Qualified Christians

Do you know the problem with the world? I think I have figured out part of it. Sin being too over simplistic an answer for me, although that is the biggest problem, I think that we have it all backwards. I am sure I have read somewhere that the ones who want to be first must be the servant of all. We have definitely got it wrong.

A good friend once said to me "David, you're going to be a great dad one day." When I asked her why I was stunned by the answer. "Because you're built like an indoor climbing frame!" I think God is kind of like a spiritual climbing frame for us to clamber over and learn more about each day. The young lady was only eight at the time (she's now married with kids of her own), but she knew God then in a way most adults do not or have forgotten they can.

Adults bug me. They look for qualifications. Does the potential candidate have the right piece of paper that says they sweated in an exam room in the right college for three hours ten years ago? Yes? Then they get the post. It seems it doesn’t matter if you can actually do the job better because you have already been doing it for thirty years. You do not have the right piece of paper anymore.

You're outdated.

Well, I want to put the record straight. The world’s qualifications are not God’s. The world has this crazy idea that paper or an exam is God's way of saying who can do His jobs. That is why little kids are so great. They do not care if the person with them ever sat an exam in child minding, never mind where you sat it. If you can tell a good story or are built like a climbing frame that is enough for them. I love kids because they just tell it how they see it.

They have enabled me to understand why Jesus said unless we become like little children we could not enter Heaven.

Qualifications are not everything. Look at the start of the third chapter of Luke's Gospel. Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate, Herod, Philip, Lysanias, Annas and Caiaphas were all highly qualified men. Indeed Annas and Caiaphas were High Priests in Jerusalem, and so powerful in the nation of Israel, Herod, Philip, and Lysanias were Tetrarchs in their respective areas. They were revered by men, held in awe and spoken of in hushed voices in case a raised voice caused offence. So, which of these mighty and well-qualified men did God choose and say "This is the one"? None of them! The Word of God comes instead to John, Son of Zechariah in the desert! This guy must have been a first century biker! Hair probably matted, dressed in hides, and looking like a wild man, God chose him because his heart was inclined towards His will. This man was not obsessed with title or qualification; rather he wanted to see God show the long awaited Messiah to Israel.

Similarly when Israel wanted a king, Saul was a real Man’s Man. Tall, muscular, handsome. A truly imposing man. He’s the one the people want. He’s also the one who fouled things up so badly God destroyed his entire family. There are many descendants of King David, the young shepherd boy Jesse didn’t even see as worth introducing to Samuel. Saul’s family ended badly because of his sin.

Yep, adults have it all wrong. God looks on the heart, not the intellectual ability. Not the academic nonsense. God's only question is "Will this one let me be a climbing frame for them?" God chooses each of us, not on our merit or abilities we have, but on how much we are prepared to allow Him to do in and through us.

I want to be used. I really do. I want to reach the nations, and speak His word, and do His work, but there is still this part of me that says I want do it. Until I get past that "I", it's not easy for God to use me. Certainly, I am not going to be any help for healing. "I" does not have the power to heal anything, (excuse the grammar) but when "I" is given up and Jesus moves in, then I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

What is the "I" in your life? Pride, arrogance, call it what you will, it is there in all of us, and it is a direct result of the Fall. The trick is to see the "I" before the "I" gets to the front. Once that happens, and pride gets in it can kill a ministry gift. The hardest thing is when people thank you for your prayer. It is tempting to play false modesty. That can be an "I" getting in the way.

One more thing. If any of us can have an "I", and any of us can give it to God, then that means that any of us can be used by God to further His work. Even if we are dressed in animal skins with matted hair and a Harley-Davidson.

Or even if we have got the “necessary” qualifications for the job!

All Hallows Eve

Ok, so nobody uses the full name these days. Halloween has become something to be used to revel in all things not Christian, whether it's ghosts, witches, vampires or politicians.

But in the Christian calendar it was once a memorial day, a day of preparation for 1st November - All Saint's Day. All Hallows day.

Something to think of. It was a day that the church used to remember the saints and martyrs who had literally given their lives for the Faith.

Even the name "Hallows" is the same word Jesus uses in his model prayer. It means to make Holy, or set apart for God.

Now I'm not saying we shouldn't let the kids have some fun tonight. What I'm saying is the adults need to think hard and remember where the day started. It had nothing to do with pumpkins. The candles lit were a symbol of the light of Christ. The saints were remembered and their sacrifice celebrated. Witnesses who had gone before, and even those around us now.

We are called to be a light to the World. Surely this festival should provide an ideal opportunity to do that? We should be remembering people like John Wesley, William Wilberforce, William Booth, John Tyndale who were mocked and persecuted so we could enjoy the freedoms we take for granted.

So just a short entry today. It's not about pumpkins.

Be a Light to the World. Be the City on the Hill.

Take a Stand. It's a challenge. It'll test your resolve. I guarantee most people will laugh at you.

But they laughed at Jesus and His message too.

You'll be in Good company.

Choose Life

It sounds so straightforward. Choose Life.

That's the decision God puts before Israel in Deuteronomy 30. "I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live" (verse 19)

Choose Life. It's like God gives a multiple choice quiz to the Israelites, and hands them the answer script with it.

The Blessings are listed, wealth, health, long life and Blessing in the land He will give them. The curses are also listed. Death and poverty.

It seems an easy choice. Follow God, and you get the Blessings. Don't and you get the curses.

But they don't - mostly. The Old Testament is filled with the stories of men who started well, but fell apart before the end, turning away from God and watching their life's legacy fall apart with it. A few stand apart from the crowd. Caleb and Joshua, Jabez, Elijah, Elisha and some of the kings like Josiah who oversee revivial and repentance in Israel, but the majority is men who fail for one reason: they failed to fix their hearts on God.

David was a man who was known to seek God's Heart. He was so in tune with Him that when his own sin in the murder of Bathsheba's husband is brought to his attention he repents immediately. His son starts well, and his grandson even more so, calling off an entire war because the prophet tells him to. But Solomon and Rehoboam took their eyes off the game, and ultimately the kingdom was divided and fell apart. Ten tribes were lost into captivity and the once powerful nation never regained it's former status.

Because the leaders chose something other than life.

We have the same choice. The curse is lifted - as long as we accept Jesus's sacrifice - and we can live in the full Blessing God outlines in Deuteronomy. The Law was never meant to be fulfilled, rather it pointed to Jesus as the one person who could keep it, wholly set apart but at the same time a man in time. A sacrament for our relationship restoration.

So choose Life. Life in Christ. It's not easy. It's free, but it costs everything.

There are days when darkness will close in around you and all we have is the smallest of candles, but even that light cannot be extinguished by darkness itself. We have to choose to let it go out.

Choose Life.

Life. The Glory of God is man fully alive wrote St Iraneus. Man fully alive. Jesus's own words echoing back at us, that His heart was for us to have abundant life. He wanted us to live to the fullest.

Yet we allow ourselves to be burdened with "ought to" or "should" or "didn't" and heap condemnation and death on ourselves. We need to learn to cast off these shackles holding us to the old life we had before we became Christians, and actually be Christians. Imitators of Christ. In the first century it was a nickname given to the believers because wherever they went describing the works of Jesus, those same works, signs and wonders followed them.

I've never seen anyone raised from the dead, although I have met 5 people who have been raised up from physical death. I've seen a few little healings here and there, and received a few myself.

But Christian, an imitator of Jesus? I wonder if it would be recognised by the men and women who were followers of the Way in Jerusalem? I'm not sure.

James says we should demonstrate our faith through our actions. Signs and wonders are supposed to follow us as believers. How then have we reached the place where the spiritual cart is before the horse? We want to see a miracle, then claim responsibility for it. Scripturally, that's not how it works. Jesus would do the miracle as a wake-up call to the people, feeding them spiritually and mending them physically to back up His words. We (including me) miss that part.

Stand with me today. Take up Jesus's challenge.

Choose Life.

The Darkest Hour

The very first post I wrote on this blog, "When the road is Darkest", shows as zero readings, but for me right now it is something I'm coming back to.

There are other posts here that follow similar themes, but none that are as explicit.

I wrote it in Feb 2011, and now - almost 3 years later - I find myself facing many of the same challenges, but with a slightly different perspective.

I'm relying heavily on teachings I heard many years ago, which I've practically worn out the original cassettes (yes, that long) from repeated listening.

The teaching centres around Jesus final words to His disciples the night of the Last Supper, as recorded by John in chapters 14-16. But the one thing I'm having to lean on most heavily right now is the first few verses of chapter 14: “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know.” (John 14:1-3)

Basically, Jesus's message is "Don't Panic - Believe" (Thanks to Andrew Wommack for that phrase!)

It's easy to panic as the waters start to swamp the boat. It's easy to try to hide as Adam did in Eden. It's easy to try to dig ourselves out by our own strength - even when we know we can't do it. We see people taking these "easy" options every day. It's easier to leave your spouse than to wade through the issues that have ravaged your marriage because you kept sweeping them under the mat and pretending they weren't there. It's easier to stop talking to your friends than to compromise and repair the relationship. It's easy to go and find another church because the people in the one you're in are just "wrong". At the extreme, people believe it's "easier" to commit suicide than to go on living in this world.

Every case above is one I've faced personally.

Including suicide.

It may seem odd to find a Christian writer openly admitting he struggled with suicidal thoughts at one point. It went further than thoughts. Four times I tried to end my life, and four times God helped me through. I've still not completely worked out why, but I suspect His unconditional Love for me probably has something to do with it.

And yes, all those attempts happened after I was born-again. It took a second personal encounter with Jesus to get my head clear enough to battle the thoughts that drove me so deep, and it's a constant one. The war doesn't stop after a single victorious battle, sadly. I was plagued with the thought processes for years after my last attempt, but in the darkest hours that those thoughts came, I was reminded by Jesus of His Love for me, and His goodness.

It seems incongruous to have a Christian blog comment on such things, but it is a part of my story, of how Christ has helped me in the battle for my life.

But where should we rather be able to comment on this kind of thing? If we can't talk about the battles we fight in our minds within the Body of Christ, it's a poor reflection of our ability to be part of that Body. These things get swept into the realm of psychology and out of the consiousness of the church. But Paul writes about the weapons we have being forged specifically for fighting thoughts. Any thought that sets itself up in our mind against the knowledge of the Truth. "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled." (2 Corinthians 10:3-6) Paul's inferrence is crystal clear. The weapons we have are specifically designed to shape our thoughts. To bring our thinking in line with God's way of thinking.

No matter how dark the hour, no matter how deep the suffering, His Love and Light can shine in and break the hold of the Enemy.

But only if we remember Jesus's words. 

"Let not your heart be troubled"

Growth or Death

At our office, my wife and I normally have a vase of flowers on one side of the reception desk, and a rather large cheese-plant on the other. There is a marked difference between the two.

The plant is constantly changing. New leaves sprout every few days and the plant is in danger of becomint too heavy for the desk holding it over time. Certainly it will need a larger pot and more soil for nutrient before too much longer.

The vase holds flowers, often roses, but flowers most weeks. We place them as an arrangement and watch them open and the colours present a splash of vibrant hues into the room. After a week r so, we take them from the vase and replace them with fresh stems.

The difference is simple. The plant is alive, growing and changing. It is adapting to its environment and expanding. The flowers are dead. They were dead when we put them into the vase.

There is a story of an aristocrat sentenced to death during the French Revolution who believed those whose head's were cut off maintained "consiousness" for a short time after the guillotine fell. Anne Boleyn had been said to continue praying after the sword severed her head, mouthing silently. He requested as a final experiment that one of his friends watch hie face after the beheading. He, for his part, would blink hard for as long as he was able. The reports vary, but the general consensus of the witnesses was that the blinking continued for around 30-40 seconds after the blade fell.

Our flowers are no different. They were alive attached to the plant, dead after removal. They retained a semblance of life - the petals, leaves and scent - for some time after the cutting, they drew water up, but they were dead. No new shoots, no new buds. Only decay.

We are no different, except in one way. We get to choose. We can choose to be cut flowers in a vase, or to be a plant, growing and changing over time.

" I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live; that you may love the Lord your God, that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days; and that you may dwell in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them." (Deuteronomy 30:19,20)

We have the choice, given to us by God, to decide to follow Him and be a plant in His garden, or to reject Him and His Life. God will not interfere with our choice. He will not force us to choose Him and His path. Even after we are Born-again, He doesn't force us into His will. We can choose to be cut stems, or allow Him to fully grat us into his life.

I used to grow roses, and one of my favourite things was to find a strong and healthy root from any variety, and taking a shoot from another strain with beauty but a weaker root system and grafting them together. It's a tricky process, but the strong and established rootstock will maintain the grafted shoot. I managed to develop a single root with 3 different grafts being fed by it.

I used roses, Jesus used vines - the same principle. A weaker stock with unhealthy roots (us) can be grafted onto a strong root (Jesus) to allow it to produce fruit. 

On our own, we are dead flowers waking for the day we are tossed into the bin or onto the compost heap. Inviting Christ allows us to grow and become moulded by His life flowing through us and producing the fruit He would have us produce.

So there it is. Growth or Death.

And it's up to us to decide.

It's a two way street

My last post, Omission vs Commission, talks about choices we make specifically relating to treatment of illness.

I need to add something to that thought which is a point separate in itself - hence the new post.

I just finished readling an article on the CNN website about a young girl who was driven to suicide by incessant bullying. I was horrified at the article.

I was more horrified at the attitude of the bullies' - sorry "alleged" bullies - parents.

I accept I am not a parent yet, but I do have friends who have children in their early teens. They are decent, responsible kids because the values they were taught are decent and responsible values. They don't have access to cyberspace other than on a computer in the family area, where comments are monitored. Conditions for the priviledge of using the computer are that any social network sites the child is on must include among their friends both parents. And this is in a family where they have no doubt their child will behave in a responsible and caring manner.

Parents are responsible for their children's behaviour up to a certain age. That age is the point when the child leaves home. It's that simple.

If the behaviour of a child causes another human being to be so beaten down that they end their life as a result, then both the bullying child and the irresponsible parents who allowed it to happen on their watch must be held accountable for that death.

Before the D-Day invasion, the Commander of the Allied Invasion Force drafted a letter to the President of the United States to be delivered in the event the invasion was unsuccessful, accepting the blame was his, and his alone. Acknowledging the men under his command had done allt they had been asked to do, and holding himself personally liable for every drop of blood lost in the failed attack. As we know, that letter was never sent because the invasion was a success - but the "father" of the troops recognised it was his responsibility to look out for half a million "children" in his care.

Too bad the parents today don't share that sentiment over a single child.

I'm often not a fan of the NIV translation, but on this verse it's got the others beaten. Proverbs 22:6 (NIV) says "Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it." I love that. "Start children off" The concept of instilling the behaviour from an early age, reinforcing that behaviour to the point that the child cannot do anything but behanve that way when it's older.

I've been accused of chauvinism because I hold a door for a lady, offer my seat on public transport and walk on the traffic side of the footpath. I don't know any other way to be. My dad didn't sit me down and tell me, he lived the principle in front of me. Respect women, honour them. Respect other children - but don't be afraid to fight if you have to.

Bullies are cowards at heart. I can say this from the possibly not unique, but experienced position of having been both a victim and a perpertrator.

After my brother's death, the other kids at school couldn't handle what I was going through and did what a young teenager does with what they fear or can't comprehend. They used it as a way to attack me. I withdrew into myself, but there were a few people who managed to get alongside me and prevent me from going too far - actually talking me out of killing myself more than once.

In an effort to make the pain more bearable for myself, I found a kid who was about Robin's age and who irritated me, and I became a bully - not for long - but nonetheless. That's nearly 30 years ago. Last year I had the chance to talk to him via the internet. I apologised for my behaviour and any pain I'd caused him. I didn't expect to become best friends, but the intensity of the venom thrown back at me caught me a little off-guard. I extended another olive branch, but it has yet to be replied to. Ultimately, it's his choice to forgive or not. Something I've learned from surviving the experience I had is that you forgive for yourself, not the other person.

But parents beware: bullying behaviour by your kids says more about their home environment than just about the child. Excuses like "I took the computer out of the room around the time it was posted" only make you look foolish and incompetent in parenting. Why did the child have that kind of unrestricted access in the first place?

I was blessed to have grown up before the internet took hold. The telephone was screwed to the wall, and the computer plugged into the TV. It was impossible to "cyber-bully" anyone. But I know if I'd been caught bullying - and this is why I stopped - I'd have had hell to pay for it.

First world society has shirked the responsibility of the parent onto the state. Teachers must now instill moral values to children. The fact that by the time a child reaches a classroom for the first time it's oral values are already entrenched seems to matter for nothing. It's the school that is failing.

Garbage.

Our children are our responsibility. I wouldn't give my dogs over to someone else to train, and I can't believe I would do differently with a child. I don't want to be told my child has taken it's first step, or said it's first word. I want to be there and guide it. Maybe that's because I'm 41 and still don't have kids, but maybe that's because it's how I saw it done by my parents - and I honour them by wanting to do the same.

The two-way street. Respect and honour. Treat others as you would have them treat you. Sometimes you'll get your hand bitten, true. But someone has to make a stand. If not us, then who?

Omission vs Commision

I've been wrestling with a dilemma for a few days now. The dilemma is this: is omission a sin?

It seems straightforward at first.

But I have had to dig deep into myself and what God has shown me to find an answer.

A few years ago, my father died from an incurable brain tumour. Nothing the medical industry did was ever going to save, or even prolong his life. But they tried anyway. They removed a tumour the size of a grapefruit from his head, and he was then subjected to intensive chemo and radiotherapy sessions that they knew wouldn't cure him.

How does this fit with this topic?

Simple. My dad's last few weeks were spent largely in a state of nausea and vomiting from the chemical and radiation he was put through. It would have been kinder to rather let him live those weeks peacefully at home and slip away quietly instead of what he was put through, but he (and we) wasn't given a choice.

There's the crux. Choice.

Is it sin for a terminally ill person to refuse chemotherapy when they know it won't save them?

No, I don't believe it is.

But what about other illnesses? Cancer is one thing, but what of diabetes, cholesterol, HIV etc? They all kill, but the medication can prevent it pretty much indefinitely until old age gets us.

I think the choice is what's made at the time of diagnosis, and the progression of the illness itself at that point. I cannot stress that sentence enough - at the time of diagnosis.

I believe in healing of the body as part of God's atonement through Christ. I also take medication for diabetes. The two are not contrary philosophies. It is simply that my faith muscle has not developed to the point where I can stop taking the meds in the certain knowledge that my faith is complete. Actions do not produce Faith, rather it is Faith that produces action. So I wait.

But what of someone who has one of these treatable "chronic" conditions and has had for some time. Add depression to the mix, and suicide is an absolute "no", would the simple cessation of medication be considered sin?

Now I may step on some toes here.

I believe it would. If the reason for the cessation is to prematurely terminate your life, the the act of conscious omission of medication is actually a commission of a wilful act itself. It is different if no treatment has ever been taken or available, but the conscious decision to stop treatment is an act of commission, not omission.

I don't know how I would respond if I were to be told I had HIV. I would probably take medication simply because these days there is no reason a person shouldn't live a long, healthy and normal life with that particular illness (assuming they are not healed).

Others may choose differently. If the illness has progressed to it's final stage before it is detected then perhaps they may choose to make peace with the world and live out their final days. I don't believe that choice, at the point of diagnosis, would be sinful.

The real question is whether it would be sin to change your mind later. If after a period of time things get rough before they have time to get better, is it acceptable to quit treatment? Humanistically, the answer is clear - yes. From a Christian's perspective it's more hazy. By choosing to omit treatment that has been started in order to shorten your life, that is the commitment of an act, not the omission of one.

Declining treatment at first is one thing. Using cessation as a means of ending one's life may not be the fastest of prettiest of methods, but it is still taking one's own life. And by so doing, rejecting Christ's sacrifice as insufficient.

Sorry if this sounds hard, but I've never said this blog would be gentle - only what I find to be Truth.

There are many times in the Old Testament where God judges Israel for being half-hearted towards him. Jesus spits the luke-warm church out of His mouth in Revelation.

Either we trust Him, and yes - that may involve using medication - or we don't.

I've trusted Him for almost 30 years. I've seen my health go in both directions, but since I was told there was diabetes in me I've never had the degeneration generally associated with the illness. My sight is fine and, albeit for now with medication, my blood sugar is normal.

I believe I will see the day I no longer need the meds I take.

I commit myself to Him again each day, and try to make sure if there are any omissions, they are accidental.

Awareness

It seems to be the time of year when "awareness" becomes the watchword. My facebook feeds from friends fills up with female friends declaring they "like it on the floor in the living room", a statement which apparently has something to do with breast cancer, but is a mystery to me.

Local to me in Cape Town, there seems to be a glut of ribbons being sold to raise "awareness" of everything from breast cancer to homelessness. If I bought just one of each ribbon I could probably make a blanket big enough to keep the cold at bay next winter.

Red, yellow, pink, black, green - so many I don't know what they all stand for. The obvious ones at the moment are pink (breast cancer) and red (HIV), but there are literally dozens of them. And not one does anything to make me (or anyone else) more "aware" of things than they were.

Growing up I used to look forward to November when we became more acutely aware of the sacrifice made by the young men in 1914-18 and 1939-45. Poppies representing the Somme Valley battles covered the area, and on 11th November at 11am there wasa 2 minutes silence to contemplate the sacrifice. It had such a profound effect on me that the first chance I had, at age 12, I visited the battlefields in France where my great-grandfather had fought. By 14 I'd been 3 times, and every second of those trips on the actual fields and walking the trenches that still scar the landscape remains clear in my mind.

But ribbons? Maybe this generation will look on this symbol the way I do the remembrance poppy, but frankly I doubt it. Here, red ribbons adorn every cemetary. It is a symbol of death, not of hope. And the rhetoric constantly declaring HIV to be not something to stigmatise sufferers serves only to add to the stigma of the illness.

My former employer, Discovery Health, does a lot to try to influence research and influence of this illness. But it again only serves to increase the stigma of the illness.

Diabetes is in my family, and affects my life as well. It is known as a "progressive" illness, which means it gets worse. As my understanding of God has increased, my health has improved - including my need for medication. It has been a year since there has been any increase in my medication, and I fully expect to begin decreasing within the next few months as my sugar levels in my blood are now between normal and low on average.

I have friends affected by other illnesses, including HIV, who have experiences similar to mine. As their knowledge of Christ grows, they become healthier and the enemy begins to lose his hold.

The Awareness we must therefore strive for is, obviously, Awareness of Christ and His power in our lives through the Holy Spirit. We must truly learn to understand CS Lewis's words "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

This awareness, that we see by Christianity, through the Holy Spirit in us rather than because we see the "proof" first is a primary step towards the Scriptural model of Christianity.

Signs and wonders follow the believer. First comes faith, then action. James writes as much when he says about demonstrating his faith through his deeds. We should learn to do the same. Become aware of the Power that dwells in us. Our ribbon is our actions. Our faith should cause us to act like Christ.

"Christian" was a nickname given to the believers because their actions matched Jesus's own during His life. They cast out demons - and yes, I do believe in demons as real beings that can be fought and should be - healed the sick and provided for one another. We have lost that level of awareness.

I was honoured and disturbed by a comment a dear friend made to me a couple of weeks ago. We were corresponding about our friendship and how our conversation over the last year has been so intense with regard to God and His power in our lives. I found it comfortable and normal to talk openly and passionately about His power in my life and what I've seen, and she spoke of much the same. However she and I are no longer working at the same place any longer, so our conversations have been further apart. She mentioned that nobody talks with her the way I did (and do). My friendship with her is built on this shared Faith and Fellowship. I find it strange that what was so "normal" for us is so alien to most others - including many of my Christian friends.

Awareness is lacking. And we must reclaim it.

We need to be aware of Christ at a far deeper level than we have been. In Revelation 12:11 John writes "They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death." when referring to the way to defeat the Enemy. The conversation I have shared with this, my closest friend, was nothing more than this description. And the friendship is stronger than many I have had for ten times as long but not had the same level of testimony in.

The awareness has strengthened us.

So be aware of His power. Speak to one another about His work in our lives. Remember His actions and let us remind each other of what He has done in us. Fellowship grows in this way, and our awareness of true power allows us to strengthen in the walk of Christ.

Remember and be aware.

Define "Real"

"Real" is something the World has become obsessed with recently. The number of "reality" shows like Survivor, The Amazing Race, The Apprentice etc has boomed over the last ten years or so, each one claiming to be "reality" in it's purest form.

Nonsense.

Shots are made and re-made using doubles in competitive envirnments and clever editing to avoid embarrassing moments from being shown for what they are - fakes.

Shows like "The Bachelor" or "Mamma's Boys" claim to be "real", and we suck it up like it is. Even current affairs or "makeover" shows where homes or even bodies are remodelled to a "perfect" standard are prime television shows. Here in South Africa, Top Billing shows off houses that only multi-millionaires and corrupt politicians could even dream of affording. The average viewer has no chance of affording these "realities", and the average citizen (taken from the number in the population) still uses a bucket system and doesn't have electricity, running water - except what comes through the roof - or basic sanitation that more affluent areas take for granted.

I live (at the moment) opposite a less-formal settlement. The majority of the houses are brick and mortar, ut they have corrugated iron and wooden structures in what was designed to be their gardens housing families that rent these "homes" from the dwellers of the brick buildings. We have a dear friend who is such a backyard dweller - a decent couple with three children who were denied sterilisation after their second child - whom they were barely able to afford to feed - because of their ages. They were deemed "too young". But nobody bothered to support them financially when they were expecting a third child.

Reality is a very subjective word.

My first visit to South Africa was a real cultural shock to me. Cape Town international airport was the least spectacular building I'd ever seen, the processes were incompetent and the staff indifferent. I stepped outside and opposite the terminal was an "Informal Settlement". This is the politically correct title for a place I wouldn't consider letting a dog live, but the majority of Cape Town's population live in these circumstances.

Khayelitsha is by far the largest of these areas, and has more than doubled in size in the last ten years. It's horrifying. The City Council provides funds for development as it can, and the local members of the National ruling party (who do not control the Western Cape) arrange for protests about lack of service delivery.

Reality is subjective.

So why is this in a Christian Blog?

The Bible also spends a lot of time discussing reality.

Hebrews 11 has been on my mind in particular. "Faith is the substance of things hoped for".

Substance. Real.

Faith is the "evidence of that unseen".

Substance. Evidence.

I see my feet, and I flex my toes, and I know they are real and present on the end of my legs. But I can't feel them. Gradually over the last 25 years or so, I have lost the sensation in them. In the last 5 years or so, this has slowly started to reverse. It defies medical knowledge - it is Faith, and Faith alone that drives it. I got fed up of doctors telling me that "diabetic neuropathy" is incurable and eventually my feet would need amputating - so I stopped asking them for help and went to the Creator of my feet.

Reality check. I have more sensation now than I did 5 years ago. I get pins and needles in my toes, something I didn't get for many years. It even hurts now when I stub my toe - which is a mixed blessing.

But the reality didn't start in my feeling my feet. It started in my believing I was healed. Was healed, not will be. The manifestation is taking time, but it's happening.

"Real" takes time for me.

We have to overcome the unbelief in us to action the faith. It's harder than it sounds. A party of revolution, such as the ANC, struggles in Government often because it has the wrong mindset. So much time was spent during Apartheid focussing on winning Freedom that very little was done to plan what would be done with that freedom for the majority once it was won. So 20 years on, the poorest members of society here are actually in many cases worse off than before. The tax-paying base is proportionally smaller, and the "reality" of life is this potentially great country has many people dying of hunger, cold and preventable illness on a daily basis.

I'm not generally interested in politics, and never have been. But the reality of the lives of people I meet every day is too much to ignore.

So define "Real". Every person has a "real" life. It isn't a Kardashian or a Trump experience generally. Almost nobody lives in a palace.

The majority of people in South Africa will never read this blog because they don't have access to the hardware to reach it.

The majority of people outside South Africa will read it and dismiss it. After all, I'm a white immigrant here. Obviously I have money and power here. The stereotype sickens me. 25 years ago my marriage would have been illegal here under the race laws. I'm currently self-employed because the new race laws say I'm the wrong ethnicity to offer my experience in business to help develop this country's businesses become the world-leaders they can be.

So what is "real"?

Real is what we make of where we are. To be honest, my family is considering a move away from this area, possibly out of the country for a while, so we can become financially more stable. Our "reality" is the possibility of losing our home, three years of illness having prevented my wife from working and a cut in our income of about 90% because we were self-employed at the time.

But "Real" is also a state of Hope. Real is the Chariots of Fire camped between us and the enemy like Elisha saw when Syria sent out to capture him. "Real" is what Paul wrote: "If God is for us, Who can be against us"

God is for us. The overwhelming power of the creator of Everything is on our side.
God is for us. Not "will be" or "could be", but is.
God is for us. He's on our side, rooting for our Victory so much He gave up Heaven to die on our behalf.
God is for us. Not the World, not our neighbour (although He is), but us. He cares for us intimately and passionately.

That's Real. Bank on it.

Open War

After Gandalf awakens Theoden from his magic-induced sleep state, Theoden makes the choice to lead his people to Helm's Deep. The stronghold of Rohan as described by Tolkein in the Lord of the Rings. He does this rather than face open war, but as Gandalf reasons, war is upon him in any case.

We live our lives as Christians often in the same frame of mind as Theoden King. Either we are blinded by the lies of our own wormtongue or once our eyes are open we choose not to face the battle before us.

Whether we acknowledge it or not, a War of immense magnitude is already upon us. From the moment we hand our lives back to Christ we are involved in an epic battle for that very Life that God Himself went through death to win for us.

If the Glory of God truly is Man fully Alive as St. Irenaeus said, then to be fully alive we must experience a birth into that life. As Christians, this is usually referred to as a "conversion" experience, but then what follows is an almighty battle that lasts from that moment to our going to be with Christ after we leave this World behind.

We live in a state of War. The sooner we realise it, the better equipped we will be to fight and receive the Victory Jesus won for us. He gave us all the weapons we need to undo the works of evil in this world. Weapons for destroying strongholds of the mind, sickness, poverty are all at our command, simply at the name of Jesus. We are able in His Power to literally drive out demonic influence exactly the way He did and release others held in the captivity of the World and it's systems.

But War involves casualties. Something we are apt to forgetting. It's uncomfortable, and painful to watch people we've grown with in the Faith falter. It's more uncomfortable to realise "I faltered" as we walk. We tend to be given over to pointing out other's faults than acknowledging our own. That is a major battle in itself, and one the Enemy wages daily within us.

I fell away from God for several years when I left home. I moved in with the girl I was seeing, and we shared that arrangement for some time. When the relationship ended I moved back to God, drawn back by memories of teachings and cassette tapes of sermons I had heard years before. It was with much struggle I acknowledged my error and accepted His leadership in my heart. It was arrogance on my part that let me fall into a battlefield I would have lost if I had not been able to admit I was failing in my own strength.

Warfare is not a comfortable topic, and it may be a harsh reality for us to live in. We are the embodiment of Christ in the World, but living out that life to the full is a battle we will have to continue to fight on a daily basis, minute by minute for our entire life.

No, I'm not Religious...

I've been musing on the thought of religion recently.

It began a couple of weeks ago when a psychiatrist asked my wife and me if we were "religious" people. She was trying to categorise us into her scintific classification I think. Rene's answer was a simple yes to start with, but then the further questions came: which church are you in now, which church did you grow up in, what's your background?

Eventually she tried to explain that Christianity is about relationship not religious dogma.

The doctor's head spun round and exploded. She tried to classify the entirety of Christianity into her defined box, and it defies classification.

That's not to say there's no firm rules in Christianity. We are governed by an ordered God who has set out the Law of Faith, which hold all things together. That Law is immutable. We're not going to get into His presence and be shown the original, then the first amedment, second amendment (the right to prayer arms) and so on. God's Law is fixed, but it's not religious. It has power, but where religion binds, God's Law frees.

So no, I'm not religious.

I despise the term. As soon as I say I'm a Christian to someone they get this look that says "ok, got you pegged now".

Then they come over for coffee. And I give them my mug for religious people.

My dad and I got these mugs about 20 years ago in a novelty shop in the Gower just outside Swansea. They are inscribed "JESUS SAVES (with the Bethlehem Bank)"

I love watching the reaction when I use them. The confusion and bewilderment is great. It shatters any pre-conceived concept of a "religious" box for me to fit in, and it usually opens the door to talk very freely about the relationship that is Christianity.

Now I do have to be mindful of Paul's advice to not cause another to stumble by our actions. With that in mind, there are a few people I tend to put the mug WAY out of sight because of where they are. But I also have a mug I was given with the word "Aries" and my birthday on it that I hide away from them as well. It's not that I place any power over my life by these things, but they may cause others to trip.

I don't eat halal meat, not because of any religious reason, but because I generally like my steak rare and a little bloody - halal always tastes a bit dry to me, but I use the halal lamb chops to make a stew if they look better than the regular. I'll buy a kosher chicken if it looks like a nicer bird than the others. Like I said, not religious. Like Jesus said, "Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man." (Matthew 15:17-18)

"A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of." (Luke 6:45). Jesus sums it up here. He never said a religious word whilst He lived in Israel. His words were filled with Love and Power, not religion and dogma. He liberated, not imprisoned. He shattered the burdens of the people and replaced their yoke with His.

So I don't want a religion. I'm not religious.

I follow Jesus.  

Choices

We all have choices to make in this world. I'm not referring to a dinner menu, but real decisions as to where we will draw the line, where we will make our stand.

The World will minimise our decisions. Satan numbs us to the passage of time in our youth. We are given arrogance and a sense of immortality which belies the fragile nature of our existence. We are only guaranteed this heartbeat.

I'll repeat that. This heartbeat.

Just for a moment, consider what you'll regret if you die right now. Who have you not told you love them? What truly important work did you not finish? What decisions about your afterlife have been ignored?

What if this world isn't everything, and like Jesus said there's another coming? What if He was right and you're wrong?

Now I'm not an evangelist. Reading these blog posts should make that clear to anyone who hasn't met me. It's not my primary calling. But I do get moved on occasion to speak about Christ as if someone hasn't met Him. For some reason, perhaps the person reading this post right now, today is one of those days.

I love CS Lewis's books. He has a way in his work of succinctly putting across an argument with grace and clarity. I often come back to Mere Christianity, and his brilliant summing up of Jesus: "A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would be either a lunatic — on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."

We have only three options about Jesus. That's it. Either madman, devil or God. But Satan will try to put off our choice of which. He sends smokescreens to blind us to the Truth and to either persuade us of Christ's insanity, seek to convince us He never existed or sow doubt and fear to illicit mistrust in God.

A lot of the time, fear is enough. We are afraid of death so we don't think about it, talk about it or consider what's beyond it. We blunder through life, stumbling from one sign pointing us to Christ to another and disregarding them all. Like Jim Carrey in Bruce Almighty we miss even the most obvious signs placed right in our path. (Of course we don't then get to trade places later)

Christianity is not an easy walk. It takes guts to walk against the stream of sewage this World pours at us on a daily basis.

We revel in building up an idol just so we can watch it destroy itself. We hold people accountable for things they say and do, but never point that same finger at us. The rich and famous are easy targets. They even point at one another, missing the point that theirs could be the wrong opinion.

I'm considering closing my twitter account, or at least radically cutting out the number of people I follow because I follow certain people just to watch them fall myself. I laughed at Charlie Sheen's public meltdown, - and followed it on Twitter. I actually started following one or two people because of their ongoing meltdowns.

It seems that people fascinate us. They fascinate me. What someone says or does comes back to haunt them years later and out of context. Everything is held up for scrutiny, and when we say or do something out of line with the mainstream of public thought we are lambasted and ridiculed.

It takes guts to choose Christ. Every step of a Christian life opposes the World. Every word we speak against the World opens us up to ridicule. I respect the stand of people like Cliff Richard who achieve fame on the World's terms, accept Christ and then refuse to buckle under the pressure of walking His path in the face of the World.

It's a choice to follow Christ. The decision is one we all have to make eventually. God will defend the choice we make - even if it sends us to Hell.

He'd rather we choose Him.

The problem with Atheism

I have an old acquaintance I occasionally interact with on Facebook. We went to secondary school together, but since I left home over 20 years ago we've not had the chance to meet in person.

One of the things we discuss, usually amicably, is God. I believe, he doesn't.

This is not a new debate for me, and probably not for him either as we are both in our 40's now - I'm not sure how that happened - and have built lives. I have travelled, and indeed settled on another continent, in another hemisphere, whilst he has remained local to where we grew up.

I have no problem with moving or staying put. Both my parents moved away from their home towns, their parents stayed fairly local to theirs. Both are valid life choices.

What I am troubled by is my friend's inability to conceive that God exists. Our debates, for the sake of our friendship, generally end at a stalemate where each of us agrees to terminate the discussion for the sake of the friendship.

The problem is the ultimate meaning of that stalemate. If I am wrong and I choose to live as if God exists despite that, I lose nothing ultimately. If he is wrong, he loses everything.

No argument seems to hold sway, and not just with my friend, but with all the professing atheists I've talked to at length. I see the order in the Universe and ask how it could have come to be by chance. I look at the most intricate patterns in nature, the symmetry in a fractal pattern and finally at life itself. Science can do many things, but it cannot do just one simple thing. A chemist can mix together the exact proportions to mimic the size, smell, taste and appearance of a grain of wheat, yet when planted in the ground it produces nothing. There is no life in it.

Atheism, literally the absence of God, is without life, since God is the source of Life. Everything that exists is held together by that life given by Him. Yet atheists claim He doesn't exist.

My friend denies the existence of Christ as a man but accept the existence of Julius Caesar - despite there being many times the number of primary source documents other than the Bible showing Jesus existed than that of Caesar. People doubt miracles, yet there are many hundred of documented occurrences through the centuries that science cannot explain where the Name of Jesus was called on. These are dismissed by atheists as they cannot explain them.

Christians are referred to as hypocrites, while their accusers celebrate Christmas and Easter - surely a greater hypocrisy than someone acknowledging they have weaknesses in (in my own case) a short temper? I cannot fathom the notion of using someone else's beliefs to gain selfish unearned prizes in the form of gifts I neither need nor desire. I would rather wait and buy them myself - something my wife gets very frustrated by I might add.

Atheists are worse hypocrites than Christians. I never once met a Christian who wanted to take a day off work because it was Lenin's birthday or to celebrate the publishing of Darwin's "Origin of Species".  It seems ridiculous that the year numbering system had been forcibly changed from BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini -The Year of our Lord) to BCE (Before Common Era) and CE (Common Era) without resetting the numbers to zero. I was studying for my degree and actually had to ask my lecturer what BCE and CE meant as it made no sense to me.

Atheism falls short and poses more questions than it can ever hope to answer because it can only pose questions. No answers are possible without God for many of the questions it poses. Why do people get sick? In theory, the human body produces cells identical to the ones that die off, so explain aging and death. Why give a super-computer the power of the human mind to something that can never hope to live long enough to use it all?

Until Creation, the Fall and God are factored into the equation, the answers will always elude us. Our minds were designed to never die. Aging and death are a result of Sin. If we are designed to live for ever, we need a computer like the brain that can grow and develop new pathways spontaneously to cope with the ever increasing data pumped into it.

Atheists tend to be, in my experience, a fairly morose lot. They have no vision beyond their own mortality and live very small lives. Most (not all I acknowledge) seem to be self-centred in their approach, wanting to leave behind something the world will look at and remember them. But who remembers the atheists of 2000 years ago? 1000 years? Last year? Few if any. Richard Dawkins will fade from memory but Jesus will go on as He has for 2000 years. John's Gospel will still be read 500 years from now when the "Naked Ape" books have long been forgotten.

Eventually, Truth will win out, as it always will. Even Jesus had to deal with doubters in the form of the Sadducees, whose teachings are largely forgotten. The human Spirit requires Hope to function, and Christ to fuel it. CS Lewis suggested that Human History is the story of man tring to find something besides God to make himself happy. That's not a direct quote, but a summary of parts from Mere Christianity, which I suggest anyone read as Lewis was far wiser than I.

A "rational" argument for faith could probably be made. Tony Campolo tried in his book "A Reasonable Faith", and others have done the same, but ultimately Truth is not something that can be found through intellectual means, rather it is found in the heart.

Somewhere, a little Faith is required to recognise Truth when it shakes your hand. Take that away and Hope leaves with it.

And all you have left is an absence of God.

Time to go

Most of the posts I put on this site are intentionally oriented around teaching and building from Scripture. This one will be a little different as it forms part of my personal testimony:

My dad was a good friend to me as well as being my dad. He would call me "Mate" when I was growing up, which he didn't do with my brother. It made me feel very loved and special in his eyes. As a teenager, we would go and play tennis together during the summer, walk in the Westcountry hills round Child Okeford and Shillingstone in Dorset where his parents lived, and do a lot of things friends do rather than parent/child relationship.

Even after I left home, this continued. We took a couple of holidays together, my favourite being a trip to Italy where we visited Pompeii and Herculaneum as we were both fascinated by ancient history.

Why is this relevant here?

In early 1999, he began to get headaches a lot. By March he was using massive doses of pain pills to control them unknown to me or my mum. In late May he collapsed and we rushed him to hospital where we heard he had a tumour in his brain. His life expectancy would be months, not years.

He died in August 1999 in Torbay Hospital with me holding his hand as he went to be with his Lord. Despite the pain he'd been in it was a peaceful passing at the end, and whilst I believe he could have been healed if I'd known then what I've learned since, I don't doubt his destination.

By the end of the year, I was a mess. 1999 can be summed up for me by how I spent my birthday - at a dear friend's funeral. I started the year with a fiancee, a decent job, my health and 2 parents.By the end of March I'd lost the job and my fiancee had left me - looking back that wasn't a bad thing, but at the time it stung. By September my dad had died and my health, at the age of 27, was failing. At the end of the year I suffered what in layman's terms would be a total mental breakdown. I couldn't function at all, I physically couldn't speak, rarely smiled and thank God Tesco had started opening 24 hours so I could shop at 3am or I'd have starved because of agoraphobia.

I was told by a doctor I'd never be fit to work again by the end of that year and signed off on permanent health grounds.

From that point I dipped even lower until, almost inevitably, I become suicidal. In the early part of 2000 I made 4 serious attempts at ending my own life. I was told at the time that each should have been successful. I took overdoses of various medications I was using. On the fourth try, I felt death come for me. It wasn't like in Ghost. It wasn't warm and friendly. I felt fear like I've never known before or since for myself. This was not what I'd seen my dad going to. There was no tunnel, no light, none of the cliched things you expect, just darkness, cold and fear. Then there was a sense of a greater power beating the darkness back. Death lost it's grip, and I woke up in my bed knowing I'd just been saved from something far worse than the depression I'd had up to that point. I didn't see Jesus as much as I was aware He had stepped in to save me from myself, but I learned something I've only recently been able to find the words to express.

From my experience, I realised suicide is not a release from, but a dive in to pain. It is selfish and cruel, and it says to God that what Jesus did on the Cross wasn't enough. In short, I believe it blasphemes the Holy Spirit by placing a higer value on  a person's actions than Christ's.

I decided then it was never going to be an option again. There have been times when I've wished God would take me, but I know I'll never take that step again, no matter what.

I know this message is meant for someone out there. Whoever it is, remember you're not alone. There are many people who have been through depression and illness and come out of it the other side. I'm terrified for those who didn't make it through.

Don't be one of them. When it's time, let it come naturally. Don't force God's hand. Reach out to His children around you. Let them, let us help you. Don't give up. There's help closer than you think. Call it.

Changes...

Change is the only real constant in this world. Cliched, but true.

After the Resurrection change was pretty much a constant for the disciples. They went out from Jerusalem into the Roman Empire and beyond.

But we try to keep everything the same. Change makes us uncomfortable in general. We've been taught to like certainty, predictability and sameness. Probably because God is - by the World's standards - unpredictable and dangerous.

John Eldridge shows in "Wild at Heart" that Man was made for adventure, created in God's image we are adventurous, impulsive and dangerous creatures. The Lion of Judah is no household pet, and the same should be able to be said of the cubs.

We need change to grow. A body of water with no change becomes stagnant. The only physical condition with no change is death. Why would we want to emulate that in life?

But we strive for predicatability. A paycheck on 25th of the month. Like the typical Hobbits in Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, we keep things as they are, maintaining the status quo and waiting for death before we say "it's so short" and realise what we missed. "All men die, Dougal. But not all truly Live" says William Wallace in Braveheart before routing the English troops.

The stories we love are filled with change, either metaphor or true. In the Lord of the Rings movies I was disappointed by the ending. The creators missed the point of Tolkein's masterpiece by having the young hobbits return to an unchanged Shire. In the books, the fact that they were now battle-hardened was critical as it allowed them to save the Shire.

We have to be aware of the danger of stagnation in our walk with God. He calls us to be tried and tested for battle - ready for the fight at any time the Enemy brings it to us. He's already bought the Victory for us, but we still need to fight some battles. We can fight, and in that fight we may be wounded, but the Victory is assured. We only need to remember we fight from the victory, rather than towards it. If we become stationary we lose the certainty that comes with knowledge of Christ. Many denominations began with good intentions then as they grew they lost sight of their founding principles, stagnating and forgetting as their size increased that they were part of God's Church, not all of it.

It's no different for us as individuals. We are either growing and changing, or stagnating and dying. There are no half measures, and no space for it is made in Jesus' teachings. The Gospels show Him encouraging all He came to to grow in their knowledge of God and His love for us.

Jesus Freaks

There's a part of me that wants to shout it from the rooftops. I'm a Jesus Freak.

There's a part of me that wants to then hide under the bed.

We have, as humans, an innate need for the relationship with God that we lost in Eden. We also have the same sense of shame Adam felt after the first sin.

Jesus took the punishment and bore the shame for us, but we still feel it. Especially when we admit our need for Him. Human nature since the Fall changed us from freely connected to God, walking with Him in the cool of the evening as friends to ashamed and hiding. We learn as we grow in our faith how to overcome that, and to take the stand for Christ.

But we always have the fight within us. Even Paul wrestled with his old nature. It was a battle he was prepared to fight for Jesus's sake.

So I'm a Jesus Freak.

DC Talk joined with Voice of the Martyrs a few years ago and compiled a collection of testimonies of people who had been imprisoned, tortured, ridiculed and killed for their faith in Jesus, starting with Stephen's stoning in Acts and moving to the murders of children and adults worldwide up to the early 21st Century. Every century since Jesus has seen hundreds of martyrs die for their faith. These Jesus Freaks took a stand despite their worldly nature and held fast to the confession of their faith.

I want that.

So I'll say it again. I'm a Jesus Freak.

Now I've been criticised for taking a stand for my faith. In the Western society the toughest persecution we face is largely insidious, undermining us a little at a time until we simply stop fighting, like a paralytic agent. I get the occasional barbed comment on facebook from people I've not seen in 20 years who are proudly atheist - men with no invisible means of support - and from people who have become friends more recently but don't share my beliefs. I made a reference in a quote to Islam a while ago and offended a few people. The summary is that I agreed with a writer - mis-represented as Bill Cosby - who had stated he was sick of being told Islam was a religion of peace while it's representatives were busy undermining Western society by means of terrorism.

Christianity is not without it's dark history, such as the Crusades (as sponsored by the Gengis Khan school of evangelism) in the Dark Ages, and it's persecution of innocents for heresy through the 16th to 18th centuries. I'm not saying those actions were right either. The inquisition as it is remembered by History could not be further from true Christianity than the Islamic terrorists who took down the World Trade Centre are. Pure evil bred from fanaticism.

I doubt very much that the people who have rejected Jesus over the years will be amused when they stand in Judgement and realise how easily they were deceived and that they chose the deception rather than face the flames, sword, cross or critics.

I don't want to be one of them.

I refuse to be.

Jesus Freaks stand out in a crowd. Usually because they are moving against the common flow. All rational argument is placed before them, and the response is "But God said". It's a tough place to be. The criticism even comes through families and churches. I left a church some years ago because the leadership rejected a major move of God in that congregation. They stirred up trouble for the minister to the point where he left and a large number of people left with him because we refused to stand by and reject God's movement with them. The church slipped back into religiosity and practically died on it's feet.

Jesus Freaks have Faith, not religion.

James said he would show his faith by his works. We should do no less. I want to be known as a man of Faith, not a religious man. My Grandfather was a man of Faith who coincidentally was a leader in his local Salvation Army. Ony a few days before he died he called me, excited to share what God was revealing to him after 64 years as a Christian. Fresh revelation and new insight to the Lord he loved and lived for. Neither of us knew it was a preparation for his Promotion to Glory, but he was excited at the thought of new insight. My dad, his son, was a man of Faith too. He quietly spoke and learned and demonstrated his Faith in his everyday life, sometimes initially through clenched teeth he would extend forgiveness to people who had been a thorn in his side professionally and personally, but always from the heart eventually. He understood that forgiveness, like love, is as much or more a choice than a feeling.

I move in fits and starts sometimes. I have a time when my Faith is more important to me than my life, then I get distracted for a while, but it always comes back to the same root eventually.

I'm not a fan of big churches. They have their place, but I prefer a smaller group where true fellowship can grow. I understand many churches have "home-groups" where a small group gathers and has a mini church meeting mid-week, and some of them are amazing groups, but some of them are as forced as the Sunday service.

I spent several years in and around Totnes in Devon, England. Whilst there there was a group of us who for several years lived almost as the first century Christians did. We were in and out of one another's homes, ate together, met up at impromptu times, crashed on each other's couches, used each other's cars and put up with each other's personalities because we had a true fellowship. I miss that group still today after almost 15 years since we last were all together. I've never had that shared experience of faith anywhere else.

We were Jesus Freaks and proud of it. We went into the local secondary school and ran a youth alpha course, we invited Jehovah's Witnesses in for coffee and spoke nothing but Truth and Love to them until they were fighting to leave!

We met and prayed and loved and sang with each other from Dartmouth to Buckfastleigh and every nook in between.

Jesus Freaks to the last.

It's amazing that the memories are so fresh as I recall those days, the anointing on the conversations stick in my mind, and the witness of the group stays in my heart. I love those people as much today as I did all those years ago, and I long for their company again.

Jesus Freaks. United by a common insanity the World can never grasp. And worth every second.

The Last Minute

The last minute features heavily in scripture. It's a concept that coes across all the way from Genesis through the Bible.

The concept isn't restricted to Scripture, however. As Christians we have a tendency to wait until things are desperate before we try to trust God. It's an insane way of living.

But it's how we do things most of the time.

I was at my dad's bedside when he died, holding his hand as he went to be with Jesus. I spent the last minutes of his life talking to him even though he could barely respond. I held his hand as I spoke and he was able to respond to my voice as I spoke to him. I spoke of a holiday we'd taken together to Italy a few years before, of time I'd spent with him as a friend, not merely my dad. Each time I spoke of something we'd shared that was a funny memory he would squeeze my hand. It was barely perceptable, but the timing of every squeeze was too much for it to be a coincidence. He was in there.

I was able to speak to him about how I loved him, the first time I had actually spoken the words that I can remember. I asked the staff to shave him and put his own pyjamas on him. They brushed his teeth and combed his hair too. Then he settled. A peace came over him. I held his hand again and spoke one last time. I told him if he wanted to go we'd be ok. Then his breathing became shallow. As he died he suddenly opened his eyes and fixed them on me, squeezing my hand. Then he was gone.

I was blessed to have those last minutes with him. I regret that I left it until the last minute to tell him how I felt and how much he meant to me, but I'm glad I was able to.

You'd think I would learn from that, but Noooooo!

My whole life I wait until the last minute to ask my Father for help. Often we all do. I have financial needs that I trust God to provide, but just as often I wait until my back is against the wall to do it. On paper it looks like we may lose our house, but we have been sustained by God's provision for several years. It seems that in spite of this I still wait until the last minute to look for that provision.

Peter waited until the boat was full of water to call to Jesus to walk on the water. Jairus waited until his daughter was almost dead. The widow comes to Elijah after her husband died.

We're not alone in waiting until the last minute. God came through time and again to show His power, but He would rather not let us. We choose to wait, trusting ourselves to provide rather than Him. He'd rather we call on Him for Blessings and Life in abundance than Miracles and stumbling from crisis to crisis.

So from here onwards I'm going to strive to move forward, remembering that I come from a place of victory through the Cross, not from a place of grovelling defeat. Sonship has been given to us and we can go to Him any time for any thing we need.

So let's make a deal, you and me right now.

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