this housegroup is in a poorer area of town with quite a reputation and there is me standing in the porch of a block of flats ringing the bell to no avail.... i am staring at an odd formation of broken bricks that could well be a perfect sculpture for the area.... but it is an odd one right there in the middle of the path.... and i feel uneasy i mean why would they be there... what if i was vulnerable by everyone's standards?
gottago
so i raise the issue and find myself in a brawl over my time keeping AND THEN we are going over the same ground again .... that i should not pray for.... why ? we are in the same spot but i am calmer and yes indeed it would be more helpful if the folks concerned actually talked to me direct... andsomething weird happens yes i spot a something and tell it to go in the Name of Jesus out loud ... something has been happening over time... the conversation ends with us professing our liking and sibling love for eachother and a weird thing happens i find myself listened to for the rest of the day!... i find myself feeling thinking oh!? there's nothing worse than talking cos you have to and saying stuff again and again and screeching with the frustration of that feeling of not being listened to! like as a default position? ....and that becoming a pattern of behaviour that embeds itself... so you speak out and you continously don't feel believed of listed to... during my 'sabbatical' i found myself in deep hot water afterwards but GOD knew precisely what GOD was up to! you see i heard a voice 'help me' i looked up and in that moment through the small crowd came somebody directly up to me asking me how i was.... it was odd... but i asked them how they were and Ministry situation errupted... i got some Ministry too and part of that was about me not being heard.. like speaking the right stuff and it not being somehow getting through... i was amazed i had not expected that! oh and afterwards i got a right rollicking afterall i was just a visitor... well not exactly i was there cos GOd told me to... still i got a rollicking which left me frustrated... you see it was not cos of the quality of my Ministry there was an experienced Ministry person standing there (which is how i got found out) just the impertenance of .... well when it was explained in more detail i could see that visitors can sometimes just be seen as visitors with all the complexity of unknowns and all that that goes with it... remembering i have to say i did love a lot of that church! and the bizarre experience of folks giving Ministry which was encouraging me ! apparently in the areas where i had been well and truely ticked off !
so where was i? ohj i have really been enjoying telling this one! so there i am not let in and feeling vulnerable but i look to GOD GOD tells me to ring the bell one more time on i do for the severalth time and then GOD leads me up the path (garden path).... and back the way i have come i notice some youngsters apparently revving up for a rowdy night out... i pray... something stills in them... someone coming towards me ... i notice them by the bizarre fact it's like they are suddenly making a rapid be-line towards me there is something Spiritual going on... i can tell so much so that they have to physically adjust their path to avoid direct collision with me as they weirdly slope by i pray for them ... i see an ambulance and pray for that too and suddenly it's all forgot the indignity of being shut out in the cold!... there is a hospital not too far away and there i go and sit and pray...
i have an added incentive as i have recently been told about somebody being admitted so i certainly feel the need to pray for them even though i have never properly met them.... ironically it is only recently that GOD brought me into a place where we talked about them and i find myself conscious of a barrier of sorts a sort of for want of a better word 'judgement'... and i feel somewhat ashamed ... to not be someone who is connected sufficiently to visit them!
this it seems is a general condition ... i sit and stare and pray and watch ambulances hither and to and fro... and at some point i feel ... a bus is coming ... i am hungry a bit cold tired and.... GOD starts to talk to me ... i stop GOD seems to want me to go to the entrance of the building... surely this late the building is closed! apparently not ... as.... oh and the bus pulls away.... i don't quite make it to the entrance but see two people go in and well i pray but surely that's where i should be physically.... but i am completely rooted to the spot!.... attempting to talk to GOD whilst still feeling i should be allowed to have got that bus!... there is a significant wait for the next one ... GOD seems to draw me down a side street so .... a little bemused i go... find myself drawn to a person so strongly that i am sure that perhaps am i meant actually to speak to them!? instead i acknowledge them and pray and carry on... i allow my attention to just go where it is and then i see someone looking into a shop window that makes me think ... how odd!... i look at the shop and feel sympathetically something like connection.... shop and person... i vaguely pray... i spot a fast food outlet that's open and stand in the doorway pondering fastfood A or fastfood B i sense somebody behind me they walk around me and i hear 'hi'... i look they the person outside the shop is speaking to me... and i'm thinking confusion... they recognise me i don't recognise them they tell me where we have met oh wow confused that's ages ago? not that long ago some bells are ringing i am feeling embarrassed at not entirely placing them they are a christian from a church i have not visited for quite some time... then i start to tell them about that i had just noticed them... and boldly ask if there is a connection between shop and person..... there is a connection important Ministry.. i am a little flummoxed this christian is not doing the usual thing ie step 1) see me and avoid (though sometimes folks really don't see) step 2) ask person how they are and don't wait for answer.... and yet they are still there... well me i am like boldest tof the bold ... i am uncomfortable in the cold hungry i ask them if they want coffee.... they say no but come in with me there's a couple of chairs we can sit i order coffee..... after a while we are shouted at 'no coffee'.... that is ridiculous! i want coffee GOD wants tea? ok GOD wants tea... i say... we are sitting chatting bible is coming out and we are in effect having a housegroup... which various folks came in and walked through... but housegroup it was and the weird and bizarre thing is here is i mean IS 2 charismatics sharing experience notes and even theology and me am just sharing my stuff and somehow ... well there is me demanding to GOd that my companion is not in anyway led astray cos well.... i do think differently but somehow ... it is a very special time! and what a GOD APPOINTMENT!... we walk a bit of the way ... i tell you i am now sipping my tea.. i could not somehow manage to get the cover off in the fastfood place!... but now it comes off and what is more the tea is a good temperature! .....i am telling them about treasure hunting explaining that i once asked to go to a group at their church and it never quite materialised and am telling about the tiny group of 3 at my church and a face appears quite suddenly round the corner ... and it's mog!... an incident has delayed his lift and he decided to walk how was housegroup? what did you do? did i draw the short straw no GOD BLESSED me! and gave an amazing adventure! how BLESSED DO I FEEL the now 3 of us exchange Ministry and we all end up manifesting in the Holy Spirit!.... and i get a word a word that matters and find i give a word a word that matters.. mog and me wander homeward
man cannot live on bread alone... this was the opening line of discussion about the controlled referencing that goes on in church ...
1THEN JESUS, full of and controlled by the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led in [by] the [Holy] Spirit
2For (during) forty days in the wilderness (desert), where He was tempted ([a]tried, tested exceedingly) by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they were completed, He was hungry.
3Then the devil said to Him, If You are the Son of God, order this stone to turn into a loaf [of bread].
4And Jesus replied to him, It is written, Man shall not live and be sustained by (on) bread alone but by every word and expression of God.
Deuteronomy 8:3
He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.
i am moved by these words!
GOD BLESS!
Peace and Love,
Home
Search
Calendar
Login
Register