"It's important that a show-dog has his testicles"

Hi.
Sorry (once again!) for the lack of postage on this hunk of junk I call a blog!

Its my day off, so I thought I'd better write something.

Anyhoo, J9 had her scan yesterday and got the 'all clear', which I'm told is good.
I does mean she doesnt have to have an operation, and also she should start feeling better now.
Thanks to you for all your kind words and prayers.

Ive kind of been dealing with it in a very inwardly 'zen master' style, which has been working well. But (thers always a "but"!), last week I felt i needed to get some stuff off my chest, so I wrote a song. I'm not sure if you'll ever hear it performed (cuz I physically cant get thru all of it without chocking up!), but I felt I should post it on here for you guys to read, then it wouldnt be a total waste.

Here goes . . . .

Someday

I saw your picture for the first time,

And the last time, well what am I to do?

Everytime I see that look in her eye,

or her smile, it reminds me of you.

We made plans for moving house,

a dream nursery, that you will never see.

She was gonna make a wonderful mom,

but now somethings gone, I feel so incomplete.

I pray to God and ask Him "why us?",

"why me?", "why'd He take you away from me?".

The shadow proves the sunshine,

thats what He said, what He said to me.

Its in these times that I need Christ,

His sacrifice, I fall down at His feet.

And now there's one more angel in heaven,

and I can't wait, 'till we finally meet.

Even though I never got to hear you speak

And even though I never got to hold your hand

Somehow I know, somehow I understand

That I will, someday.

Love you x

Distant much?!

Hey sorry I aint blogged for a while.

AND sorry I aint really bin around at church recentley. Ive been kinda distant.

Youve all probably heard our bad news.

Ive found myself doing a "Job" on it. I guess its a human reaction to ask "why me?".

Anyway, Im sure God has a way to bless Janine and I thru this situation.
Plus someone said on sunday morning that the hardships we endure on earth are converted into rewards in heaven.

Although I think just seeing our unborn child one day in heaven will be reward enough.

God IS good.

Love you x

Crazy Cradley

Hey Hey Hey !!!

I was gonna share this last night, but there was no oppurtunity.
Anyhoo, just wanna say how much of a blessing last friday night was. It was really cool to see their youth "letting go" and getting up and dancing, singing and clapping.
This was deffinately aided by the persuassion of our youth. THANX GUYS! YOU ROCK!!!
It was encouraging to see that kids (not our own) were enjoying what we do. AND praising God!
I also wanna say a big THANK YOU to all the guys that stayed at Oakham and continued the work there. This IS just as important.
Plus there is new photos and a video to have a butchers at it.

Love you x

calling the you't....

Hey. Dunno if you've heard but the naz are doing a gig at Cradley Baptist. Theyve only got a small youth group but are interested to see how to make music for God and how to freshen it up to be more attractive (dunno why they asked us!).
Anyhoo, weve spoken to James and he said he was happy for us to poach you 'friday night podders' for this gig (if you wanna come?)... I think hes just happy to get out of doing a meeting!
Anyways well have more info for thursday night at the pod. If you is under 16 theres a form we gotsta get you to fill in. (crappy paperwork!)
I think it would be really encouraging for them to see you guys rockin out!
love you x

Please pray

Hi.
Please pray for AND attend the pod bible study on the thursday night.
Reason, Im doing it again.
Ive tried to make it like a part 2 for the one I did the other week on the Apostles.
Please remember me in your prayer times, as this sort of thing dont come easy/naturally to me.
(Im a bit fick!)
Anyway, see yous later!
Love you x

Anyone excited?

It's JC's 1st birthday party tonight! woop woop!
And I'm really looking forward to it.
It'll be good to let my hair down (what little ive got left!) and have a boogie and kick ass on stage with the rest of nazmatazz. Also I will be celebrating some other news. Me and Janine are gonna have a baby! How cool is that?!
Well, I should see you all there later (if not, then I want to know why!)
Love you x

POD

Flip me!

I just got back from the usual thursday pod bible study. Except it werent no ordinary pod bible study..... I did it!

I'm not sure how it went. A couple of people seemed quite happy with my avenue of thought, but I dunno.

I felt as if that was what God wanted me to talk on.

Guy send some encouraging comments about my podding!

love you x

Liberators

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

Your playing small doesn't serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine as children do.
It is not just in some of us, but in everyone and as we let our own light shine we unconciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Love you x

God is everywhere . . . even Rock Bottom!

Hey guys!

This week I've been really concerntrating on being church-ste even at work.

"Why live two lives?"

Anyhoo, I shared this on sunday morning (so sorry if you've already heard this!), but I was thinking in the week about how cool it would be to work within a christian based job. How much easier it would be to just be who I am (with no come backs).
As I work in a 'secular' job, I sometimes feel a bit alone (cuz of my faith), but after reading my bible I realized how stupid I must sound!

God goes everywhere with me.

So how can my job be secular if God is in it? . . . It can't!

love you x

Ugh!

I feel crappy!

I got some kind of stomache bug/infection thing.

It sux!

I aint blogged for a bit (not my fault!) the computers been all outta whack!

I'm lookin at samuel at the moment in my bible study.

The main aspect of christian life I need to work on is listening to God.

I have no trouble in talking to God, but patiently waiting for and recognizing when He answers is my stumbling block.

How do I know when it's God talking and not just my over-exaggerated imagination?

I think I need to spend some more time in silence with God and give Him the opportunity to speak.

Love you x

Distractions

How come you always start the day with good intentions and then it all goes very very wrong.

Things happen throughout the day and for some reason or another I let God (and/or myself) down.

Even whilst I'm typing this I'm . . .

Thinking about what to have for my tea, wondering if the Pats are gonna beat the Broncos, watching the tv AND talking to Emily on msn!

I'm gonna try and be more focused.

Its like Rob (in tha pod) said the other week, "its time to get serious with God"

love you x

God Glasses

Jonah 4:10-11

In the last post we looked at the importance of staying humble and remembering that we are not gods.

It's ok that we don't always understand why things happen.

It's ok that things don't always look clear to us.

It's ok that we are sometimes unsure of ourselves (and others)

Through Jonah's eyes all that could be seen were the hideous war crimes being commited by those pagan warriors (the Ninevites), but God saw 120, 000 weak human beings in need of help.

From Gods perfect vantage point, things look very different.

Thats it! The end of Jonah.

We don't find out if he finally humbles himself to God.

I hope its helped you half as much as its helped me.

Pete has given us a book on interpreting the bible, so there maybe more studies in the future.

Feel free to let me know what you thought of this whole blog/bible study thing.

Love you X

Leave being God to God

Jonah 4:9

We need to remember our place in the grand scheme of things.

God is God.

God is our Father, not our mate and deffinately not our servant.

God does what God does.

Let Him (He's good at it!)

God confronts Jonah with the question . . . .

"Do you have a right to be angry about the plant?"

God quizzes him with a type of question that all of us could do with hearing from time to time.

"What right do we have to suggest how God works?"

"Who do you think you are?"

When we have question for God, He may be gracious enough to answer - but when we hear no reply, we should still honour God in the same way as if we had heard the answer we were hoping for.

We laid down our rights at the cross.

Don't pick them up again.

Love you X

That's grace for you!

Jonah 4:5-8

Picture the scene;

Sunday morning, 9:45, church.

You sit in a low blue chair with arms, in walks auntie May "thats MY chair, shift!"

You move.

An old brown leather chair at the back of the church, in walks Trevor "You're in MY seat!"

If you did this enough you'd come across some very unhappy people.

In the last post we saw that anger can sometimes be reasonable. But sometimes we get moved or made to feel uncomfortable and this triggers unreasonable rage.

We are all selfish.

It's in human nature (sin)

At first glance it may seem that God is "messing" with Jonah. He gives him the lovely shade of the plant only to take it away again in the form of a worm.

Jonahs joy disappears with the plant.

God's not "messing" with Jonah, He's teaching him a valuable lesson.

There is adouble meaning within this text;

Shade:- relieves Jonahs 'trouble' - which is the same as He did for the city of Nineveh.

However, while Jonah was delighted that his God would do that for him, he was furious that something similar should happen for others, especialy these pagans!

We would all like God to be the instant judge of everyone elses sins but to be gracious and patient with us.

Maybe scorching wind and blazing sun is a reminder to Jonah.

Perhaps this was a taste of the nastiness he had in mind for the Ninevites.

This was so horrific that he (once again) wished for death.

Next time we speak of judgement, lets remember that none of us got what we deserved - that's grace for you!

Love you X

Instant answers (just add water!)

Jonah 4:4&5

Very oftern we (and I include myself in this!) are SO eager to hear God's answer to our prayer requests, that if we don't have an instant reply we assume God's not listening.

This is crazy.

Just because something isn't fitting in with our grand scheme doesn't mean its wrong.

Jonah thought along these lines (as he would cuz its a human reaction) and when he didn't get his own way and couldn't run away from this situation, he decided that God should just smite him and be done with it!

Sometimes when God moves, not everyone is pleased.

When Jesus first started his ministry gig he was performing miracles in his area (which was Galilee). This, as you could imagine, caused quite an interset and it wasn't long before crowds were gathering in little Galilee.

The locals weren't happy with the increase in tourists and so they asked Jesus to leave!

Can you imagine being so self-absorbed that you would rather not be in the presence of the son of God?

Love you x

One step forwards, Three steps back!

Jonah 4:3

Dude! Jonah was angry with God, NOW he's feeling suicidal!

Just when it looked as if he was gonna learn from this experience, he slips right back into to stoopid mode again.

Jonah couldn't face serving someone who could do the kinds of things that God was doing.

He would sooner die.

This is Jonahs stuborness - TO THE MAX!!!

It also shows that Jonah had learnt very little. He still wants to run away - but this time, he looks to run not to another country but to the grave.

Don't live your lives with unresolved anger inside of you. It will catch up with you eventually. (and the longer its left to fester, the worse it becomes)

Maybe you watch enviously as other people go further in God than you.

Or perhaps you resent new-christians for their bright, fresh approach to faith.

Don't run and hide from God.

Take these problems and bad feelings to God a talk to Him about it.

Learn from your past.

Walk towards God.

Love you x

Scandalously good

Jonah 4:2

For all his weaknesses, Jonah did tell God what was really in his heart, even if it was ugly. He brought his frustrations to God's attention.

If you are struggling, depressed or disappointed, tell God.

He knows anyway, but He considers our expression of pain a moment of intimacy.

Use God as your shrink.

Its kinda ironic that the most amazing descirptions of God found in the bible came out of the mouth of such a bitter/enraged man like Jonah.

The minor prophet finally 'fesses up' to why he did a runner from God in the first place - he was frightened that God WOULD be true to His promise to forgive the Ninevites.

So why would anyone complain about such beauty and grace?

The answer is simple.

We want God to be gracious and forgiving to US - but not people who WE consider not worthy of it. (as if we have any grounds to be judgemental!)

Love you x

Mr. Angry

Jonah 4:1

Jonah was a little miffed.

He had gone to this place (that he really didn't wanna) and preached a 'half-assed' message (begrudgingly) and not only did these people listen to what he said, they also took it to heart as a whole nation.

Jonah has preached the shortest and most successful sermon in history and rocked the city with words of revival.

You'd think he would be happy.

The exact opposite. The writer is keen for us to understand just how angry Jonah was with God. First off there is a use of a literary device called a figura etymologia ( a double emphasis )

We see uses of this many times throughout the book of Jonah to show just how intense something was. (e.g. the sailors feared a great fear, Jonah was called to proclaim the proclamation, and now he was angry with a great anger!)

Take it from me. He's upset.

When we are frustrated we need to run to God not away from Him.

Love you x

The Mans gotsta do what the Mans gotsta do

Jonah 3:9

I was flicking through the channels the other day and I stumbled across the God channel (I would normally flick right past) but something made me hesitate. The broadcast was of some American minister preaching from the book of Isiah.

He was (in a round aboput way) telling the congregation to 'tell God what to do.'

His whole message was based on Isiah 45:11 ('concerning the work of my hands command ye me'). Do a double take on this passage; it's very clear that God is actually saying the opposite; that He is God, and will do what He will do. God invites and encourages our prayers and even suggestions but in the end, 'He is God'(Isa. 45:18)

Mission is about inviting everyone to have a relationship with God, to place their hopes, dreams and ambitions at His feet and allow Him to take charge of their destiny.

Here, in Jonah, the 'pagans' did better than the prophet

Similar to the 'pagan saliors' the king's decree expresses hope in God, rather than a demand (Jonah 3:9)

Pray with hope and don't pout when the answer doesn't come, or isn't what you wanted.

Love you x

Be careful what you pray for

Jonah 3:7&8

A lot of people would say that their main prayer request would probably be for growth within their church. However, this has a dangerous underside. Growth is not only messy and disruptive, but also hard work.

One of the most impressive examples of transition was made by the infant church, in allowing the gentiles to also hear the good news. (Acts 15:1-35)

This was a major shift in thinking.

So, say we pray for a more effective youth group/outreach program and suddenly masses of young people (maybe with drug/alcohol abuse history) start showing an interest in the church.

Christian parents (probably the very same people who prayed for the growth in youth!) begin to feel concerned for their 'sheltered' children.

What effect will these new kids have upon the old ones?

Who will influence who?

When God moves, the people most surprised by what He does are usually the guardians of His last move.

Have we seen this before?

Maybe in the new testament pharisees and religous teachers' reactions to the ways and teachings of Jesus Christ.

The scene in the book of Jonah must have looked kinda crazy.

People forcing their livestock to fast and also wear sackcloth!

Jonah had no idea on the impact of his reluctant message to the people of Nineveh.

Be careful what you pray for. The answer may bring some surprises.

Love you x