Twist or Stick - Gospel Ambition

With reference to the above New Year sermon - Times writer Daisy Waugh reflects on the passing of the years and going on pamper hotel breaks....

Of course there was a time... when the idea of spending time and money on anything so grossly unadventurous and let's face it - middled aged, would have been laughed out of court by the pair of us. But circumstances change. People change. Most of us grow a little less curious, a little more complacent, a little less inspired or inspiring as the years rocket by.

The Times Magazine, p7 (9/1/11).

Let the old apostle remind us again of another way...
7 But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. 10 I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 3