiculously difficult. Add to that the fact that I’d never told the story of the Resurrection before... my panic mode kicked in and I put it off as long as I could.

I had various different ideas floating around in my head, but none of them seemed viable – or Deborah enough. I wanted to show to the others what the Resurrection meant to me, personally. That meant putting myself out there - something I'm not always good at.

At the start of last week, I finally made myself sit down and do some work. With my essay mostly in the bag (I’m quite a last minute person, to my shame), I focussed on my presentation. I read all four accounts of the Resurrection and the various encounters with Jesus that the disciples had, and I thought and prayed about what it meant to me, for me, personally and how I could get that across.

It was a journey of self-discovery to some degree, and looking back I am so glad I chose this topic for my presentation. This module on the Bible has given me a refreshing hunger for God’s Word – looking and seeing Jesus throughout the entirety of both the Old and New Testaments was something I’d not done before, but it is so amazing to see it all there, right from the start. God’s plan to reconcile man to himself. God’s plan to restore that broken relationship. All of it – both before and after the gospels – points to the cross; the death and resurrection of Jesus.

While it originally seemed really odd for me to be doing a presentation on the Resurrection so close to Christmas (Resurrection is Easter!), I realise now that it has given me a renewed understanding of the importance of Christmas and of how truly wonderful God’s gift to us was. God sent us Jesus, His only son, as part of His overarching plan to restore His relationship with us, to rescue us from sin and death and give us eternal life.

‘I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death.’ (Hosea 13:14)

Isn’t it beautiful?

Yesterday, I saw an advert on the side of a bus which said ‘this Christmas it’s all about you.’

I was horrified to say the least, and then overcome with an urge to graffiti the side of the bus. I was so saddened by what I saw. I had been so excited over that past few days about what Jesus had done for me – about what Christmas really meant – that I had partially forgotten what the rest of the world thought. I want – need – to share what Christmas really means, and who it really is about. And I need to keep a check on my own selfishness. We all do.

This coming week, I have an opportunity. I’m off into a few local primary schools to do Christmas lessons with a team from Glenwood. These lessons will teach the kids about the real meaning of Christmas, and I can only pray that they take something of God’s love for them away from those lessons and share it with their families.

In other news: I actually have a day off today. My Saturday has been blissfully quiet thus far, and I’m hoping it will continue into the evening. Oh, and Wales to win in the rugby!

One last thing – never work with animals, especially of the stuffed, puppet variety, and especially camels called Carlos.

Thank you all for your support and prayers, and I’m looking forward to seeing you all soon!

Love and blessings from Cardiff,

Debs xxx

www.goingpublic.org.uk