The opening talk at the UCAN conference has caused quite a problem. Based on the profound book "The Starfish and the Spirit", I found my jaw dropping at many of its insights and its revelatory explanations of how God created the church to function.

Breath-taking simplicity, profound consequences, but only attainable through miraculous intervention. Impossible to see happen except in rare circumstances?

Back in January, I started my new year as I often do with a new initiative. A persistent and niggly injury is preventing me running, so I found myself tempted to head for another goal. To learn to do a handstand.

Step by step exercises, and a wider fitness regime for suppleness and core strength. A tantalising dream that dangled in front of this "almost-50" year old. Most of the 10 moves didn't prove a problem, but the "Downward Dog" that required me to simultaneously kick both feet up in the air at the same time has been my undoing. Trying to follow the exercises and have the persistence and repetition to do them every other day, soon popped my bubble. They proved far harder in practice than the athletic prowess that was demonstrated on the videos.

I'm caught in the dilemma of the downward dog - something that is clearly possible to do… when you can do it, but which presents in practice as impossible to achieve.

I've often felt like giving up and I am so far away from attaining the goal that I don't feel like I'm any steps further forwards than the day I started. My head keeps trying to tell me how unrealistic it is, and it is quick to remind me of my age, injuries, lack of time, and my naivete.

The church is very similar. Many good ideas do the rounds, but the initial proclamation of "that's it!" quickly give way to apathy, lack of resources, acceptance of the status quo, and a plethora of politics and the myriad reasons why it's not "it", until the next idea comes along

However, it's all the layers of Christendom that have been added to God's original design that are getting in the way. Church was designed to do the impossible and be the incarnate Kingdom on earth.

Jules Morgan's talk and this book grab the seemingly impossible but divinely-crafted pattern of what church was created to be. They remind us that when we nurture and train in line with the design, then the miraculous gets to become. It holds out the simple dream of what God can do and wants to do with the church.

God turned my world upside down and turned my understanding of church on its head through this book and the UCAN conference (as it always does!), and maybe that's the first step and the encouragement I need to be persistent in making the rest of my work and faith to follow suit.

So, Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

Ephesians 4:11-13

My selfish and far-fetched desire to achieve a handstand suddenly doesn't seem to be so impossible. After all, God designed me to be able to do this, so all I need to do is to keep my eye on the goal and keep following the instructions. So if you catch me on my hands upside-down, throwing my feet up into the air, and muttering about a downward dog, don't be surprised. It's a miracle in progress.

May our work as church administrators see the church not from our human perspective and all the problems we learn to navigate, but in God's upside-down world of how He created the church to function and thrive.

Julian Mander

Riverside Church - Birmingham

Former UCAN Director