Paul Long's Ramblings

In the NZ news yesterday and today ... The Government will double funding to tackle truancy after a survey of schools found more than 30,000 children a day are skipping classes. The Government acted quickly on its election promise to get tough on truancy, passing legislation under urgency that allowed parents of persistent truants to be fined, and ordering an urgent investigation into truancy levels. But a Ministry of Education survey released today shows truancy rates remain almost unchanged from 2006, with 4.2 per cent of New Zealand's 750,000 students cutting classes every day. 30,000 kids skipping school a day: what needs to be done? Here is the latest selection of Your Views Click HERE for the report. Wow! This is high ... 30,000 a day. But it is not something that is a total surprise to me. As I work near 6 schools, I see children in uniforms casually hanging around outside the school grounds as well as all over the place during school hours. They are not even bothered to co...

It is sad that there are more church leaders in the news because of controversy related to church leaders being too money oriented ... the Calvary Church, Malaysia issue is still not settled and a quick look at the Calvary Today website it is disturbing that the court case has been postponed yet again ... Case fixed for mention on 17.12.09 was postponed Mention date fixed on 12.1.10 was postponed. Mention date fixed on 24.02.10 was postponed. Further Mention Date is fixed on 23 March 2010. I wish they would just get on and settle the matter and clear the air as this is giving Christianity a bad name in Malaysia and not helping the church. But looks like New Zealand has its own "Calvary Church" issues to deal with. I get very nervous when it comes to dealing with money and I am so glad my church leaders agree with me that I be exempt from handling church financial matters. Destiny Church has been attacked by former members who say it is nothing more than a money-making ventur...

Took these at the International connection gathering ... First, another shot of the beach soccer game - equally as popular with girls. This girl enjoyed her role as goal keeper - and proudly told me later - that her team won! My son Steven (in the dark green T-Shirt) had a great time playing. The first photo of the tree ... if you look closely you will see that someone climbed up and put a traffic cone (the orange thing) on top of the tree. The second and third tree photos ... there is a girl up the tree. One of our church youth - Laura who loves climbing trees. Showing the third photo just to indicate how high she climbed. I discovered she was up the tree when I was wondering where she was. I asked her mum and she told me that her daughter was up a tree. I thought she meant one one of those easy ones with the huge limbs. Then I was told it was this tree. I went under the tree but could not see her so I thought her mother was mistaken. Then I realized that I could hear someone singing...

The last International Connections meeting on 27 th Feb was the most relaxing I have ever attended. I think it is due to my not having any official duties and the fact that we have become much better in organizing and delegating! Also the numbers were much smaller - making it both a good and not so good thing. Good because small makes it easier to chat with others ... not so good because we have less contact with new migrants (who do not have stable community support) or more intimate contact with new refugees. Sure miss a great American couple who have returned to the USA. They were involved full time in refugee work and so had the time and energy, the expertise, contacts and most important of all the passion and compassion for refugees. Without them, we have less intimate contact with new refugees. But then again, it is great to know that many who needed help in the past have strong support groups and do not need such events anymore to help them better adapt to life in NZ. In a real...

Bit late I know .. been busy :-) The church Chinese New Year Outreach meeting (20th Feb) went really well. We had more people at the meeting than we have in a regular Sunday service! (and more than half our members did not come!) I think our Chinese speaking Home group did a marvelous job. Nice to see so many shy ones getting involved up front. Games, stories and sharing, singing, items and a gospel message And the message was with interpretation! - Made me wonder if I was back at seminary during combined chapel :-) Good news for me is that I had no role to play except to pray and give thanks for the food. Bad news :-( is that the group wants a break next year and want me to take back the responsibility for the event... We'll see. :-) Food was as usual a highlight. Really good food. It was nice for me to attend too as I had a super quiet CNY - shingles! :-( and thus missed the earlier great food and fellowship meetings. I am dreaming of having a different cultural based outreach me...

This is a kind of cross post. Just posted something on the MBS (ED) Alumni blog on this topic appealing to alumni to send in their stories (click HERE ). But the subject is something that interests me, so here's a more personal and longer rambling version :-) I read this morning a simple piece by Gordon MacDonald entitled Entering the Stories of Ordinary People. Caught my eye because I "love" stories. Not just stories as in illustrations for sermons ... but stories that define and shape everyday people. The article and link can be found below but before that ... just a few rambling thoughts. I find it sad that most people do not want to share their stories. Sometimes people think their lives are boring and they have nothing significant to share but I doubt that this is actually the case especially if one is a Christian. I can't imagine how being a Christian can be boring especially since God is working in our lives daily, changing us into Christ's likeness. I th...

Just posted my latest Pastor's Notes. To read, CLICK HERE