Friday 23 October 2009

Beginnings of Change

God was shaking and sifting not only me but the church. You always seem to think it is just you, or just your church, when there are problems, but i started to hear reports from other churches of similar problems. Then from around the world. There was a shaking and a sifting going on all over. This was God's time, His season for it.

I was desperate, hanging on by my fingernails, spiritually drained as was a lot of us. My faith was sure and strong but the situation i found myself in was oppressive and hard. That is all i will say for there is no point in raking over old coals and just in case someone is hurt reading it.

Then came fresh air. The wind of change had come. God was starting a new season. 'See i do a new thing', He says. It started with being given a little yellow booklet called 'The Importance of Forgiveness', by John Arnott.

I knew about forgiveness so i thought, but this book brought a whole new dimension to it. I learnt that by the measure i judge others so i will be judged by that same measure. I should have known that, i did know that, but i didn't always live by that knowledge. My mind shot to the times and things i was judgemental on and i could imagine being judged the same. God showed me that when i judged i gave the enemy the right to get me back in that same area. Why? Because the bible says, 'by the measure...'.

Along with that went, 'you reap what you sow'. If you sow in judgement, bitterness, unforgiveness you will reap the harvest. If you sow in prayer and holiness into your church, then someone along the line reaps the harvest. The same with your children and grandchildren.

This was brought back to me again just this last weekend at a conference. We was told. If you sow 1 tiny seed you usually get a big harvest. Look at 1 pea, 1 bean, 1 potato, how many do you get back when you sow just that 1. Sow 1 judgement seed think how big the harvest will be. If you sow a weed you harvest a weed and that produces lots more seed, and so the weed multiplies. Ouch!

It was with gentleness this was all said, not with a stick to beat, but nonetheless God our Father has a way of highlighting the things he wants us to know.

The second whammy of the book was about forgiveness, once i had sorted out the judging. I had been through forgiving everyone i thought i needed to forgive, but here was all new things that i had never thought of. I am not going to name them in case people read this and do not understand but once again i was brought to my knees.

You can tell when Father is doing something rather than yourself navel gazing or the enemy, there is no condemnation, just an 'oh Father, i didn't realise, i'm so sorry. Then the peace and freedom that comes with repentance.

Wednesday 21 October 2009

What it is all about

Well strangely enough I've started a new blog, something i have been thinking of for a long time. Strange because i haven't been very good at writing in my other blog 'Stop The Clock'. What is different about this blog. Well, it is going to be a christian blog only.

This will not be a devotional but as the title suggests a recording of the things God has been doing in my life over the last two years and my yearnings for what i hope he does in the future.

The last couple of years have been a steep learning curve for me in my christian journey and i feel the need to write it down here rather than in the haphazard way i have of using many different note books.

Now i have given my testimony of how i became a Christan in my 'Stop The Clock' blog so i don't intend to repeat it here. Suffice to say that i have spent my whole christian life in the one Methodist church and on the few occasions when i have asked God if he wanted me to move the answer has always been a loud 'no'. Right from very early on in my christian walk my views veered towards evangelical charismatic, or is that charismatic evangelical... Anyway my understanding of being a Christan would be considered both evangelical and charismatic.

For years things have trundled along, sometimes having times of being hungry for more. Sometimes seeing small glimpses of what might be and then times of apathy, dry deserts, wilderness and back sliding. But after going through a very dark time of which there is no point in explaining here, a change occurred.

God started doing a new thing all around the world it would seem but certainly in my life.

He started showing me lots of things and bringing other things to my notice. Like certain American preachers that i had always been told to have nothing to do with. Heretics i was told, so i never bothered with them. Now having looked at the preaching and teaching of the ones that have caught my attention i realise that whilst not all they say i agree with, most of them really walk the talk and are doing great things for God. No one teaches or preached 100% correct, unless you are Jesus because we are fallible humans. So i say to those who judge (and i say it kindly). What is it that you get wrong. I know for myself i do not necessarily believe the same things now as i did at the beginning of my walk, but that doesn't make me a heretic.

One of the things i felt God saying at the beginning of this new time of learning was that he wanted me to cross the road and look at things from a new perspective. He said there was nothing wrong with driving along on the left-hand side of the road but now was the time to go over to the other side and see things from there. At about the same time, a very good friend who is also a very spiritual person, told me about a dream he had that was very similar to what i felt God had said to me. He also had been told to go over to the right-hand side of the road.

So this is the start of what has been happening over the last two years and what a two years it has been. But more of that later.