telling a story

Ireland is a country where story telling is as cultural as pint of guinness or a penny whistle.  While here I have been reading a book about story. It is essentially components that make a great story. You see the writer slowly going the direction of saying "if your life isn't a good story, it isn't a good life." This part really stuck out to me 

" i like slower stories these days. The simple ones. The ones that play out like art films. It's like God saying, ' write a good story, take somebody with you, and let me help... A good storyteller speaks something into nothing. Where there is an absence of story, or perhaps a bad story, a good storyteller walks in and changes reality. He doesn't critique the existing, or lament his boredom, like a critic, He just tells something different and invites other people into the new story he is telling."

since being here i have found a new appreciation of storytelling and storyliving. i hope to be able to sit down with God and tell him stories and Him laugh with remembrance or smile with nostalgia or beam with pride, and Him to remind me of those stories I have long since forgotten. To know that this short span on earth wasnt wasted sitting on a couch and watching t.v. and complaining about how boring and messed up this world is.

to dublin

After spending last weekend in the Closkelt , we caught the bus down to Dublin (not without a literal crash course in driving a minibus on this side of the pond)We have been here for four days now and are staying in a suburb of the city called Malahide.  We have been doing a few mid day school programs and youth events in the evenings. It has been cool to work with the kids here and they seem to be very receptive to us. Also we have been doing a fundraiser through St. Andrews that is benefiting relief effort in Haiti. In Ireland they do not have people at the grocery store to bag your items. A local supermarket has let our team come in and bag groceries with jars for people to give a donation.We took the train into the city tuesday and spent the day seeing downtown dublin. the republic is a much different feel from the north. dublin is bigger and much more expensive, but it is cool to see a new place and get to know new people. We are only in Malahide for the week before heading down to Cork for 2 weeks. It is strange how fast this half of outreach can be. Below are some photos from the past week or so.

Darren from the bridge where the river meets the sea in Newcastle...it seems kind of ominous

morning walk in Closkelt. It was a beautiful view from the house up there. when the morning fog clears you can see the mourne mountains on the horizon

shelby at a bookstore on the trinity university campus in dublin

Palmer at the train station ( sporting a lion mane)

God Save Ireland

the past few days most of our team has been out sick. those of us who were feeling well and not wanting to be stuck in quarantine  with the ill got out of the houses and went up to see belfast castle. today we took a mural tour with one of the John Hash of YWAM Ireland. He is working on his doctorate in the theology of reconciliation at Trinity University. John showed us the different murals depicting the troubles on both the protestant and catholic side of the wall and explained quite a bit of what the mentality is here and some of the obstacles and steps to an interdependent Belfast. I know many of us learned more about reconciliation in a few short hours with John than many people will have in a lifetime....below are some of the pictures from the past few days...