I shouldn’t be surprised when God answers prayer. It’s not that I don’t get answers – I do, but there are some requests that I make that at the time do not seem to be answered. I am speaking of prayers for healing – the ones I pray for myself!
I can’t count the number of times when I have prayed over colds, sore throats and other aches and pains. I have always assumed that the nature of the illness was not that severe that time and nature would not do their stuff eventually. A sleepless night of coughing and spluttering were small in comparison to dealing with cancer or something.
There has, however, been something probably just as small, but infinitely more painful over the last few months. I have been waking up in the middle of the night with a feeling of being suffocated. It feels like tight band across my upper abdomen and I find it hard to breath. After a while, things begin to relax a little, but it is all very painful. I am quite sure that it is just a very painful episode of indigestion. I am not a doctor, so I could be wrong. After an hour or two of the cramps, a visit to the toilet usually sorts things out.
While I was away on holiday, visiting family, I had a very bad session. I was awake most of the night and eventually drove to an all night petrol station to buy pain killers and indigestion tablets which had absolutely no effect at all. That was after praying fervently for a healing touch that never came.
I was no better in the morning, the day we were due to come home, and was incapable of driving anywhere. The following day, having had to pay for an extra night at the hotel, I drove home. I wasn’t really up to it, but another night was out of the question.
I think it took a week to feel like myself again. That maybe sounds like something more serious the indigestion. Frankly I think it was the KFC chicken things. A touch of food poisoning perhaps. I used to have a steel lined stomach in my younger days, but as I get older, things don’t always agree with me. I know that you can have these allergy tests done, but I would be horrified to discover a list of things that I am allergic to.
Earlier this afternoon I felt the stirrings of another attack of indigestion. There was the same tight feeling of being unable to breathe and a severe pain that had me doubled over. It was bad. I am sure I was groaning loud enough to be heard next door. I will admit to taking a couple of painkillers just before I slipped onto my knees and prayed.
I don’t think there was anything different in the words I used, or my sincerity, or faith level. I just knew that I couldn’t do another week like the last time. There was absolutely no time for the painkillers to take effect. I had taken them some twenty seconds before I began to pray. I remember praying that the pain would leave just as swiftly as it had come, and that healing was part of the salvation package. And then it happened – just as quickly as the pain had come, it went away. Not after a while. Not a gradual feeling better. It really was instant, straight away, immediate – and I was amazed!
The sceptics would say that it was the tablets. The spiritually zealous would condemn me for taking the tablets in the first place. I say that God healed me!
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Sunday, August 03, 2008
Eau de Burnt Bolognese
“Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.” John 12:3
There is a fragrance in our house at the moment. The word fragrance evokes images of something pleasant. Perhaps the word smell would better describe it.
Earlier on in the week, perhaps Monday, my husband arrived home very late. I had made a Bolognese sauce to go with pasta and left it in the pan for him to heat through. Then I had gone to bed. Apparently, between switching on the hotplate and returning to see how it was doing, he had fallen asleep on the sofa. Who knows how long he was asleep, but I can guess what it was that woke him up – smoke!
I was woken up by the smell of the smoke and made my way downstairs through a misty haze.
My husband was in the kitchen “dealing with it”. The black burnt remains of the sauce were being scraped into the bin.
Since that day, the “fragrance” has hung about the house. I find myself sniffing the hall carpet, the net curtain in the kitchen, the towels in the bathroom and, yes, even pressing my nose against the painted wall of the hallway. The smell seems to have permeated every surface of the house. Doors and windows left wide open seem to have little effect in diminishing the odour.
Just how long does it take? What else must I do?
It reminds me of the story of Mary breaking the jar of perfume over Jesus’ feet and filling her home with its wonderful fragrance. How long did the fragrance fill her home? Did she open all the windows and doors to try to clear the house of the aroma? Did she, perhaps, keep the doors closed to try to hold on to the fragrance? For week afterwards, did she pick up things and catch a hint of the perfume that remained?
There is nothing pleasant about the aroma of burnt Bolognese sauce. If only my husband had spilled a bottle of perfume instead!
There is a fragrance in our house at the moment. The word fragrance evokes images of something pleasant. Perhaps the word smell would better describe it.
Earlier on in the week, perhaps Monday, my husband arrived home very late. I had made a Bolognese sauce to go with pasta and left it in the pan for him to heat through. Then I had gone to bed. Apparently, between switching on the hotplate and returning to see how it was doing, he had fallen asleep on the sofa. Who knows how long he was asleep, but I can guess what it was that woke him up – smoke!
I was woken up by the smell of the smoke and made my way downstairs through a misty haze.
My husband was in the kitchen “dealing with it”. The black burnt remains of the sauce were being scraped into the bin.
Since that day, the “fragrance” has hung about the house. I find myself sniffing the hall carpet, the net curtain in the kitchen, the towels in the bathroom and, yes, even pressing my nose against the painted wall of the hallway. The smell seems to have permeated every surface of the house. Doors and windows left wide open seem to have little effect in diminishing the odour.
Just how long does it take? What else must I do?
It reminds me of the story of Mary breaking the jar of perfume over Jesus’ feet and filling her home with its wonderful fragrance. How long did the fragrance fill her home? Did she open all the windows and doors to try to clear the house of the aroma? Did she, perhaps, keep the doors closed to try to hold on to the fragrance? For week afterwards, did she pick up things and catch a hint of the perfume that remained?
There is nothing pleasant about the aroma of burnt Bolognese sauce. If only my husband had spilled a bottle of perfume instead!
Monday, July 21, 2008
A piece of wood
Exodus 15:22-25 - “Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. (That is why the place is called Marah.) So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, "What are we to drink?" Then Moses cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became sweet.”
It’s not always obvious from just looking at something that something is wrong. Take me, for instance - I am sure my husband will echo that thought – I look fine. I am not pale or wan. I haven’t fainted or spewed up. I look robust and healthy.
But..
If you could just peel away my skin, roll it up carefully (there are enough wrinkles already) and lay it to one side. If you could unhook all the tendons and muscles and hang them over the back of a chair. Leave the heart alone. I don’t think that is where the problem lies – (although God might not agree with me on that one!) I’d rather you didn’t touch the lungs and liver. Head south – somewhere around the abdomen. Try untangling the intestines. Pretend it’s the end of the toothpaste tube and squeeze gently. Ouch! I did say gently!
It’s not a pretty sight! All is not well in digestive system. I have eaten too much, too often and the belly is revolting! (Revolting as in the verb, not in the adjective!) I don’t think it is just the quantity of food that has been consumed. I have a feeling that it may also be the quality. I have eaten something that seriously disagrees with me.
As I said before – you can’t tell by looking at my outside that anything is wrong, but, believe me, having lived with my insides for a better part of a week, I know for sure that there is something not right!
Moses and the Israelites couldn’t tell by looking at the water that there was something wrong. It looked like water. It probably didn’t have a suspicious looking scum floating about on the top of it. It took someone to sip it to discover that there was a problem.
“A piece of wood” was the solution to Moses. Thrown into it transformed something bitter into something sweet. The story ends with God revealing something about himself – “for I am the LORD, who heals you." What is it that I can throw into my digestive system that will transform it? I have tried indigestion tablets and aspirins by the pocketful with little success.
Maybe it is time to toss in a bit of wood – a reminder that the death and resurrection of Jesus cures all ills – the physical ones, the emotional ones and the spiritual ones!
It’s not always obvious from just looking at something that something is wrong. Take me, for instance - I am sure my husband will echo that thought – I look fine. I am not pale or wan. I haven’t fainted or spewed up. I look robust and healthy.
But..
If you could just peel away my skin, roll it up carefully (there are enough wrinkles already) and lay it to one side. If you could unhook all the tendons and muscles and hang them over the back of a chair. Leave the heart alone. I don’t think that is where the problem lies – (although God might not agree with me on that one!) I’d rather you didn’t touch the lungs and liver. Head south – somewhere around the abdomen. Try untangling the intestines. Pretend it’s the end of the toothpaste tube and squeeze gently. Ouch! I did say gently!
It’s not a pretty sight! All is not well in digestive system. I have eaten too much, too often and the belly is revolting! (Revolting as in the verb, not in the adjective!) I don’t think it is just the quantity of food that has been consumed. I have a feeling that it may also be the quality. I have eaten something that seriously disagrees with me.
As I said before – you can’t tell by looking at my outside that anything is wrong, but, believe me, having lived with my insides for a better part of a week, I know for sure that there is something not right!
Moses and the Israelites couldn’t tell by looking at the water that there was something wrong. It looked like water. It probably didn’t have a suspicious looking scum floating about on the top of it. It took someone to sip it to discover that there was a problem.
“A piece of wood” was the solution to Moses. Thrown into it transformed something bitter into something sweet. The story ends with God revealing something about himself – “for I am the LORD, who heals you." What is it that I can throw into my digestive system that will transform it? I have tried indigestion tablets and aspirins by the pocketful with little success.
Maybe it is time to toss in a bit of wood – a reminder that the death and resurrection of Jesus cures all ills – the physical ones, the emotional ones and the spiritual ones!
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Chasing Fantasies
I read Proverbs 12:11 this morning, “He who works his land will have abundant food, but he who chases fantasies lacks judgement.”
From a farming point of view it’s obvious that if you don’t plough the fields and sow the seeds, there will be nothing to harvest come autumn. There will be no abundant food. Just because it is wild and windy out in the fields, or wretched and raining, or indeed hot and humid, the farmer cannot afford to sit around and wait for better weather.
I am thinking about the land that I have been given. It is not a physical field of grass and hedges. It is all that makes up my life – the relationships that I enjoy, the talents and skills that I possess, the job with all its challenges. My field is made up of all the varying aspects of my life. All of them, with the right amount of work, should be wielding a harvest of some kind, but I wonder which bits are lying fallow.
If I had actually done all that I had imagined doing over these last few weeks I would have:-
• Dealt with the weeds in the garden
• Called the plumber to repair the leak in the loft
• Driven the car to the garage to have the dents and scratches sorted
• Contacted the heating engineer to replace to the boiler and the gas heater
Perhaps it is when I look at my walk with Jesus that I am most shocked about how little I work the “land” – the prayers that don’t get answered because I don’t pray them, the illnesses that I endure because of the promise of healing that I don’t claim, the mediocre life I live because of the promises in God’s word that I don’t hunt out and hang on to, the challenging conversations I don’t have because I don’t visit friends, the opportunities to witness that I don’t take advantage of because I lack confidence… the list is a long one!
If only I lived the life I imagined to live, where my fantasies were transformed into realities, by some hard work, how different I would be, and perhaps how different the people around me would be too!
It is time to stop chasing fantasies and start doing some hard work!
From a farming point of view it’s obvious that if you don’t plough the fields and sow the seeds, there will be nothing to harvest come autumn. There will be no abundant food. Just because it is wild and windy out in the fields, or wretched and raining, or indeed hot and humid, the farmer cannot afford to sit around and wait for better weather.
I am thinking about the land that I have been given. It is not a physical field of grass and hedges. It is all that makes up my life – the relationships that I enjoy, the talents and skills that I possess, the job with all its challenges. My field is made up of all the varying aspects of my life. All of them, with the right amount of work, should be wielding a harvest of some kind, but I wonder which bits are lying fallow.
If I had actually done all that I had imagined doing over these last few weeks I would have:-
• Dealt with the weeds in the garden
• Called the plumber to repair the leak in the loft
• Driven the car to the garage to have the dents and scratches sorted
• Contacted the heating engineer to replace to the boiler and the gas heater
Perhaps it is when I look at my walk with Jesus that I am most shocked about how little I work the “land” – the prayers that don’t get answered because I don’t pray them, the illnesses that I endure because of the promise of healing that I don’t claim, the mediocre life I live because of the promises in God’s word that I don’t hunt out and hang on to, the challenging conversations I don’t have because I don’t visit friends, the opportunities to witness that I don’t take advantage of because I lack confidence… the list is a long one!
If only I lived the life I imagined to live, where my fantasies were transformed into realities, by some hard work, how different I would be, and perhaps how different the people around me would be too!
It is time to stop chasing fantasies and start doing some hard work!
Saturday, July 12, 2008
A Pocket History of the Last Few Weeks
“What’s it got in its pocketses?”
It might have been a life changing question for Bilbo Baggins in the book “The Hobbit”, but for me it’s just a bit of trivia that says something about what I have been up to recently and other things
Tissues – I sneeze a lot. I was amazed to discover that most people don’t. I find that until I have sneezed at least half a dozen times in the morning I am not really awake. Some might suggest that I must have a allergy to something – being awake, perhaps?
A used ticket for Glasgow’s underground trains – the system is called the Clockwork Orange. It’s the Metro in miniature! The trains are short, the platforms are short and the list of stations along the line is also short! It is less busy than the underground at London, less threatening. I seem to remember many years ago having my purse stolen on the London underground somewhere between Walthamstow and Covent Garden.
A new AA membership card – I have been with them for nine years according to my card. A good investment considering the number of times that I have called the out. It has usually been about flat batteries having left the lights on too long. The last flat battery incident was Easter time. We were on our way to visit the folks in Englandshire and had stopped off at Pitlochry for breakfast. The lights were not on for long, but enough to drain the battery. The AA card was not in the purse and I approached a wee man who had pulled up to recycle old newspapers and bottles at the far end of the car park. He went home to get his jump leads! What a nice man!
A stone – it is very glittery. It looks dull when it is out of the light. I picked it up on a recent walk through the Glenmore forest. I know that some places tell you not to take things home with you. It’s not as if it’s a fossil, or a semi precious gem – it’s just a small stone.
A green pen – it’s actually a blue pen. I thought it would be green. I bought a pack of them – a blue, black, red and green one thinking that the outside of the pen mattered. I go through red pens quite rapidly. However, whatever the outside colour of the pen, they all turned out to be blue pens – even the black one was blue.
£1.61p in change – I have no idea why such a specific amount. The penny is probably picked up off the floor. I used to walk with my head down looking for dropped pennies – then I decided that was no way to walk anywhere – looking down at the ground. It was too earth-bound a posture, so I stopped doing it.
A maroon coloured toy car – I bet you don’t have one of those in your pocket! Last week we went to a Quiz night organised by my husband’s work. I go to so many of their socials now that I am sure people are wondering whereabouts in the office my desk is. It was a quiz based on TV Quiz shows. Everyone in the team got to fly solo. I represented my team in the “Catchphrase” round. Our team got the overall biggest score in the end, but chose not to gamble thinking we were far enough in front not to be caught. We came second, another team gambled and got ten extra points, and our consolation prizes were the toy cars
My new Bingo card - there are too many plastic cards issued for various things. I think someone ought to implement hand prints, or thumb prints or iris scanners.
A restaurant receipt – The big multiplex cinema is very picky about what films it will show. There may be dozens of screens, but most of them show the same latest box office hit and the not so mainstream films get elbowed out. Eden Court cinema tends to pick them up. Eden Court has been upgraded. The new cinema is very plush. The seats are so soft and not numb bumming at all. We went to the restaurant first. It was very nice, but we didn’t have enough time for desert! The film was full of moral dilemma and not the least easy watch!
A hairdressing appointment card – I got my hair done seeing as we are going away on holiday. My natural shade is grey – but my husband thinks that there is no need to stay grey when there is a huge variety of bottles and lotions available! I used to be dark brown –very dark brown. The salon has changed hands. The new lady uses different colours. In between colouring and cutting and blow-drying my hair she was fielding phone-calls. Apparently the previous manager didn’t pay people and has left a string of debts which the new manager is having to sort out. Despite the distractions I came out looking passable – the cut is nice (how long will it take to for the side parting to sneak into the middle?), the colour is a bit too dark.
A badge – a ceramic pink tartan ribbon thing in aid of the Scottish Breast Cancer Scheme. It appeared in my pigeon hole at work during one theses raising awareness weeks. The only significant thing I have noticed about that part of my anatomy (or those parts seeing as there is more than one of them) is that they are definitely not pert! Gravity has taken its toll!
It might have been a life changing question for Bilbo Baggins in the book “The Hobbit”, but for me it’s just a bit of trivia that says something about what I have been up to recently and other things
Tissues – I sneeze a lot. I was amazed to discover that most people don’t. I find that until I have sneezed at least half a dozen times in the morning I am not really awake. Some might suggest that I must have a allergy to something – being awake, perhaps?
A used ticket for Glasgow’s underground trains – the system is called the Clockwork Orange. It’s the Metro in miniature! The trains are short, the platforms are short and the list of stations along the line is also short! It is less busy than the underground at London, less threatening. I seem to remember many years ago having my purse stolen on the London underground somewhere between Walthamstow and Covent Garden.
A new AA membership card – I have been with them for nine years according to my card. A good investment considering the number of times that I have called the out. It has usually been about flat batteries having left the lights on too long. The last flat battery incident was Easter time. We were on our way to visit the folks in Englandshire and had stopped off at Pitlochry for breakfast. The lights were not on for long, but enough to drain the battery. The AA card was not in the purse and I approached a wee man who had pulled up to recycle old newspapers and bottles at the far end of the car park. He went home to get his jump leads! What a nice man!
A stone – it is very glittery. It looks dull when it is out of the light. I picked it up on a recent walk through the Glenmore forest. I know that some places tell you not to take things home with you. It’s not as if it’s a fossil, or a semi precious gem – it’s just a small stone.
A green pen – it’s actually a blue pen. I thought it would be green. I bought a pack of them – a blue, black, red and green one thinking that the outside of the pen mattered. I go through red pens quite rapidly. However, whatever the outside colour of the pen, they all turned out to be blue pens – even the black one was blue.
£1.61p in change – I have no idea why such a specific amount. The penny is probably picked up off the floor. I used to walk with my head down looking for dropped pennies – then I decided that was no way to walk anywhere – looking down at the ground. It was too earth-bound a posture, so I stopped doing it.
A maroon coloured toy car – I bet you don’t have one of those in your pocket! Last week we went to a Quiz night organised by my husband’s work. I go to so many of their socials now that I am sure people are wondering whereabouts in the office my desk is. It was a quiz based on TV Quiz shows. Everyone in the team got to fly solo. I represented my team in the “Catchphrase” round. Our team got the overall biggest score in the end, but chose not to gamble thinking we were far enough in front not to be caught. We came second, another team gambled and got ten extra points, and our consolation prizes were the toy cars
My new Bingo card - there are too many plastic cards issued for various things. I think someone ought to implement hand prints, or thumb prints or iris scanners.
A restaurant receipt – The big multiplex cinema is very picky about what films it will show. There may be dozens of screens, but most of them show the same latest box office hit and the not so mainstream films get elbowed out. Eden Court cinema tends to pick them up. Eden Court has been upgraded. The new cinema is very plush. The seats are so soft and not numb bumming at all. We went to the restaurant first. It was very nice, but we didn’t have enough time for desert! The film was full of moral dilemma and not the least easy watch!
A hairdressing appointment card – I got my hair done seeing as we are going away on holiday. My natural shade is grey – but my husband thinks that there is no need to stay grey when there is a huge variety of bottles and lotions available! I used to be dark brown –very dark brown. The salon has changed hands. The new lady uses different colours. In between colouring and cutting and blow-drying my hair she was fielding phone-calls. Apparently the previous manager didn’t pay people and has left a string of debts which the new manager is having to sort out. Despite the distractions I came out looking passable – the cut is nice (how long will it take to for the side parting to sneak into the middle?), the colour is a bit too dark.
A badge – a ceramic pink tartan ribbon thing in aid of the Scottish Breast Cancer Scheme. It appeared in my pigeon hole at work during one theses raising awareness weeks. The only significant thing I have noticed about that part of my anatomy (or those parts seeing as there is more than one of them) is that they are definitely not pert! Gravity has taken its toll!
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Like abandoned babies
Psalm 35:13b-14a “When my prayers returned to me unanswered, I went about mourning as though for my friend or brother. I bowed my head in grief as though weeping for my mother.”
This comes in the middle of a prayer of King David for God to stand up for him and fight against his enemies. It seemed to him that God was being silent while his enemies were free and unrestrained in their mockery of him. David was fulfilling his side of “treat others the way you would like to be treated yourself”, but he wasn’t being treated so nice by others.
I reached the bit about unanswered prayer and I started to think about my own response when God seems silent. King David digs in deep – out come the sack cloth and ashes. He mourns. He takes prayer to a deeper level, not content with God’s silence. It matters to him that God hears and God answers.
My own response is so very different. I had a very brief but clear picture of a new-born baby abandoned on a doorstep!
A mother is committed to the baby not just for the first few days, or until it no longer needs her milk, or until it can walk, or talk, or become a little bit more independent. The mother is committed right up until the child matures and leaves home, and even then she is still involved.
I may not have abandoned any babies on doorsteps, but I am quite sure I have abandoned some very important prayers, because I didn’t see an immediate response from God. Suddenly the burden became too heavy, I wasn’t sure that God was going to shoulder it with me, or that He was even interested, or that it really mattered that much. And so, just like an abandoned baby, I dropped it and walked away. I am not even sure that I dropped it on someone else’s doorstep!
I was reading earlier on this week about Caleb waiting forty-five years to finally claim his bit of the Promised Land. I don’t think I could even climb a mountain, let alone fight the giants who lived there. Caleb is not like me! He kept himself in shape and he held onto the word of God!
He abandoned none of his babies!
This comes in the middle of a prayer of King David for God to stand up for him and fight against his enemies. It seemed to him that God was being silent while his enemies were free and unrestrained in their mockery of him. David was fulfilling his side of “treat others the way you would like to be treated yourself”, but he wasn’t being treated so nice by others.
I reached the bit about unanswered prayer and I started to think about my own response when God seems silent. King David digs in deep – out come the sack cloth and ashes. He mourns. He takes prayer to a deeper level, not content with God’s silence. It matters to him that God hears and God answers.
My own response is so very different. I had a very brief but clear picture of a new-born baby abandoned on a doorstep!
A mother is committed to the baby not just for the first few days, or until it no longer needs her milk, or until it can walk, or talk, or become a little bit more independent. The mother is committed right up until the child matures and leaves home, and even then she is still involved.
I may not have abandoned any babies on doorsteps, but I am quite sure I have abandoned some very important prayers, because I didn’t see an immediate response from God. Suddenly the burden became too heavy, I wasn’t sure that God was going to shoulder it with me, or that He was even interested, or that it really mattered that much. And so, just like an abandoned baby, I dropped it and walked away. I am not even sure that I dropped it on someone else’s doorstep!
I was reading earlier on this week about Caleb waiting forty-five years to finally claim his bit of the Promised Land. I don’t think I could even climb a mountain, let alone fight the giants who lived there. Caleb is not like me! He kept himself in shape and he held onto the word of God!
He abandoned none of his babies!
Two Little Ducks
Rites of passage are ceremonies that mark important events in a person’s life. If I get around to sending a wedding acceptance card, later on in the month I will witness my friend taking her wedding vows.
In addition to the official rites of passage like baptisms, weddings and funerals, there are lots of unofficial ones. For my family, amongst the girls at least, it was our first bingo game! At the age of eighteen we were old enough to join the village Working Man’s Club - not that in my case I was either working (I was still at school doing “A” levels and planning to go to university) or a man!
My mother sat around the table surrounded by my elder sisters and we played Bingo! The winnings didn’t amount to much, unless it was the “snowball” which was £50 or more. That was quite a lot in those days! I may have won a line. The first appearance at bingo as soon after the eighteenth birthday was a must, but attendance after that was purely voluntary – and I never caught the bug.
A couple of Christmases ago, my husband bought me a set of bingo markers with a promise that he would take me to the new Bingo emporium (the word “hall” doesn’t match the look of the building!). The manager of the club was a friend of his from school days in Glasgow. Being told that it was my birthday in March, the manager had said that he would treat us to the night out – but we would have to pay for the “books”.
It didn’t quite materialize. We never seemed to dig out diaries and set dates. Last night we decided we would go. The bingo markers were dug out from the back of the drawer and we headed off.
This was most unlike the village Working Man’s Club. The place was huge! The foyer was all glitzy with water fountains behind glass panels. There was also a crowd of people outside the entrance smoking a last cigarette before heading inside. Having learned that we were “bingo virgins” someone walked us through the whole process. There were dozens of different game cards – one of which was a “national game” .Then our guide took us on a tour of the bar and the café.
Once settled down, two ladies at the other end of table saw to it that we were marking the right card at the right time. They tutted every so often when Joe and I giggled at how serious everyone was. I think they frowned when Joe won a game – not a mere £50 I can assure you!
What really struck me about it, comparing the whole thing with the Working Man’s Club was a lack of – the best word I can think of – colour. I remember that, in my first bingo experience, they didn’t just call the number. It wasn’t just “6 and 9, 69”. Many of the numbers had bits attached. 69 was the “upside down one”. Some of the numbers were easy enough to guess where they were coming from – “Sweet sixteen and never been kissed”, “Two fat ladies – 88” (in the age of political correctness, one can see why they may have abandoned that one – along with the sexist “legs 11”), “two little ducks – 22” (my own personal favourite). Some of them were not so easy to work out – something and 9 (could be 3, 4 or 5 – I don’t remember which) – “the Brighton Line”. This is what I mean by colour. I missed that last night – I missed the two little ducks!
I suppose that is where big business and simple enjoyment part company. No one could say that in the Working man’s Club people were out to win a fortune. There was no way they could win enough money to pay off their mortgage with a shout of “house”. Last night, at the Bingo emporium, that was a possibility – in the national game, if your final winning number was 99 (or “top of the shop” in the old days). The emporium doesn’t have time to spend on “two little ducks” when there are so many books to get through, and big bucks to rake in.
Thursday, July 03, 2008
Improving the Church Expereince
I thought for a moment that I had sold my principles for a £20 Tesco voucher yesterday morning!
I was ambushed beside the recycling containers by a harmless looking woman. Through one ear I was listening to the satisfying smash of bottles inside the big containers. The other ear was being assailed by a woman telling me that she had not met her quota and could I please give an hour of my time to do her a favour!
The favour was simple enough – walk around the supermarket and give my opinion of the layout of the store and suggest improvements to make the shoppers’ experiences that much more satisfying. The difficult part was in working out which boxes to tick in terms of my attitude towards Tescos. I suspect that I was more unhappy than happy, and if she needed an unhappy person, to balance her cross section of ordinary shoppers, I could be that person. I was assured that they were not interested in the views of the “unhappy” customers, because obviously they are only going to say negative stuff! So why have a box on the form for unhappy people? It seems to me that you need to listen to the views of the unhappy ones too to find out why they are so unhappy!
So we ticked the “mixed” view box in the end.
What am I not happy about? I think it could be the cheap prices. It makes me wonder how they can produce things so cheaply. At whose expense are they making a profit? I also wonder about the small local businesses that cannot compete price-wise and end up closing down. In one of our units on Justice in the World we look at the way big multi-national companies produce things so cheaply and elbow their competitors out of the way. Once the competitors are gone, they can up their prices because they are the only supplier left in town.
Tesco will never be the only supplier in town – but you get my drift.
So it was under some apprehension this morning that I turned up to do my walk about and give my views. It was nice to discover that a colleague from work had also been ambushed by the same woman, and we were in it together. My friend had obviously given it a lot more thought than I had. She was able to rattle of a dozen areas where they could make improvements, starting with the car-park
The lady that took us around asked us plenty of questions about certain sections of the store, the freshness and range of food, the speed through the checkouts, the helpfulness of the staff etc. Many of the questions focussed on the negative things, about what we didn’t like about the store and what could be improved.
Her final questions, after the walkabout and the general discussion, was in interesting one. If Tesco implemented all the changes we had suggested – fresh fish counters, proper butchers, a bigger range of some of the products – would we come more often? Would it make any difference to our shopping habits? Would we spend more?
My honest answer was “No” in the sense that it is where I tend to do the weekly shop anyway. I go often enough, and I already think I spend too much there and I don’t give enough of my business to the smaller independent shops like I could. I don’t want any more reasons to shop at Tescos – or Morrisons, or Sainsburys or Asda.
Coming away from my market research hour in Tescos, I thought about applying their techniques to church setting! What is it about church that you like, or you don’t like? Are the seats too hard, or too soft? Is the décor pleasing to the eye? Are the words projected onto a big screen better than leafing through a hymn book? Talking of hymns, are they outdated? Should it be all modern songs and choruses? Is the sermon too long? Or too irrelevant? Are the congregation welcoming? Or judgemental?
And finally after you have discussed it all – your final questions – “If we made the changes you have suggested, will you come more often?”
The honest answer? Probably not!
Many churches have made changes in they way they do things. I don’t think they have changed to attract people who otherwise wouldn’t come. I think they have changed to find better ways to worship and help people to live holy lives in the world.
In the end though, it is people that need to change. God doesn’t fit himself around people and their routines. It is people that need to dismantle what they do to fit around God.
I was ambushed beside the recycling containers by a harmless looking woman. Through one ear I was listening to the satisfying smash of bottles inside the big containers. The other ear was being assailed by a woman telling me that she had not met her quota and could I please give an hour of my time to do her a favour!
The favour was simple enough – walk around the supermarket and give my opinion of the layout of the store and suggest improvements to make the shoppers’ experiences that much more satisfying. The difficult part was in working out which boxes to tick in terms of my attitude towards Tescos. I suspect that I was more unhappy than happy, and if she needed an unhappy person, to balance her cross section of ordinary shoppers, I could be that person. I was assured that they were not interested in the views of the “unhappy” customers, because obviously they are only going to say negative stuff! So why have a box on the form for unhappy people? It seems to me that you need to listen to the views of the unhappy ones too to find out why they are so unhappy!
So we ticked the “mixed” view box in the end.
What am I not happy about? I think it could be the cheap prices. It makes me wonder how they can produce things so cheaply. At whose expense are they making a profit? I also wonder about the small local businesses that cannot compete price-wise and end up closing down. In one of our units on Justice in the World we look at the way big multi-national companies produce things so cheaply and elbow their competitors out of the way. Once the competitors are gone, they can up their prices because they are the only supplier left in town.
Tesco will never be the only supplier in town – but you get my drift.
So it was under some apprehension this morning that I turned up to do my walk about and give my views. It was nice to discover that a colleague from work had also been ambushed by the same woman, and we were in it together. My friend had obviously given it a lot more thought than I had. She was able to rattle of a dozen areas where they could make improvements, starting with the car-park
The lady that took us around asked us plenty of questions about certain sections of the store, the freshness and range of food, the speed through the checkouts, the helpfulness of the staff etc. Many of the questions focussed on the negative things, about what we didn’t like about the store and what could be improved.
Her final questions, after the walkabout and the general discussion, was in interesting one. If Tesco implemented all the changes we had suggested – fresh fish counters, proper butchers, a bigger range of some of the products – would we come more often? Would it make any difference to our shopping habits? Would we spend more?
My honest answer was “No” in the sense that it is where I tend to do the weekly shop anyway. I go often enough, and I already think I spend too much there and I don’t give enough of my business to the smaller independent shops like I could. I don’t want any more reasons to shop at Tescos – or Morrisons, or Sainsburys or Asda.
Coming away from my market research hour in Tescos, I thought about applying their techniques to church setting! What is it about church that you like, or you don’t like? Are the seats too hard, or too soft? Is the décor pleasing to the eye? Are the words projected onto a big screen better than leafing through a hymn book? Talking of hymns, are they outdated? Should it be all modern songs and choruses? Is the sermon too long? Or too irrelevant? Are the congregation welcoming? Or judgemental?
And finally after you have discussed it all – your final questions – “If we made the changes you have suggested, will you come more often?”
The honest answer? Probably not!
Many churches have made changes in they way they do things. I don’t think they have changed to attract people who otherwise wouldn’t come. I think they have changed to find better ways to worship and help people to live holy lives in the world.
In the end though, it is people that need to change. God doesn’t fit himself around people and their routines. It is people that need to dismantle what they do to fit around God.
Game, Set and Match
I guess I always knew that when Andy Murray came up against Nadal in the quarter finals at Wimbledon, he had hit a brick wall and gone as far as he could. Nadal was unstoppable. The man is strong and fast and determined to win.
The interviewer after the game made the point that Nadal is just one year older and is going to be playing the same tournaments as Andy over the next few years. The bottom line was – “Why bother? Nadal is always going to be there! You can’t beat him!”
Murray gave a really wise answer. Nadal last year was beatable. Over the year he had improved his game, addressed his weaknesses, improved his strengths and he was a better player. There is always natural talent – but on top of that there is training and discipline and hard work. If Nadal could do that in a year – then so could Murray!
Commentators have not been slow to talk about the changes in Murray’s game. I read an interesting article on the “nicification” of Andy Murray, of how the Murray camp have made him much more appealing to the British public – not loud, or abrasive, dragged a cute puppy into the picture and placed the pretty girlfriend on display. But ignore all of that – what matters is what happens on the court. His serves are faster and stronger. He has worked out in the gym to build up stamina and strength. He is doing what Nadal did! He is looking at the weakness of his game and doing something about them.
I have just been reading through chapters 10, 11 and 12 of Joshua. It reads like a Wimbledon tennis tournament – imagine Joshua as Nadal relentlessly marching through all the rounds, wiping out the opposition with powerful serves and magnificent returns. Unstoppable no matter the size and the experience of the man on the other side of the net.
What makes the victory sure for Joshua is not all the hard work that he has put into the training of his men, though I dare say they haven’t sat around on their backsides all day, is his unswerving obedience to God. God has said that He has given the nations into Joshua’s hand. He has stepped on the necks of his enemies and has been told that victory is his every time. Joshua takes God at His word and claims the victories one after another, even to the extent of demanding that God stops the sun in its tracks to give him time to finish the fight! And God does – because He sees His heart reflected in Joshua’s own.
I am trying to picture my foot on the neck of my enemy – and to hold that picture in my head, so that the times when I serve a double fault in life, or surrender a set point to the opposition, or miss the volley – I do not lose the sense that victory is mine in the end.
The interviewer after the game made the point that Nadal is just one year older and is going to be playing the same tournaments as Andy over the next few years. The bottom line was – “Why bother? Nadal is always going to be there! You can’t beat him!”
Murray gave a really wise answer. Nadal last year was beatable. Over the year he had improved his game, addressed his weaknesses, improved his strengths and he was a better player. There is always natural talent – but on top of that there is training and discipline and hard work. If Nadal could do that in a year – then so could Murray!
Commentators have not been slow to talk about the changes in Murray’s game. I read an interesting article on the “nicification” of Andy Murray, of how the Murray camp have made him much more appealing to the British public – not loud, or abrasive, dragged a cute puppy into the picture and placed the pretty girlfriend on display. But ignore all of that – what matters is what happens on the court. His serves are faster and stronger. He has worked out in the gym to build up stamina and strength. He is doing what Nadal did! He is looking at the weakness of his game and doing something about them.
I have just been reading through chapters 10, 11 and 12 of Joshua. It reads like a Wimbledon tennis tournament – imagine Joshua as Nadal relentlessly marching through all the rounds, wiping out the opposition with powerful serves and magnificent returns. Unstoppable no matter the size and the experience of the man on the other side of the net.
What makes the victory sure for Joshua is not all the hard work that he has put into the training of his men, though I dare say they haven’t sat around on their backsides all day, is his unswerving obedience to God. God has said that He has given the nations into Joshua’s hand. He has stepped on the necks of his enemies and has been told that victory is his every time. Joshua takes God at His word and claims the victories one after another, even to the extent of demanding that God stops the sun in its tracks to give him time to finish the fight! And God does – because He sees His heart reflected in Joshua’s own.
I am trying to picture my foot on the neck of my enemy – and to hold that picture in my head, so that the times when I serve a double fault in life, or surrender a set point to the opposition, or miss the volley – I do not lose the sense that victory is mine in the end.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Safe
“Red Sea to the front of them, Pharaoh at the back – here they were stuck in the middle with God”
It was all about God setting the scene to display His glory, not necessarily to His people this time, but to His enemies. The whole of Egypt was about to learn that there was no messing with God and what God claimed as His own.
The Israelites didn’t see it that way. As far as they were concerned they were stuck between a rock and a hard place. The impenetrable barrier of the Red Sea was in front of them, and the Egyptian army was coming up behind. They didn’t see any way out.
It was a complaint they were going to lay at Moses’ and God’s feet throughout the next forty years – about them dying in the wilderness, brought out of “safe” Egypt to be massacred, and that life was much better before Moses interfered.
Egypt became synonymous with safety, and yet there wasn’t any real safety there at all. Where was the safety in sons being put to death as they were born? Where was the safety in their working conditions as they built whatever it was they built? Perhaps there is a certain safety in “business as usual”, in familiar routines, unpleasant though they may be. People have coping mechanisms that are adequate for a particular setting.
God’s “safe” didn’t have any appearance of being safe at all and yet it was the safest place in the world. It doesn’t look safe but it is, not because of any of the externals, but because of the presence of God.
As I was reading the account in Exodus, the news was buzzing in the background. The report was about the elections in Zimbabwe. The leader of the opposition party had stood down leaving Robert Mugabe a clear path to power. As I was reading it was like the political situation in Zimbabwe was overlaid on the story of the Exodus. The people in Zimbabwe are as much between a rock and a hard place as the Israelites were. In front of them was the election process, behind them were the supporters of Mugabe – intimidating electors, killing more than a few, insisting people turn up an vote for someone they didn’t want in power, but powerless themselves to make a difference.
I don’t know enough about the politics of this country, let alone the politics of another. I don’t know why there is so much silence from those that could raise a banner in support of free elections. I don’t know when living to fight another day becomes more prudent than dying for a cause.
I found myself praying for God to intervene – much like he intervened for the Israelites. Both groups of people were denied freedom. Both groups of people are in need of a deliverer.
One of the on-line newspapers said that “Mr Mugabe has said "only God" can remove him.” It is almost a challenge, isn’t it? If only I were God…
It was all about God setting the scene to display His glory, not necessarily to His people this time, but to His enemies. The whole of Egypt was about to learn that there was no messing with God and what God claimed as His own.
The Israelites didn’t see it that way. As far as they were concerned they were stuck between a rock and a hard place. The impenetrable barrier of the Red Sea was in front of them, and the Egyptian army was coming up behind. They didn’t see any way out.
It was a complaint they were going to lay at Moses’ and God’s feet throughout the next forty years – about them dying in the wilderness, brought out of “safe” Egypt to be massacred, and that life was much better before Moses interfered.
Egypt became synonymous with safety, and yet there wasn’t any real safety there at all. Where was the safety in sons being put to death as they were born? Where was the safety in their working conditions as they built whatever it was they built? Perhaps there is a certain safety in “business as usual”, in familiar routines, unpleasant though they may be. People have coping mechanisms that are adequate for a particular setting.
God’s “safe” didn’t have any appearance of being safe at all and yet it was the safest place in the world. It doesn’t look safe but it is, not because of any of the externals, but because of the presence of God.
As I was reading the account in Exodus, the news was buzzing in the background. The report was about the elections in Zimbabwe. The leader of the opposition party had stood down leaving Robert Mugabe a clear path to power. As I was reading it was like the political situation in Zimbabwe was overlaid on the story of the Exodus. The people in Zimbabwe are as much between a rock and a hard place as the Israelites were. In front of them was the election process, behind them were the supporters of Mugabe – intimidating electors, killing more than a few, insisting people turn up an vote for someone they didn’t want in power, but powerless themselves to make a difference.
I don’t know enough about the politics of this country, let alone the politics of another. I don’t know why there is so much silence from those that could raise a banner in support of free elections. I don’t know when living to fight another day becomes more prudent than dying for a cause.
I found myself praying for God to intervene – much like he intervened for the Israelites. Both groups of people were denied freedom. Both groups of people are in need of a deliverer.
One of the on-line newspapers said that “Mr Mugabe has said "only God" can remove him.” It is almost a challenge, isn’t it? If only I were God…
Sunday, June 22, 2008
The Mechanics of Hugging
I learned to hug some time between 1982 and 1987.
Our family wasn’t really a demonstrative family. We didn’t hug, or hold hands, or cuddle or stand side by side with arms draped across shoulders or round waists. We were just not touchy feely people. It wasn’t quite all stiff upper lips and ramrod backs – but not that far from that. We just didn’t hug and didn’t feel inclined to!
In 1982 I headed off to Cyprus to teach in a small Christian school with very close links to the Brethren Church. They hugged a lot. Greetings were not exchanging handshakes or air kisses on either cheek, but a solid, and at times quite crushing, embrace. They were tactile people!
Quite accidentally, I started hugging my sisters. It wasn’t intentional. I just forgot that I wasn’t in church. I had been home for the holidays and was all packed up waiting for the taxi to take me to the train station when I turned around and pulled my sister into an embrace. I hugged her.
There was a moment, a look of total surprise on her face, a slight inclination to pull away before she surrendered and joined in the hug. Now it has become part and parcel of meetings and departures. I think my eldest sister enjoys them most and had become the initiator rather than just the recipient. It is a race to see who can hug who first when we meet!
I was dreaming last night about hugs – or, perhaps more significantly, the lack of hugs. I am not sure where I was, but a meting had been arranged between me and a friend. She was my best friend at secondary school and over the years we had lost touch. In my dream we were seated in a room and the whole meeting was permeated in awkwardness. We were not comfortable with each other’s company. In the real world we haven’t seen each other for twenty years or more, and for all but maybe on or two letters and a score of Christmas cards, we really have lost touch. In the dream she was surrounded by her family. I wasn’t married, but somehow had a son called Nick. (There is something not nice about waking up to discover that you don’t have a son called Nick – I know he doesn’t exist but I really miss him!)
Conversation was stilted between us. It was painful and embarrassing and all of us wanted it to end soon. I think it was me that eventually excused myself and stood up to say goodbye. As is my habit I reached out to give my friend a hug. She just didn’t seem to know what to do. Her arms were held stiff against her side and she looked at me with a perplexed expression. It was more than about why we should be hugging when we didn’t seem to have any relationship left that warranted a hug, but more about not knowing the mechanics of hugging.
How do you teach someone how to hug? Isn’t it something you just so? Apparently not in the dream world! I can remember in the dream world having to position her arms – one going up and over my shoulder, the other going down and around my waist. Then we hugged. It was like a re-run of my first hug with my sister – that brief moment of holding off before surrendering. Then it was real – it wasn’t just the physical meeting of two bodies in an embrace, but we made connections on all levels. It was a good hug!
Then I was aware than my hand was resting on her head and I was praying for her. I don’t know what I was praying, but it was fervent and passionate and powerful.
“Hug me too!” I was dazed as my friend and I broke apart, to be met with the other people in the room wanting a hug. And then I woke up…
We need to feel connected to people. Too often we live disconnected lives. Even as Christians, meeting in the same church body, we don’t always make the connections. Sometimes the hug is a substitute for really getting to know someone properly. It is not enough without the background relationship – like jewel rolling around on a workbench that ought to be in the setting of a gold ring.
As I think about the dream, I am challenged to think about all the connections that I make with people and what I can do to make those connections good hugs. It is out of the connections that perhaps we are drawn to pray for people more fervently, passionately and powerfully.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Strong Deliverer
I am not quite sure just what it was that I saw last night. I could have done with a button to rewind and play the scene through slowly. There was a car. There was something in the middle of the road that made the car slow down. There was a seagull swooping down in front of the car and picking up whatever it was in the middle of the road. The seagull then dropped whatever it was carrying onto the pavement. The thing that it dropped turned out to be a very small black bird that made a very loud racket once it had been dropped. It seemed to be unable to fly away by itself and hopped along the road, chattering to itself. Finally, just as I was about to try to pick up the blackbird and put it somewhere safe, a man came out from his garden and picked it up, crossed the road and put the wee bird into the hedge.
What I would like to think happened is that the little bird was in the path of the car, unaware that it was about to get run over. A seagull saw the danger and swooped in to rescue it, dropping it neatly on the pavement. Yeah, I know that it is an unlikely scenario. It is more likely that the seagull thought it was a tasty meal, about to be splattered by the car wheels. It swooped down to pick it up and then got a bit of scare when the meal began to loudly protest!
I mention this because, in the middle of a worship meeting last night, I had a flash back of the gull swooping down to pick up the wee bird.
Sometimes worship goes in an unpredictable direction. It is not always comfortable. The challenge gets a little bit scary. Suddenly, it doesn’t feel safe!
There was a moment when I felt like that. I wasn’t sure where things were headed and not sure I liked the challenges being set. I was getting unsettled. That is when I had my flash back. It was my scenario that I felt applied – this time I was the bird on the road, the car wasn’t the worship itself, but the feelings that it provoked, the seagull – as it swooped down to pick up the bird, I felt God saying, “It’s OK! I will keep you safe from any danger.”
A line of the song we were singing at the time contained the words “strong deliverer” which I thought was really appropriate for the moment.
Walking with God is always an adventure. It is comforting to know that all the time I am with him I am safe. Not physically safe, it doesn’t mean that I can’t come to any physical harm, but it does mean that no matter the circumstances I can feel secure.
Seeing the Picture
Toilet facilities in workplaces can be very functional. Someone in my workplace has added a table and a houseplant to brighten things up a bit and there are a few posters on the walls. Some of them are about aspects of women’s health, but the one that catches the eye is an optical illusion poster. It is one of those posters that has a series of wriggly lines across the page. There is a way of looking at it and you are supposed to see the proper picture.
I have never been able to see anything beyond the wriggly lines. Someone noticing my bemused look will tell me to focus on a point, cross my eyes over, and other such helpful instructions but I never see it. I put it down to astigmatism in my right eye!
Not being able to see what someone else can see is very frustrating. What seems obvious to someone else is not always obvious to me.
A few weeks ago, we had a mid-week meeting. It came about because a couple in another church had been to Lakeland, Florida and been touched by what had happened there. They wanted to see the same thing happen in our local churches. They had “seen” something and wanted to share that experience with others.
I am not sure if I could stick a label on the kind of meetings that we have been having since them. There is a lot of worship and a lot of prayer and much more than that. It’s different every week.
I always think that it is so exciting when God’s people get together and the barriers are down. Not all of us come from the same church – we are a real mix of church backgrounds. The people that meet together, many of them are involved in practical ministries like the Healing on the Streets and Street Pastors. They are enthusiastic and zealous.
I often think to myself – what power there is in the room! These people are one in heart and mind and totally involved. They are like a spiritual SAS team – dynamite. (I don’t say “we” because I guess I see myself as tagging along and I am not so involved!) A group of people like that in God’s hand is a mighty weapon. It is important that God is allowed to wield the weapon in the way He would like.
Proverbs 4:25 from the Message reads, “Keep your eyes straight ahead; ignore all sideshow distractions.” What qualifies as a “side show distraction”? Distractions take away our attention from what is important. Before I went to the meeting, I was spending time with God. I am not sure what I supposed to be seeing at the meetings. What was important, and what wasn’t? I can handle the worship, and the prayer, but not always the other stuff. I worry that we major of feelings and experiences to the detriment of something greater.
My question to God was, “What is it that I am supposed to see?”
His reply was, “Me glorified!”
And did I see it? Oh yes:)
I have never been able to see anything beyond the wriggly lines. Someone noticing my bemused look will tell me to focus on a point, cross my eyes over, and other such helpful instructions but I never see it. I put it down to astigmatism in my right eye!
Not being able to see what someone else can see is very frustrating. What seems obvious to someone else is not always obvious to me.
A few weeks ago, we had a mid-week meeting. It came about because a couple in another church had been to Lakeland, Florida and been touched by what had happened there. They wanted to see the same thing happen in our local churches. They had “seen” something and wanted to share that experience with others.
I am not sure if I could stick a label on the kind of meetings that we have been having since them. There is a lot of worship and a lot of prayer and much more than that. It’s different every week.
I always think that it is so exciting when God’s people get together and the barriers are down. Not all of us come from the same church – we are a real mix of church backgrounds. The people that meet together, many of them are involved in practical ministries like the Healing on the Streets and Street Pastors. They are enthusiastic and zealous.
I often think to myself – what power there is in the room! These people are one in heart and mind and totally involved. They are like a spiritual SAS team – dynamite. (I don’t say “we” because I guess I see myself as tagging along and I am not so involved!) A group of people like that in God’s hand is a mighty weapon. It is important that God is allowed to wield the weapon in the way He would like.
Proverbs 4:25 from the Message reads, “Keep your eyes straight ahead; ignore all sideshow distractions.” What qualifies as a “side show distraction”? Distractions take away our attention from what is important. Before I went to the meeting, I was spending time with God. I am not sure what I supposed to be seeing at the meetings. What was important, and what wasn’t? I can handle the worship, and the prayer, but not always the other stuff. I worry that we major of feelings and experiences to the detriment of something greater.
My question to God was, “What is it that I am supposed to see?”
His reply was, “Me glorified!”
And did I see it? Oh yes:)
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Programme Full
A couple of weeks ago, just before heading out to a mid-week meeting, I remembered to set the video recorder to record the next episode in a series that my husband and I had been following. Pushing the buttons as usual I hit a glitch! The screen came up with the message “Programme Full”.
This was not something I had seen before and I wasn’t sure quite what it meant or what to do about it. I seem to remember on a previous machine we had that there were a certain amount of lines for programming and there was a way of deleting them, to empty the memory banks.
Somewhere in a box, in a cupboard, in a plastic polly-pocket, if I had an hour or two to spare, I could track down the manual for the video recorder. The alternative was to randomly press every button on the remote control to see if it made a difference. I am not technically literate and pressed the buttons somewhat cautiously wondering if I was about to do some un-doable damage! However, my plan worked and the screen was filled with lines of dates and times of previous programmes we had recorded. I had no idea what to the next step was to delete all the dates, and the remote gave no clues. After another flurry of random button pushing I managed to delete everything ready to begin again!
Lately I have been feeling a bit like my video recorder. When challenged to do something a message pops up in my brain “Programme Full”. Just as the machine was stuffed full of old programming and wouldn’t do anything new, I feel a bit like that! I am full of the sediment left over from dealing with the stresses and strains of work accumulated over the last few months and there is just no space left for anything new!
God is not like me. He doesn’t need to randomly push my buttons to see what works! He is not content for me to wait until the holidays and miss out on the opportunities that come my way over the next week and a bit. I might be content for me to do that! God wants to de-clog me. (That sounds something painful that they do to Dutch shoemakers or something!) As I sit in His presence and enjoy time with him, I unwind. The lines of old programming get deleted and I am ready for the new things.
Talking with some friends about my “ask me in two weeks time” response to things, one of them said that sometimes we don’t think we can to what God asks us to because we are thinking about out own lack of resources and strength rather than looking to God to supply all that we need.
This was not something I had seen before and I wasn’t sure quite what it meant or what to do about it. I seem to remember on a previous machine we had that there were a certain amount of lines for programming and there was a way of deleting them, to empty the memory banks.
Somewhere in a box, in a cupboard, in a plastic polly-pocket, if I had an hour or two to spare, I could track down the manual for the video recorder. The alternative was to randomly press every button on the remote control to see if it made a difference. I am not technically literate and pressed the buttons somewhat cautiously wondering if I was about to do some un-doable damage! However, my plan worked and the screen was filled with lines of dates and times of previous programmes we had recorded. I had no idea what to the next step was to delete all the dates, and the remote gave no clues. After another flurry of random button pushing I managed to delete everything ready to begin again!
Lately I have been feeling a bit like my video recorder. When challenged to do something a message pops up in my brain “Programme Full”. Just as the machine was stuffed full of old programming and wouldn’t do anything new, I feel a bit like that! I am full of the sediment left over from dealing with the stresses and strains of work accumulated over the last few months and there is just no space left for anything new!
God is not like me. He doesn’t need to randomly push my buttons to see what works! He is not content for me to wait until the holidays and miss out on the opportunities that come my way over the next week and a bit. I might be content for me to do that! God wants to de-clog me. (That sounds something painful that they do to Dutch shoemakers or something!) As I sit in His presence and enjoy time with him, I unwind. The lines of old programming get deleted and I am ready for the new things.
Talking with some friends about my “ask me in two weeks time” response to things, one of them said that sometimes we don’t think we can to what God asks us to because we are thinking about out own lack of resources and strength rather than looking to God to supply all that we need.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Resonation
I have to confess that I haven’t really hooked myself into the various God channels on Sky TV. Usually when I am home from school I will tune into one of the Radio channels – the UCB UK channel is one of my favourites. I like the music they play and I try to expand my repertoire of praise and worship songs through listening.
Some friends we met on Sunday were enthusing about the live programmes from Florida with Todd Bently. “Normal” TV doesn’t happen in their house any longer and they talk about “feeling the love” and being “blown away” by the healing that is happening as they watch.
Last night I tuned in. These friends are not the only people I known that are enthusiastic about the programmes, and I supposed I wanted to know what it was that was appealing to them. I watched for less than fifteen minutes. I am not sure why it didn’t appeal, but it just didn’t.
Anyway, seeing as I was in amongst the God channels, I flicked around to see what else was on offer. Lots of the channels featured preachers, usually black, standing behind pulpits. There were a couple of cosy sofa discussion programmes too.
The programme that held my attention though was a worship meeting. It was recorded live at the Victory Church in Oklahoma in the form of a music and dance presentation called “Resonation” – the idea of worship resonating in people’s hearts.
I danced once! At college, our Christian Union, took responsibility for an evening meeting in the local Salvation Army hall. We sang a number of upbeat worship songs, and worked out a couple of dances – twirling things in floaty dresses and artistic poses.
The dance choreography was perhaps a little more adventurous with almost snatches of quite crisp street dance routines. In some ways it could have been any kind of concert – spectacular shifts in the lights, big screens. Then when you started to listen tot the lyrics – you knew this wasn’t just any kind of concert at all, and when the camera spanned the congregation and saw the faces of the people lifted in worship – you knew that they were connecting with God.
It was powerful stuff. It was so professional. The music the lights, the dancing – if you had paid to be there you would not have been disappointed.
That is where I wanted to be – not in Florida with Todd Bently. However, I came to the realisation that I am a poor worship leader in the sense that I don’t have enough musical talent, no matter how much my heart is in tune. I can’t hold notes for that long. I can’t switch into harmonies. I can’t really do the spontaneous stuff. It is not just a case of if I keep practising it will come. I just don’t have the basic talent! I am better than I used to be, and maybe five or ten years down the line I will be better than that – but the bottom line is that I am not gifted musically. Music is not my passion. Worship is my passion, not necessarily worship leading.
Psalm 33:3 has these words “Sing to him a new song; play skillfully, and shout for joy.” There are people that really dismiss the bit that says “play skillfully” and major on singing a new song and shouting with joy, but I saw last night what a huge difference it makes to have someone play skillfully – whether that be the musical instruments or the vocal chords. You can’t dismiss skilful and draw people into a powerful place of worship.
There is almost something kind of liberating in realising just what it is you can’t do! It allows you to move on I suppose. I will never be a great musician and I am happy with that! I will not pack away my worship leading hat, I may not be great, but I am not that bad either. I hope I don’t hinder people on their way to the throne room. I am however going to stop piling the pressure on to try to be gifted in that area when I am not.
I love being drawn into the presence of God by a good worship meeting – a gifted leader, skilful musicians and a well chosen selection of songs. Watching something like that, and then thinking about the kind of worship many churches offer, we need to aim for something more glorious.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Detox, Diets and Who is really in the Driving Seat
The talk at work amongst my colleagues has turned to diets and loosing weight. One of the ladies has begun a four day jump start diet thing. I hate the word “detox” but I am guessing that it is something like that. It is just for four days and each day’s intake of food is very strictly defined. Yesterday’s lunch was two boiled eggs, a plate of green beans and a glass of tomato juice. Today she ate a salad made up of green beans, melon and tomatoes. She didn’t look the least bit happy eating it, but assured us that for four days she could put up with anything.
My brother once asked me, a number of years ago, if I was still watching my weight. My very sour reply at the time was, “Oh yes, I am watching it go up!”
I am floundering at Weight Watchers. Since I returned in the New Year, while other fellow joiners are well into the second or third stone, by my current reckoning I am averaging a pound a month in weight loss! You haven’t mis-read that – a pound a month. We are fluctuating badly. Yo-yos have more stability than my week by week progress.
I just cannot bring myself to eat Nimble bread and I am loosing the battle against “foursies” – that must-eat feeling that hits me when I get home from work! I guess that I have a lazy attitude towards weight loss, I’m not focussed enough or exercising enough will power. Targets that I set myself never actually get reached!
The conversation at work moved on to talk about people we knew had lost a lot of weight. One lady was mentioned for being a size twelve now when she was once a size eighteen. Apparently her face is gaunt looking and she has drooping jowls. Another lady had also lost a lot of weight but her strict control over her food had become an obsession and she had “gone too far”. She was pale and unhealthy looking.
The next shift in the conversation was about how some people feel that so much of their life is out of control that they begin to think that the only area where they can establish any control is in what they eat. In that one area they are the boss!
As I was listening a wave of gratitude washed over me. I don’t have to worry about being life being out of control. It is God who has responsibility. He is sovereign. I am held very safe in his hands, and although things around me may be in a kilter, I am held secure. I don’t need to be in control because His is! However, he expects me to take control over areas of my life that need tweaked, but gives me the direction and strength necessary to do it properly.
I think I need to try to stop doing this weight watcher thing without His direction and strength!
My brother once asked me, a number of years ago, if I was still watching my weight. My very sour reply at the time was, “Oh yes, I am watching it go up!”
I am floundering at Weight Watchers. Since I returned in the New Year, while other fellow joiners are well into the second or third stone, by my current reckoning I am averaging a pound a month in weight loss! You haven’t mis-read that – a pound a month. We are fluctuating badly. Yo-yos have more stability than my week by week progress.
I just cannot bring myself to eat Nimble bread and I am loosing the battle against “foursies” – that must-eat feeling that hits me when I get home from work! I guess that I have a lazy attitude towards weight loss, I’m not focussed enough or exercising enough will power. Targets that I set myself never actually get reached!
The conversation at work moved on to talk about people we knew had lost a lot of weight. One lady was mentioned for being a size twelve now when she was once a size eighteen. Apparently her face is gaunt looking and she has drooping jowls. Another lady had also lost a lot of weight but her strict control over her food had become an obsession and she had “gone too far”. She was pale and unhealthy looking.
The next shift in the conversation was about how some people feel that so much of their life is out of control that they begin to think that the only area where they can establish any control is in what they eat. In that one area they are the boss!
As I was listening a wave of gratitude washed over me. I don’t have to worry about being life being out of control. It is God who has responsibility. He is sovereign. I am held very safe in his hands, and although things around me may be in a kilter, I am held secure. I don’t need to be in control because His is! However, he expects me to take control over areas of my life that need tweaked, but gives me the direction and strength necessary to do it properly.
I think I need to try to stop doing this weight watcher thing without His direction and strength!
Monday, June 09, 2008
The List
There is a list in my head. It is not frequently read. It is just there. Every so often something happens and the list gets a little bit longer. Sometimes when I remember it is there, and I read it, or I add to it, I feel a little less happy than I felt before.
Yesterday my husband and I were invited to witness the baptism of the two daughters of friends of ours. We are not talking her about babies and christenings and a sprinkling of holy water. Our friends are members of a church that practises adult baptism through complete immersion – although it being not a very deep paddling pool, the complete part of it didn’t really happen.
The father of the household had the privilege of performing the rite of passage! He stood beside them in the water as they proclaimed their faith in Jesus. It was by his hand they went under the water (almost under) and by his hand that they were raised up.
It is inevitable that he should be there at their first, natural birth, but quite something precious to be there at their second, supernatural birth. The first time was the result of a conception, the joining of egg and sperm. The second time – a supernatural conception – the joining of the human spirit to divine Holy Spirit. My friends have faithfully lived out their walk with Jesus before their daughters, and now they are seeing the fruit of that.
Because I am not a parent, this is something that I can only see others do. There are no sons or daughters, for me, to baptise. And – yes, that makes me a little sadder than I was. It has been added to the list of things I won't get to do because I am not a parent. Parenthood is not part of my journey.
There are so many things that parents get to do – some perhaps not really what they want to do at all. But not having children really excludes you from a whole plethora of experiences.
My biggest realisation is that I will never be anyone’s grandmother. There is not another generation of Kerrs waiting in the wings. My biggest fear, an offshoot of all that, is ending up alone.
It is a fear, thankfully, that will never come to fruition! Being a part of the body of Christ, planted into a local expression of His church – I don’t get to end up alone. If I do, it’s either a bad church or I am making the choice to isolate myself!
Yesterday my husband and I were invited to witness the baptism of the two daughters of friends of ours. We are not talking her about babies and christenings and a sprinkling of holy water. Our friends are members of a church that practises adult baptism through complete immersion – although it being not a very deep paddling pool, the complete part of it didn’t really happen.
The father of the household had the privilege of performing the rite of passage! He stood beside them in the water as they proclaimed their faith in Jesus. It was by his hand they went under the water (almost under) and by his hand that they were raised up.
It is inevitable that he should be there at their first, natural birth, but quite something precious to be there at their second, supernatural birth. The first time was the result of a conception, the joining of egg and sperm. The second time – a supernatural conception – the joining of the human spirit to divine Holy Spirit. My friends have faithfully lived out their walk with Jesus before their daughters, and now they are seeing the fruit of that.
Because I am not a parent, this is something that I can only see others do. There are no sons or daughters, for me, to baptise. And – yes, that makes me a little sadder than I was. It has been added to the list of things I won't get to do because I am not a parent. Parenthood is not part of my journey.
There are so many things that parents get to do – some perhaps not really what they want to do at all. But not having children really excludes you from a whole plethora of experiences.
My biggest realisation is that I will never be anyone’s grandmother. There is not another generation of Kerrs waiting in the wings. My biggest fear, an offshoot of all that, is ending up alone.
It is a fear, thankfully, that will never come to fruition! Being a part of the body of Christ, planted into a local expression of His church – I don’t get to end up alone. If I do, it’s either a bad church or I am making the choice to isolate myself!
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Serenading God
A serenade is “a composition performed for a lover, friend, or other person to be honored, typically in the evening and often below a window.” There is a scene in a film starring Mel Gibson that features a serenade. Mel Gibson’s character has been accidentally frozen in an experiment and he wakes up fifty years later. His sense of etiquette is fifty years out of date. He tells a young boy who is in love with a girl at school to sing to her. Time is too short to wait and sometimes you just leave it too late and the moment is gone. So the boy climbs a tree and sings “You are my sunshine” to her. The girl is somewhat embarrassed, but also delighted at the same time.
I have more than a few romantic bones in my body and that kind of thing would really appeal to me! If I had been a boy, I would have serenaded a girl – maybe. I did entertain the idea for a short while of persuading a guitar playing friend to join me outside my husband’s window – before we were married – and accompany me as I sang. My friend would have been up for it – but I am chicken-hearted at the best of times. Having been married now for some years, my husband wouldn’t have appreciated it. It might have been the death blow to our blossoming romance!
I was listening last night to a new worship CD I bought. It contains new Spring Harvest songs. Some of them are not new to me, but different arrangements of things we sing in our fellowship. It is a double CD. The first disc is very stage performance orientated – like it would sound if you had a wide variety of musicians. The second CD is a selection of some of the same songs,and some different, but much more acoustic – one singer with one guitar.
One of the tracks “Ever Faithful God” brought a picture to mind of a man standing beneath a balcony, guitar in hand, singing his heart out to the one he adored. In this case the one he adored was not a woman, but God.
I just love the picture of worship being like a lover serenading the one he loves. He or she may be in a room of a hundred or two hundred, but in his heart of hearts, he or she is alone, beneath a balcony, singing exuberantly.
Psalm 66:2 reads “Sing the glory of his name; make His praise glorious!
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Twitching
I am very glad that our kitchen window looks out on to the back garden. There are no other houses, just the whirly gig washing line and a bright orange fence. Beyond that there is a row of trees, and beyond that there is the playing field. You can’t see the playing field for the orange fence and the row of trees!
Had the bird feeder hanging from the whirly gig been in the front garden, it might be a very different story!
A month ago, or more, I bought a book from the book company that, every so often, visits the place where I work. It was a bird watching handbook. It is a beginner’s guide, designed for a child, with a page for each bird. There is a picture of each bird with a short description of what it looks like and what is sounds like. There is a space to stick a photo and a few lines to write where you saw said bird, what time of day it was, what said bird was doing and something about the weather conditions.
Quite why I bought the book, I don’t know. It was dirt cheap! I have always envied people who knew that names of birds. You would think that having been brought up in a country village I would be less ignorant of those kinds of things. I know what magpies look like, but that is about my limit.
The book recommended a bird table. I thought that a bird feeder on the whirly gig might do instead – it’s not so expensive for one thing. It is only in the last few days that the birds have discovered that it’s there!
I have found that my attention is consumed with watching the birds on the feeder through the binoculars. The book isn’t the most comprehensive of books and I’m not sure that the birds I am watching actually get a mention. The closest I have got to matching up the picture in the book with the bird hanging pecking away at the peanuts is a coal tit. There are lots of little brown birds too – thrushes maybe?
The only time that I have paid any attention to birds was a long time ago. The night before I had watched, was it Alfred Hitchcock’s film, “The Birds”? There is a scene in the film where, just outside the school, there is a climbing frame, and it is all covered with birds which attack the children as they come out from school. I kid you not, the next morning the climbing frame in the playing field that our back garden looked out onto was covered with birds – just like the scene in the film. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up!
So, yes, I’m twitching!
Looking at the antics of these tiny little birds I am reminded about Jesus teaching – “Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”
Friday, May 30, 2008
Nothing Left in Reserve
Without really intending to, I got hooked on “Britain’s Got Talent”. That’s not actually true – I got just hooked on George Sampson, the last act to perform in one of semi-finals this week. I have recorded his street-dance routine and have watched it over and over again. I have no intentions of becoming a groupy, but had I been one of the panel of judges, or the presenters or the producers of the show, I would have called it a day. As George himself said, in his interview afterwards, “It doesn’t get any better than that.”
So for those of you who missed it, what did he do? Well, he left the belly dancing and the magic tricks to others. He danced! The track was a really up-beat version of “Singing in the Rain.” He did it better than Gene Kelly! Mid-way through the routine, there was a flash of lightning, and a rumble of thunder – and then it rained! (Some credit has got to go to the TV programme providing the setting to his diamond of a dance. The shower of water, the lightning flash and thunder that they supplied all added to what he did. The effect would not have been as spectacular without those things.) For a few moves, he played with an umbrella, then he just tossed it aside and danced!
It was amazing! There was so much energy and passion and complete commitment to every move. Obviously there had been a whole lot of choreography and rehearsal, but that can only take you so far. Knowing the right moves and being able to do them in the right order is just the framework. George poured his life and soul into the performance. This was his one chance, an opportunity never to be repeated, perhaps, and he threw everything that he had into the dance.
I was thinking about the energy, passion and complete commitment of George and he made me want to get up and dance! I wanted to be with him on stage, in that shower of water, twisting and turning, flinging my arms around and just being entirely lost in the moment.
I am challenged that in so much of what I do – whether in my relationships, or in the various environments that I inhabit or the things that consume my time, I am, in comparison, luke-warm.
At the end of George’s dance he had nothing left to give. There had been no holding back. If his performance didn’t earn him a place in the final – well, there was nothing else he could do. He left nothing in reserve. There was no Plan B. That was absolutely everything.
I don’t operate like that. I know there is always more to give. I know that there is always something kept in reserve. There is always a Plan B lurking in the shadows.
Is it an age thing? Is George so passionate because he still young? I was going to write that George doesn’t know about knock-backs and bruises – but he does. He was not a new face to the competition, having entered last year. He never made it through the various rounds. He didn’t give up then. He worked hard to improve his act and came back the following year with something better! He must have been convinced it was there and was prepared to put himself through the auditions a second time to show people. Had he got turned away a second time, I believe that her would have turned up the following year – better.
I want to pour that much more of me into everything that I do. I want to have nothing left over, nothing held in reserve. It’s a tall order, for a naturally slothful personality like mine – but knowing that I did everything I could have done, I want to be able to say “It doesn’t get any better than that.”
Saturday, May 17, 2008
The Pen in Your Hand
I caught the tale end of the news on Thursday evening after I had come home from a meeting.
It was an update of the situation in China. Days after the earthquake, rescue personnel had made it to the epicentre of the quake. There was lots of footage of the rescue operation. Planes flying overhead were discharging parachutes – some with men strapped into the harnesses, other with boxes of food and water. On the ground, men were shifting piles of rubble trying to reach those that had been buried. Watching as one school was being excavated, were parents looking for their children. I had forgotten the Chinese government had restricted each family to one child – and that one child was now buried under a pile of concrete! It doesn’t matter, I suppose, whether there is one child or a dozen in a family, the loss is still there and the parents are just as inconsolable.
There is one image that has caught my eye and stayed with me, and I have searched the net to find it, without success. It is of a school, or the remains of one. All you see is a single hand, uncovered in the rubbish. A child’s hand clutches a pen. I wasn’t listening to the narrator, just looking at the hand clutching a pen. I am sorry that I wasn’t listening properly. Something else came to mind, that at the time seemed to matter more.
As I said, I had been at a meeting. Some friends in another church had been over to Florida to be a part of whatever it is that Tod Bently has become involved in. I have perhaps muddies the waters of my mind by reading a selection of reports of what is happening over there – some enthusiastically rubber stamping it, and others calling it a false revival. I don’t know.
The couple reporting back were very enthusiastic and many people in the meeting caught their enthusiasm. We went into a time of worship and waiting on the Lord – as you do at some of these kinds of meetings.
The worship was excellent. The worship leader was really gifted and his song selection was just what I wanted to sing. I was in the zone. My heart was absorbed, but my mind was also at work. I have been to many meetings where the emotions run high, and people are whipped up into a response that isn’t always helpful. I wanted to be built up and not hyped up.
People shared pictures of what they thought God was saying or doing. I experience these things too, but I am never sure that it is not just my imagination! The picture that I had I didn’t feel was a shared picture.
I had the sense of being in a room with a whole load of presents. They were all shapes and sizes, colourful wrappings and ribbons, and very clearly labelled. I was walking around picking them up and not finding one that had my name on it.
To some extent I think the impression or picture was in response to how I was feeling. I didn’t feel qualified to be there. Many of the people there were involved in lots of “missional” things like healing on the streets and street pastors. They were buzzing with enthusiasm. I was feeling out of place – hence the idea of no present for me. You can see where I am coming from, perhaps.
I was getting rather dispirited about not finding my present when I had the impression of God speaking.
“There isn’t one.” My heart took a deep dive – It was like confirming that I really was in the wrong place. Then He went on to say, “I have already given you yours.”
I looked down at my hand and I was holding a pen.
“The pen in your hand is my gift to you. There is nothing better than that!”
I am not sure if can I convey the sense of profound privilege I felt. I am never more at home than when I am writing! To my mind there is something incredibly powerful about the written word and the written word read out loud.
I suppose that I might have dismissed the whole thing as just my imagination except for that one image of the child with the pen in their hand.
I can be Jonathan in this one thing! This I can do!
Being Jonathan
Earlier this week I was reading a story from 1 Samuel. It contrasted the actions of Jonathan and Saul.
Jonathan, along with his armour bearer, was clambering among the rocks and “ambushing” the Philistine outposts, killing a dozen or so man. He hadn’t been told what to do. He didn’t have a “word” from God to act and everyone apart from the armour bearer was unaware of his actions. The words that he used when he addressed the Philistines reminded me of the words that David used about Goliath – uncircumcised dogs that had not right to be there. He was not hiding or afraid, or unsure of his action. He saw something that offended him and made plans to dispose of it.
The way the story reads, Jonathan’s actions released God to move. He sends confusion into the main camp and the Philistines start killing each other. Jonathan had been like a catalyst – a flame to dry wood – and God has seen His heart reflected in Jonathan and responded. There are some people, and some things that people do that make them entirely irresistible to God and He just can’t help himself from joining in.
Saul and the rest of the Israelite army, however, were miles away sitting under trees, dithering and inactive. Saul had a priest in his camp but didn’t use him to seek a word from God what to do next. Once Jonathan had picked the fight, he eventually joined the battle – but he wasn’t the initiator. He didn’t “act”, he just “reacted”.
There were a few other groups of people who get a mention in the story – the ones that had swapped sides and joined the Philistines did a “U” turn when the Israelites were winning. They wanted to be on the winning side. They had joined the Philistines because they were winning at the time, and now they weren’t winning they moved camps. There was also a bunch of other people who were hiding in the hills. It wasn’t until they could smell victory that they came out of their hiding places to join the battle.
I was challenged to think about where I would be – would I be like Jonathan, filled with a sense of “this is so wrong that I must put it right”? Would I be the armour bearer – stirred to follow “heart and soul” a person like that? Would I be like Saul, having access to the word of God, but passive and accepting and waiting for a better time to act? Have I somehow joined the other side, the people who are “winning” at the moment? Or perhaps I am hiding in a hole somewhere in the hills above the battle!
I was also challenged about how easily I could justify the actions of each person or group. I could see where they were coming from and feel a kind of sympathy for them. I have never been in a war zone the way they have. My life isn’t under threat. I have access to food and water and comfort and security and if I didn’t who is to say that I would act any differently.
However, that said, I am in a spiritual war zone and if my life is not under threat then I must be so harmless to the enemy that I am not worth the effort to eliminate!
Does anyone who reads the story think “I am Jonathan!”? Do we even want to be Jonathan? Personally, I think I am quite comfortable to be the armour bearer where there is someone else who is calling the shots, making the hard decisions, and I am following! I can do that. I am ashamed if I am Saul here – with access to God’s word, but not expressing his heart in my actions.
I want to be Jonathan. I want my actions to be so irresistible to God, that the things I do mirror His heart and He can’t help but join in. I want to live a life that allows God to do the things He wants to do and doesn’t limit Him in any way.
Jonathan, along with his armour bearer, was clambering among the rocks and “ambushing” the Philistine outposts, killing a dozen or so man. He hadn’t been told what to do. He didn’t have a “word” from God to act and everyone apart from the armour bearer was unaware of his actions. The words that he used when he addressed the Philistines reminded me of the words that David used about Goliath – uncircumcised dogs that had not right to be there. He was not hiding or afraid, or unsure of his action. He saw something that offended him and made plans to dispose of it.
The way the story reads, Jonathan’s actions released God to move. He sends confusion into the main camp and the Philistines start killing each other. Jonathan had been like a catalyst – a flame to dry wood – and God has seen His heart reflected in Jonathan and responded. There are some people, and some things that people do that make them entirely irresistible to God and He just can’t help himself from joining in.
Saul and the rest of the Israelite army, however, were miles away sitting under trees, dithering and inactive. Saul had a priest in his camp but didn’t use him to seek a word from God what to do next. Once Jonathan had picked the fight, he eventually joined the battle – but he wasn’t the initiator. He didn’t “act”, he just “reacted”.
There were a few other groups of people who get a mention in the story – the ones that had swapped sides and joined the Philistines did a “U” turn when the Israelites were winning. They wanted to be on the winning side. They had joined the Philistines because they were winning at the time, and now they weren’t winning they moved camps. There was also a bunch of other people who were hiding in the hills. It wasn’t until they could smell victory that they came out of their hiding places to join the battle.
I was challenged to think about where I would be – would I be like Jonathan, filled with a sense of “this is so wrong that I must put it right”? Would I be the armour bearer – stirred to follow “heart and soul” a person like that? Would I be like Saul, having access to the word of God, but passive and accepting and waiting for a better time to act? Have I somehow joined the other side, the people who are “winning” at the moment? Or perhaps I am hiding in a hole somewhere in the hills above the battle!
I was also challenged about how easily I could justify the actions of each person or group. I could see where they were coming from and feel a kind of sympathy for them. I have never been in a war zone the way they have. My life isn’t under threat. I have access to food and water and comfort and security and if I didn’t who is to say that I would act any differently.
However, that said, I am in a spiritual war zone and if my life is not under threat then I must be so harmless to the enemy that I am not worth the effort to eliminate!
Does anyone who reads the story think “I am Jonathan!”? Do we even want to be Jonathan? Personally, I think I am quite comfortable to be the armour bearer where there is someone else who is calling the shots, making the hard decisions, and I am following! I can do that. I am ashamed if I am Saul here – with access to God’s word, but not expressing his heart in my actions.
I want to be Jonathan. I want my actions to be so irresistible to God, that the things I do mirror His heart and He can’t help but join in. I want to live a life that allows God to do the things He wants to do and doesn’t limit Him in any way.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday, dear Church
Happy Birthday to you!
It's Pentecost - the birthday of the church!
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday, dear Church
Happy Birthday to you!
It's Pentecost - the birthday of the church!
Saturday, May 03, 2008
Praying in Your Comfort Zone
Last night I had intended to go to pray with the Street/Prayer pastors, but I got to a page turning moment in the book I was reading and talked myself out of going – I had had a hard week at work, the last time I went they all prayed so quietly that I couldn’t hear them anyway, I could just as easily pray at home…you’ve heard them all before! God didn’t press me on it, just reminded me that I had got off to a good start with the ten day global prayer event and it was a shame that I was falling at the second fence. I turned another page in my book and vaguely promised I would make up the time!
Much later that night – it could have been early hours in the morning I finally finished the last page of the book, dropped it on the floor, switched off the light and snuggled into my snoring husband.
Then God said, “I let you finish your book – now get up and pray!”
I wouldn’t say that I was averse to the idea but I pointed out that there were so many other people I knew that prayed much better than I did and I rattled off a few names.
God didn’t say, “I know that!” I don’t think He even entertained saying it, though I might have if I had been Him.
“I like to hear you pray,” was His answer.
How irresistible is that? So I disentangled myself from the duvet, kicked about under the bed to find my slippers and picked up my dressing gown and glasses and headed down stairs. He told me to leave the watch on the bed-side table – I didn’t need to keep looking at the minutes ticking by and wonder when I could go back to bed.
We worked our way through the list of prayer suggestions. It seemed quite surreal praying for Christians to join together to pray – when I was sat all alone in the early hours of the morning! There were a couple of other things not related to the global prayer list that God put on my heart to pray about – personal things for friends and family. We just got talking about a wide range of things.
I returned to bed glad that I had got up and joined God in prayer. I thought I had done a good job. I didn’t get all emotional, or loud, or declarational, or even noticeably passionate. I just sat on the sofa, curled up, talking – and yet, I felt that God and I had connected. There are times when I suppose we pray outside of our comfort zones – this wasn’t one of them, but it was no less effective.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Storing Up Evil
My husband, despite being away on business for most of the week had to do overtime yesterday. I suppose I could have left him to get a bus in, but I have missed him so much already, that even a short ride into his work was worth it! Getting out to the car, however, we found that someone has dented the front passenger corner. Now, I am almost certain that it wasn’t me. I would have known about it – it is not just a bit of paint scratched off, but the whole corner banged up.
The last time something similar happened was when a friend and I had gone to the cinema. Two hours, a bucket of popcorn and a film later we returned to the car to discover the front of the car badly bashed in.
This time, like the last time, there was no note stuck on the windscreen with an apology or a phone number or anything – just the bashed corner.
After a mild diatribe about people not taking responsibility for their actions, I got to the stage where I accepted there was nothing I could do the track down the culprit. Complaining about it was not going to change anything. We had the money in the savings to cover the repairs.
Last night, however, I had a dream. I am not sure where I was, except that it wasn’t in Inverness. The district council had claimed back the front gardens in a row of houses to make a car park. I parked my car – the front dent was still there! The next morning the car wasn’t where I parked it. It was being picked up by a car recovery lorry. It looked like someone had been at it with a sledge hammer. There was also lots of unpleasant graffiti in black paint. It was not nice.
My sister told me that she thought she knew who had done it. It turned out to be a little old lady, a devout churchgoer! Apparently she had seen a jar of cooking sauce on the back seat of the car. She believed that I was mistreating my husband because I wasn’t cooking a meal from scratch, but using the jar. She was thoroughly convinced that this was a sin not just against my husband, but against God too.(It’s a dream! Absurd things are allowed in dreams!)
I remember being extremely angry. The damage to the car was bad enough, but damage to my reputation was even worse! She didn’t know me and yet she had judged me on the basis of a jar of cooking sauce! And then to claim to be a devout Christian too…
I remember yelling something like I was going to tell God all about her and He would take my side and she was in for a heap of trouble! There was no turning the other cheek, just out and out fury!
What remained with me when I woke up was the level of fury that I felt.
In Luke 6:45 it says “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.” I am not sure that what the woman did to my car, or my reputation, justified the words I spoke, or the tone of voice I used. I would hate to think that there is evil stored up in my heart, but I would imagine that every time we refuse to forgive, or every time we revisit a hurt and massage the grudge – it is like storing up evil. It is there ready to come out at an opportune time.
James 5:16 suggests the way of confession, “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”
I don’t need to ask if I could be as angry in the real world as I obviously got in the dream world, or whether I can let my heart speak words that unloving. The answer is a shameful “Yes!” But I am not powerless to change things – or rather Christ is not powerless to change me.
Like Paul I can cry “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? (Romans 7:24) and have my answer “Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! (7:25)
The last time something similar happened was when a friend and I had gone to the cinema. Two hours, a bucket of popcorn and a film later we returned to the car to discover the front of the car badly bashed in.
This time, like the last time, there was no note stuck on the windscreen with an apology or a phone number or anything – just the bashed corner.
After a mild diatribe about people not taking responsibility for their actions, I got to the stage where I accepted there was nothing I could do the track down the culprit. Complaining about it was not going to change anything. We had the money in the savings to cover the repairs.
Last night, however, I had a dream. I am not sure where I was, except that it wasn’t in Inverness. The district council had claimed back the front gardens in a row of houses to make a car park. I parked my car – the front dent was still there! The next morning the car wasn’t where I parked it. It was being picked up by a car recovery lorry. It looked like someone had been at it with a sledge hammer. There was also lots of unpleasant graffiti in black paint. It was not nice.
My sister told me that she thought she knew who had done it. It turned out to be a little old lady, a devout churchgoer! Apparently she had seen a jar of cooking sauce on the back seat of the car. She believed that I was mistreating my husband because I wasn’t cooking a meal from scratch, but using the jar. She was thoroughly convinced that this was a sin not just against my husband, but against God too.(It’s a dream! Absurd things are allowed in dreams!)
I remember being extremely angry. The damage to the car was bad enough, but damage to my reputation was even worse! She didn’t know me and yet she had judged me on the basis of a jar of cooking sauce! And then to claim to be a devout Christian too…
I remember yelling something like I was going to tell God all about her and He would take my side and she was in for a heap of trouble! There was no turning the other cheek, just out and out fury!
What remained with me when I woke up was the level of fury that I felt.
In Luke 6:45 it says “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.” I am not sure that what the woman did to my car, or my reputation, justified the words I spoke, or the tone of voice I used. I would hate to think that there is evil stored up in my heart, but I would imagine that every time we refuse to forgive, or every time we revisit a hurt and massage the grudge – it is like storing up evil. It is there ready to come out at an opportune time.
James 5:16 suggests the way of confession, “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”
I don’t need to ask if I could be as angry in the real world as I obviously got in the dream world, or whether I can let my heart speak words that unloving. The answer is a shameful “Yes!” But I am not powerless to change things – or rather Christ is not powerless to change me.
Like Paul I can cry “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? (Romans 7:24) and have my answer “Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! (7:25)
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Frozen Assets
There was a marvelous testimony from Friday night’s prayer meeting.
Before we got down to the business of praying, there was the usual ice-breaker-getting-to-know-you-a-little-better part of the evening to get through. We were not required to come up with something “whacky” this time – just a little bit about yourself and a testimony. I spoke about our monthly prayer meetings at work. I think it is wonderful that there are people that want to meet together to pray. I found myself hurrying at lunchtime to be there. I rarely hurry anywhere! I amble. I was visiting a friend last week who owns a very interesting croft (small farm) on the outskirts of Inverness. He took me on a tour of the place. He doesn’t amble but strides out. I had a hard time keeping up.
The lady sitting near me was talking about the faithfulness of God. It had been some time ago – years rather than months or weeks. They were struggling financially and it was a definite Old Mother Hubbard scenario. The cupboards were bare. They were down to a last packet of fish fingers and a bag of frozen peas. They had a few days to go till pay day and there was no way they were going to make it through.
She prayed to God about the situation, asking for just five pounds. That was all she needed to get them through the next few days. Just five pounds!
“Use what you have,” God replied.
She dug out the fish fingers and stuck them under the grill, took out a pan to tip the peas into.
In among the peas was a small cellophane wrapper. She pulled it out and took a good look at it. Un-wrapping the cellophane, she unfolded a £5 note.
On the packet of the peas – it was one of those promotional things – “Are you a lucky winner?” Inside some of the packets of peas the manufacturers had hidden £5 notes and £10 notes and £20 – as they do occasionally to get people to buy their produce.
She had asked for £5 and that is what she received!
It kind of reminds you of Jesus being asked to pay his taxes. Having no money on him, he sent one of his followers to catch a fish. Inside its mouth was a coin. It was just what the tax man was looking for! God is faithful – even with the little things that we ask for.
Before we got down to the business of praying, there was the usual ice-breaker-getting-to-know-you-a-little-better part of the evening to get through. We were not required to come up with something “whacky” this time – just a little bit about yourself and a testimony. I spoke about our monthly prayer meetings at work. I think it is wonderful that there are people that want to meet together to pray. I found myself hurrying at lunchtime to be there. I rarely hurry anywhere! I amble. I was visiting a friend last week who owns a very interesting croft (small farm) on the outskirts of Inverness. He took me on a tour of the place. He doesn’t amble but strides out. I had a hard time keeping up.
The lady sitting near me was talking about the faithfulness of God. It had been some time ago – years rather than months or weeks. They were struggling financially and it was a definite Old Mother Hubbard scenario. The cupboards were bare. They were down to a last packet of fish fingers and a bag of frozen peas. They had a few days to go till pay day and there was no way they were going to make it through.
She prayed to God about the situation, asking for just five pounds. That was all she needed to get them through the next few days. Just five pounds!
“Use what you have,” God replied.
She dug out the fish fingers and stuck them under the grill, took out a pan to tip the peas into.
In among the peas was a small cellophane wrapper. She pulled it out and took a good look at it. Un-wrapping the cellophane, she unfolded a £5 note.
On the packet of the peas – it was one of those promotional things – “Are you a lucky winner?” Inside some of the packets of peas the manufacturers had hidden £5 notes and £10 notes and £20 – as they do occasionally to get people to buy their produce.
She had asked for £5 and that is what she received!
It kind of reminds you of Jesus being asked to pay his taxes. Having no money on him, he sent one of his followers to catch a fish. Inside its mouth was a coin. It was just what the tax man was looking for! God is faithful – even with the little things that we ask for.
Praying on Autopilot
There is no excuse for my bad manners towards someone on Sunday evening. A friend in the church could tell that I was rather stressed out and offered to pray with me. I turned her down, quite sharply, I have to confess.
There were a number of irritations that had built up throughout the day. A lot of it was work pressures and deadlines seeming to hang like black clouds.
I had also been on one of my church visits that morning. The church had the most glorious views overlooking the city – enough to stir the heart. It was a wonderful spring day and the sun was shining. That was outside the church. Inside the church we were being reminded in no uncertain terms that we were miserable sinners. It was very serious, straight laced and pretty much joy-less. There was a huge congregation and I wondered just what it was that made them return back each week to be told they were miserable sinners! Maybe I just hit a bad week.
Anyway, that is digressing. The other irritation was the lawn mower broke. There was just something about leaving a half cut lawn that offended my sense of order. It is silly that thing like that can suddenly take on huge proportions! Straw and camels backs!
And then there was our own church meeting itself. Evening meetings do not agree with me! I was to be preaching or sharing the word, under the impression that I had to keep going for 50 minutes. My husband was grumbling because, while I was preaching, he was doing the children’s work – for 50 minutes. Someone suggested that he try drama to keep the children occupied – not a good suggestion. He is happy to watch drama, but to encourage and direct it? Not at all!
So, yes, when the offer to pray with me was given, it was not well received! What I wanted at that moment was just to – I was going to write, stick my head in the oven and turn the gas full on – but that is not what I wanted. I think I just wanted space to collect my thoughts. I wanted to be left alone – not to seethe and froth at the mouth at the injustice of it all – but just to restore order and perspective. I know when I am being unreasonable and given enough time I can give myself the required talking to.
Sometimes prayer can be a cop out. Sometimes it is too easy to launch into a prayer almost as a cover up for real conversation. Sometimes we launch into almost a set pattern and predictable phrases and we are paying on auto-pilot. It is not offensive stuff but it is not perhaps that effective either.
Sometimes prayer can be like a sticking plaster we put over an injury. We don’t necessarily take the time to work out where the injury happened, with a view to preventing it happening again.
I am not saying – don’t pray. I am not even saying that prayer should not be our first resort. I am not saying that people don’t need to prayed for because they do. Somtimes we perhaps need to ask if we can help in any way, or push a cup of tea in their hand or even just sit next to them for a moment or two without saying anything at all.
My friend is a wonderful woman of God and I know that she loves me wholeheartedly. There is no excuse for unkindness, particularly among the children of God. I talked with her at the end of the meeting, and I asked her to pray for me, and we talked a little. Things were back on an even keel.
I just want to say that prayer isn’t always the answer. It can be part of the answer – after a long chat perhaps to get a better insight into the situation.
(Stage direction – Mel climbs off soapbox and exits stage left having said her piece)
There were a number of irritations that had built up throughout the day. A lot of it was work pressures and deadlines seeming to hang like black clouds.
I had also been on one of my church visits that morning. The church had the most glorious views overlooking the city – enough to stir the heart. It was a wonderful spring day and the sun was shining. That was outside the church. Inside the church we were being reminded in no uncertain terms that we were miserable sinners. It was very serious, straight laced and pretty much joy-less. There was a huge congregation and I wondered just what it was that made them return back each week to be told they were miserable sinners! Maybe I just hit a bad week.
Anyway, that is digressing. The other irritation was the lawn mower broke. There was just something about leaving a half cut lawn that offended my sense of order. It is silly that thing like that can suddenly take on huge proportions! Straw and camels backs!
And then there was our own church meeting itself. Evening meetings do not agree with me! I was to be preaching or sharing the word, under the impression that I had to keep going for 50 minutes. My husband was grumbling because, while I was preaching, he was doing the children’s work – for 50 minutes. Someone suggested that he try drama to keep the children occupied – not a good suggestion. He is happy to watch drama, but to encourage and direct it? Not at all!
So, yes, when the offer to pray with me was given, it was not well received! What I wanted at that moment was just to – I was going to write, stick my head in the oven and turn the gas full on – but that is not what I wanted. I think I just wanted space to collect my thoughts. I wanted to be left alone – not to seethe and froth at the mouth at the injustice of it all – but just to restore order and perspective. I know when I am being unreasonable and given enough time I can give myself the required talking to.
Sometimes prayer can be a cop out. Sometimes it is too easy to launch into a prayer almost as a cover up for real conversation. Sometimes we launch into almost a set pattern and predictable phrases and we are paying on auto-pilot. It is not offensive stuff but it is not perhaps that effective either.
Sometimes prayer can be like a sticking plaster we put over an injury. We don’t necessarily take the time to work out where the injury happened, with a view to preventing it happening again.
I am not saying – don’t pray. I am not even saying that prayer should not be our first resort. I am not saying that people don’t need to prayed for because they do. Somtimes we perhaps need to ask if we can help in any way, or push a cup of tea in their hand or even just sit next to them for a moment or two without saying anything at all.
My friend is a wonderful woman of God and I know that she loves me wholeheartedly. There is no excuse for unkindness, particularly among the children of God. I talked with her at the end of the meeting, and I asked her to pray for me, and we talked a little. Things were back on an even keel.
I just want to say that prayer isn’t always the answer. It can be part of the answer – after a long chat perhaps to get a better insight into the situation.
(Stage direction – Mel climbs off soapbox and exits stage left having said her piece)
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Licking the Lid of Life
I personally think that it is a waste of a perfectly good bottle of malt whisky, but my friends are raving about it!
The last time, not the most recent time, but the time before that, my brother, Richard asked us to bring down a bottle of whisky – a good quality single malt would do. A friend of his had given him a recipe for something that sounds like a whisky liqueur. Apparently one was supposed to collect a bowl full of blackberries and soak them in the whisky for six months or more, adding a few spices like cinnamon. After six moths or more, one was then supposed to strain the mush and put the liquid back into the whisky bottle.
I guess his wife was not prepared to surrender the house-keeping money to purchase the whisky, so he persuaded us to do so. I handed over the bottle on the last visit and didn’t give it a second thought.
On our recent visit home – Rugby – once Richard knew we had arrived at my mum’s, he must have grabbed the whisky bottle and ran round. Yes – he takes a while to respond to a request to replace a popped light bulb, but when Joe and Mel arrive and he has a treasure to share with them – he is there in an instant (my mother’s words – not mine!).
So there he is, with the bottle – blackberries steeped in whisky and strained and stuff. He hunts through the cupboards to find enough glasses. Incidentally, my mother has a tee-total visitor sitting on the sofa. The lady downstairs comes up on an evening and they read the Bible together and pray. She graciously accepts a glass and as she takes the first sip something like delight spreads across her face. Apparently after we had gone she wheedled a second glass out of my mother!
On Thursday night, after we had finished a mid-week fellowship meeting, Joe dug out the bottle. Just about everyone agreed it was the nicest thing they had drunk. Unlike most liqueurs, it wasn’t sweet and sticky, but quite light and refreshing. They asked me if my brother was going into mass production!
I have talked before about my brother’s diving-in mentality. If I had been given the recipe, I would have thought about doing it. I might even have bought the whisky and picked the blackberries. But when it came down to actually doing it – I would probably chickened out! I would have thought of the million reasons why I shouldn’t and never got the venture off the ground!
There are so many experiences where I “wait and see” and I end up not doing it. My sister in law, Richard’s wife, asked me whether any of the rest of the family were like Richard. There was never an opportunity that he let slip by. There is never a “wait and see” for him, but he just dives in. He squeezes life dry of every drop of enjoyment. Like the yoghurt advert says - he is licking the lid of life! I am sure there are one or two regrets along the way when things don’t work out – but equally he will never have to say “I wish I had done that.” He doesn’t play safe!
As ever I find that very challenging and I am trying to stop myself from playing safe. Right now there’s a whole list of things that I have to say “I wish I had done that.”
I aim to make in-roads into the list!
The last time, not the most recent time, but the time before that, my brother, Richard asked us to bring down a bottle of whisky – a good quality single malt would do. A friend of his had given him a recipe for something that sounds like a whisky liqueur. Apparently one was supposed to collect a bowl full of blackberries and soak them in the whisky for six months or more, adding a few spices like cinnamon. After six moths or more, one was then supposed to strain the mush and put the liquid back into the whisky bottle.
I guess his wife was not prepared to surrender the house-keeping money to purchase the whisky, so he persuaded us to do so. I handed over the bottle on the last visit and didn’t give it a second thought.
On our recent visit home – Rugby – once Richard knew we had arrived at my mum’s, he must have grabbed the whisky bottle and ran round. Yes – he takes a while to respond to a request to replace a popped light bulb, but when Joe and Mel arrive and he has a treasure to share with them – he is there in an instant (my mother’s words – not mine!).
So there he is, with the bottle – blackberries steeped in whisky and strained and stuff. He hunts through the cupboards to find enough glasses. Incidentally, my mother has a tee-total visitor sitting on the sofa. The lady downstairs comes up on an evening and they read the Bible together and pray. She graciously accepts a glass and as she takes the first sip something like delight spreads across her face. Apparently after we had gone she wheedled a second glass out of my mother!
On Thursday night, after we had finished a mid-week fellowship meeting, Joe dug out the bottle. Just about everyone agreed it was the nicest thing they had drunk. Unlike most liqueurs, it wasn’t sweet and sticky, but quite light and refreshing. They asked me if my brother was going into mass production!
I have talked before about my brother’s diving-in mentality. If I had been given the recipe, I would have thought about doing it. I might even have bought the whisky and picked the blackberries. But when it came down to actually doing it – I would probably chickened out! I would have thought of the million reasons why I shouldn’t and never got the venture off the ground!
There are so many experiences where I “wait and see” and I end up not doing it. My sister in law, Richard’s wife, asked me whether any of the rest of the family were like Richard. There was never an opportunity that he let slip by. There is never a “wait and see” for him, but he just dives in. He squeezes life dry of every drop of enjoyment. Like the yoghurt advert says - he is licking the lid of life! I am sure there are one or two regrets along the way when things don’t work out – but equally he will never have to say “I wish I had done that.” He doesn’t play safe!
As ever I find that very challenging and I am trying to stop myself from playing safe. Right now there’s a whole list of things that I have to say “I wish I had done that.”
I aim to make in-roads into the list!
X Marks the Spot
Last night I joined with the prayer pastors to pray for the street pastors who were out last night. I had been preparing the word I was supposed to bring on Sunday. I hadn’t got to a hard bit or anything and things were chugging along quite nicely, but I thought that maybe being in the presence of God corporately I would get a deeper insight. I also thought that a friend of ours who we support in prayer was going to be out last night, but she wasn’t.
We were a very quiet bunch – not quiet as in long periods of silence or anything, but quiet spoken. Even tilting my good ear in their direction was not helping. I found it difficult to say my “Amen”s because I wasn’t sure what I was agreeing to, although I am sure that it was good stuff.
My tintitus, the ringing in my ears, seemed particularly loud as it does at the end of a school day. Perhaps under normal circumstances things would have not been so difficult.
There were times when we would stop praying about something and converse for a while about things we thought God was prompting us about. After a while the leader would say to someone, “Andrew, would you lead us in prayer on that?” It was always very specific, with a named individual. The trouble is that when I was the named individual I wasn’t sure exactly what I was leading people on. I have developed a habit I suppose. In those times of low volume, I will do the tilting of the head thing, but after a while, I just stop concentrating. I am content to let them talk and do not feel the need to join in. Maybe I get a glazed look that goes with it.
Last night there were two moments when it was “Mel, would you lead us in that?” The first time I had managed to follow the conversation – it was about asking God to send more workers to the field. I could do it. The second time, I was really caught out. It was getting on for midnight and I was drifting into sleep mode and I had stopped concentrating. Suddenly there was a “Mel, will you lead us in that?” I had no clue. I had not been listening big time! I didn’t even know enough to fluff it. So I had to ask them to repeat the information.
I am glad that God knows me well. Because the ears are not up to the job, He will often appeal to the other senses.
I will not claim to have anything other than a flash of a picture. I had the impression that I was seeing a field. The field was full of holes, so much so that it looked almost like a lunar landscape. I had the impression that I had asked a question about the hole. “Where have all these holes come from?” I had the impression of someone answering me, quite casually, “Oh, they were left behind by the people who dug up the talents they had buried.” It is a time for digging up buried talents!
If you happen to be a person that has buried your talent – find a spade and start digging! If you happen to be a person who hasn’t buried your talent – help someone that has to dig up theirs!
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Stepping Into Something Greater
I treated myself to a book yesterday. It is just a small book and didn’t cost a huge amount. Why is it, I wonder, that Christian books seem to cost more than other books? It is by Dave Billborough – “Worship and the Presence of God”.
I read these words this morning. He has described exactly what it is I want to experience when I worship.
“When we worship Christ, we step out of the reality present all around us and into the truth of who God is – a much bigger reality. As we worship, so we begin to bridge the gulf between the transcendent worlds of the unseen and the seen…We might meet together on a Sunday morning and go through many familiar acts of worship, and yet we always need to be reminded that we are stepping into something greater. We’re aligning ourselves with the things of heaven as we worship.”
Sometimes it seems that we have shifted the focus away from that “stepping into something greater” to just going through the motions of the “familiar acts”.
Someone who was fed up of going through the familiar acts was Moses. In Exodus 33 Moses does some stepping out into something greater. It is not enough to see a cloud or a pillar of fire, or to hear a voice that sounds like thunder. It is not enough to see God’s provision of water from a rock or in a flock of quails. It is not enough to see God’s power in each of the plagues, or in the parting of the Red Sea. Not quite “familiar” in my experience – but it was in Moses.
Moses wants something more intimate. He wants God himself – a personal encounter not disguised as a burning bush. God sees the desperation and the desire and graciously complies.
Not enough of His people ask to see His glory today. We are not desperate enough! We don’t like heights – so standing in a cleft of a rock is too far out of our comfort zone. We are more like the rest of the Israelites – watching from the safety of the doorways of our tents.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
More than a Song
I am feeling somewhat frustrated at the moment. I am not sure that much of what I experience on a Sunday qualifies as worship. At the end of a meeting where I was leading worship, I was left thinking – did we just song songs or did we worship? Just becuase one or two people lift up their hands - does that mean anything? Are they just going into "worship mode" or are they genuinely in the presence of God?
On Thursday night I went to a meeting at a local church. The new Culloden Visitor’s Centre is due to be opened some time and the church felt the need to meet together to celebrate that today Culloden isn’t the battlefield it was some two or three hundred years ago. There were men in kilts!
We began the meeting with a time of worship. Worship has got to be more than singing songs, no matter how modern. There was a string of songs – some old and some new, with all the words projected on to the white bit of the wall. Some of the songs had nice lyrics, perhaps even adapted from scripture.
In amongst them all was “Shine Jesus Shine” which, if you did not know, was voted number ten in the top one hundred hymns and songs in a “Songs of Praise” survey. That brought back a few memories!
There was no pause between songs. There wasn’t even a smooth chord sequence to get from one tune to the next.
A few people in front of me, and perhaps a few behind, lifted up one hand or two – but I am thoroughly convinced that we just sang songs. “We” might have worshipped, or “they” might have worshipped, but “I” sang songs – not for the want of trying to do something more than that.
My lips moved. My vocal chords moved. My hands moved as I clapped to one song, or tapped the side of my leg. My feet moved as I shuffled from one leg to the next in a very muted form of the Charismatic two step. I even stretched out a hand to heaven at one point. Anyone looking at me would have thought – “There’s a woman who is worshipping!”
Many things may have moved – but my spirit didn’t! I didn’t go anywhere. I don’t know, but if the person leading worship isn’t really going anywhere, does that mean that the people he or she is leading are not going anywhere either? Can I blame it on the worship team? Or does that not matter at all? Some people make the distiction between a worship leader and a lead worshipper - is that just semantics? If the lead worshipper isn't leading you then are you actually going anywhere?
I really don’t want to just sing songs! I want to connect. Worship isn’t worship at all if there is no encounter with God. i know what it feels like to connect and I know what it feels like when the connection is absent.
I read this Hebrews 4:14-16 this morning about worship. This is how the Message puts it:-
“Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let's not let it slip through our fingers. We don't have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He's been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let's walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help. (Hebrews 4:14-16)”
On Thursday, I didn’t “walk right up to him” and get what He was so ready to give.
As I think about leading worship in our fellowship, I am challenged about whether I give people the opportunity, through my choice of songs and the way in which they are sung and played, or indeed anything else that I might say or do that creates the right atmosphere, to walk right up to Jesus and to get from Him what He is so ready to give.
On Thursday night I went to a meeting at a local church. The new Culloden Visitor’s Centre is due to be opened some time and the church felt the need to meet together to celebrate that today Culloden isn’t the battlefield it was some two or three hundred years ago. There were men in kilts!
We began the meeting with a time of worship. Worship has got to be more than singing songs, no matter how modern. There was a string of songs – some old and some new, with all the words projected on to the white bit of the wall. Some of the songs had nice lyrics, perhaps even adapted from scripture.
In amongst them all was “Shine Jesus Shine” which, if you did not know, was voted number ten in the top one hundred hymns and songs in a “Songs of Praise” survey. That brought back a few memories!
There was no pause between songs. There wasn’t even a smooth chord sequence to get from one tune to the next.
A few people in front of me, and perhaps a few behind, lifted up one hand or two – but I am thoroughly convinced that we just sang songs. “We” might have worshipped, or “they” might have worshipped, but “I” sang songs – not for the want of trying to do something more than that.
My lips moved. My vocal chords moved. My hands moved as I clapped to one song, or tapped the side of my leg. My feet moved as I shuffled from one leg to the next in a very muted form of the Charismatic two step. I even stretched out a hand to heaven at one point. Anyone looking at me would have thought – “There’s a woman who is worshipping!”
Many things may have moved – but my spirit didn’t! I didn’t go anywhere. I don’t know, but if the person leading worship isn’t really going anywhere, does that mean that the people he or she is leading are not going anywhere either? Can I blame it on the worship team? Or does that not matter at all? Some people make the distiction between a worship leader and a lead worshipper - is that just semantics? If the lead worshipper isn't leading you then are you actually going anywhere?
I really don’t want to just sing songs! I want to connect. Worship isn’t worship at all if there is no encounter with God. i know what it feels like to connect and I know what it feels like when the connection is absent.
I read this Hebrews 4:14-16 this morning about worship. This is how the Message puts it:-
“Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let's not let it slip through our fingers. We don't have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He's been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let's walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help. (Hebrews 4:14-16)”
On Thursday, I didn’t “walk right up to him” and get what He was so ready to give.
As I think about leading worship in our fellowship, I am challenged about whether I give people the opportunity, through my choice of songs and the way in which they are sung and played, or indeed anything else that I might say or do that creates the right atmosphere, to walk right up to Jesus and to get from Him what He is so ready to give.
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Serving The Lord "Right Merrily"
When I lived in London for two years I used to attend a dance class twice a week. It wasn’t like social dancing or ball room dancing, but the kind of dancing you see in the film “Footloose”. I actually owned and wore leotards and leggings – note the plural! The one thing that I didn’t like was the mirror. It was across one wall of the studio and the idea was you were supposed to look at yourself in the mirror as you danced and check your posture. I have never really been into mirrors. The less I see of the whole of me, the better I like it. I am not one for preening.
At the age of twenty two I was one of the oldest in the class and certainly one of the least agile. I did have a lot of determination and plugged away at the choreography to learn the routines. It was like being on the cast of Fame Academy! I just saw it as being a way to let off steam. I was teaching, at the time, in a tough East End of London Secondary school where you got to confiscate guns and knives and where the pupils did sometimes literally swing from the light bulbs!
I had forgotten all about that when I was in a shop a few months back and they were doing a clear out of all DVDs and CDs and things. I picked up a dance DVD produced by the Pineapple dance studio in London. It promised that I can learn the latest dance moves. They are probably not the latest any more!
There were no leotards and leggings but loose baggy t-shirts, trousers with the crotch somewhere down by the knees, baseball caps on backwards and a choreographer that kept saying “Go, girl!” Do I qualify as a girl at my age?
I guess these things are not designed for the overweight woman of advancing years. I was managing quite well for the first eight bars. I managed the turn, the star jump and unfolding my arms in front of me. Things deteriorated rapidly with a complex footwork routine, thrusting out my ample bosom in various directions. Then we were supposed to crouch down and shimmy upwards whilst gyrating the bum. It was all very Hip Hop and in the end I abandoned myself to the sheer joy of flinging my arms and legs about to the music. (I bet King David didn’t employ a choreographer when he danced before the Ark of the Covenant as he brought it into Jerusalem!)
I know that I probably had the option of sitting down for half an hour and praying, or doing an in depth Bible study, or even just soaking – but you know what? I really enjoyed my prancing about and I laughed so much that my sides ached.
In a recent visit to London, Joe and I went to Covent Garden. There is a church there – St Paul’s. It is dedicated to actors. All around the walls there are plaques in memory of different playwrights, actors, musicians and artists. One of them, I am not sure of the name, Margaret Someone-or-other, particularly stirred my spirit. The epitaph read “She served the Lord right merrily.”
May that be said of me – “She served the Lord right merrily.”
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