There is beauty and hope and light and life in Belfast – no matter how dark things may look.  So we lament when evil flourishes… we weep for the city… but we KEEP PRAYING….

The Dock Walk featured on Radio Ulster’s Sunday morning service today – in case you missed it, you can catch up for another seven days on iPlayer here

Very very proud of my trusty Dock Walkers – they didn’t bat an eyelid at allowing our usual Dock Walk discussions and prayers to be recorded by a man with a big fluffy microphone.  I love the way all the different voices chip in to the broadcast with new ideas and perspectives: how much richer is this discussion than any sermon I could’ve preached on the subject?  Click the link, pour a cup of tea, relax and enjoy!

Great minds are divided on the usefulness of New Years Resolutions.  Are they a fantastic chance to start writing a new story on the blank page of the new year, or are they a recipe for guilt and failure?

I’ve gotta say I do find them useful.  Anything which provides a stimulus for growth, change, improvement is worth embracing – whether or not the implementation is wholly successful.  Save me from being satisfied with being stuck in a rut…

So I’m going to offer three 2013 Resolutions for those of you who follow the Dock blog.  2012 was a whirlwind of scarcely-dreamt-of opportunities; I never would’ve dared to hope, this time last year, that Dock Cafe would be open and vibrant and playing its part at the heart of life in the Titanic Quarter.  But if that is to continue and grow, we’ll need more and more people to step from the sidelines into the adventure.  And here’s how:

MEET

 The beating heart of The Dock is its fantastic team of volunteers – committed, energetic, stylish, suave, sophisticated, just a little bit sexy.   We’re always on the lookout for people to join the team (most of those qualifications are optional) – so let us know if you have a few hours free between 11 and 7 on a Monday-Saturday.

And if you’re wary of signing up indefinitely, this year we’re planning to run ‘Volunteer For A Day’ days when you can get a taster of life behind the coffee bar.  Watch this space for more details…

PRAY

The soul of The Dock is our conviction that faith matters (maybe more than ever) in this crazy world, and that life makes more sense  lived with God.  The practical expression of that faith, as well as a hundred-and-one unplanned conversations and prayers during the course of the working week, is our weekly gathering at 3:33 on Sunday afternoons – the Dock Walk.

If you haven’t come across the Dock Walk before, it’s our experiment in building a church without a building – church without walls.  We meet for coffee, we walk, we chat, we discuss a Bible passage, we listen to readings and songs through a funky little bluetooth speaker, standing beneath the circling seagulls and glowing winter skies of the wild reaches of the Titanic Quarter.  It’s a workout for the body and the soul; it’s a dander with a lovely bunch of people; it’s the most profound and encouraging ‘church’ I’ve ever been part of.

You’ll get a taster of Dock Walking on Sunday morning at 10:15am on BBC Radio Ulster.  If you like what you hear, what about giving it a try in 2013?  (Don’t let the weather put you off – even on the worst of days, as Sus and I drive into the TQ for the walk, we pass loads of families bundled up in macs and wellies walking along the seashore at Jordanstown.  Going for a walk is a good thing – whatever the weather!)

At the start of the new year, it’s also a good chance to re-commit to embedding a little bit of Bible in every day life.  The Wordlive daily podcasts, which we use as our discussion starters on the walks, are a brilliant, imaginative, convenient way to centre yourself on a passage of scripture every day – I can’t recommend them highly enough.  A good New Year habit to start (or re-start) whether you’re able to join us on a Sunday afternoon or not!

GIVE

The lifeblood of The Dock – not pretty, but necessary – is the funding which arrives day-by-day in the Honesty Box in the cafe – people have been breathtakingly, wonderfully honest throughout 2012.  However as time goes on there are expenses that the Honesty Box can’t cover – new equipment, utility bills, investment in ideas which will help us expand – we want to keep growing, and we can’t do that if we’re always rooting round down the back of the sofa for loose change.  We also want to be able to offer a warm welcome and a guilt-free experience to those who use the cafe and genuinely can’t give generously to the Honesty Box.

So at the start of 2013, I’m asking if you would be wiling to sign up to a donation to The Dock.   You can make a one-off donation under the ‘Give’ tab on the homepage of the website, or you can follow this link to a DOCK standing order form for making a regular donation – a New Years Resolution which will keep making a difference as the year rolls on!

So – Meet/Pray/Give.  Sign up for a volunteer-for-a-day day… Join us at 3:33 on a Sunday… Form a Wordlive habit… Make a donation… Start a standing order…   Things you can do at the start of 2013 which will make a big, big difference in this adventure of Life in the Titanic Quarter.

The heaters are on… the rain is beating against the window panes… the Christmas tree lights are still twinkling (for another day or two…)… the last pot of Christmas Brew coffee is on the hot plate… Yep, Dock Cafe is open again for the first day of business in 2013.  It’s good to be back!

And what an exciting start to the year…  It’s been a week of Dock Walks – first of all our New Year’s Day walk on Tuesday, as we walked and dreamed and prayed about all our hopes and plans for 2013.  And stopped to give thanks for all that’s happened in 2012 – remembering that on our New Years Day walk last year, there was no such thing as Dock Cafe, no admittance yet to the building site of Titanic Belfast, no way to walk on Titanic’s slipways… so many changes in such an incredible year.

Then today, Dock Cafe had only been open for a few minutes when a BBC crew arrived – we had arranged for some 0f our regular walkers to be here so that one of our Dock Walks could be recorded for radio broadcast.  After a few minutes where it felt a bit awkward being followed around by a boom microphone, the team relaxed into it and did a great job – as always the conversation was buzzing with different ideas and perspectives as we chewed over a Bible passage from one of the Wordlive podcasts.  The result will be broadcast as the Sunday service on BBC Radio Ulster this coming Sunday morning (6/1/13) at 10:15am – a unique Sunday broadcast to start the new year!

Oops, I nearly forgot to post details of when and where Dock-World springs into life again after Christmas…

DOCK WALKS continue as normal throughout Dec and Jan – so there will be a wintry, blustery, bracing walk every Sunday at 3:33 (including tomorrow – 30th Dec) – wrap up warm and see you there!   As added incentive, we always find somewhere cosy to stop for coffees or hot chocolates on winter walks – and we get to see beautiful winter sunsets like this, taken at the Thompson Dock last Sunday:

We’re also continuing the tradition of Dock Walking on New Year’s Day – meeting at 3:33 to walk the length of the TQ, looking back with thanksgiving over 2012 on the road out, and looking forward with hope into 2013 on the road back.  It’s a great way to start the new year – fresh air, good friends, great chat, and space to get your head around the new year…

And DOCK CAFE is re-opening on Thursday for a new year of Life in the Titanic Quarter… incredible to think that this time last year, the cafe wasn’t even a twinkle in our eye… what surprises and blessings are waiting for us this year?