We visited  St Andrew’s  in Fife  yesterday to catch up with some of the congregation who are at the CLAN Gathering for this past week. They’ve taken over at least two houses and a group of them are living together in community. I was really encouraged to hear how God has been blessing them this

week. I ‘m sure they are  all going to return to Bo’ness with a renewed vision for the work of the gospel in Scotland. Erica you make a mean omlette, you really are a woman of many talents!

It was wonderful to meet up with Rudi again from South Africa. Rudi was one of our visiting students to Bo’ness when we were running the World Without Walls video training school in 2005.

He and Hildigaard made a fantastic little movie called the lost coin, which actually won our International Film Festival in 2006. I hoping that we will be able to reconnect with Rudi again and perhaps have a contingent from South Africa join us for   the World Without Walls Cycle Challenge next July.  Anyway if you want to have a look at the film they made check it out by clicking here

In a few days some of us will be heading off to India to continue to develop the friendships that we have made through our World Without Walls Programme. I praying that God will raise up the right people to help me to continue to establish this overseas development work making use of technology. There is just so much that can be achieved when we use technology in the right way.

Anyway I hope all our folks get back safe from CLAN and that they will inspire our worship on Sunday morning.

There is always something happening around the church building here in St Andrew’s Bo’ness. Its great to see the building being used and cared for by a wide variety of people. Take for instance today. Elizabeth Ann was down looking after the garden and watering the plans

Apart from the staff members who were working out of the building, we had a young teenager in for a few hours getting coaching on work experience. Then we a visit from the BBC Children in Need programme to meet Andrea our Family Worker and to meet some of the children who attend our various creative art clubs. Children in Need were particularly interested in helping the children tell stories using animation.

Here is a picture of Andrea preparing for the children a few minutes before our friends from the BBC start working with them to make up a story and them film it using models the children have already produced earlier on today.

It actually great to see how the children respond to Andrea. She has a real talent in making all the children feel loved and accepted but above all that they all have some wonderful stories to tell  and some amazing gifts .

One of our greatest resources in St Andrew’s is people too often we forget the influence that  even one person can have on the lives of children. Recently I was watching a Channel 4 documentary on children who had grown up in care and where now adults getting on with their lives. I was impressed to hear the impact that one lady carer and her husband had on all these children. Everyone of them mentioned her by name as one of the most important people in their lives as children. I think a number of children in Bo’ness will be grateful for the Bounce Higher programme and the contribution that Andrea and her helpers are making to their lives.

Here are just a few of models the children made yesterday. I believe they’ve turned it into a short animated film, which will appear on the BBC website in due course.