Jonathan Manafo

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My first ever post was called ‘33 days until Easter’, which was basically a comparison of how we countdown Christmas, but forget to countdown Easter. Now, I know that many church traditions do, but there are many that don’t. I’m glad to see a few more of my ‘free church’ evangelical friends finally getting on board with proper prep for Easter, which includes (of many things) LENT.

What are you giving up for the next 40 days? I have chosen once again to give up anything sweet (i.e. deserts, donuts, chocolate, …). Some may say that I’m not creative, but I know how much I love something sweet with coffee or milk, and if lent is about sacrifice, then trust me when I say this is a sacrifce, expecially because I really try to go from Monday to Friday without any sweets and always seem to fail a few times during the week. (I must confess that I emailed a friend this week who is single and asked if he’ll be giving up Girls for 40 days.  I’ve yet to get a response, but I sure hope he got a kick out of it…sorry Josh)

I’m also reading another NT Wright book this season. Last year I read his 52 day devotional called, ‘Reflecting the Glory’. This year I’ll be reading a book with 7 sermons he preached during last years Holy Week called, ‘Christians at the Cross: Finding Hope in the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus’. Since I’m presently reading other parts of Scripture (Joshua & Romans) I thought it would different to simply read 1 sermon per week as we lead up to Easter.

I hope and pray that during this wonderful season you’re setting aside ample time to read the scripture, reflect on God’s gift of love, and praying for more of Christ’s character to be evident in your own.

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This week we (CLC) are focusing on praying a little (or a lot) more. It’s been really cool. From Sunday to Sunday we’ve had the church open (6am-9pm), with 6 prayer stations (confession, cross, scripture, one another, missions, an altar and a community impact station) to go to, experience, and pray specifically. We’ve also planned 3 nights and 2 (early) mornings where we gather corporately to pray. If anyone’s interested on how we did this give me a shout.

I’ll leave you with a scripture from my reading today…Romans 5:2-5

“…we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not dissapoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”

That was a reminder to me that my growth & development as a person who follows Christ is a process!

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I’ve waited until this new year to write another post. December was way too busy for anything but family & ministry. We experienced many meaningful gatherings at CLC during the advent season. Lots of reflection on the coming of Christ and his love for the world. We did some very cool arrangements of Christmas tunes too…seriously, we funked them up!

Family time was wonderful. My wife and kids throroughly enjoy this season. Having a 6 and 3 year old makes Christmas lots of fun. Trying to lead them counter culture is a task, but one that I enjoy doing and they seem to be getting. Jacob said that “it’s amazing that only Jesus would give gifts out on his birthday, I only get them.” We went low on gift quantity this year, and the kids were just as happy. Our best family event was New Years day. We brought the kids tobogganing and oh…what a blast. Jacob was trying to snow board with a sled and Madi was going down backwards smiling at us the whole way. For a young dad like me, to quote my son at the bottom of the hill, “that was totally awesome”.

The reality is that as we enter a new year we really have no way to know what’s in store. We always hope for good health, enough money and food & good relationships. As I get older (and I’m still young…I turned 34 today) I go into every year (every day) with lots of faith. To paraphrase an old Hymn, “I don’t know what tomorrow olds, but I know who holds tomorrow”.
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Peace, Love & Recycle for 2008,
jm

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…no time to write blogs

stay tuned…

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It seems my blogs have recently been reduced to updates on my life and happenings. Hope that it doesn’t bore you, but life somtimes gets too busy to blog so it’s easier or more efficient to pack it into one.

Here goes…

My life is still pretty hectic these days…with work, school (2 graduate classes) and my family (plus an extra gig in here and there), there’s not much time for anything else…ok…I always seem to squeeze a little golf in.

My family and I had a week of vacation (which as you can see, I need)…I took a brake from all the things above (except my family of course) and spent a great week together. We went to the always exciting, ‘Niagra Falls’ for a few days, where my kids thoroughly enjoyed an indoor water park and the Marvel Adventure Centre…actually, I kind of enjoyed those too.

On Thursday, Janet and I (along with 2 great friends in Rob and Nicole) went to see The Police in concert…great show. Amazing to see these 3 guys having a blast on stage with no worries at all. Sting always impresses (not as much as he does with his other band), Andy Summers looked the oldest by far and Stewart Copeland was all 80’s (i.e. white pants and and classic nike’s)

The rest of the week was spent lounging around the house.

My vacation ended by playing bass with (old friend) Phil Aud. We put on a concert to raise money for his (first) upcoming cd. He writes great tunes…seriously…they’re musical, meaningful and very profound…unlike some of the crap that’s out there. I had the pleasure of playing with a great Toronto Jazz pianist who sat in on keys with our band. His name is Roby Botos and he’s a pretty amazing musician (considered Toronto’s best Jazz Pianist). I have a few gigs (on bass) coming up in the next few weeks which I’m looking forward to…better keep my chops up. Phil did great as usual and so did the band…the great Sean Meredith-Jones on guitar and Matt Smith on Drums.

If I sound like I’m rambling then I probably am. Life is sometimes like that…going from event to event and then looking back to see what heck you actually did.

Peace

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