Spontaneous Song

Spontaneous - Kim Walker, Bethel Church

Wonderful!

Skywatch #95

Southbank, originally uploaded by duopastorale.

Image via Wikipedia

Some nice skies this week. Rather than clean blue expanses, we have had changing skyscapes which is much better for photography. The first photo was taken a few days ago on the Southbank (see left) where crowds of people were enjoying the balmy evening and the many restaurants on offer. I had Sushi salad and an enormous banana waffle with chocolate sauce :)

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Wear Your Shield

Image via Wikipedia

"The flesh will seek to ensnare you, and to prevent your pressing on to glory. 'It is weary work being a pilgrim; come, give it up. Am I always to be mortified? Am I never to be indulged? Give me at least a furlough from this constant warfare.'

Satan will make many a fierce attack on your perseverance; it will be the mark for all his arrows. He will strive to hinder you in service: he will insinuate that you are doing no good; and that you want rest. He will endeavour to make you weary of suffering, he will whisper, 'Curse God, and die.' Or he will attack your steadfastness: 'What is the good of being so zealous? Be quiet like the rest; sleep as do others, and let your lamp go out as the other virgins do.' Or he will assail your doctrinal sentiments: 'Why do you hold to these denominational creeds? Sensible men are getting more liberal; they are removing the old landmarks: fall in with the times.'

Wear your shield, Christian, therefore, close upon your armour, and cry mightily unto God, that by his Spirit you may endure to the end."

Charles Spurgeon
(1834-1892)

Complete Love

When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God... For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.

Ephesians 3:14-19 Romans 5:5

This is my song of the moment (Complete by the Parachute Band). No matter what we are called to carry in this life, however broken we are, God is making us complete in Him. That is what today is about. The Spirit comes to live within us. Jesus is actually coming to us and making His home with us. Without Him we are nothing but with Him we are complete, lacking nothing. But He does ask us to seek, ask, wait. He comes to give us gifts to be given to others, gifts that will build others up and bring them to Jesus, but most of all He brings us a revelation of His love for us.

That is where it starts. God is love, and without love nothing has any value at all. Jesus had this experience of being filled with the Spirit and being affirmed as God's Son. "You are my dearly loved Son, and you bring me great joy." Mark 1:11. That was the beginning of His ministry. So it is with us; we need to seek Him before we can give out. That's what I am doing today, seeking Him. May we all know a fresh understanding of that love that is too great to understand fully. Blessings.

Pentecost 2010

An amazing evening at the Hammersmith Apollo, with HTB, Jesus House & Hillsong London. The anticipation was intense with camera crews and photographers all over the place... nothing quite prepared me for the energy and enthusiasm, not to mention the volume! 3 churches meant 3 sermons, with an emphasis on unity, which seems to be what the Spirit is saying to us all this year. The Spirit was asked to come by Nicky Gumbel and some laughter started to ripple out just from where he was standing... and then people were praying for each other all over the auditorium.

An evening not for the faint hearted. I had not realised that 'Stalls' meant 'Standing', but there was not much time to sit on the job anyway with 3 hours of non-stop high energy worship. Reuben Morgan, Tim Hughes and the Jesus House Choir (wonderful!), all came out to deafening cheers.

Quite an experience and unlike anything I've ever encountered before,not least because of the sheer energy and passion of the worshippers. Come Holy Spirit!

Life Verse

Image by stewickie via Flickr

I have not yet reached my goal, and I am not perfect. But Christ has taken hold of me. So I keep on running and struggling to take hold of the prize. My friends, I don’t feel I have already arrived. But I forget what is behind, and I struggle for what is ahead. I run toward the goal, so I can win the prize of being called to heaven. This is the prize God offers because of what Christ Jesus has done.(CEV)
Philippians 3:12-14

I'm taking a break from my blog routine, hence the out to lunch sign yesterday; time to step back a little and get some perspective on my life online. I also need to spend some more time back in my journal which I have neglected terribly. Sometimes in order to move forward we need to stop , take a rest and look we're we are going! In the meantime you can follow my tweets, such as they are.

For those of you who don't know Mark Browns blog from down under, take a look at his latest post on my life verse.

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Out To Lunch

DSC01510, originally uploaded by FotoSpawn.

Out Of The Deep

Out of the deep I cry to you, O Lord; O Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy.
Psalm 130:1-2

Skywatch #94

Isabella Green, originally uploaded by duopastorale.

The LORD appeared to Abraham by the oak trees
Genesis 18:1

The green of the oaks is amazing at the moment, look at that beautiful colour, complimented of course by the beautiful blue of the sky! Wishing you all a great weekend and happy skywatching :)

You Are My Strength

The LORD Almighty is my strength.
He makes my feet like those of a deer. He makes me walk on the mountains.
Habakkuk 3:19

I've just discovered Audio Boo; seems like a great place to share some sounds so here is a bit of my piano playing. In my best worship moments I sit at the piano and get lost. Often I have a word or an idea floating round my head but if I actually try to compose lyrics I get stuck. So here is a simple improvisation on Jesus as 'my strength'.

Feed On God's Word

Image by duopastorale via Flickr

Your words were found, and I ate them...
Jeremiah 15:16

A woman bought a parrot, took him home, and then returned him to the pet store the next day. 'This bird doesn't talk,' she told the owner. 'Does he have a mirror?' asked the owner. 'Parrots love mirrors. They see themselves and start up a conversation.' So the woman bought the mirror. Next day she returned. The bird still wasn't talking. 'How about a ladder? Parrots love walking up and down a ladder. A happy parrot is more likely to talk.' The woman bought a ladder. Sure enough, she was back the next day; the bird still wasn't talking. 'Does your parrot have a swing? If not, that's the problem. He'll relax and talk up a storm.' The woman reluctantly bought a swing and left. When she walked into the store the next day her countenance had changed. 'The parrot died,' she said. The pet store owner was shocked. 'I'm so sorry. Tell me, did he ever say a word?' he asked. 'Yes, right before he died,' the woman replied. 'He said, 'Don't they sell any food at that pet store?'

The moral of this story is: You can spend your life on mirrors, focusing on appearance; on ladders, focusing on career success; on swings, focusing on entertainment-and starve to death spiritually. Mother Teresa said the most difficult cases she dealt with in Calcutta were those who'd lost their appetite entirely, or were so sickly they couldn't feed themselves or digest food. You'll die spiritually if you don't feed yourself on God's Word each day! Jeremiah said, 'Your words were found, and I ate them, and Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart.'

Used with permission from UCB Word for Today. Free issues are available here for the UK and Republic of Ireland.

Resurrection: Rob Bell

Resurrection - Rob Bell

Is the world ultimately a cold, hard, dead place?

Does death have the last word?

Is it truly, actually, honestly dark?