Friend of the Friendless

Today a group of us from CCK ventured out into the city centre asking God for words of knowledge about people He wanted to speak to. There are a number of churches in Newfrontiers who have begun stepping out in prophetic evangelism but this was the first time we'd done anything like this. I thought I'd share a story from today.

Before we left I felt God speak about some one with 'leg pain' and saw in my mind a diagram of the lower part of a leg.

I was walking through the Lanes with my friend Lottie, when we saw a woman sat on the doorstep of a shop. She was crying, shivering and looked in a pretty bad way. We stopped and asked if she was ok or if she wanted to talk.

The lady (who's called Claire) began to cry said 'no I'm not ok.. my mum committed suicide...' 

She began to open up to us. Her mum was bi-polar and had become so ill that she had stopped work to care for her. When her mum committed suicide she ended up losing the place they lived in and becoming homeless.

She told us she had got out of hospital this morning. Some one had recently set fire to her sleeping bag when she was in it. She jumped out but because the polyester had melted on her legs, as she tore away the sleeping bag it pulled off the skin on her legs with it. She pulled up her jeans to show us all this raw skin, holes and scabs all the way up her shins. It was pretty hard to look at. It must have been excruciating.

We asked if she had got any help with accomodation. She told us she had been offered the opportunity to stay in a Women's safe house, which would provide her with counselling and she would have time to apply for housing benefit, and the opportunity to get back into teaching drama (her profession) and get her life back again. But she had to give them money by tonight or she'd lose the place. She told us she had sat there all afternoon getting more and more desperate. Nothing had happened and she had given up hope on this chance to get her life back on track. 

She then said how she used to go to a church called 'CCK'(!); that it was a big place but there was such an amazing sense of community. She said a couple in the church had tried to help he with accommodation when her mum died but she had been too proud to accept their help. She thought she could mend things on her own but it had all gone wrong and she had felt too ashamed to go back. She had also become angry towards God that her mum died and left her. 

We were able to say 'We go to CCK and we'd love it if you came back. God loves you and he's put us in your path today because He wants you to know that'. It was then I had remembered the word 'leg pain'! I explained that earlier in the day I felt God speak to me about some one with 'leg pain' who He wanted to make himself real to. Her face was a picture. She began welling up with tears saying 'really? seriously?' An amazing moment as she realised God knew her situation and had singled her out. So we prayed for her leg to be healed. She said the pain improved a bit.

We then asked her how much she needed to pay to get onto this scheme and secure her house for a year and she said '£18. Crazy hey'. We probed a bit further but felt she was genuine (who cares if she wasn't - it's grace!) so we put the money in her hand, much to her disbelief. She smiled, looked up and said 'thank you God..'.

Jesus is so kind.. He never gives up on us. Even when we run away or blame him, he runs out to meet us before we're even home. He reaches down to where we are. He's the most gracious person I know. 

A weekend in Portugal

Last weekend I had the opportunity to go to Portugal for a weekend away with the Newfrontiers church in Lagos. Dave Fellingham was doing the teaching and I was asked to lead worship. It was a great time of hearing from God, being in His presence and sharing stories over good food!

The guys in Portugal love to worship - as soon as I started singing on the first evening they were ready, expectant and belting out the songs. In fact, they sung so loud I couldn't hear myself at all on the first night! It was raw, passionate, full of God's presence and I loved it. 

One lady came up to me after one of the sessions rather speechless and said 'I have never ever heard or seen worship like this before'. She became a Christian in the summer after God made himself known to her while she was fishing! But her only experience of worship was chanting in a catholic church whilst thinking about her lunch. She had no idea that she could encounter God in such a tangible, personal, and powerful way. 

While we were there met an 80 year old lady called Iris, who felt God tell her to go to Portugal as a young woman, after she heard that her fiance had been killed in the war. So she left England and went. When she arrived she couldn't speak the language and said to God 'ok.. I'm here. Now what do I do!?' She gradually picked up the language and has been there ever since, telling people about Jesus.

God really loves his church. It's amazing to hear what He is doing in such a dry nation, and the way He is sovereignly pursuing people and changing their lives. His kingdom and His kindness are unstoppable. The church were so grateful to us for coming over, but these guys are amazing - they are faithful and follow God, even when it's tough. It was humbling to be amongst them.

Compassion

I've recently been assessing the compassion levels in my life.

In the gospel we're told Jesus often was moved with compassion for people - the word used is 'splagchnizomai' which means 'to be moved in one's bowels'! When Jesus saw hurting people he was moved in his gut and the deepest seat of his affections.

If you do a search through the gospels you'll find that when Jesus felt compassion for people it led to an action. (He healed, taught, fed people, comforted, raised the dead, etc). As Phil Wilthew says in this brilliant talk, 'compassion has teeth'. It leads to action.

This last week I have been asking God for compassion and was amazed at an opportunity I had on Saturday morning.

As I was walking into town and a woman came up to me on the street asking for money. I gave her what little I had and we began to talk. I asked her where she lived and she began opening up to me and telling me about her boyfriend who was often drunk, her struggle with pleuracy, how she was orphaned and how her family had wanted nothing to do with her.

Then she pulled a photo out of her pocket and it was an image of a grave stone. She said 'some one sent me this 4 months ago, it's my fathers grave'. She read out his name and the poem which was written on his grave stone. As she stood there reading me this poem, which was obviously some comfort to her, I just felt this deep ache inside and the love of the Father for her.

When she finished I said 'I'd really love to pray for you. I believe Jesus is alive and loves you'. She had obviously had experience of church because she said 'ok.. please no hands on my head though'. So I prayed for her pleuracy and that Jesus would reveal to her how much he loves her. She gave me a big hug and thanked me and then asked what time our church meets. I told her and am praying she comes.

When Donna initially stopped me and asked for money, my natural reaction was one of slight annoyance, judgement and mistrust. But Jesus stops for the outcasts; for the people that we wouldn't give the time of day to. He loves people we write off. His compassion and kindness is truly breathtaking.

'God is not in the business of gratifying our desires for excitement nor helping some of his children win arguments over others. He is in the compassion business. To the degree that you can enter into his compassion for the sick and for the hurting, you can be a vessel through whom the healing power of Jesus can flow'. (Jack Deere)

God is looking for vessels. This is my prayer at the moment. I know making myself available to be used will mean interuptions in my schedule. It will mean laying down my pride but it will also mean glory for Jesus as he reaches into the broken lives in the city of Brighton. What a privilege.

The Power of Silence - Hearing God's Whispers

"Is the ambient noise level of my life low enough for me to hear the whispers of the Lord?"

It's quite a well-known quote from Bill Hybels, but when I read it again recently I began to ask myself some questions about the 'noise' levels in my life and how sensitive I am to God's whispers.

I love the story in 1 Kings 19 where God speaks to Elijah.

The elements are at God's disposal and he was pleased to employ them in the previous chapter when he sent down fire from heaven, followed by a rain storm. He is the one who knows how to get the attention of nations in quite a dramatic fashion! But as Elijah sits alone in a cave feeling hopeless and at the end of himself, God comes to his prophet and whispers to him.

Sometimes it's a challenge to just sit and be still. It requires discipline. I have to fight my urge to waffle, fidget, think about a text I need to send, work I need to do, washing I need to get done.

Jim Elliot once said “I think the devil has made it his business to monopolize on three elements: noise, hurry, crowds . . . Satan is quite aware of the power of silence.”

The world throws so many distractions at us and seems to continually scream 'do, do, do!' But Jesus in contrast says "Blessed is the one who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting beside my doors".

Recently I've deliberately set aside chunks of time to be before God in silence and to have solitude. No people, no phones, no internet, no books, no music, no emails. It's been an amazing journey and I have found God so willing to draw near and speak to me. He is so surprising.

In Psalm 29 it says that God's voice is powerful, full of majesty, breaks cedars, flashes flames of fire, shakes the wilderness and strips the forests bare. And yet he loves to draw close to his children and whisper in our ears. I find it hard to get my head round! Elijah seemed to stand unmoved by God's displays of power but when his still small voice came he was at once affected. It changes everything.

I love God's voice. It carries such strength, peace, courage, correction, love, grace, purpose. I could go on. There's really nothing like it. So, if you want to be happy, listen, watch and wait!

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"A closed mouth before God and silent heart are indispensable for the reception of certain kinds of truth. No man is qualified to speak who has not first listened." [A.W. Tozer]
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"It must be that preparation for ministry demands significant times of solitude. We simply can't maintain a radical God-centeredness under an unbroken barrage of human interaction. The depth and value of what you bring in your heart to other people will depend on what you do with your solitude". [John Piper]

Entering blogger world

Hello and welcome to my blog.

Here are some of my photos from 2008 (Click to enlarge!)