Faith in the Margins

Edge Of Glory

2011-12-31T11:59:00.002Z

So this is it this is how it feels - after 27 years of knowing it would feel like this - I get to experience how it actually does feel --------- and yes it feels amazing, beyond words i am tingling from head to toe writing this. Welcome back into my life - this is just the beginning I know. I'm on the edge of glory and I'm hanging on a moment with you...........

The Lost are Found

2011-07-10T22:16:00.002+01:00

The lost are found
The blind will see
The lame will walk
The dead will live
And You Are God
Forever You will reign.....

Living Stones

2011-07-03T18:28:00.005+01:00

Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. To bind up the broken hearted and to bring healing to the sick and set the captives free.

He did not come so we could play 'happy church' on a Sunday morning and Wednesday evening then go home feeling satisfied that we went to church and played our part so well that we should be congratulated.

Christianity is NOT about having and getting, it's about losing and giving.

It's not about living the good life well.

It's about dying uncomfortably, rejected and misunderstood.

It's not about having a great friendship circle to laugh with, to live with and to share with,

It's about walking away from the above to reach out and move towards those who have no-one.

It's not about attaining the dizzy heights of church 'leadership and ministry'

It's about laying it all down for Christ and aligning with the poor.

Christianity is about Jesus.

He was poor and mistreated, misunderstood and rejected.

He was love and he loved and he chose to align himself with the 'least' and the lost, the sick and the unwanted.

It's about following Jesus where he what and doing what he did.

The church of the real Jesus exists in hiding. He is building his church on the margins of life in the dark and abandoned places where christians fear to tread.

The church of Jesus is alive and kicking. It's growing and it's beautiful, filled with the humble and the broken - those the world rejects and has no time for.

Jesus is placing the stones just where they should be. One by one honed and polished shining like diamonds in the blackness. He is keeping a remnant for himself.

Occasionally he places a diamond inside the institutional church - to show his workmanship, because Jesus does want to save christians.... but mostly the diamond is trodden on or ignored, because by standing alone and appearing so different it is gauged to be useless and too unconventional to have any worth........

John 1:5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

Loss is Gain

2011-07-03T18:05:00.004+01:00

Tonight I sat on the floor. And I realised something I've seen glimpses of in the distance. This time it came in full focus. You cannot teach someone compassion, only the Holy Spirit can do that.
I've spent decades trying to open the eyes of the hardened Christians around me to the needs and the desperation of their suffering and struggling neighbours. But it never worked. Not once. Not once in 20 years did I teach or show by example how to feel, live and walk with those on the edge of life, those who don't fit those who suffer and search and holler from the gutter for justice mercy and love. Not once. Not once.

I'm blessed.

He took my life.

He gave me life.

I spent 20 years in the gutter losing everything bit by bit until I had nothing left. No dignity, no love, no respect. He allowed me to make mistakes... to lose the husband I adored the family I loved the child I would die for the house I waited for the career I had planned, the respect of my friends, the belonging to a church which accepted me. Everything...... until I was crawling in the dirt dying alone and forsaken.

Over 20 years He allowed me to be beaten until in the end he could win.

What did he win?

Tonight I saw. I saw the person He has made me. The person who 100% aligns herself with the poor and forsaken and rejected. Who has compassion. I am so eternally grateful that He allowed me to lose every thing. Because in losing it all I have gained Christ in His fullness pressed down and overflowing in streams of living water , over and over and over my cup overflows.

Blessed be your name.

Matt 16:25 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

Real Church

2011-07-03T00:03:00.005+01:00

I work with the homeless. I get paid to rescue the lost and the broken and those who have given up on life.

Took a while.

Took 45 years but God got me there in the end.

It's a blessing, poured out, over flowing, more than I can handle more then I could ever have hoped for, beyond my wildest dreams - I would never have dreamt this dream because for so long I was just the same as those I'm paid to rescue - and when you're like that you don't dream dreams of being rescued and fulfilled, you wait to die.

God has a heart for the poor. God's heart is so infused with love and grace towards the poor and broken that it literally bursts out of me across the room to those who need his touch his help and his healing.

I understand from the Bible that you have to be born again to 'see' the Kingdom of God. Lazarus entered heaven - there was no record of him being 'born again'. He entered because he was enlightened - although there is no record of him being 'born again' he was broken humble desperate and vulnerable. - a beggar, the lowest of the low. He had no means of supporting himself. He relied on others - and they did not care. So. Lazarus went to heaven and the rich man went to hell. Wow do I love Jesus! The rich man not only ignored Lazarus's plight but he was 'glad and made merry and rejoiced every day' while Lazarus suffered..........

I think and I watch. I see the happy well fed joyful Christians I know making merry with their endless get togethers, parties, social functions and prayer meetings and then I see Jason.

Jason metaphorically 'waits at the gate.' But guaranteed he will not be welcomed in and given sustenance, because he is an un-desirable.

Jason is the type of guy you cross the street to ignore.

So I'm sat with Jason while he pours out his sad tale of rejection, alcoholism and physical illness. At 45 he's alone with no home and no money. Everything he hoped for as a child, a teenager , a young adult has been snuffed out. He is dishevelled, unkempt and un-appealing. So I sit with him. He tells me his story. And he has no hope, and he's dying, he has a fatal illness. He's dying at 45 with no money, no partner, no family and no home. So sad. I know the Bible and I know?! Jason is not born-again so he's going to hell. Right then and there towards the end of my time with Jason. I cry out to God from my heart as I speak to him. I cry out God: 'if there's a heaven, which I know there is and people like Jason are not gonna be there because they have not openly professed faith in you and become 'born again' and attended church regularly then God I want no part of it. I will go to hell, because I want to spend eternity with the Jason's of this world and not the Christians of this world who are for the most part hard and cold and removed from the suffering and the pain, cocooned in their little worlds of happiness and joy and adept and pushing the Jasons out of their cocoon because they are dirty and sinful and tainted',........so anyway - long prayer....

Back to Jason. He tells me his wife threw him out and he hates her. So I asked him if he could 'let this go.' I'm not permitted in my job to ' talk religion' to him as its not considered politically correct' so I rephrase my questions accordingly.... Let this go? his eyes light up.

He looks directly at me and says ' you mean forgiver her'?

Woooo I was not expecting that. (I feel God nudge my spirit!)

Yes I said forgive her.

Again he stops - this weak and shattered man - before me suddenly looks alive and awake.....

Are you religious he says?

Uhm I say... I believe I'm a follower of Jesus but I don't go to church...

I get the feeling this is going somewhere....

So from zero/zilch I am now faced with this desperate and hopeless individual who seems to have an understanding of the basic principles of Christianity....by then I know he has in the past been touched by God.

Yes he tells me he used to go to church, yes he tells me he believes, no he says he wont go back as he was rejected and made to feel dirty, unacceptable and rubbish when he tried to go he felt no good and inferior.

So in the wildernerness Jason and I sit and we talk - about faith, about life and about hope. And he agrees that he needs to forgive and he shares that he wants to forgive - knows that he should. And we don't pray or lay hands or sing songs or look holy. We look like normal people off the street. But God is there and we both know it.

And Jason goes back to his sofa and I go back to my kids - and that was church for us.

REAL CHURCH.

Matt 18:20 Where two or three people meet together in my name, I am there with them.

Listen to Lazarus

2011-07-02T23:25:00.004+01:00

As most of you know I have had a hard time in Institutional Church. The IC tends in the main to run as a business with a hierarchical model - much like the 'world' Also much like the world the poor, the outcast, the socially inept, the single parent, the uneducated, and the homeless get mistreated, ignored and deprived of having any real voice or influence. As a poor divorced single parent from the wrong side of town I have suffered untold and told abuse at the hands of those who supposedly are shepherds of the flock. It has been the same for every other person from my background that I've taken to church. So what's that all about?

I was praying this morning and asking God why he allowed myself and my children to be treated this way in 'His' church? Surely anyone with only a minimal knowledge of the Bible knows that much is said about protecting, nurturing and leading the widow and fatherless gently....
So why God why did you let us be so viciously treated at the hands of your very own ministers and leaders?

If your face and background fit you will never see or feel the abuse. That's the problem. IC can be a great place to be an 'acceptable christian' - if you find favour with the leadership because your lifestyle, family and background are considered 'acceptable' It's also a bonus if you have some hard cash to 'give' on a regular basis. This is the truth.

One day those who abused me, ignored and shunned me because I didn't have the 'right' credentials will have to give an account to God for their actions. The thing is I don't know anyone else personally who has spoken up about the way they have been treated by IC - I have watched so many from my background go to church and leave quite quickly - but they don't have the courage to speak out. The middle classes scare them. They baffle them with eloquent speech and long words. They have money and power and influence.The poor are aware of their shortcomings. The IC causes the poor the uneducated and those who don't 'fit' the required and acceptable mold of a believer to feel even more inadequate. The last thing they will want is a confrontation - on every human level they know they would lose - so they leave.

I hope and excuse me if this sounds a bit harsh.... I hope that on judgement day Jesus will bring every poor, rejected, lonely, outcast, homeless and desperate person I took to church into the great hall. Then he will bring the leaders of the church in who rejected, ignored and shunned them and then I hope he will ask them for an explanation and then I hope he will judge accordingly. Sounds to me a bit like a story Jesus told here about the rich man and Lazarus - but of course institutional church portrays this as a mere parable which 'doesn't have to be true in all its particulars...........'!!

We - all of us are without excuse if we mistreat the poor. The Bible is clear as to what awaits for those who behave this way...

What surprises me is the way so many Christians concentrate on showing and telling the world about their blessings of wonderful husbands/wives and families and Gods provision of their amazing church/house/car/holiday/promotion etc etc. Now this I agree is ok as long as it's used as a vehicle to reach out and tell those who don't have all the above that God can intervene in their lives and give the same things to them. All too often the church keeps the blessings to itself. The members keep the blessings within the confines of the church family and congratulate themselves for being so holy and worthy to receive these gifts. Bullshit.

Do these Christians ever stop and think what their boasting does to those in the gutter who have lost their spouse, their homes, their jobs, their self respect and are struggling to survive?
I don't recall Jesus ever going on like this. Hang on, I know, remember the time he walked right up to a disabled, homeless guy on the pavement and told him how God had blessed him with amazing legs so he could walk run and skip. Of course then Jesus went home and wrote all about it on his blog telling the world about how God had blessed him..... I think not. Jesus was too humble and thoughtful to do that!

If I ever do get 'blessed' with a spouse and my own home and the regular comforts all my christians brothers and sisters consider 'blessings' I will not speak about them as I would not want to cause even more pain and heartache for those who have not or worse still, had but lost.

These are the blessings Jesus spoke about so I have no problem with anyone boasting about these...

"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when men shall hate you, and when they shall exclude and mock you, and throw out your name as evil, for the Son of Man's sake.
Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for their fathers did the same thing to the prophets.
"But woe to you who are rich!
For you have received your consolation.
Woe to you, you who are full now,
for you will be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
for you will mourn and weep.
Woe, when men speak well of you,
for their fathers did the same thing to the false prophets.

Well I didn't plan for this post to go this way... but it has got me thinking about all those happy blessed, full and highly regarded christians out there...... who like to write endless blog posts showing just how much they have and how richly God has blessed them..... Taking into account the above verses the 'blessings' they so want to ram down our throats are not from God at all!!! I'm not saying christians shouldn't write about Gods provision or Gods healing power or Gods intervention in their lives - that's fine and good as testimony is always uplifting. But 'bragging' about a 'blessing' that God doesn't even call a blessing is wrong and very hurtful to those who are struggling and suffering and 'have not.'

I recently had some correspondence with a christian (no-one who reads my blog!) who constantly goes on about 'his' and 'his' families 'blessings' I challenged him about this and explained how it could be very hurtful to those who had nothing. He disagreed and was very self righteous with me so much so it had me quite tearful, I deleted his last message as I am not clever enough to respond using the kind of language he uses and also as a woman who has already been so abused and downtrodden by the IC I just don't have the strength to fight what he says. He has a huge following in the States and is well respected, maybe I'm wrong or misguided - i don't know, all I know is that Jesus measures our Christianess by how it impacts (for the good) on the 'least' among us. (Matthew 25:31-46)

This is an unfinished post which has sat in my drafts for 6 months. I'm posting it anyway today as it is as I continue to grapple with the issues mentioned here myself.

Persecution - Coming To A Town Near You

2011-02-27T18:45:00.011Z

Have you noticed how the spiritual climate in the UK is becoming anti-Christian at an alarming rate:

Christians in the West told to prepare for persecution.http://tinyurl.com/6x6bnjj

Christian hotel couple to appeal over ruling on homosexuals - http://ind.pn/g0Vu90

Christian Wandsworth Council worker loses sacking claim: All he did was suggest to a terminally ill client of his that she might try and put her faith in God!!!!! and for that after 18 years in his job he got sacked for gross misconduct.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-10935390

Twenty years ago I would never have believed there could be the remotest possibility of being persecuted for being a Christian in England. It's starting small, just a story here or there but the bandwagon has started rolling - and it will only pick up speed and get bigger. It will affect me in my life time. I'm just realising that. It won't affect luke-warm believers -they're safe, because it's easy to follow the latest man made Christian idea or stance without causing controversy.

But those of us who hold fast to the innerancy and inspiration of Scripture - and live like we believe it - we are already on shaky ground.

Have you noticed how hard it's becoming to find believers who talk openly about what the Bible says about homosexuality? It is a sin and an abomination before God :

Rom. 1:26-27: God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

1 Cor 6:9: Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! The sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, practicing homosexuals will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

We are already on shaky ground.What about marrying homosexuals in Church!? Church is supposed to be a holy and sacred place where we go to meet with God hear his word and meet our fellow believers. I cannot fathom how a truly born-again believer could condone a marriage blessing in church of two homosexuals, when God speaks so strongly against homosexuality in the Bible.

Ok - so I'm not gay - so how can I speak about these things with compassion and sensitivity? I speak only what the Bible says. So what should a Christian do if he/she feels a homosexual tendency - I would say pray and fast and decide to live as God intended: Single or married (ie a man and a woman). Same rules for me. I am a heterosexual female. I have been divorced for 10 years. I live a celibate life. It is amazing - being able to devote all my time and energy to serving God and helping his Kingdom to come. Trouble is these days anyone with a homosexual tendency is encouraged to let it have free reign - this is diametrically opposed to what the Bible says. As Christians we need to stand up and be counted on this issue. We cannot condone homosexuality when the Bible speaks so fervently against it.

Just today I read this story which cut me to the heart as I was hoping to be a foster Mum now my kids are all growing up and I have time and love to give - http://tinyurl.com/6x6bnjj - so it loos like it's not to be. A Gay couple can adopt or foster but a married Christian couple can't! How long before it becomes illegal to talk to your friends or colleagues about Jesus. How long before we are not permitted to bring our kids up Christian as it will be seen as brainwashing?

Another area where I can see I may fall foul of the new anti-Christian movement in the UK is I believe Jesus is the only way to God. No other way. Now that statement will soon get me into trouble. God's ok - people are fine with that but mention Jesus being the only way to God and it causes annoyance in others and even now already in the West people who hold this view are starting to be seen as 'bigots' How long before we are not allowed to promote this belief in public places, work places, on the internet!?

The 'New World Order' is fast approaching. Just look at what's happening in the Middle East. Wouldn't the world think it good if a new leader rose up and pulled the whole thing together in the not too distant future? He would probably be areligious. He would be worshipped and revered for his ability to finally overthrow religion once and for all - and bring different groups and nations together to live in peace and harmony. Even the West would start to look to him because of the seemingly amazing way he had turned the Middle East around...... and likely the West would give him jurisdiction over our countries - and allow him to influence our practices and I guess getting rid of religion would be seen as a good thing..........

I really hope I'm wrong. But the signs are there. Persecution is just around the corner if you're a true Christian......

Soli Dei Gloria

The Glorification of Relationships

2011-02-23T20:07:00.009Z

If you want to be my disciple, you must hate everyone else by comparison--your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters--yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple. - Luke 14:26

I guess we all know this passage and are relieved to read interpretations which mean Jesus didn't really mean anything serious by this statement. We tend to believe he was just saying it for effect to get his point across that God should come first - always. So then we can all settle down again to idolising our wives and husbands and to a lesser extent our children.

I've been praying about this and feel that Jesus meant here that our commitment to him should be paramount - above and beyond any earthly commitments to relationships. How many times have I heard someone say - 'Oh I can't do THAT for God because my wife wouldn't like it or my husband wouldn't let me or I have to THINK of the children. I'm not in any way against people being married and loving their spouses and children - what I am against is when these relationships become the cornerstone of our lives, the reference point from which we decide if it's Gods will or not for us to do something. I believe this is a curse in the Western world. It is one of the reasons why Christianity here is luke warm.

What if God is calling you to lay down your life - there's no way he could be asking that we think because he wants me to put my family first and love my my wife and protect my children - WRONG. I believe God is calling us to a deeper and more life changing relationship with him that breaks down all our carefully built barriers so he can get us where he wants us doing what he wants us to do. We need to bear in mind that we are called relinquish completely our earthly bonds.

When I constantly see Christians idolising marriage/family/children it makes me shiver. If God is asking us to do something our spouse doesn't like then who should we be listening to?

Western Christianity has become luke-warm and ineffectual for the most part because of our obsession with finding the marriage partner God 'has' for us and having the trendiest wedding where we invite all the 'right' people and so further our good reputation in the circles we mix in - which I guess gives us the best chance of getting the best ministry and most renown..... I'm wondering where in this scenario we see the life of Jesus reflected. But it's all too common - I see it all the time. Marriage in Christian circles is so highly esteemed and if you're not married others look on you with a wistful sadness and pat you on the back saying they will pray for God to give you a partner! What?! What if you don't want one because you're putting Jesus first...... no-one really believes that and Jesus wasn't even married!

I have been thinking about all this for a long time but the case of Said Musa bought it to the front of my mind.

He could tell the guards he had reconverted to Islam and they would let him go I guess. Then he could be free again to love his wife and protect his children........

We need to learn a lesson from his case and many other similar cases in the world. We need to be prepared to die for Jesus. And if that means our spouses and children lose us then so be it. God needs to retake his rightful first place in our lives at any cost and as Christians we need to stop our obsession with earthly relationships particularly with marriage and children.

FREE SAID MUSA

2011-02-20T18:53:00.012Z

Said Musa is an Afghan convert from Islam to Christianity. He lost his leg in a landmine explosion and has worked for the past 15 years for the Red Cross helping other amputees.

He converted to Christianity 9 years ago. Last summer he was seen on a video being baptised - not long after this he was arreseted and thrown into jail for his faith. No lawyer would dare to represent him as they were too afraid of what would happen to them if they did. He needs a Christian Lawyer to stand up for him in court. He represented himself last December. He didn't get told what his crime was but he has been sentenced to death by hanging - this could happen any time.

Since being imprisoned, Mr. Musa has been interrogated and beaten repeatedly. He has been sexually abused mocked and ridiculed. He will not renounce his faith. Please spread word of this story. Write to the President (USA) the Prime Minister (UK) here. Sign petitions, link to this story if you have a web page, Facebook or Twitter - let's get this story out and save this mans life. To God be the glory.

Petitions to Save Said Musa:

Here and here and here

America Quiet on the Execution of Said Musa

Let Karzai Kill me

Lawyers blocked from visiting Said

Please do the following to save the life of SAID MUSA

1) Call your congressman TODAY here. Ask them to call Afghanistan Ambassador, save the life of SAID MUSA

2) Call your senator TODAY via http://bit.ly/3UAs. Ask them to call Afghanistan Ambassador, save life of SAID MUSA
3) Call or email Political Counselor Abdul Atarud TODAY at Afghanistan Embassy via http://bit.ly/e1OiKx. Demand that Afghanistan save the life of SAID MUSA
4) Email Afghan President Hamid Karzai c/o Nazer Husain Rahimi, Special Secretary to the President, hussain.rahimi@gmail.com and ask that Said Musa and Shoaib Assadullah Musawi be set free.
5) Email President Obama here and ask that he continue working to free Said Musa and Shoaib Assadullah Musawi.
6) Like our Facebook Page at http://facebook.com/WeAreAllSaidMusa to increase the number of friends. Share and ask your friends to Like and Share this page as well.
7) Follow our Twitter account here to increase our number of followers. Ask your friends to Follow it as well.

Run for your Life

2011-01-20T18:48:00.000Z

Run from gospels that focus on your success and prosperity.
Run from those that use the name of Jesus Christ only for personal gain.
Run from those that are picking your pocket in the name of Jesus.

Run!

Run from gospels that focus only on self-improvement, or on three steps to a better personality.
Run from churches where men and not Christ are glorified.

Run, get out of that place!

Run from churches where there is no Bible, no cross, no searching Word, no repentance from sin.
Run when there's no mention of the blood of Jesus. It's an unclean place, so run!
Run from churches where the worship leaves you cold, where there's no sense of God's presence, because they don't know God.

Run!

Run from churches where you're comfortable in your sin. If you enter God's house with sin in your life, but you're not convicted of it, you're sitting at a table of devils.

Run!

Run from pulpits that are filled with politically driven men who use the pulpit of God for a personal agenda.

Run!

Run from those who preach division between races and cultures.

Run!

Run! Get out! Turn it off. They know nothing of God.
Run from ungodly, spasmodic movements and endless empty prophesying. Beloved Church.

Run for your life!

Run from preachers that stand, who tell only stories and jokes.
Run like you've never run before.

Run from those that are only after money and they use one gimmick after another to get your money. One foolish thing after another to get your money.

Run!"

( taken from 'Run' by Carter Conlon)

Others May, You Cannot

2011-01-17T21:23:00.000Z

OTHERS MAY, YOU CANNOT

by G. D. Watson

If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. Matthew 16:24-25

If God has called you to be truly like Jesus in all your spirit, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility. He will put on you such demands of obedience that you will not be allowed to follow other Christians. In many ways, He seems to let other good people do things which He will not let you do.

Others who seem to be very religious and useful may push themselves, pull wires, and scheme to carry out their plans, but you cannot. If you attempt it, you will meet with such failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent.

Others can brag about themselves, their work, their successes, their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing. If you begin to do so, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.

Others will be allowed to succeed in making great sums of money, or having a legacy left to them, or in having luxuries, but God may supply you only on a day-to-day basis, because He wants you to have something far better than gold, a helpless dependence on Him and His unseen treasury.

The Lord may let others be honored and put forward while keeping you hidden in obscurity because He wants to produce some choice, fragrant fruit for His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade.

God may let others be great, but keep you small. He will let others do a work for Him and get the credit, but He will make you work and toil without knowing how much you are doing. Then, to make your work still more precious, He will let others get the credit for the work which you have done; this to teach you the message of the Cross, humility, and something of the value of being cloaked with His nature.

The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch on you, and with a jealous love rebuke you for careless words and feelings, or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem distressed over.

So make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign and has a right to do as He pleases with His own, and that He may not explain to you a thousand things which may puzzle your reason in His dealings with you.

God will take you at your word. If you absolutely sell yourself to be His slave, He will wrap you up in a jealous love and let other people say and do many things that you cannot. Settle it forever; you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue or chaining your hand or closing your eyes in ways which others are not dealt with. However, know this great secret of the Kingdom: When you are so completely possessed with the Living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of heaven, the high calling of God.

Two Little Eyes

2011-01-10T15:21:00.024Z

Wait for the Lord: Those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

I remember being 27 - about 20 years ago. (This is going to be a long post!) I had just become a Christian, prior to this I had been about to commit suicide as my life had fallen apart in every way possible. I guess I thought that as I had invited Jesus into my life and accepted him as my Saviour and the Holy Spirit had knocked me to the ground everything would start to sort out. My husband (the love of my life and my baby daughter's father) would return and I could get on with a normal life. As I climbed into a friends car and sat in the back God spoke to me at that time very clearly He said 'I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten' Joel 2:25. I was elated. He was going to turn my mourning into dancing, my tears into joy and my despair into hope. I waited.........

It took another failed marriage, 2 more children, another suicide attempt, an abusive relationship with a church leader, being rejected by 2 more churches, becoming homeless and abandoned by all but one of the Christians I knew, it took becoming penniless and nearly having a mental breakdown before God brought to my attention the repayment. All in all 20 years of despair, suffering and waiting. But when he did it boy - does he know how to do it!!!

I have 3 children. This is a story about one of them - the other 2 are just as amazing in different ways.

My son.

He was born into a marriage made in hell. I married for all the wrong reasons - for the second time. I was still broken hearted about losing my first husband. I was still a mess, yes I was a christian but God had so much still to do in me before he could get me in my right mind. After 3 years we split up.

We had a son together. He was long awaited. I had a daughter so I really wanted a son - and God in his graciousness gave me a son. He was born too early and I thought he might die. I would sing to him in his incubator and promise him I would always be there for him no matter what, and I promised God if He let him live I would give him back to God all the days of his life. God didn't forget that - and neither have I.

Through all the suffering and pain the next 16 years brought me I never realsied until now how those two little eyes had been watching. He watched and learnt. He studied my actions and watched the way others mistreated this vulnerable single parent in the churches I took him to. He was there when they asked me to leave - he lost his sunday school and his church friends and his faith in institutional church. He lost his childhood home and his stability because of what the church did to us. He watched. He understood that we had no money, that we had no home of our own. He understood we were weak and it was easy for those with power in the church to walk all over us - and they did and he saw this.

He watched as I tried to furnish an empty rented house in a new city without money or friends. He watched me struggle and he heard me pray and cry until my heart broke. He made him and his little sister dinner when I lay in bed so damaged by life and church that I couldn't function. He watched it all and I loved him. I taught him about God and how he cares for the lonely, the unwanted, the needy and those on the edge of society who have nothing - I taught him, I lived it and he used to say 'Mummy when is God going to care for you? Why does He let bad people do bad things to us when we have no man to protect us? Why doesn't God protect us from bad people in the church? And I couldn't answer him. And this was the story of his life for 16 years.

I remember when he was about 12 he started to get really good grades at school. I was pleased - but not really that concerned, as what was inside him and how he treated others was of a greater concern to me. I watched him. He would come home from school - retreat to his room and study. On his own, while my life fell apart almost to the extent where I nearly had a breakdown. He studied. And I continued to pray with him and teach him about our amazing God who cared for me and him and his sisters and who was just and merciful.

All my Christian life I have been ignored and treated like a second class person because I am twice divorced and live in poverty with the poor in social housing - homes the government provide for those who have no money. I have no social standing in the church and therefore my views and opinions have never been heard. I am an undesirable by the churches standards - still.

All the church goers who have treated me like this have been from well to do middle class backgrounds from wealthy family's who raised them to be good Christians (and to avoid people like me) and who sent them to the best schools where they got the best grades and went to Universities like Oxford and Cambridge where they learnt to look even further down their nose at people like me - True!

Now one day 2 years ago my 16 year old son when thinking about applying to go to University said he might try and get into Oxford. I was still reeling from the fact that I could actually have a child that went to University at all!

I think my world stopped in that moment.... and things began to dawn on me.

My son.

And us with no money and no home of our own and no 'breeding' or social standing and him with no well to do upbringing which had trained him from the year dot to get into Oxford etc etc....... I pondered this in my heart and my heart grew. And he applied. And sent off his personal statement - to Oxford University. And my heart leapt inside me. And we waited. He was offered an interview - we screamed together and jumped round the room. He told me things. He told me he wanted to change the world for the better. He wanted to right he wrongs he had seen in his own life and those of others who are forgotten about and mistreated. He told me he wanted to be a voice for the voiceless. He told me he wanted to be a politician - a good one. He had soaked it all in. He told me he would put God first and do as He told him. He wanted to serve God with any opportunity he was given.

The interview was tough. I knew and he did that he did not have the background, upbringing and training to negociate an interview of such a high calibre.

I prayed, he prayed, we prayed together - if it be your will God. By now I was nearly shouting it in the streets.......................

Today I drove him to University for the start of his second term at Oxford. He is studying P.P.E. (Politics, Philosphy and Economics) the course studied by our present and many former Prime Ministers. We walked through corridors walked down by people such as Clement Atlee, William Beveridge, Gladstone and C.S. Lewis and saw them staring down at us from a great height. I helped him unpack in his little room round the back of the old cobbled steets. He and I were quiet together. We didn't need words. He did it. My kid. After all we've been through. This was not even in my frame of reference for what God might do. My son knows God has called him here for a purpose.

We hugged and said goodbye, I walked out into the cold January air. I breathed it in deeply. I looked heavenwards and saw the large tower of Magdalen College rising up into the grey afternoon sky.

Magdalen College Tower

I drank it in and smiled. I felt my heart leap inside me as I punched the air (victory!). God caught my attention and said:

'I told you I would repay you for the years the locusts have eaten.'

Perfect timing. I hadn't thought about that for years.

I feel like Cinderella must have felt when the Princes butlers found her and she tried the slipper on and it fitted and no one could believe it was her!!!!!

N.B. In all the years I've waited for God to intervene and turn my life around he never answered one of my 'big' prayers. I prayed for him to save my first marriage, I prayed for him to save my second marriage, I prayed for him to give me recognition and a ministry in the church so I could be a voice for the poor and outcast. I prayed for a Christian husband. Each of these prayers consisted of long battles, years long. And He did not answer. Instead He gave me the best answer I could dream of - something which cannot be taken away from me. He used my past and all my pain and struggles and turned it round and poured it back into my lap until my cup overflows with JOY. And it came through the vessel of my most dearest and most precious thing - my son.

Glory be to God.

Oxford University

Concentration

2011-01-05T21:45:00.005Z

I have practically no concentration any-more when it comes to listening to Christians talk or reading Christian books. I cannot listen to online sermons by my fave preachers or follow blogs or websites I have followed for years. I cannot concentrate on a good sermon or have a normal discussion with anyone about God without losing interest in the first few seconds.

And as for church! well. When I realise it's the day for church I sigh a deep bored sigh and I dread it all day. I know I'm gonna have to brace myself for about 2 hours of intense boredom. Listening to people whinge on and moan and berate each other about their 'hard' lives, the oh so typical Bible study. I can predict every discussion how it will start and how it will end. I know what's gonna be drawn from a passage before it starts.

I'm perplexed and a little annoyed with the way I am behaving but I have no control over it. I can't tell the christians how I feel because I will just get marched off for ' prayer' and get the 'how to be a good christian talk' from my pastor and peers which is liable to elicit an even more worrying response from me in some form which will probably see me cast out of another church! I am concerned though - what does it mean? I love God as much as I always have. But I cannot force myself or my children to be with other christians or to go to church. The Pastor said last week that without regular church we would lose our faith we would flounder. He shook his head like he was agreeing with himself that without church faith dies. He knows I've been without church for 3 years nearly..... and my faith is smoking!

The only things I can still do are worship and read the Bible. It's been hard to write this post I had to force it out of me I just wanted to stop writing- having to reflect on christian stuff fuses my brain.

Let me tell you a story...

I work with the homeless. I feel alive and connected to everything when I'm with the unfortunate people I support. So last week I get a new client. He is 54 and his brain is shot from using to many drugs and drinking too much alcohol. So I meet him. I'm slightly wary - he comes from a family notorious for violence in his town.

He answers the door and my heart nearly leaps out of my rib cage. He can't walk without support, he can't talk without slurring, he struggles to sit down and is obvious pain. He is fragile physically and mentally. He is so humble he wakes my emotions and interest up. My heart stirs within me. He asks for nothing - lots of clients demand and expect even on a first visit.

I wanna scream with joy. This guy has nothing from a worldly point of view , but he has everything he needs. He talks to me in a quiet voice looking at the floor alot, but when he looks in my eyes I see my brother - I can't explain it any other way.

He thanks me regularly as we talk. He thanks me when I haven't done anything except tell him how our organisation could help him secure accomodation and help him pay his rent and access grants etc.

I ask him questions many of which are quite personal about his drug and alcohol history and his violent past. He answers every question far more honestly than any church minister I know ever has. He is honest about his failings. Genuine. Tearful and regretful. Totally humble.I'm on the verge of tears myself. We get to the question about religion.I ask him if he has any religious or cultural needs we need to take into consideration. He looks me straight in the eye and says 'I'm a born again Christian' and that's how I've given up my addictions and moved away from my violent family....

And there my friends you have it. For the whole time I was with him you could have heard a pin drop. My concentration was 110% I was transfixed talking to him. I knew - even before he spoke that he belonged to God. So you see I can concentrate, on occasion, when talking about christian things. But I have zero concentration when I'm with middle class, rich, shallow, happy zappy clappy types. They make me wanna puke and run til I can run no more.

Thanks be to God.

First and Last

2010-12-03T23:12:00.000Z

The last will be first and the first will be last. Amen.

Hail to the King

2010-11-26T21:59:00.001Z

Hail to the King!

Christians Don't Like Me

2010-11-20T22:16:00.006Z

so there you have it.
Christians don't like me. It's not that I care anymore. It's just ironic. The brothers and sisters God gave me hate me. I try so hard to be what they want me to be but they see through my disguise. And they hate me. And I don't give a crap - I used to but not anymore. I'm not 'pretending' anymore. I love Jesus with every fibre of my being and I would die for my brother. I walk alongside THE LAME AND THE SICK AND THE DYING AND I LIE IN THE GUTTER WITH THE HOMELESS AND THE BROKEN. And have no money, I have few possessions, I have no credence or reputation (in christian circles.) I was broken and damaged and yes totally destrotyed by life and the things which happened to me. My blood cried out - but it sounded uncomfortble and unmanagable. so the christians blocked their ears. And the Pastor said 'try another church' and my children cried becasue they didn't want another church............ and so there you have it.

But God in his might and his splendour stays with me outside the walls and he grows me stronger and wiser and he gives me joy and it overflows in the dark places and with the dark people in the shadows and you know what I'd give my very life to be where I am today - I'de give it all up and lay it all down to be where I am today. But I don't have to cause I'm already here. And my life has already - thankfully - been taken.

Jesus lives on the margins with the marginalised, the poor and ignored and desperate. 'I've come to preach the Good News to the poor, to proclaim freedom for the captives, to bind up the broken hearted and give sight to the blind.' - Jesus.

And he does that - in the dark, forgotten abandoned places where Christians refuse to go and never see - or perhaps don't want to see. He's alive and doing it - all of it - all the time every millisecond, more and more grace and power and love - out of sight of what we call ' church' He's building an invisible church and drawing his own to himself - just as he promised and right under the nose of the church as we know it the 'religious' and the rule keepers.

Glory be to God. He takes my breath away.

Every day. It's a secret - or maybe more of a blessing. I am blessed because in losing everything I have gained Christ.

Offensive Love

2010-11-06T19:16:00.001Z

Isaiah 58:10

2010-11-06T19:00:00.004Z

And if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday sun.

How should we respond to this?

What will we give?

Spend Your Time.

Energy.

Money.

Spend Yourself.

If You're Gonna Try go All the Way

2010-11-06T18:48:00.001Z

Born of the Spirit

2010-11-05T19:02:00.007Z

After re-entering 'church' after 2 years I'm not coping at all with it. I am completely unmoved by the very same things which used to cause my heart to leap. I'm trying to look interested and not appear ungrateful - I can do that but it takes emotional energy to keep it up. I'm bored by the way the whole things goes - I know before it happens exactly what will be required of me and everyone else knows too. And I'm frigging bored out of my mind.It feels like those double Maths lessons that seemed to last an eternity at school - only worse because you have to appear 'engaged' all the time! But what to do! The Bible says do not give up meeting together.... so I don't want to 'give up' but my heart won't listen, it won't act on those words. It's already given up. I know that really. But I can't explain it to the nice people for whom the little church group I belong to means so very much. It's their home their nest. Their safety blanket their healer, their place of belonging and being needed and being found useful. That's normal. I'm not normal anymore.

I don't know if I want to go to heaven if it means I have to spend eternity with the people who go to church because I will die of boredom and emptiness inside. If heaven is gonna be full of nice religious people who never cause any offence and read their Bible everyday and help old ladies across the street and play perfectly intune worship songs on their guitars ad infinitum. God help me because I really can't go there.

I wanna spend eternity with the homeless people I work with every day. With Alec and Leanne. Alec is a broken alcoholic with a heart as big as the sun. Leanne is clever but has no self esteem due to being abused by her stepfather. She can talk her heart out and take you with her on her journey and she makes me feel alive with her openness and genuineness. With Johnny who sat in our office and cried til he could cry no more because his wife had taken his best friend, his home and his child and he had got hooked on heroin and couldn't stop and now he lives in an old abandoned car...... and he actually tried to go to church on his own one day looking for God. Instead he found a Pastor who preached that the 'wasters' of the world should 'work' because that's what the Bible said. He left half way through went back to the car and blew his brains out with as many drugs as he had available. Eventually he finished up at our door.

I wanna spend eternity with a broken young girl called Darcy who has decided to keep the baby which resulted from a rape even though her mother abandoned her age 4yrs to a childrens home and she left school at 12 to live with a drug dealer who got her addicted to crack by age 14 which led her to be street homeless at 15 and pregnant at 16. Now she sits opposite me as cool as you like with the world on her shoulders and tells me she will raise her child with all the love and care she never had. I believe her. Her head is brimming with emotion and her heart is scarred so deep. But she's alive. They all are.I don't know what I mean by that but she's alive. And the christians they're not. I'm not a universalist I'm probably a bit reformed if the truth be known so why do I see life in little Darcy's eyes.........

I feel and see Jesus as I spend time helping and listeneng to the poor and homeless. He moves through their lives with speed and agility and helps them and makes straight paths for them in their distress. The strange thing is when I get the chance, if I raise the subject of church or Jesus they all have a story to tell.... they know. Somewhere deep inside their scarred and broken hearts and lives Jesus has made a connection with them.

Will that kind of person be in heaven? Is the Kingdom really that upside down. I hope so.
Coz if you wanna find me on the other side come and look among the addicts the outcast the sick the disabled the unwanted the poor, those who have been left out in the cold on this side of eternity, those who have no education, the starving and the forgotten. Because I'll be with them, the real people, and I'm hoping that's where Jesus will be too.

Nice

2010-10-20T20:27:00.008+01:00

So after a 2 year break I finally decided to 'try' and go to church again.I braced myself.

It was hard... not because of all the abuse and bad experiences I've had in church but because I knew what was going to be expected of me in the 2 hours I was there. I would have to put my 'church head' on again after a whole 2 years being free of it. We were met by 2 very lovely pleasant people at the door of this huge sprawling cottage set in acres of garden leading down to a river - the Pastors house. I tried very hard to overlook this!(It will be hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God) His wife was just as lovely, friendly, kind and warm. They lead a small housechurch.

It was nice.

Very nice all nicely nice and snuggly. I felt snuggly and nice and safe. The people there were also nice. Nice and warm and safe and pleasant and they all knew how to speak and make appropriate conversation. Everyone knew when to stand when to sit when to speak and how to speak. No one would ever admit all this - because of course the Spirit is leading us to be act this way. But mostly - without saying he gets us all to be nice. Nice and snuggly and warm. All together tickling each others ears and making each other feel good and obedient.

So we were all good and obedient and nice to each other for 2 hours and we looked at the Bible and that was nice to and said nice heartwarming things to us like 'good things come to those who are obedient' (like us) and just a tiny bit of struggle if your friend won't speak to you is to be expected - because suffering is here for a time then it passes and God is teaching us something. I wanted to say ok so what is he teaching the starving millions? What is he teaching the little boy whose Mother beats him daily becasue shes so drunk she doesn't know what shes doing etc etc..... I had some very un-christian thoughts while sitting there, more bad thoughts than I ever have with my worldly non-christian friends. I mean sat there surrounded by luxury and comfort harping on about a friend who has stopped speaking to you!???? .....Nevertheless after nearly 2 hours of the spirit moving us all into niceness I felt myself falling asleep. I had to strain to keep my eyes from wandering -(out the window) I was so mind numbingly bored. But everyone else seemed engaged and chatty and smiling...
So I guess it's me the infidel! yet again I mess up as far as church goes ;-)

My mind wandered to the people I know outside the church, the poor and uneducated, the broken and the helpless, alcoholics and drug addicts, the women in refuges who have been beaten to within inches of their lives, the homeless teenager whose Mum abused him from the age of 2 and now his head is shot to pieces, HOW could I ever bring them here? How could they cope with the expectations?

But maybe they are not meant to be here. Maybe their saving grace is that they need not ever worry about going to church to find God because he's already with them as he was with Lazarus at the rich mans gate. But where does that leave this kind of christian then who ignores the plight of the desperate and needy and enjoys his riches....? God is with those who suffer and can't make the grade that is required in church. He is with them outside the walls in so much more power and glory than you could ever ever find in a group of nice warm snuggly (rich) middle class Christians doing their thing. How do I know this? because I see it almost every day.

Heart Cry

2010-10-08T22:43:00.006+01:00

I work with the homeless. I get paid to rescue the lost and the broken and those who have given up on life.

Took a while.

Took 45 years but God got me there in the end.

It's a blessing, poured out, over flowing, more than I can handle more then I could ever have hoped for, beyond my wildeset dreams - I would never have dreamt this dream because for so long I was just the same as those I'm paid to rescue - and when you're like that you don't dream dreams of being rescued and fulfilled, you wait to die.

I understand from the Bible that you have to be born again to 'see' the Kingdom of God. Lazarus entered heaven - there was no record of him being 'born again'. He entered becasue he was enlightened - although there is no recoed of him being 'born again' he was broken humble desperate and vulnerable. - a beggar, the lowest of the low. He had no means of supporting himself. He relied on others - and they did not care. So. Lazarus went to heaven and the rich man went to hell. Wow do I love Jesus! The rich man not only ignored Lazarus's plight but he was 'glad and made merry and rejoiced every day' while Lazarus suffered..........

I think and I watch. I see the happy well fed joyful Christians I know making merry with their endless get togethers, parties, social functions and prayer meetings and then I see Jason.

Jason metaphorically ' waits at the gate.' But guaranteed he will not be welcomed in and given sustenance, because he is an un=desirable.

Jason is the type of guy you cross the street to ignore.

'if there's a heaven , which I know there is and people like Jason are not gonna be there because they have not openly professed faith in you and become 'born again' then God I want no part of it I will go to hell, because I want to spend eternity with the Jason's of this world and not the Christians of this world who are for the most part hard and cold and removed from the suffering and the pain and cocooned in their little worlds of happiness and joy and adept and pushing the Jasons out of their cocoon because they are dirty and sinful and tainted'.

so anyway - long prayer....

Back to Jason. He tells me his wife threw him out and he hates her. So I asked him if he could 'let this go.' I'm not permitted in my job to ' talk religion' to him as its not considered politically correct in my job' so I rephrase my questions accordingly.... Let this go? his eyes light up.

He looks directly at me and says ' you mean forgiver her'?

Woooo I was not expecting that. (I feel God nudge my spirit!)

Yes I said forgive her.

Again he stops - this weak and shattered man - before me suddenly looks alive and awake.....

Are you religious he says?

Uhm I say... I believe I'm a follower but I don't go to church...

I get the feeling this is going somewhere....

Yes he tells me he used to go to church, yes he tells me he believes, no he says he wont go back as he was rejected and made to feel dirty, unacceptable and rubbish when he tried to go to church - no good and inferior.

So in the wildernerness Jason and I sit and we talk - about faith. about life and about hope. And he agrees that he needs to forgive and he shares that he wants to forgive - knows that he should. And we don't pray or lay hands or sing songs or look holy. We look like normal people off the street. But God is there and we both know it.

And Jason goes back to his sofa and I go back to my kids - and that was church for us.

REAL CHURCH.

Underdog

2010-07-13T21:38:00.008+01:00

Woe to the church who mistreats and abuses the underdog.

Woe to the greedy for power and adulation.

Woe to the pastors who put 'church' before love, before compassion and before grace.

Woe to the filled and the satisfied and the self appointed,

Woe to the rich who steal from the poor and ignore:

the pain and the suffering and the needs of the broken, the desperate, the messy and the unclean - for the sake of the 'good name' of their church and the wealth of their reputation and position

WOE

to the learned and the knowledgeable with their titles and positions, their creeds and their expectations which flow so eloquently from their mouths but neglect the heart of the outcast and the underdog who are waiting mouths open to grab at the scraps from the table they preach from.

WOE

to those who continue to peddle the evil of legalism, to freeze out the ones who are fighting to breathe and to survive and escape their demons only to be beaten and rejected by the hands they were told were sent to free them

WOE.

For Jesus he came for the sick for the sinner for the needy and broken for the soul that has crashed and burned and faltered and realised their need - only to be told by the 'church' upon entering that they are no good that their sins are crimson and go ever before them - but with words that say 'we love you' 'we accept you' and 'we include you' while at the same time rejecting and cursing and eliminating them from the ranks of 'their' chosen'

WOE.

Those Teeth Hurt

2010-06-26T19:16:00.009+01:00

"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves"
— Matthew 7:15

Be careful - for there are many who call themselves followers of Christ but by their actions show they are not. They bite. They are usually in leadership or aspiring for leadership in the church. They are very well disguised - you would not know they were wolves at all from a distance. They preach eloquent heartfelt sermons and live lifes which appear to be beyond reproach - pure and holy on the outside.... it's not that the sermons they preach are in doctrinally unsound it's more that they preach only that which serves their purpose. They will ignore the kinds of passages which require 'dying to self' 'serving the poor' 'laying down your life for your brother' or making any serious sacrifices for the good of others. Apart from that in the main the sermons they preach are scriptural and often rousing.

Wolves demand allegiance to their personal interpretation of the verses which they hold dear. Everything is fine as long as you come 'under authority' and 'tow the line' as far as their particular take on scripture is followed. A follower can spend his whole life happy and safe in the bosom of the church with lots of friends, a good reputation and a fruitful ministry........... if he never crosses the leader(s) - all this but without ever meeting the risen Christ.

But woe to the follower who dares to ask why?!

Wolves do not want anyone to ask difficult questions. They believe they have total authority and expect 100% allegiance to their ministry and their practices. Once an enemy within is recognised ie one who questions unbiblical practices or points out how great chunks of Scripture are ignored while others are 'majored on' all hell breaks lose for the one who dares to question.

The thing about the 'wolves' passage is no one ever thinks it can happen in their church or that their leaders could be wolves. But in my experience all the churches I've been involved in have wolves either leading the church or being part of the leadership. Jesus expected this to be the case so why shouldn't we. They don't come with a big sign on saying 'watch out I'm a wolf'! then there would be no deception, it's for us to 'watch out' - and that means use our eyes, ears and our God given intuition. If we have any doubts not to be afraid to gently ask why is that being done a certain way? Why are only a certain type of people allowed to be in leadership? What are the tithes being spent on? Where are the poor and when they come why does the large majority of the church not hold out its hand to them but rather ignore them and exclude them?

It's no co-incidence that in Matthew 26: 31-45 Jesus says whether we get into heaven or not will be decided by how we treated the poor - never heard that preached in church! It's THAT important to Jesus but this passage is overlooked and purposely mis-interpreted in institutional church, because it is blind to it - doesn't want to see it or act on it as the price would be to great.

When I dared to ask why? I thought I was doing a good thing. I thought perhaps no-one else in the church had noticed that even though the church was on the poorest estate in town where there were many drug users, people with mental health problems, drink problems and 100s of broken familes - much pain and destruction, why was the church 99% full of well to do middle class, middle income 'nice' families. I thought the elder was going to explode when I asked why weren't we reaching these people like Jesus would? The first bite was unexpected, he said I had a chip on my shoulder about class and needed to repent.... and so it began.

I was very upset and confused, from here it went from bad to worse to unbelievable. The devouring began, with others who I thought were my friends joining in with the leadership in labelling me as divisive and unteachable! I and my children were banned from going on the church holiday, chided and made to feel I was following Satan if I didn't 'tithe' and go to church every Sunday, not allowed to choose which midweek group I could go to - I had to go to the one run by the Pastor! If I took any poor/socially unacceptable people to church I was scorned by many of the members. I stayed in the church because I was told I would be in danger if I left.... really!

The little children from the local 'bad' housing estate weren't allowed into the service when I brought them - they were too disruptive. I remember seeing their little dirty faces pressed up against the glass door while the service was in progress.

I remember one of the final things that happened to open my eyes... It was the 3rd New Years Eve in a row I had been on my own. I didn't want to celebrate with my many non christian friends and go out and get drunk. I asked a church member who I thought was a friend if I could go to a party he was going to hosted by one of the homes groups at our church. He looked at me straight faced and said 'they are not really very inclusive so I can't really take you' I went to bed and cried myself to sleep as midnight passed. Since then I've not really celebrated New Year! but then I don't think Jesus would either!

Eventually it was suggested to me that I might like to leave the church, this happened when I requested to become a member - 'no' was the reply, straight faced, you can't become a member until you come 'under authority' and stop this obsession with serving those who are poor and needy. No consideration for my children who were fatherless and had lots of friends in the church, no consideration for what this rejection would do to them and their future faith. Obviously no consideration for me they wanted me out. This sort of treatment goes largly un noticed as those who get treated like this in institutional church are usually so horrified and damaged that they don't speak out. It happens and is happening all the time to hundreds/thousands of people, usually the very people Jesus came to save and heal - the outcast, the lonely, the poor, the broken, the socially unacceptable, the single parent, the divorced..... the nobodies and the invisibles and the untouchables who nobody cares about.

To this day when I see the leaders or any of the people from that church they pass me by as though they haven't seen me!!!

Being Like Jesus

2010-06-25T21:10:00.006+01:00

Being like Jesus in the church got me thrown out.
What then does that say about that institution?
Particularly as I was a poor, single parent with no one to defend me/us - someone with no 'standing' in church circles, no relatives or friends in the higher echelons of the church 'circle'.... easy pickings we were, easy to walk all over and turn a blind eye to, easy to persuade others to do the same.
What then does that say about that institution?

My offence.

Being like Jesus.

What then does that say about that institution?

Not just discarded and abandoned - but walked all over too with a full knowledge of the crime committed, with no compassion or love - the higher purpose of church 'unity' superceded the needs of myself and my children - yes......
If I kept my mouth shut and came under authority and accepted my place on the back row and never questioned why the poor were ignored, why the uneducated were excluded, why the outcast were kept out, why the vicar used the offerings for his big gas guzzling people carrier..... Or why the vicar lived in a sprawling mansion on a hill while the homeless guy who stood at the back of the church was not welcome because he smelt and he drank too much alcohol and why the vicar refused to meet with anyone who wasn't in leadership or being 'groomed' for leadership and so many other whys? which I know Jesus would have wanted the answer too... why? How can those people worship with such apparent conviction and reverence falling on the floor and 'crying' then walk out the church and ignore the poor at the door? and pretend not to have seen me in the street the next day?!Why? how? Why how?

After 25 years of this kind of experience in the institutional church in the UK what it has shown me is the institutional church is a hierarchical 'system' with it's roots in privileges for the wealthy, those of high status and those with the right connections..... just the very opposite of all that Jesus preached church should be while he was on this earth - the system is not built on the rock which is Christ but on the sewer which is the devil.
Through and through.
and through.............

Days Like These

2010-02-23T21:22:00.004Z

This morning was tough. Thrown in at the deep end to a meeting of professionals at which I had had no time to prepare for and an there was an expectation on me to 'deliver'. I don't much like that sort of thing. I'm not good at jargon and social work speak. But it goes with the job - I have to do it.

On the flip side this afternoon I found myself transported to another world altogether one in which all I needed to be was myself and stay tuned to God.

Susie rang the office crying. She was about to be evicted from her property by her pimp because she was refusing to sleep with him. She had called a couple of weeks earlier and this time also I had picked up the phone. She never received the form I had sent her to request help - she thinks he takes her mail. She is not a British national and has no ID she has no recourse to state benefits of any kind and soon she will have no home.
I offered to send her another form - protocol. We do not hand deliver forms. Suddenly I found myself offering to hand deliver the form to her. Next moment I am knocking on her door after waiting down the road for her 'visitor ' to leave. I knock and the upstairs window flies open. A tiny, white face peers down at me and I wave the form. She runs down the stairs and opens the door. She is slim and pretty and so beautiful even though she is covered in spots and her eyes are red from crying. She was so grateful to me for bringing the form to her. I could tell she would not get it together to get to the shop and buy a stamp and post it back to us! 'You're an angel' she says to me through tear stained eyes, she's very broken and humble. Thank you so much, thank you, you're an angel. I offer to pick the completed form up tomorrow. I'm in all day she says I have no life, I don't go out.

Days like these.

Thanks be to God who cares for the hopeless and broken.

Don't Give Up or Lose Hope

2010-02-21T21:06:00.008Z

Who would have thought that after 45 years of sheer and utter hell, since the day that I was born that God would turn it all around.
Abandoned and rejected by institutional church, left by my husband,with 3 kids to look after, homeless, rejected and on the verge of mental insanity with the pain....He's turned it all around and used every single tear and every single ounce of pain I suffered and poured it all back into my lap until it overflows and I cannot manage the joy and surprise.

Through 20 years of my journey I was a believer - a very confused and bewildered believer.... how come although I followed God and trusted him and lived in the obedience God commanded - how come my life went from worse to bad to utterly horrific?.

The 'how come' was that he was killing me.

How blessed I am now that he chose me and set me apart to destroy every dream I had and every hope I had built in this world. Blessing beyond any measure, words could express. But he wasn't finished with me. He tore away from me every one I loved and needed until I was completely alone. And then when finally all I had was my trust in Him to give me my life back he even tore that away from me.

In the end when all was said and done the only thing left was Him. And than the peace and freedom came. Freedom no pen could express nor even words. Freedom from all the ties, expectations and hopes of this world. Freedom from the clawing, desperate, demanding, needy, expecting, selfish being that is myself.

And when He was all I had left. He answered my hearts cry, the cry I had been crying for 20 years. Let me serve you God, let me reach the poor and lost and needy with your love and compassion. Let me be your voice in the dark places, your comfort to the desperate and your peace to the broken.

so He has and He did and I'm wrecked and can't take it in and I don't know what from here... He could take it all away tomorrow, but you know it doesn't matter - IT REALLY DOESN'T MATTER!. I had one day. I had one day where everything was perfect - infact it's not been one day now it's been 18 months. I get home from work and lie on the sofa and it's like it's not really me, I'm so blown away with his love for these messed up people. Some days the Holy Spirit is so powerful as I support the homeless and the desperate that I'm knocked for 6, out cold, numb almost with the gratitude that he is finally working through me to touch the VIPs of our society, the ones no one else cares about. What an honour!.

So don't ever lose heart and don't give up. Gods ways are higher than our ways and what seems like hopeless desperation and uselessness can be often turn out to be your crown. He won't waste a single millisecond.

What I didn't realise until I was free of myself was that God had been waiting and working patiently all these years to get me to 'let go' (of the world). He wanted me free, but knew the only way was through the pain, was through the torture and rejection and total abandonment of the world because until he had purged me of this world how could I or any of us really live at peace with him. He's a jealous God but also a humble and gentle being who wants us to want him and choose him because that ultimately is what's best for us. He misses us all the time when we choose elsewhere and he pines for our love like a father who has lost his child, until we are able to become completely his.

He's the name above all names.

What If Jesus Meant All That Stuff?

2010-01-02T14:34:00.006Z

Article by Shane Claiborne Nov 2009:

To all my nonbelieving, sort-of-believing, and used-to-be-believing friends: I feel like I should begin with a confession. I am sorry that so often the biggest obstacle to God has been Christians. Christians who have had so much to say with our mouths and so little to show with our lives. I am sorry that so often we have forgotten the Christ of our Christianity.
Forgive us. Forgive us for the embarrassing things we have done in the name of God.
The other night I headed into downtown Philly for a stroll with some friends from out of town. We walked down to Penn's Landing along the river, where there are street performers, artists, musicians. We passed a great magician who did some pretty sweet tricks like pour change out of his iPhone, and then there was a preacher. He wasn't quite as captivating as the magician. He stood on a box, yelling into a microphone, and beside him was a coffin with a fake dead body inside. He talked about how we are all going to die and go to hell if we don't know Jesus.
Some folks snickered. Some told him to shut the hell up. A couple of teenagers tried to steal the dead body in the coffin. All I could do was think to myself, I want to jump up on a box beside him and yell at the top of my lungs, "God is not a monster." Maybe next time I will.
The more I have read the Bible and studied the life of Jesus, the more I have become convinced that Christianity spreads best not through force but through fascination. But over the past few decades our Christianity, at least here in the United States, has become less and less fascinating. We have given the atheists less and less to disbelieve. And the sort of Christianity many of us have seen on TV and heard on the radio looks less and less like Jesus.
At one point Gandhi was asked if he was a Christian, and he said, essentially, "I sure love Jesus, but the Christians seem so unlike their Christ." A recent study showed that the top three perceptions of Christians in the U. S. among young non-Christians are that Christians are 1) antigay, 2) judgmental, and 3) hypocritical. So what we have here is a bit of an image crisis, and much of that reputation is well deserved. That's the ugly stuff. And that's why I begin by saying that I'm sorry.
Now for the good news.
I want to invite you to consider that maybe the televangelists and street preachers are wrong — and that God really is love. Maybe the fruits of the Spirit really are beautiful things like peace, patience, kindness, joy, love, goodness, and not the ugly things that have come to characterize religion, or politics, for that matter. (If there is anything I have learned from liberals and conservatives, it's that you can have great answers and still be mean... and that just as important as being right is being nice.)
The Bible that I read says that God did not send Jesus to condemn the world but to save it... it was because "God so loved the world." That is the God I know, and I long for others to know. I did not choose to devote my life to Jesus because I was scared to death of hell or because I wanted crowns in heaven... but because he is good. For those of you who are on a sincere spiritual journey, I hope that you do not reject Christ because of Christians. We have always been a messed-up bunch, and somehow God has survived the embarrassing things we do in His name. At the core of our "Gospel" is the message that Jesus came "not [for] the healthy... but the sick." And if you choose Jesus, may it not be simply because of a fear of hell or hope for mansions in heaven.
Don't get me wrong, I still believe in the afterlife, but too often all the church has done is promise the world that there is life after death and use it as a ticket to ignore the hells around us. I am convinced that the Christian Gospel has as much to do with this life as the next, and that the message of that Gospel is not just about going up when we die but about bringing God's Kingdom down. It was Jesus who taught us to pray that God's will be done "on earth as it is in heaven." On earth.
One of Jesus' most scandalous stories is the story of the Good Samaritan. As sentimental as we may have made it, the original story was about a man who gets beat up and left on the side of the road. A priest passes by. A Levite, the quintessential religious guy, also passes by on the other side (perhaps late for a meeting at church). And then comes the Samaritan... you can almost imagine a snicker in the Jewish crowd. Jews did not talk to Samaritans, or even walk through Samaria. But the Samaritan stops and takes care of the guy in the ditch and is lifted up as the hero of the story. I'm sure some of the listeners were ticked. According to the religious elite, Samaritans did not keep the right rules, and they did not have sound doctrine... but Jesus shows that true faith has to work itself out in a way that is Good News to the most bruised and broken person lying in the ditch.
It is so simple, but the pious forget this lesson constantly. God may indeed be evident in a priest, but God is just as likely to be at work through a Samaritan or a prostitute. In fact the Scripture is brimful of God using folks like a lying prostitute named Rahab, an adulterous king named David... at one point God even speaks to a guy named Balaam through his donkey. Some say God spoke to Balaam through his ass and has been speaking through asses ever since. So if God should choose to use us, then we should be grateful but not think too highly of ourselves. And if upon meeting someone we think God could never use, we should think again.
After all, Jesus says to the religious elite who looked down on everybody else: "The tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the Kingdom ahead of you." And we wonder what got him killed?
I have a friend in the UK who talks about "dirty theology" — that we have a God who is always using dirt to bring life and healing and redemption, a God who shows up in the most unlikely and scandalous ways. After all, the whole story begins with God reaching down from heaven, picking up some dirt, and breathing life into it. At one point, Jesus takes some mud, spits in it, and wipes it on a blind man's eyes to heal him. (The priests and producers of anointing oil were not happy that day.)
In fact, the entire story of Jesus is about a God who did not just want to stay "out there" but who moves into the neighborhood, a neighborhood where folks said, "Nothing good could come." It is this Jesus who was accused of being a glutton and drunkard and rabble-rouser for hanging out with all of society's rejects, and who died on the imperial cross of Rome reserved for bandits and failed messiahs. This is why the triumph over the cross was a triumph over everything ugly we do to ourselves and to others. It is the final promise that love wins.
It is this Jesus who was born in a stank manger in the middle of a genocide. That is the God that we are just as likely to find in the streets as in the sanctuary, who can redeem revolutionaries and tax collectors, the oppressed and the oppressors... a God who is saving some of us from the ghettos of poverty, and some of us from the ghettos of wealth.
In closing, to those who have closed the door on religion — I was recently asked by a non-Christian friend if I thought he was going to hell. I said, "I hope not. It will be hard to enjoy heaven without you." If those of us who believe in God do not believe God's grace is big enough to save the whole world... well, we should at least pray that it is.

Your brother,

Shane

When I'm looking for inspiration I often turn to Shane. I listen to many good sermons online - but Shane doesn't just preach it he lives it - and gets attacked for living it - by Christians!

Jesus was mostly homeless and spent his time with the sick, poor and lost in one way or another. Most Christians tend to spend the majority of their time with other Christians. Jesus didn't live this way. Yes he had a close circle of believers as friends but as I read the Gospels it seems to me that the time he spent with other believers was simply to build him and them up in faith so they could better do the work they were called to do - REACH OUT!

In our modern church it's the other way round Christians spend 99% of their time at meetings, prayer groups, socials, homegroups, and other solely 'christian' functions and maybe if there's time 1% reaching out to the lost and sick! So this is why I like Shanes lifestyle - it inspires me when the christian sub-culture eats into my brain and I start to get sucked in. He makes me more confident of my own convictions and gets me back on the right path.

My Chains are Gone

2009-12-28T20:49:00.010Z

Anyone that knows me is aware of the struggles and suffering I've encountered over the past 20 years or so.

Through it all I continued to trust God and ask him for what I needed - although he never gave me what I asked for.

I lost my first husband - he left me with a baby who grew up without her father. I found Jesus. I became 'born again' It was life changing and still is. Then I prayed relentlessly for 7 years that God would bring my husband back to me and give my little girl her Daddy back - he didn't.

In the 7th year my then trusted Vicar ran off with my homegroup leader - both were married to other people. I just went numb. It was all too much.

I went on a blind date set up by a friend. He seemed ok. We were married within a year a baby soon after - he wasn't a Christian. It was hell. After 5 years and one more baby he left. I prayed again. Please God not another broken family. Two more children to raise without a father. It broke me into a million pieces. I returned to church.

Church alone with 3 kids. Living on the wrong side of town and broke as I would not work. I figured my kids has lost their fathers they would not lose their mother too. I stayed at home and raised them with every ounce of love and attention I had. We were never accepted though in institutional church. Rarely got invited anywhere. We were not 'included' in the inner circle or even the outer one. I tried to talk to people - make friends. I couldn't though make the posh intellectual conversations they could, I didn't have any money at all or a job to talk about and I lived on the wrong side of town - recipe for disaster if you want to be accepted in institutional church! Ever thought why most average working class people don't ever darken the doors of a church building.... they know! My testimony here.

I became close to one of the male leaders in the church. We entered into a (platonic) relationship. I was not about to commit fornication - not for anyone!! He though turned out to be a walking demon. He abused me violently and tried to force me over and over again to sleep with him. My mind could not take it in. He was well respected and in leadership. Why was he behaving like this?? He though was very clever and manipulative and I fell under his spell. He eventually (after 4 years together)started sleeping with the Pastors best friends daughter. I told the Pastor, he called me a liar and threw me out the church. The Pastors best friend had a very large extended family that basically 'ran' the church. Lose them or me, a poor single parent with no friends and no voice - no competition!!! I had to explain to my 3 confused children that we could not go back to our home church. This had been a great security to them for the past few years. The Pastor told other members of the congregation not to speak to me or have anything to do with me. I was cut off completely from all my friends and trusted confidants within the church. I was even warned not to talk to my parents! who weren't even in the church! All through this my precious little boy who was 11 - studied. I remember him always working - at his desk into the night. I was so proud of him.

It got worse. We were followed and spied on by my ex's family and his new girlfriend.( My ex eventually married the woman he was having the affair with) I couldn't go into town or out my house. I was weak, broken and beaten by the very people I believed the Bible said were to love me and be my family. I was totally out of my mind with pain and confusion. I packed my children into the car one evening and drove out of town - and didn't go back. The children cried. But it was either this or me having a nervous breakdown. (It was then I started blogging)

We got a rented house in a new city and joined a new church and things looked up a bit. All through this my son worked. I used to watch him from my bedroom sat at his desk across the landing. We would chat and laugh and tell jokes to each other. My eldest daughter had been through hell at the hands of the church. She was never accepted or included becasue of her background and the fact we had no money to pay for outings and 'things' the other kids might like to borrow or use. Eventually she went to university in London to train to be a nurse (which in itself was a miracle after what she had been through in her life and the rejection she had experienced) My youngest daughter seemed happy in her new school. All in all my children did not seem damaged. I felt better. My confidence grew and I had a few discussions with my new Pastor about reaching out to the poor in the neighbourhood. I offered to head up the Ministry to the Poor - after all it had been something God had placed on my heart when I first found faith and I was poor and outcast and vulnerable and I had a wealth of experience in understanding and relating to the poor. I spoke their language and lived with them and understood them and had done for 15 years! The church I was part of was next to the roughest and poorest estate in the city - but no one ever mentioned this or reached out in any way to the estate. I wanted and was willing to start doing this - alone if necessary. When I asked if I could do this he looked at me strangely. The next week I discovered he had placed an Oxford Graduate in to lead Ministry to the Poor. He was 22. I asked the young man why he wanted to lead this ministry..... He just said he didn't really know but the Pastor had asked him!!!???

Bang. Again shot down by the institutional church because of my background and lack of social stranding.

I met a lovely guy not long after this. I was careful to vet him. He seemed genuine. He loved the poor or so it seemed at the time. He would take me on 'visits' to the poorest side of town. We would make polite conversation with some unfortunate individual them he would check his watch and leave on the hour. He had done his duty. Alarm bells rang for me. But again weak as I was I fell for him anyway. He talked about marriage alot and we made plans for the future. I did have niggling doubts about him though. When I asked him about when he met with God he got very edgy and abrupt with me and couldn't answer. His idea of reaching out to the poor was a couple of 'hour' slots twice a week. This I strongly disagreed with. Jesus was a friend of sinners I would argue, he ate with them, mixed with them, treated them with respect and valued them. I found out that this was the general feeling among most others in the church. They had their nice tidy organised lives and they all had nice tidy organised friends from their own background they would 'visit' the poor but not include them in their social circle..... Very wrong.

Anyway I was in love and totally smitten. He was all I had in this new city.

One day he announced he was leaving me.

He went. Without so much as an explanation or a sorry. This time I did not recover. I stayed in bed for the best part of 3 years. I prayed and fasted and begged God to reconcile us. My ex moved to another city.

20 years of praying and asking for things I really needed like a husband and my kids to have a father and to be accepted at church and valued - all unanswered.

On Nov 6th 2008 I had a complete spiritual breakdown and tore into god with everything I had and reminded him fo the past 20 years and what he had allowed to happen to me......But then i caved in and realised he is God and I am but dust. I resigned myself to following God whatever. For the rest of my life - even if he never answered one of my prayers or showed any concern for me.

That's when the peace came, a year ago.

And it has not left. And since then God has been restoring my life just as he said he would... 'I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten.' But he is/has given me more than I could ever imagine pushed down and overflowing! He is true to his word and he is worthy of our trust even when we can't see what he's doing and our lives fall apart and we are left alone, broken and with piles of unanswered prayers and no hope. He's still working away there - preparing the way for us.

UPDATE 2009:

My son got 12 'A' Grade GCSE's at 16 and was in the local paper. My daughter is about to graduate with a degree in Nursing. God brought us home a few weeks after the peace came.We prayed to come home, back to our home town. We have a house directly opposite the one I left. All of us cried and I knew at last God was listening to my prayers. We drove home that day in a state of total disbelief. I have no money. The chances of being given a house next door to the one we left must have been millions to one - easy for God though!
Then I got a job which allows me to spend every single moment reaching out to the poor and homeless and vulnerable and helping to get their lives back on track. I feel God with me 100% of the time I am working. He loves the poor SO MUCH. I get home from work and cry sometimes tears of joy. I get paid good money to do what I would happily do for free and I get to meet some of the most needy people in our society and be Jesus to them. It is so fulfilling. I now understand the verse ' my cup overflows' But the best was still yet to come...

My precious son came to me a few months ago and said Mum I'm going to apply to Oxford University. I remember freezing inside for some reason. This was something that was so far outside my frame of reference I could not process it. A kid raised in poverty with no father. 12 different addresses in 16 years. Homeless twice. Abandoned and rejected by the church that was supposed to protect us. Betrayed and ignored by the male role models in his life. So many traumatic and disturbing events he had experienced.

The top University in the country. Privately schooled kids spend 2 years preparing for the entrance exam and a lifetime geared towards gaining a place at Oxford!

Well. With my head spinning with joy at the realisation of what God might have been planning all along. I was behind him 100%.

While my life was spiralling out of control for 16 of his 17 years Daniel had watched and learnt. He's political and left wing. He wants to change the world for the better. He has seen 1st hand the injustice and powerlessness of the poor and excluded in our society. He has watched the way his mother has been treated as a vulnerable powerless woman, in a society that didn't care and churches that preached love and acceptence but never had any intention of practising it. He has grown up 'on the edge' of society. He has compassion, a heart for the poor,nerves of steel and the confidence of a 30 year old. He's as strong in God as I am (now) at 17! And he's going to change the world! Yey!

He sat the entrance exam. I offered to borrow money to pay for him to have extra tuition. 'If I can't pass on my own merit then I don't want to go to Oxford' he said. I knew he would be up against some of the top brains in the world for a place at Oxford! We prayed together again and again. My heart filled with the most glorious faith and peace.

We waited 2 weeks.
And then the letter came. He had passed!! we laughed and cried together. One more step nearer. Now he had an interview which would either see him gain or place or be rejected......

Not in my Wildest Imagination

2009-12-20T22:25:00.006Z

Joel 2:25-27:

25"I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten the great locust and the young locust, the other locusts and the locust swarm my great army that I sent among you.

26 You will have plenty to eat, until you are full, and you will praise the name of the LORD your God, who has worked wonders for you; never again will my people be shamed.

27 Then you will know that I am in Israel, that I am the LORD your God, and that there is no other.

Sometimes, and with some of us, locusts are the only way forward. Now I was born with so much crap from previous generations of unbelievers that for God to sort me out the locusts had to have their way. They stripped me of everything I had materially, emotionally and physically, until I was a walking zombie, non feeling, non responding and eventually non needing. When you have lost it all and been stripped to the very core of your being relentlessly over a period of 25 years eventually you give up.

I gave up on God after 25 years of faithful service. In that time I had been faithful but suffered unbearable and continual abuse in my personal life and constant rejection and misunderstanding from the institutional church.

One night I threw the towel in. so many decades of unanswered prayer. What was the point. Obviously God was not who he said he was and I would NOT become a hypocrite.

That was Nov 6th 2008.

I lay down and gave up.

And now. And now. And NOW!!!! One year later.

Let me tell you. God is everything he says he is. He is all. He is Lord and King and Master and Friend. He cares so deeply for each of us its immeasurable. He knows what we need. For 25 years I thought I knew what I needed but I had no idea no idea no idea.

So once I had died to all my dreams, to all my desires, to all my wants and preferences. Once the locusts had taken it all every last mouthful.

He came.

In such power and such majesty and with such undeserved grace that I'm in a constant state of blown awayness. How did he know? All the things I asked for and prayed for and believed for and fasted for and waited for over 25 years....... and all the time he knew I would have to die to all that before he could blast into my life with the most perfect most 'ironic' and most gobsmacking gift i could ever imagaine!

God knows.

Oh how I wish some one had sat down and explained all this to me many years ago. But then my joy would not be so full and complete now.

'Trust in the Lord with all your heart ( no matter what the hell is you are going through), lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and (eventually) He will make your paths straight!'

Thank you God.

Suffering for being a Christian

2009-12-13T15:00:00.005Z

1 Peter 4:12-19

12 Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you. 13 But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. 14 If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. 15 If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. 16 However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name. 17 For it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? 18 And, "If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?"

19 So then, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.

Operation Starvation

2009-12-13T08:58:00.009Z

One reason why I love Jesus...

2009-11-02T09:03:00.000Z

"How fortunate is the one who gets to eat dinner in God's kingdom!"

Jesus said, "Yes. For there was once a man who threw a great dinner party and invited many. When it was time for dinner, he sent out his servant to the suburbs, with invitations, saying, 'Come on in; the food's on the table.'

"Then they all began to cry off, one after another making excuses. The first said, 'I bought a piece of investment property and need to look it over. Send my regrets.'

"Another said, 'I just made some plans for dinner with my friends, and I really like them . Send my regrets.'

"And yet another said, 'I don't know who your master is, and I'm not comfortable eating with a table full of strangers.' Send my regrets."

"The servant went back with invitations still in hand and told the master what had happened. He was outraged and told the servant, 'Quickly, get out into the city streets, back alleys, skid row hotels, under bridges, crack houses, ditches and gutters. Collect all who look like they need a square meal, all the misfits and homeless and wretched you can lay your hands on, and bring them here.'

"The servant reported back, 'Master, I did what you asked— and there's still room.'

"The master said, 'Then go to the country roads, scour the ditches, vacant lots and prisons. Whoever you find, drag them in. I want my house full! Let me tell you, not one of those originally invited is going to get so much as a bite at my dinner party.'"( Luke 14: 15-24 paraphrased )

Jesus is my Disequilibrium

2009-10-27T23:05:00.001Z

"Jesus is always very difficult to deal with, and religious-minded people really do struggle with his form of ‘religion.’ Actually what Jesus taught cannot properly be called religion at all, in fact Ellul rightly calls it ‘anti-religion’ precisely because it undoes all religion. It effectively dissolves any need for a complex mediating institution with all its priestly/churchly paraphrenalia, and opens up the God-relation to all who will repond direclty to its call. That’s why the religious folk hated him. He de-legitimizes everything they stand for (priesthood and institution) and opens it up to the people. They must take him out.

"Here’s what I think: Christianity minus Jesus equals religion. And this happens in more churches than we are given to believe. We marginalise Jesus all the time and in so many subtle ways. And we do this because dealing directly with Jesus (or God for that matter) is always a disturbing thing to a sin-wracked people who would prefer a stable, more controllable, religion. Like all living systems, churches seek equilibrium. We want to settle down. We want to bolt down the Revelation and make God understandable, accesable, and therefore more controllable–a ‘God-on-tap.’ Sociologists call this ‘the routinization of charisma’ (google that!) and it is written through the structures of all religions including our own.

"But Jesus disturbs our equilbrium. He won’t be controlled. He won’t be handled only by priests and professional religionists. He won’t be domesticated. He is Lord! Yes, Jesus is our disequalibrium. And the way back to an authentic Christianity is simply to put Jesus back into the equation. Christianity plus Jesus equals World Transformation."

from Shapevine by Alan Hirsh

Shaun's Flat

2009-10-27T21:41:00.000Z

Shaun's flat is definitely the last place anyone would choose to spend an afternoon. I'm willing to bet that within the past 20 or so years Shaun's only visitors have been fellow alcoholics, drug users or those with mental health problems. I was taken there by a complete stranger who accosted me on the street, he was very drunk - practically unable to stand! he tried to speak to me but he was incoherent. The stranger was sitting on the floor outside the block of flats I was visiting to see one of my clients who was threatened with homelessness. He caught my eye as I approached. The stranger motioned me over to him. He seemed to be playing with an object on the floor which at first I thought was a knife.... He attempted to stand but fell straight over. He tried again and this time I got his arm and locked it in mine. In his drunken stupor he seemed to know something I didn't. He kept mumbling at me and attempting to point in a certain direction.... We stumbled together me trying to hold him up toward the flat on the ground floor. All the time my friend, the drunk stranger seemed to want to tell me something but he was too intoxicated to speak clearly.

Into the flat we went. Who was in there? I had no idea, what would happen to me in there? I had no idea. The flat consisted of one room and a kitchenette. It was so filled with smoke I couldn't see clearly and my throat tightened trying to breathe. There were piles and piles of rubbish all over the floor. Moldy food, litter and so much junk. The place stank of urine. One table in the middle piled so high with beer cans and cigarette ends I just stared at it - how could a human being live like this? I've seen a lot of filthy, messy, untidy houses but never anything like that.

I noticed my client was sat in the corner. Daniel smiled at me a great big beaming smile! 'Ello' he said - so you met my mate Alec.... Alec the drunk stranger had been posted at the door to bring me in to Shaun's flat. Alec looked pleased with himself he had succeeded in his mission. On another chair covered in rubbish and cigarette ends sat an old man. I smiled and said hello to him. He was so drunk he couldn't get any words out. Daniel told me he had been like this for over 30 years. Apparently I was to find out later - Shaun was dying, due to his alcohol abuse. His body was giving up. Dying a death in that hell hole with no dignity and no hope. It was like it was too late for Shaun. Daniel later told me he was sleeping on Shaun's sofa to keep and eye on him if he went unconscious. He didn't like the thought of Shaun dying alone. Bless Daniel.

Shaun never spoke a word to me. He never gave me eye contact. The next time I visited Daniel we talked a lot about the help Daniel could get with his alcohol problem. We shared a few jokes and we chatted about how best Dan could work at changing the habits of his lifetime that had brought him to a place where he felt he had no hope. Dan and I have a rapport - it doesn't happen with all of my homeless clients. It seems to be a relationship that so far works well. Dan is making incredible progress - he has detoxed from a 10 year heroin habit - and stayed clean for a few months. Now he needs to tackle his alcohol problem - in his time. Shaun never said a word. He was completely drunk and filthy from head to toe. The flat stank. I sat on a sofa covered in urine! My clothes were wet. I shuddered.

Last week I visited for a 3rd time. I walked in the flat. I got the shock of my life. It was tidy. No cans, no cigarette ends, no urine smell, I could see the carpet. The bed had covers on it. I could see the table. It was - to me- a miraculous transformation. And Shaun was soba. Sat there in his right mind with clean clothes on and his hair brushed. He looked like a human being. I had a fit on the spot and wanted to jump up and down with joy. Shaun spoke to me for the first time. That was a 'Kingdom' moment for me. He was thinking clearly. He had detoxed on his own with no medical support. He had simply 'stopped' drinking alcohol. He could have died without proper meds, but he didn't die. I had resigned myself to the fact that it was too late for Shaun as he was such an old man with so many many years of alcohol abuse. But it seems like someone I know hadn't given up on him and didn't think it was too late. It's early days yet for Shaun but I saw enough to know...

That's my God for you.

That is my God!

Listen to Lazarus

2009-10-27T21:34:00.001Z

As most of you know I have had a hard time in Institutional Church. The IC tends in the main to run as a business with a hierarchical model - much like the 'world' Also much like the world the poor, the outcast,the socially inept the single parent, the uneducated and the homeless get mistreated, ignored and deprived of having any real voice or influence. as a poor divorced single parent from the wrong side of town I have suffered untold and told abuse at the hands of those who supposedly are shepherds of the flock. It has been the same for every other person from my background that I've taken to church. So what's that all about?