{"id":1668,"date":"2016-03-19T18:46:35","date_gmt":"2016-03-19T22:46:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/change-ringing\/"},"modified":"2016-03-19T18:46:35","modified_gmt":"2016-03-19T22:46:35","slug":"change-ringing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/change-ringing\/","title":{"rendered":"Change ringing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.communityofjesus.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/bell-tower.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5626395\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-5626395\" src=\"http:\/\/www.communityofjesus.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/bell-tower.jpg\" alt=\"bell-tower\" width=\"176\" height=\"261\" \/><\/a>Plain Bob, Plain Hunt, 3-4 down, 3-4 up\u2026minimus, minor major\u2026circle of work, top\u00a0of the stroke, and sallies, clappers, and stays. The words circled around me, like flying\u00a0elephants with very small wings, heavy, dense and ready to come crashing down at any\u00a0moment. Wow \u2013 this was not quite as I imagined.<\/p>\n<p>I had watched our band of bell ringers since our tower was dedicated in 2009. Their\u00a0perseverance and dedication was obvious. Over time the rhythm of their rings had\u00a0steadily improved, and the patterns they rang became more complex. I had always been\u00a0intrigued by the quiet focus of the band during their post \u2013 service ringing. It was a team\u00a0sport of the most intricate and subtle kind. Faces focused, no one uttering a word, eyes all\u00a0looking to the center of their circle. How one word by the leader, \u201cbob\u201d, could make\u00a0them all change the timing of their bells and create another pattern. It was a bit like a\u00a0secret world of sound, ringing the rest of us into and out of our beloved church for\u00a0worship, elections, passings, all the most important moments of our life together.<\/p>\n<p>Receiving a letter of invitation from our tower captain last March, I jumped at the chance\u00a0to be a part of this. Despite the obvious complexity, it seemed doable. I was well trained\u00a0in rhythms from years of playing an instrument. It couldn\u2019t be that hard \u2013 pull on the\u00a0rope, let the bell swing a bit, pull again\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Wow \u2013 how wrong I was! I found out it was not \u201cbell ringing\u201d, but \u201cchange ringing\u201d, and\u00a0letting a 500lb bell swing with only a 15ft rope to control it through a complex pattern of\u00a0\u201cchanges\u201d was an art that will take a lifetime to master. I have so much to learn and many\u00a0teachers here to help me, and I am finding there is no shame in this experience. As one\u00a0who has never taken easily to the spiritual principal of \u201cbeing wrong\u201d and of humility, it\u00a0has actually been a joy (mostly) to fail miserably amongst my brothers and sisters, in\u00a0pursuit of this art that is so glorious to God and man when done well. It occurred to me\u00a0this is a life lesson of the best kind. To fail and get up again, without condemnation,\u00a0trusting in God\u2019s love through others around us. There is a wonderful freedom in that \u2013\u00a0and well worth a little \u201cbruised\u201d pride to obtain.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Follow us<\/strong><br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/communityofjesus.org\">https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/communityofjesus.org<\/a><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/TheCommunityOfJesus\/~4\/FcMLwxo-e50\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Plain Bob, Plain Hunt, 3-4 down, 3-4 up\u2026minimus, minor major\u2026circle of work, top\u00a0of the stroke, and sallies, clappers, and stays. The words circled around me, like flying\u00a0elephants with very small wings, heavy, dense and ready to come crashing down at &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/change-ringing\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-paraclete-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}