Reaction Time

I will be driving along sometimes and there will be someone waiting to pull out and I don't notice them in time to stop and let them through, or somebody is speaking and afterwards I think, I should have been concentrating more, I could have said...., the other week, driving to work, in my rush, I pulled out to overtake and then noticed a hitchhiker in a layby, that because of my rush, I missed being able to stop for.

It seems to me my reaction time is a bit slow, or maybe my eyes are not open enough, or even, I am not looking because, it is not natural for me to have my eyes open, ready to respond, I am looking internally, responding to what is in front of me and missing need on the periphary.

How do I get naturally wide eyed?

It says at the beginning of Ephesians 5 that I should be an imitator of God, how do I do that? Spend time with Him. His word, in prayer, in time. The more I know of Him, the more natural it is to respond because I am more aware of His heart, of His ways, of His view of things, He has a very wide aspect.
I want to be wide eyed and able to respond as naturally as breathing.

Regeneration

I have a great book by a guy called Andrew Wilson called 'God Stories.' I hope it does not sound rude if I say it is a great toilet read, the chapters are really short and yet gets so much across, it is the perfect book for toilet concentration.

I was reading a chapter the other day on regeneration and what God does in and to our lives and it inspired this wee post.
It really made me think of Doctor Who, because he gets regenerated, when he gets mortally wounded or you think that is the end, or some actor does not want to be typecast, (even though they now already are), anyway, then Doctor Who gets regenerated.
New body, new voice, new habits, new characters in his life, new tastes and always a new dress sense. He becomes somebody completely new, yet, he has the same memories, the same knowledge, he is still the doctor.

Of course, easy analogy time.
New Christian, new body in spirit, new voice, new tastes, new habits, probably some new characters, maybe not the new dress sense, new life. Still you, memories and knowledge and such like and yet made brand new, a new creation, regenerated.

Little Thoughts

I have lots of these little thoughts, little moments of clarity, or acknowledgement, or moments when I just notice God staring out at me in the most seemingly mundane or even worldly things, moments when God is apparent or makes himself known through the T.V. or driving or nature. Most of these thoughts disappear into the ether minutes after I have them, I am now attempting to make notes when I am inspired and hopefully just share something short and hopefully noteworthy which has caught my eye, or just started me thinking.

I was watching Film 2011 the other night, when I had a moment like this, they were talking about remakes, asking why people cannot be original, have to copy, or take something great and try and redo it when it does not need redoing or updating, or translating, it was fine the way it was, that is what made it a classic in the first place. Remaking stifles originality, yet of course in the film making world, it is all about the money, tried and tested may mean profit, rather than the risk of originality which can be hit and miss.

The church can sometimes act like this, somebody once referred to McChurch, the way services, ministries,etc.. are replicated in so many churches up and down the country, exactly the same service, same format, same ministries.

This can work.

If that is what God is saying to you.

But what if He is saying do something new? How easy is it to break the mould?

From Enoch to today, God has asked us to walk in new ways with Him, I bet Noah just wanted to be like Enoch and walk with God, but God wanted him to build an ark, I bet Abram did not want to go walkabout but would have preferred to build an ark, God had already asked someone to do that. How about Martin Luther? Or Wesley? Or countless others, who responded to God's originality, rather than just trying to make a dull remake.

IPhone

This is me being very modern and attempting to blog from my phone. So this will be a very short blog as it is just a tester, but I still have something to share which has been on my mind now for a while.
There should be a difference between the living and the dead.

There is obviously a natural difference between a live physical body and a dead physical body. Should there not be a difference between a dead spiritual person and a living spiritual person?
Sometimes it is very plain to see when someone is saved the huge difference Christ has made in their lives and there are people I know who really shine differently from those around them because they are really alive in Christ, yet there seems to me, too many of us who there is no difference between us and the bloke down the road who has no idea who Jesus even is, in habits or deeds or way of life.
Surely there should be a difference.

Right Eyes

I am doing a degree course at the moment, which I am thoroughly enjoying and learning a lot from, there are a wide range of topics within this first course I am doing, ranging from Cleopatra to Michael Faraday to Cezanne. Out of all of these so far, the one I have enjoyed the most has been Cezanne and probably the biggest reason for my enjoyment is that my whole view of modern art has been changed as I have studied. As I was writing an essay on this artist I suddenly found myself defending him and understanding what he was doing, it was a wonderful epiphanal moment. The German poet Rilke, has a similar experience, he said he suddenly started seeing the paintings through 'the right eyes.'

The veil needs to fall away, because there is a veil in all our thinking, putting limits on God, putting God in a box, just not even getting who God is.

I find myself hearing more and more truth, I have to be discerning and I don't jump on everything I hear and run with it, but when I hear something which is truth and I meditate on it and think about what that means in my life then I start to see something new with the 'right eyes.'

I cannot force anyone to believe anything, I can only share truth and hope that something clicks, as it did and continues to do for me.

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Driving Again

Driving is something I do a lot of, it is also something I have blogged about on many occasions. The thing is, the way people act in their cars, it can be such a magnified reflection of people in real life.
The other night, on my way home from work, there is a place where there is a short piece of dual carriageway which then goes to down to one lane, it is a chance to get past any slow moving traffic, because after that, for the next 15miles, it is single lane traffic. Anyway, on this night, I overtook a lorry and then had a car overtake me, a bit ahead, I could see another lorry and wondered if I would get to overtake it or not and in my rearview mirror I could see another car in the overtaking lane that was going to overtake me.
As I got closer to the lorry, I kept my eye on the vehicle behind, which was still sitting where it was before, just behind me, in the overtaking lane, not overtaking and making me think, whether I would be able to or not, then as we got to the point of the road becoming one lane, I thought, well I won't bother overtaking, I can sit behind the lorry, it is ok. At this point the car behind notices that the road is becoming one lane and tries to overtake me and the lorry and fails miserably, and has to pull right in front of me. I flashed the driver in front, I was a bit peeved, this was dangerous, but the fella, put his hand up to apologise and I was happy to let it go. The driver was not finished though, he decided to overtake the lorry anyway, on a blind dip and nearly causes another accident, I don't know why he did it, maybe he thought I was an angry driver behind him. Lastly, 12 or so miles further down the road, the lorry is gone and I have clear road ahead when I come across this dawdling vehicle trundling along delaying me getting home and who is it? But my friend the dangerous overtaker.

My lesson, how many times do we do something stupid, dangerous or just plain wrong and follow that up by trying to escape the shame or truth and do something more stupid, more dangerous or more wrong and yet in the end, it all catches up with us.

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Church Leaders vs. football managers

Just a mixture of conversations I had between one of my brothers and my Dad, led me to start thinking about football managers and church leaders and some similarities.

A team I really struggle with talking about is Man U, horrible, horrible team, I will not say anymore, except, my dad, father in law and 2 of my brother in laws all support them and me being a Liverpool fan, is sometimes not pretty. The thing is, at man U at the moment, they will be at the top of their game for a long while, they are and will probably continue to be successful, and the probable biggest reason for this is the manager.

He is consistent, stable , innovative and some not very nice things as well, he has the support of his team and of the fans, he is building for the future and has done plenty, but if I remember rightly, at one point he was one game away from being sacked, I wonder what way Man U would have went if they had of sacked him?
I look at how some managers are treated and it is wrong, they never get the chance, things are handled badly internally, there is divisiveness, there is a lack of support, destined to fail. Yet as well, there are those that should not be in the job, those that fail and carry on regardless and cause more damage to their club, not knowing when to walk away, or to notice that things are not working, or the club does not handle the situation properly, fails to act and once again causes more damage.

All of these things have plenty to do with church leaders, especially new church leaders. How many times does a new leader come in and people are against him from the off, not supportive, decisive, not even willing to give someone a chance, a church leader walking into that situation is being set up to fail.
There are leaders that maybe should never have been appointed and are maybe in the wrong place, but an awful lot of the time, it is the support that is lacking, look what can happen if they do get the support, the backing, the chance to lead effectively, if they do get the support from their team and their congregation.

I was told that something like, out of the 20 biggest churches in the world today, 18 have had the same leader for the last 20 years, Man U moment!

Also, it does seem to me that if the support is not united, then that runs all the way up.

When Jesus was talking in Revelation about churches he had a problem with, He didn't tell anyone to leave and go somewhere else, he told them to sort it out.

Support, not divide, a divided house will fall, supported, we will win.

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Forgiveness

In my time I have wanted to lash out so much, I have done on occasion, there is so much that is not fair, so many that hurt others with no comeback and yet I am called to forgive.

The lord's prayer says ' Forgive me my trespasses and help me to forgive those that trespass against me.' Jesus goes on to say, if you forgive you will be forgiven, in Mark 11, Jesus says again when you stand praying 'forgive.'

More importantly, and in example, as Jesus was dying horribly on the cross, he asked his Father, 'forgive them..' Not 'when', not 'if', just forgive.

As a parent, I have wanted to hurt those that have hurt mine, yet the biggest truth and greatest example of forgiveness comes from God, when he saw his own son tortured, abused and murdered and forgave.

So hard, yet true, difficult, but the example has been set, and ultimately, beyond that forgiveness, beyond vengance and bitterness, anger and pain, lies freedom and life

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The Pursuit Of......

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is one of the most famous phrases from the U.S. declaration of independence, I like the idea of pursuit, to chase after something, to try to attain, it involves an effort, although it does not mean that the thing pursued is attained.

I am involved in an accountability group, based on a model from the Organic Church book by Neil Cole, in it there is a question, am I pursuing freedom from strongholds/patterns of behaviour?

I am challenged by this, it involves making choices and decisions which lead me into freedom and yet it encourages me in its pursuit, rather than its goal. I mess up, sometimes I really don't get it, but I am willing to chase, to keep running the race and keep pursuing.

Paul said in Philippians 3:12

'Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.'

I intend to keep following

A Good Song

On the video bar down the side of this blog I have set the song 'You Never Let Go' by Matt Redman. It is a great song and one I find myself singing to myself during the week, it has some basic truths in it that really inspire and comfort me, mainly that whatever I am going through, God has promised to never leave me nor forsake me, never, ever, no matter what hole I find myself in, or put myself in, no matter how much I get caught up in what I am doing and forget Him, He will never forget me.

I love the fact that in the middle of this song, is a battlecry 'And I will fear no evil, for my God is with me, and if my God is with me, who then shall I fear? Speak that into every situation, it is true.

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A good book

One of my favourite books is 'Loving the God who Loves You' by Floyd McClung, a book full of some real truths to really grasp.
The other day at work I quoted him, this was the quote;

'It is Jesus who came to bridge that great chasm. Religion is man's way of searching for God, but Jesus is God's way of searching for man.'

Love it.

Something to share

Just felt I really wanted to share this, been on my mind, it is the beatitudes, from Matthew 5, this is from the Message paraphrase.

"3'You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.
4'You're blessed when you feel you've lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.
5'You're blessed when you're content with just who you are—no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.
6'You're blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God. He's food and drink in the best meal you'll ever eat.
7'You're blessed when you care. At the moment of being 'care-full,' you find yourselves cared for.
8'You're blessed when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.
9'You're blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That's when you discover who you really are, and your place in God's family.
10'You're blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God's kingdom.
11-12'Not only that—count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. You can be glad when that happens—give a cheer, even!—for though they don't like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble."


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Something Older

When speaking last year, I used this analogy,

I was watching a football match about six years ago, between a certain liverpool F.C. and one A.C.Milan. At half time, Liverpool, the team I have followed since a small child were 3-0 down in the final of the European Champions Leaugue Final. It was easy to give up, it was hard to see any way back, any chance of Liverpool being able to contribute, to even be in the game, let alone a chance of them coming back and winning. Some believed, had faith and when the players came out for the second half, it was the Anfield anthem, 'You'll never walk alone' that was being sung. Liverpool went on to win, in the most dramatic fashion, scoring three and taking it past extra time to win on penalties.

In life, we often view things at half time, at the point when we are three nil down. I believe that God is sovereign, knows and rules over all, and he knows the full time score, there is no situation that is too dire or too far gone, redemption is open to all and all those situations can be turned around, every one, don't give up, when all is said and done, before we even get to extra time and penalties. Jesus has already won.

Moods

Time is going so quickly, I am an horrendous blogger. I am also aware that I am constantly saying that I am busy or tired, I have time I probably don't use well enough and I do get tired but it is not an excuse for behaviour or not doing something, I am getting to the point now where if I say I am tired, I feel like I have just swore or something, because the next thing that will come out of my mouth will be an excuse for that, or me saying I'm tired will be the excuse for something else.

I need to eat healthier and exercise more frequently, sorry, let me be honest, I need to start exercising, I have a lot on, but it is all manageable, and it is great to be alive in so much, I have spent so much of my life doing nothing, sat in front of a tv, drunk, every night, dreaming on what ifs. Now I don't mind having a beer and watching a bit of telly, but I do not want that to be my life and for so long it was. I am now busy in other things, which is not the thing that drives me, but I want to be able to do, and yet I have so many bad habits still, that seem to affect my moods and fatigue and these are mainly lifestyle choices that I need to get a grip on.

My lifestyle probably needs a bit of a health check and I could do with a break, which fortunately, this month, we all will have, it will be nice to recharge and a good oppurtunity when we come back to start behaving a bit healthier.

Ask, Seek, Knock

I am not keeping up with this blogging very well, oh well. Still getting there, always getting there. Things are good, learning to be contented in the now, and I have a lot to be content about, I suppose it is harder to be content when all is not right in the world.

There is this thing going round in my head right now, it is from mathew chapter 7, verse 7, it keeps on coming up, so I am going to share it here and other places and also look into where it is relevant in my life;

'Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you.'

I have chased so much in my life which has led to nothing. I know that the life I lead now, is so much more and I know that I am learning to live in freedom and run in this new life I have, and when I go through things which are hard, which I do, Jesus is with me, and the things I go through are turning me into something new, it is good.

Ask, seek, knock.

Issues

Everyone seems to have issues, the carrying of baggage, for a lifetime, or just the simple sulk for a little while. It seems so easy to pick things up and not put them down again, I was reading something recently, which really struck at the core of why so many issues, arguments and moods happen.

An awful lot of things are down to expectations and desires and when the expectation or desire is not met, or not met in the way we wanted it, we have can, worms, everywhere.

So many things in my life, so many pieces of pain, arguments and frustrations, have happened due to these reasons, generally, I did not get my own way.

It is so easy to talk about 'my' rights and what 'I' deserve and it happens to often that there is a motive in conversations or arguments, to be justified, to be right, to get what I deserve or what I want.

If I got what I deserved, I would be in serious trouble, in general, there is too much of my desire and what I want, caught up in how I express myself, it is not what I am called to be.

Jesus asked me to deny myself, to lift up the cross daily and follow Him, that means, putting everything down when I pick that cross up.

Today

It is of course St. Patrick's day today and being Irish, it is a day of celebration, a celebration of Christianity coming to Ireland, a declaration of freedom of that country at that time and hopefully a declaration that continues today, freedom through Jesus Christ.

There were many and there continues to be many brave people that go out and declare freedom in very difficult circumstances. Look at the middle east right now, or look at the pakistani minister, a Christian, gunned down a couple of weeks for making a stand on the country's blasphemy laws. It was not easy for Patrick either facing druids, chieftains and kings who did not want to hear what he had to say, at the risk of death, freedom won through.

It will continue to win through, some will fall, others will rise up, freedom will win.

Then put that into the daily context of our lives, stop worrying so much about 'being relevant' or ' preaching without speaking', declare freedom.

What title?

Trying to keep on blogging, keep thinking about it and then it sort of goes to the back of the list, no worries, I see that many others are slacking. It is important to not get things the wrong way round, I blog because 'I' want to express something, not because people are hanging on my every word, so I do have a lot I want to say, I will keep on trying to express myself, communication is so important. I know I am now waffling.

The thing I wanted to say right now, is share a verse that really encourages me and gets to my very core of who I am, here goes.

John 6

⁶⁸ Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."

When it comes down to my very being, who I am and what drives me, what my reality is, is this, this truth, that I hope I can never get away from. What I know from the relationship I have with the God I know, is His truth and that is all I have to go on, so I must run with it, be driven by it and respond to it in what ever way I can. There are no one else's words or ways that will lead to eternal life, One way. Jesus.

Thinking

I have been thinking a lot lately, I do think a lot in general, but I have been throwing lots of things around in my mind as of late, things I probably don't have to.

I am thinking about what I'm doing, what am I going to be doing, what do I want to do, what should I do be doing??????

I think about travelling to certain places, but I know the timing is not right, I think about studying, yet do not know how comfortable I would be in that environment, God knows me.

I don't know the answers to what is ahead, I do know that right now I have things to do, so I have to get on and do them. I know doors will open in the future and God has a plan with my life, I should be ready to be moved by His Spirit and trust in what is ahead.

Probably the most important thing I have to do.....is enjoy now, it is so tempting to be worried or caught up in planning for what is ahead and then miss what is right in front of you.

New Year

I have gone from 150 posts in 2008 to 40 posts in 2010. I am going to keep on blogging, I don't know if it will be more or less than last year, hopefully it will be more, I'm not going to put myself under any pressure though, just share, have the odd rant and hopefully try to inspire somewhere along the road.

Tanya, my wife, is going to try to blog daily, my Dad already does, I think it is a good aspiration and encourages discipline, something we could all probably do with more of, getting past apathy and procrastination is still a huge battle and one that has to be faced to get anything done.

I feel a bit cheated with Christmas this year, Tanya and I were sick throughout, not very fun, although I did not put on any more weight, mainly because I did not want to eat anything. I still have to go on the post Christmas diet, which does not seem fair, but I am overweight and unfit, so got to do it. New Years Eve was great though and I am very optimistic for this year.

I am still learning to live in the now, which is very important and I am still working towards more freedom in my life and in a way, I am still in a process of reprogramming, it is so easy to be going on and getting caught up in what everyone else does, telly, things, being normal. I find myself in a battle quite often with what the world says is right and being calm and just going with the flow. I have not got time right now, but that is something I want to explain more about. Who knows when that will be...........