Christ Church Huntingdon Blog

 Listen to recording here .  Is it a bird, is it a plane? No it’s a comic worth over 9 million dollars!! When three California brothers finally came to clearing out their mum’s attic after she passed away, they came across something quite remarkable amongst a box of old newspaper clippings. A pristine copy of “ Superman 1 ” – the first ever superman solo title comic published way back in 1939. Well, although there had been rumours from their mum of a rare comic collection somewhere,   they didn’t expect to find anything of value up there, they were just clearing stuff out. But exactly two weeks ago today that comic went on auction at Heritage Auctions and fetched a record breaking $9.12 million (that's nearly £7million). (Well maybe I can share that with my wife as a reason for keeping all that stuff up in the loft and in the garage. It might be worth something one day! Not sure that will go down well!) It’s a lovely story, and those 3 California brothers, who ...

 Click here to listen to audio My last "Thought for the Day" happened just before I set off for a long bike ride across Scotland. It was quite an adventure, and if you log onto the Christ Church Huntingdon blog, you’ll see a link to my photos . It was a really wonderful and memorable trip. But it wasn’t all easy. On day 5 we had a 50 mile bike ride and some of it was hard work up a very steep hill with the wind against us. It was exhausting. It was so hard we had to get off our bikes and push them up hill like heavy shopping trolleys. And then going down hill on the other side, it was still hard work as you had to cycle hard to push against the wind even when going downhill. Exhausting. I thought we weren’t going to make it. But there was one thing that kept me going.  Now vegans and vegetarians please forgive me, but a t the end of day we were due to have a meal at the family of Pastor Paul, a local church minister and friend, and he and his wife had prepared a meal of r...

  We are all coming to terms with the shocking news of the events that unfolded near and at Huntingdon station last night. Our hearts go out to all involved, and we continue to pray for healing for those who were injured, particularly the individual who is still in critical care, a member of LNER staff, who according to the BBC website acted with great heroism to protect others. What an extraordinarily sacrificial and Christlike thing to do. You might like to listen to our prayers at church this morning, led by Kendi M'Marate, a member of our congregation.  Click here . She led us through a time of prayer and quiet beautifully. Please pray for the station staff and first responders. On behalf of CCH, I went down to the station this afternoon (photos above) to take some flowers and some "Heroes" chocolates to give to the staff, both police and station staff, with a message to say that we are praying for them. One of the police said that staff on duty last night had of cour...

 Listen here to radio recording.  Good morning and welcome today’s Thought for the Day on HCRfm entitled “Be Prepared”. If everything goes to plan, when you are listening to this recording, I’ll be on a train in the Highlands of Scotland, (somewhere near the famous Glenfinnan viaduct featured in the Harry Potter movies) and soon to get on a ferry with my bike and 3 friends. I’m off to the Outer Hebrides, cycling around 160 miles on 5 of the UK’s most rugged and remote islands. For any trip you need to be prepared, and hopefully, I’ve done enough preparations! I’ll soon let you know! Preparations have included: buying a new bike (big shout out to all the guys at TAG bikes in Huntingdon Community Centre who have been so brilliant) buying train tickets, getting spare inner tubes, mending tyres, planning a route, packing kit and stocking up on sweets! One part of being prepared has been talking to people who have done this before, this has included Rob at TAG bikes, Kev ...

 Click here for audio.  Do you want the bad news or the good news? I wonder how you normally answer someone who gives you that option! I think normally we want to get the bad news out of the way so that we can be cheered by the good news. Christianity contains both bad news and good news. I wonder what your version of the bad news is. None of us can be in any doubt that there is something seriously wrong with our world. Sickness, wars, natural disasters, politicians being shot in front of crowds of thousands and their murder watched on screens across the world by millions. What’s the bad news? Is there a root cause? There doesn’t have to be a root if you think everything is a bit meaningless, but for those of us who think that things should have a rhyme and reason, what’s the bad news? Many people think it’s political . In our polarised world where the algorithm tells us the news that we want to hear, it’s the other people’s fault [1] . Other people think it’s educati...

 Click here for audio. I wonder if you’ve seen the BBC TV programme “The Repair Shop” [1] . It’s great TV. Make sure you catch up on Episode 21 of the latest series, still online if you just missed it [2] . A Cypriot Shepherd’s Bag mauled by a dog, a broken sewing machine, a 6 foot cuddly toy dog, an old clock. None of these things look very impressive at the start, but as the experts start to work on them, restitching, restuffing, oiling, greasing, pulling apart then putting the pieces back together you begin to hear the story about what makes them so precious, and you see the joy on the faces as they are fixed and made new and returned to their owner. It was a gem, and our whole family loved it. What was most moving to me on this episode must have been the barometer-thermometer-clock that Ken from County Durham brought in to be restored. It was no piece of junk, it was awarded to his dad, Bob, for his bravery as one of the rescue party first on the scene at the tragic Easingt...

 Audio here . Good morning and welcome to thought for the day. If you are into sport you will know the name of Scottie Scheffler. The American is the world’s current No1 golfer having won an Olympic gold, three majors, the US PGA championship and the British Open championship. Well for a guy who has been world number one for well over 100 weeks, and who has earned more than £67M in prize money, you might be quite surprised to hear him say “This is not a fulfilling life”. What? Fame, fortune, global success, and he says it’s not fulfilling? “It’s fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment” the 29 year old says, “but it’s not fulfilling from a sense of the deepest places of your heart” [1] . "There are a lot of people that make it to what they thought was going to fulfil them in life, and you get there, you get to number one in the world, and they're like, 'what's the point? I really do believe that because, what is the point? Why do I want to win this tournament ...