How do you advertise Lent? A time to give something up? Or a time to fast? Or a Journey to the Cross? In creating a new banner we played with a number of ideas, a variety of questions and sent words circling like characters who emerge from life to meet with Jesus. The final result was a Word Cloud gathering together the most used words in these encounters that we hope will intrigue and open up fresh 21st century conversations.

I know already that some people don’t quite understand a wordcloud, they prefer a very clear linear text that says what you want it to say, but for others it is fun looking at the various ways the Word Cloud Generator arranges the words and how that draws your eye to notice some and not others. Similarly, playing with the different colour options meant that certain words jump out, others fall back – yet the words one eye notices will be different for each person and for those whose eyes do
not allow them to see the banner at all – then there is a reliance on the way it is described for them.

When words are heard then they also take on different meanings as accents and cadence open up fresh opportunities and wisdom.
So, for you, which words come alive?

• Do they tell you something about the texts we are going to follow?
• or invite you to know more?
• Which words tell your story?
• or remind you of an experience in your own life?
• or do you suddenly notice something despite missing it previously?
  
• Would you like to come on a journey with us through Lent, or invite someone else along for the ride? We will share words – but may also find ourselves with no words to say. We will hear old stories told in new ways, and perhaps new stories told in traditional ways. And we will invite these
  words to come alive in our own times.
  
• be blessed
  Craig