Minister's Update

Here we are at the beginning of a new session again after the summer holidays. And what an amazing summer it’s been! It’s been many years since it’s been so warm and dry.

Holidays are now mainly behind us and it’s getting down to business, to work and study again. But it’s good too to get back to work. God has given us a natural rhythm of work and rest, just as he has given us a natural rhythm of the seasons.

There’s something very satisfying about the changing seasons – at least I find it so. I wouldn’t like to live in an area of the world where there was very little change in the seasons. I like Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. I like all the seasons in their own way: the bursting new life of Spring, the bloom of Summer, the fading glory of Autumn and the short wild days of Winter.

Especially I like Autumn. I don’t know why that is. Many people don’t like the shortening days and the cooling temperatures. And in many ways it is a time of year that has painful memories, the time of leaving home, of family going different ways, of settling into strange surroundings far from home.

And yet … and yet I love Autumn. There’s something that sets the nerves tingling, that sense of another world – that big harvest moon in a deep velvet sky, the stags roaring at the end of the wood, the mist coming down and muffling the noisy, bright world of the city. It’s a magical time, when forty shades of green turn to an artist’s palette of infinite vibrant and muted colour.

Talking of forty shades of green reminds me that Johnny Cash has died. You see Johnny Cash wrote the song – The Forty Shades of Green. Not many people know that, as the man said. Johnny Cash, the rockabilly hard man from the badlands of Arkansas, and The Forty Shades of Green, the archetypical Irish song.

Johnny Cash was one of the greats. He was the only singer besides Elvis to be inducted into both the Rock and Roll and the Country music Halls of Fame. His live albums recorded in Folsom and San Quentin prisons are electrifying. And he was a committed Christian. In the sixties he almost destroyed himself with drugs, but he could testify that God delivered him. And in his later years his gravelly-voiced, compassionate realism appealed to a whole new generation fed up of sugar and soap.

C S Lewis talked about being Surprised by Joy. Joy – that nerve-tingling, inexplicable pang of longing and wonder – there must be more to this world than what we can see and taste and touch.
Autumn does it for me. And the voice of Johnny Cash.

Alex MacDonald

News

Deacons Court (Boys in Wellies)
Could we thank everyone who came to help tidy around the church a number of weeks ago. Everyone’s efforts were greatly appreciated. Thanks also to those who have been doing various wee but time consuming jobs around the church building and to the tireless church cleaners.

Moving swiftly on from that, we have been getting quotations for the restoration of the stonework and railings at the front of the church and may be able to get it done this year?? Anyway that’s what we're looking at. In these projects (he sorted the car park) we have greatly benefited from and appreciated the professional expertise of a certain unnamed Lytle Ulsterman who has just shaved his beard and is about to become a father.

Also, serious feminine planning has been going on with regards to the rejuvenating of the church hall, with samples of this, cuttings of that, etc. (The boys in wellies just nodded at the appropriate times). We look forward to a great surprise some Sunday morning coming into church.

BG’s Youth Club
Whahey! We’re going again and it’s great. We have about a dozen folk who have given of their time to help with this. In the past 2 weeks we have had 5 local kids and 4 from the congregation. We hope this will build to a good number and that we will continue to have sufficient numbers of leaders to help things run smoothly and to get to know the kids. I may get round to asking you for your help but don’t wait for that, come and speak to me.

Campaigners is also starting and will need leaders. So, if you haven’t already realised, TV (especially on Mondays and Tuesdays) is rubbish, so you need something to get you out of the house. It is an absolute privilege to have the opportunity to get to know these kids, and to tell them that God loves them and Jesus died for them, to give them life abundant and eternal. If you really can’t help, pray, pray & pray for the leaders, the children and their families.

Welcome Home for Florits
There is to be a welcome home meeting for Marcos and Patti Florit and their sons, Gabriel and Ismael this Wednesday (the 24th) at 7:30 pm in Buccleuch.

The family have recently returned to Scotland after Marcos’ many years faithful service as Headmaster of the St Andrews College in Lima. He is now available for call to a congregation in Scotland.

Please come along and take part in the Church’s expression of thanks. The meeting will be conducted by Rev William Mackay, the Chairman of the International Missions Board.

Child Protection
A new Free Church Child Protection policy was approved by this year's General Assembly. The policy requires that each congregation appoints 2 co-ordinators to ensure that the policy is being properly administered within congregations. At their last meeting the Kirk Session appointed John MacRae and Roddy Macleod to fill these vital positions for Buccleuch. A further significant change in the new policy is the introduction of stricter controls on those working with children and as a result it is now mandatory that all new workers have criminal record checks.

Fair Trade
Jocelyn Hammer will be very happy to receive orders from the Traid craft Catalogue for which she is now a representative. If you want to make use of this opportunity to support fair trade (especially before Christmas) then speak to her (or phone her on 0131 664 9959). You will have the further advantage of no postage and packaging to pay on any order. Please note that this is not commission based.

Andrew Mackay's Progress
The family were thrilled that Andrew was able to fulfil the role of best man at his brother's wedding at the end of August. An amazing answer to prayer!
Andrew now has a date for surgery at the Southern General in Glasgow on Thursday 25th September. Please continue to remember him .- and also the family - through this difficult time. Thank you!

Newsletter Editor
Many thanks to David Bremner for taking over responsibility for the newsletter. He’ll appreciate your support and especially your news items!

Adopt a Cop

On Wednesday 27th August I attended a C.P.A meeting which, although not all that well attended, was indeed a time of good fellowship. Several concerns were expressed and suggested as items for us to remember in prayer.

It has been apparent to me for some time that Police officers on the front line, as a result of the new divisional (alleged) reorganisation, are under tremendous pressure and stress as a result. They are carrying some extremely heavy workloads and are sometimes never working in the same place for two days running. Their families are also experiencing the stress felt by these officers

The experience and feelings related to me at the meeting have only served to heighten my concerns about the current situation. I would ask that we all individually and as a congregation remember this in prayer.

Another item mentioned to be remembered in prayer is the ongoing murder enquiry in Dalkeith. At the moment it is not known how close the enquiry team are to making an arrest if indeed one is imminent. Please remember the family of the victim and also that the police would be able to bring this enquiry to a satisfactory conclusion with the detection and arrest of the culprit. Pray that if there is some item of evidence, which they have overlooked that it would be revealed and used appropriately.

There are some booklets containing the C.P.A Annual Report on the bookstall in the hall. Please take one.

John MacRae.

News from Friends

Gordon Matheson
I've just come back to Edinburgh after a busy summer. I immediately desired to catch up on the news from Buccleuch, and I'm greatly thankful to God to hear that so many of the needs the congregation was experiencing during my placement have been met. The newsletter has a new editor; BGs is off the ground; Campaigners has the leadership needed to continue; Prof. Mackay's nephew is making good progress; there have been so many answers to prayer! We have good reason to be encouraged!

I just wanted to take the opportunity to say "thanks" to everyone at Buccleuch who made my placement an enjoyable, worthwhile and blessed period, especially Alex and Bob. God has blessed so much of the work of your congregation - as far a field as Stornoway, where we ran the same "Christianity Applied" course, with several young Christians, over the summer months.

I do hope to be up at Buccleuch from time to time, and I look forward to catching up with friends.

May God continue to bless you all.

John MacKay
Hi Everyone! I hope you are all doing really well. It is so strange not being in Buccleuch and I'm missing seeing all my friends. That said, things are going very well here in Ann Arbor (Michigan). All my flatmates are really nice (and Christians!) and my course is going well.

I'm teaching Math 105 an introductory class of about 28 people - this university is huge though. There are 30 different sections for this course and 64 sections for the Calculus 1 course! Something like 40,000 students in total. Anyway, the teaching is fun (apart from the marking and preparation!). My courses are going well also, hard but doable, and I'm getting to know everyone in my course. All great folks.

I'm still visiting churches to settle down into. The ones I have been to have all been very good with good teaching and I'll be choosing one soon. I've been going to the GCF (Graduate Christian Fellowship - part of Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship who do the CU's in the UK). That's been great! A good chance to meet lots of Christian students - I'm going on their "Fall Retreat" this weekend. (One of the girls there from Gurnsey goes to Cole Abbey when she's in London!)

Ann Arbor is a great place to stay, smaller than Edinburgh but with lots going on, like Capercaillie are playing here in a few weeks. I won't be going.

Anyway, I am well and I hope you all are too. It's been a real blessing meeting so many of the people I've met and I look forward to hopefully seeing you all at Christmas.

Catriona MacDonald
Now that I’ve been back in Scotland four months, the luxuries of an inside toilet, porridge oats and freedom of the press are slowly but surely becoming normal again. It’s been a busy but enjoyable summer with lots of catching up with family and yapping to old friends I haven’t seen for ages. I’ve also had loads of speaking engagements where the stories and fashions of Central Asia never fail to make an impression.

At the moment I’m looking for a job to keep me going, while still thinking about my longer term prospects. To keep me busy in my spare time, I’ve just taken on the communications side of things for OM in Central Asia. This involves collecting and editing stories from what’s happening on the ground across the area and channelling them into OM newsletters and publications. Hopefully in this way I’ll continue to be a part of OM’s work while having the enjoyable job of reading the stories of what God is up to across Central Asia.

I’d appreciate your ongoing prayers as I pursue both jobs and stories.

Noticeboard

Alex’s visit to Lima
Alex has been asked to deliver a series of lectures in the Lima Evangelical Seminary to celebrate the 70th Anniversary of the founding of the Seminary. He will be away from 14th to 30th October.

Kirk Session
The Kirk Session meets in the Manse at 7:30 pm this Tuesday (the 23rd).

Deacons’ Court (again!)
The next meeting will be on TUESDAY 7th October at 8 pm in the Tower Room in the Church. Please note this is a change to the previously agreed date.

Guest Services
We are running a series of Guest services on Encounters with Jesus in Luke’s Gospel. There will be two on consecutive Sunday evenings – 28th September and 5th October – particularly aimed at new students. Please use the invitation cards to invite people along (not only students!) and pray for the success of these services.

Christianity Explored
We intend to run another Christianity Explored course weekly at 6:30 pm on Thursday evenings beginning on Thursday 9th October. There will be a Training Session for this on Saturday 4th October from 10:30 am to 1:00 pm in the Church Hall. If you wish to help in any way in the running of the course, please come along to this Training Session. You will also find the Session helpful if you are thinking about inviting a friend to the course, but are not quite sure what to expect.

Home Bible Studies
The next Study will be on Wednesday 8th October. This will be the second in the series on the Holy Spirit and will deal with The Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. The study notes will be available the Sunday before at Church and will give details of the usual venues.

Wonderfully Made: Wind Action and Erosion

Even in Britain, the action of the wind can be seen wherever loose surface dust or earth lies unprotected by a covering of vegetation. Clouds of dust rise from ploughed fields when there is a wind in dry weather. Wind-blown sand on a beach can be very unpleasant when you walk into it. Wind also helps to distribute moisture as clouds are blown across the sky and to create waves when it blows strongly across the surface of the sea.

In humid regions the wind has less effect, but in desert regions the wind is a very powerful influence. Dust storms can bring life to a halt. In the recent war in Iraq, serious dust storms held up the advance of the allied forces for several days. Dust storms darken the sky, the air may have suffocating heat, and carry fine sand over long distances. From the western end of the Sahara, wind blown sand has been carried over the Atlantic to the Canary Islands where sand dunes have built up. Red dust falls in Italy and Germany and has even been known to reach Britain through the effect of storms.

Camels have large eyes and each eye is protected by three eyelids. The two outer lids have long, curly eyelashes that keep sand from blowing into the eyes. A thin inner eyelid sweeps across the eyeball and clears off any dust that may get past the eyelashes. A camel’s ears are positioned far back on its head and are covered with hair which helps keep the ears free of dust and sand.

Deserts are of three main types. The rocky desert is found where there is a surface of bedrock from which all the surface sand has been blown away. The wind has, as it were, ‘sandpapered’ it flat. Other deserts are stony with a surface of gravel or pebbles. Still others are sandy.

In sandy deserts great dunes are formed sometimes up to 100 feet high which may move up to 20 feet a year is they are large or more if they are smaller. In parts of the United States and in Australia, windblown sand may carve the rocks in very remarkable ways, sandblasting the rock into unusual shapes.

In the Great Plains, west of the Mississippi River, grassland prairies were ploughed up for growing wheat. During several years of extreme drought, culminating in 1934 and 1935, great dust storms occurred in Kansas sweeping towards the Atlantic. The soil was stripped from the surface and the ‘Dust Bowl’ was formed. Rainfall later added to the erosion of the surface and reclamation and protection measures have had to be put in place.

In the North-East of Scotland, the Culbin Sands have had to be restrained from taking over useful land. Near the mouth of the River Findhorn the sands have obliterated houses, farms and orchards on the Culbin estate since 1694.

At the present time in Scotland, the main impact of wind is on the coast where high seas under the influence of wind can cause serious damage, on mountainous areas where the possibility of settlement may be ruled out, and on woodland where acres of forest may be destroyed by a gale.

William Mackay