Chilli for Breakfast: The Parable of the Geraniums - By Saskia

Saskia has an amazing and profound Blog, Here's her latest, and I think my favourite, post.

Chilli for Breakfast: The Parable of the Geraniums:

"I was out watering my garden this morning and I found a flower on one of my geranium plants.

This is interesting because I originally had two geranium plants, one of them I planted in pretty shallow soil and the other one in deep soil. The first geranium plant bore lots of flowers after about two days. I was overjoyed, but puzzled as to why the other geranium didn't have any. The flowers lasted for another couple of days and then died. This geranium has slowly been dying ever since. Now there are a few green leaves on it but most of them are brown and its stalk is all withered.The second geranium just sat there for weeks. Its leaves were still green so I knew it was alive but it didn't seem to be thriving. Its leaves were sort of slightly curled up and it was... well... just sitting there.

But today, at least a month later, probably more like two months, it finally has a single flower, and still looks happy and green.

This reminded me in a really concrete way of Jesus' similar parable. And it made me realise the point of that comparison - it's not actually a good thing to do lots of good stuff and look like you're doing really well straight away. If you bury yourself deep in the soil of God's love and His word, then the fruit will come.
But you have to be patient. It won't come straight away, and you might only get one change at a time.

I find this so comforting because it makes me realise how true Jesus saying was "my yoke is easy and my burden is light." I mean seriously - ALL we have to do is revel in God's love? We don't actually have to work changes in those impossible areas ourselves?
I also find it comforting because it shows me that sometimes there might be times in our lives where we feel like we are not bearing much fruit. But that doesn't mean we're "backsliding". A church I used to attend used to tell us that if you aren't moving forward in God, then you're backsliding. You can't just stand still. And I understand what they mean but at the same time that idea can cause lots of anxiety if it's taken wrongly (or presented wrongly).
Sometimes you might feel like you are at a standstill. But if we rest deep in God's love we will never stop bearing fruit."

Check out Saskia's super awesome blog!
 Do It!

Chistmas Break

Hey All, Merry Christmas!

In the light of the festive season DC is taking a break. We'll be meeting again in January next year, but the day and time (and definately the location) cay change, keep an eye on this space to find out all the info...

A the risk of sounding too festive:Merry Christmas again, God Bless,
Theo

Lapse Tonight!

Hi all,

Just a reminder that DC is going to Amnesty International's Lapse Art event tonight. It starts at 7 and is $20 to see some awesome performance (featuring Jess) and put together by Laura H, who's joined us for DC at different times in the past. Checkout the post on this blog for December 3rd for more info, or go to http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=165713820117933

Hope to see you there.
Theo

DC's home is on the move

Drama Church has met in a few locations in it's history, but mostly at SU House. Whilst you couldn't always rely on the temperature/mess/availability of the space their was something charming and usable about it.

SU House is on the move however to a new location in Bayswater. Next year DC will no longer have it's Mt Hawthorn home and so we need a new one. We've been thinking that moving to our own home might be teh best option for the present as it should accommodate the current group and it's needs well. If that changes we would then start to look for somewhere else to go. Other suggestions of central locations would also be great, if you have any.

What's your thoughts about where to take DC for next year?

Amnesty Next Week

Next Tuesday, the 7th, Drama Church is taking an excursion to Amnesty international's ARTillery Lapse 24 hour performance experiment.

ARTillery is the cleverly named arts festival that Amnesty run to promote their advocacy and get people involved in creative ways. Lapse is one of the projects where artists come together to devise a performance in 24 hours based on a given topic. The result is a series of unique performances displayed to the public on Tuesday night. The theme this year is around Women's Rights (I think) and it should be entertaining and edifying for us all.

 Please come and join us at the bamBOO Mainstage behind Luxe bar, 446 Beaufort St Highgate. The cost is $20.


For more info on the festival, visit www.artilleryfestival.com For more info on Amnesty International's work, visit www.amnesty.org.au Check out the Facebook event ARTillery Lapse 24 hour performance experiment.


Hope to see you there.
Theo

Esther's DC 23rd Nov

Esther Ran DC this week and it was great! Inspired by her Highschool reunion, she asked us all about how we saw Jesus at different stages including first impressions, when you got to know him a bit better, and today.More than that, she brought in a collection of nic-nacs which we used to demonstrate our answers by making little sculptures. We got to explain what we had done as well, so it was easy to understand what people had done.

I had the pleasure of joining in with the Fine Edge Theatre interns when Esther did this activity with them a couple of months back, and it was great to participate in. Highlights for me were hearing everyone open up and really think about the questions deeply and how they might express that.

It was great for me to take a step back and just participate as well. I'm keen for other people to get the most out of DC by sharing their thoughts as a facilitator too, everyone's got something to offer.

Theo

Blog Vission

Hi all,

My plan is to use this blog to share a bit about what Drama Church is all about. Some of the theory behind it, what's going on from week to week, and some ideas about how to do worship creatively. It's a tool for communicating Drama Church issues to it's members and to the world.

I have a vision to see where Drama Church might be useful as a tool for creative exploration. I think that forum learning is an important way for us to fight apathy in our lives and in society and I am passionate about seeing people of all ages and backgrounds taking an active hold on there faith journey and seeing the potential they have to transform the world around them.

I also wanted to use this blog to talk about some of the more weighty issues of faith that I'm dealing with from day-to-day.

Well, they're my first thoughts. My goal is to put something up here once a week. I intend to make DC a focus of mine so if this site proves worthwhile, I'll keep it up as pert of the time I intend to regularly commit to DC each week.  Happy reading!

Theo