What were others thoughts on this event this year?

Did you go?

We took a group of 9 leaders from our new church and I think just about all of us were really refreshed, convicted, and transformed by it and have resolved to bring at least 2 others next year!

I’ve been the last 3 years, though only 1 day there and 1 day watch the DVDs later because God has blessed me with children to bring up, but personally it’s now the major annual event in my calendar I think.

Speakers vary according to relevance and quality between incredible and just very good, but you always feel very privileged to listen to each one. Anyway be good to hear others thoughts. Go next year – get yourself to one of the locations, or contact them to get a new location near you.

Letter from God

I love you
And I designed the world especially for you.
Here’s how to have the happiest life:

Don’t love anyone or anything more than you love me

Don’t worship, or put more importance on any person or thing, other than me. Not your parents, not a friend, or a pop star, or a big house or becoming famous, or being pretty. Nothing.

Only use my name in a loving way, not in anger or frustration.

Have one day of the week to rest and just enjoy meeting with others to worship me and remember how I’ve saved you.

Respect your father and mother. Love them and I’ll reward you with a long life.

Don’t hate anyone, or want to hurt or kill them. Don’t murder.

Marriage is special. Commit and promise to love your husband or wife , and don’t go off and love someone else.

Don’t steal

Don’t tell lies

Don’t be jealous of what others have. Don’t be jealous of their clothes, or how pretty they are, or their things. Be satisfied with what you have.

Lots of love, speak soon

God, (The Creator of the World and You )

Can’t believe whole month of August has past without me posting – sorry guys!

We did Cornwall! We had chance of 2 weeks away but hadn’t booked anything; no money; but knew we needed 2 weeks totally away from everything as a break – so we got one of the few remaining self catering accomodations in Cornwall in August and stayed for 13 days.

Any I got a Lazy Jacks cotton sweatshirt; and the kids used their cute kiddy wetsuits; and we got into the traffic queues; found the hidden cove round from Porthcurno; I enviously lingered over all the flowery VW campervans and we happily packed onto Porthmeister beach at St Ives with the best of them! And it was great!

And it was sunny and rainy; and we got ripped off with electric tokens in our 1970s concrete holiday park chalet; and there was good local singers in the bar while I was on my laptop; and and the little ones running off doing “duneding” in the dunes; had tons of extortionately priced Walls ripp off ‘Festival’ lollies with the odd ‘local’ icecreams; and we found a rare starfish in rockpools at Mousehole; did the Christian kids holiday club on the beach at St Ives a couple of days; and it was all great and we all can’t wait to go back there! A brill UK Cornwall holiday.

Can you identify with these guys, the recipients of Peter’s 2 letters, who were

Like so many college students who weary of being mocked by their professors for being Bible-believing Christians, husbands who are mocked for not looking at porn or partying with their buddies, wives who forego a professional career to stay at home and be a wife and mother, singles who are the butt of jokes at the office for waiting until marriage to have sex, and net surfers who can’t stomach one more nasty blog or negative news story about their faith and church, their resolve was tried. They responded in one of four ways:

1) Some were enticed by the liberal route of compromise. They wanted to cut out—or at least explain away—the parts of the Bible that they were being criticized for believing. In our day, this would be most typified by the mainline liberal Christian denominations with pastors who endorse all religions and spiritualities under the oversight of unsaved bishops who appreciate their tolerance, pluralism, and minds so open that their brains fall out. This is one of the central issues in 2 Peter.

2) Some were compelled to privatize their faith. Sure, in private they would pray to and worship Jesus. But in public they would shut their mouths and keep their faith to themselves so as to not be considered the weirdo for Jesus on the block.

3) Some were considering junking their faith altogether. They were tired of being the butt of jokes in the press and on the late-night talk shows and wearied of being the Jesus freaks. Why? Because most people simply do not like being the
oddball, misfit, and outcast—especially those who are young and want to be cool and those who are old with privileged social positions to uphold.

4) Still others were attracted to the fighting posture of fundamentalism. They were preparing to separate from the culture, set up their own subculture, defend themselves, and talk trash about the non-Christians who were criticizing them, all in
the name of a culture war.

Trials come to all Christians. Trials come without warning. Trials do not necessarily come one at a time, and sometimes it feels like we’re at war on every front for the simple reason that we are. Trials can repeat, which means that just because you’ve lived through it does not mean that it is over. Trials range in severity and duration from momentary annoyance to lifelong anguish. Still, as Peter will show us, every trial is either from God’s hand or through God’s hand. Thus, if we embrace trials as an opportunity from God, they can and do result in his glory and our good.

How we respond to each trial is a witness to whether or not we are Christians, and how closely we are walking with Jesus. Furthermore, for Christians, each trial that we face is a witness to the genuineness of our faith, to reassure us that God has saved us, and to reveal to others the difference that salvation makes. Peter’s own words serve as a matchless closing exhortation, which is the purpose of this entire series. In 1 Peter 5:12 he says, “I have written briefly to you, exhorting
and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it.”

taken from the Trials series study guide from Mars Hill Church, which you can get under downloads from this page.

Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Last week or so, a close Christian relative warned me against seeing the devil round every corner, after I reported my concern of attack. And since then it seems that the opposite has happened – more and more times I seem to have had disturbing insights and revelations that the devil is indeed behind a growing tide of persecution coming on this land.

Looking online at the governments forced into “consultation” on enforced sex education for 5 year olds, including the results of powerful LGBG pressure of course’ there is a question on whether PHSE lessons should stay exempt from assessment. Extrapolate where that could be going! Then here at the Kings Church in Keswick this Sunday there was a powerful prophesy of coming persecution in this land which I felt was from God. Then as I was taking time to have my daughters stand against the tent wall as they repeatedly would not stay quiet to go to sleep, I was reminded how discipline is so loving for a child because it takes your time and attention and how the devil must hate children and enjoy causing them to lose out on loving time and attention and discipline from their parents. He must love undermining parents and others lovingly disciplining children even if those movements claim to protect children. He must love that we kill over 200,000 children each year in this country and leave many of the mothers on anti-depression drugs in future years.

And he loves helping Christians pursue seeping irrelevance from our culture in some of their main conferences. Nicely parcelling the teaching of the word up into glossy books and dry academic presentations while denying the power of the very content they are carefully exponding. A lot of 20’s 30’s coming mainly “for the chilldren”! ( Notably a characteristic of a lot of declining Anglican churches interestingly enough). Anyway better go- but please pray for me.

Just mopping up still after returning from church today to the splosh splosh sound of water pouring from dining room light after my 3 year old had been creating pond in sink for rubber ducks before church without anyone else knowing! Eternal consequences nil though – so a welcome change from day to day church matters really! Brightened up the day in fact now I think about it!

Also, this same daughter, with a gift for creative and inspiring vocabulary if you’ll remember, came up with another great one at Legoland on Friday: on passing one of the snack stands – “Mummy can I have some sludge please?”

Great things I remember from sermon today: “And what persecutors forget is that when they try to squash Christians it doesn’t make them go, it makes them grow. The Romans tried it, the Nazi’s tried it, and the Chinese government has tried it but instead of wilting and giving up, Christians with the right attitude to persecution grow.”

And: “The beginning of persecution is that words and terms begin to be redefined. 20 years ago I was an orthodox Bible believing Christian, and Peter Tatchell was a gay rights activist. In that time neither of us have changed our views I don’t think but today I would be labelled an evangelical fundamentalist, a danger to both church and state, and he is now termed a human rights campaigner.” Persecution is coming to us and we need to choose if we will be silenced or not.”

“Mummy a shining angel man was there.” …. ” Jesus died and did the punishment” …. “and his friends were sad when Jesus died” … “but the shining angel man said Jesus was alive”

Thank you God for sending my 3 year old daughter to share the gospel with me. I really needed it. Uncomfortably doling out unhealthy chocolate spread on toast to toddlers and babies just now at breakfast before going to our new church, and with YFRidays Great and Glorious CD playing, God spoke to me afresh. PLease Jesus help me know Jesus’s power, available to us who believe, that can do the impossible – things that we can never imagine are possible, for your glory, Lord

Willow creek Leadership conference

This conference at the City Temple in central London was very thought provoking and helpful if not mindblowing. There were a lot of guys there who pastor churches of between 500 and 3000 people who clearly demand a fair amount of respect, as well as ladies too who were either Heads of departments or teenage apprentices for leadership – so very encouraging.

Helped me move forward another step with Lead for England, and also had some helpful insights into handing churches over to the next generation. Basically the first generation people and the next generation people, (very tactful and constructive terms! Which link to the issues God’s people faced in the wilderness) need to ask themselves 3 questions:

1) Do I really want to do this? hand the church over.
2) What is it? transfer of authority and responsibility together. Whereas first generation people are often OK at handing over responsibility but still want control; and the next generation are OK about having their ideas implemented but want first generation people to pay for them! Need to work at making sure the two roles are linked properly then transfer them both together.
3) There are risks. but there are bigger risks to not doing it! Ie a church dwindles down and finds there’s no 18 year olds left to hand stuff onto! They’ve long gone and we’ve failed God by not trusting his ongoing purposes for the church but clinging onto how we like things rather than handing stuff onto our 18 year olds. As 30 somethings we need to be ready to train our teenagers and begin to hand stuff over.

I’m looking forward to it though I think. Do yourself out of a job every 3 years that’s a related axiom I heard from a church leader which seems to make great sense and be a sign of a healthy church I would think. Any thoughts? Comments?

(Must just say thanks to my amazing husband who looked after the kids today on his day off so I could go)

My youngest daughter always manages to invent brilliant new names for things that are actually better than the proper words! I don’t know what career this could lead to?

A month or so back it was “puddling in the puddling pool” which is pretty good as a paddling pool is just like a puddle really. And today we were having chocolate mini-rolls for the ‘pudding’ bit of lunch when she accidently called them chocolate mini-moles. To much laughter from her 4 year old sister. And actually, I think there’s potential there!

I think would be Apprentices could easily get a product out there that was a bit more expensive than cadbury’s mini rolls but did have a tapered ‘nose’ end, and cute little icing black eyes and little legs. I’m fairly sure that with the right packaging, and display height my pre-schoolers would get them off the shelves and put them in the trolley, and I would have that one too many emotionally draining verbal and physical tussle to get them back out again. A sale results.

Can I get some commission back on this idea, if a food marketeer is up for taking this on?!