Arise!

Arise! "Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you (Isaiah 60:1). It has been a while, and I would like to wish all of you a (belated) happy year that has already unfolded. I thought I should start up the year sharing with you the message I preached on New Year's Day - Arise! This is how the Amplified version of the Bible renders the passage in Isaiah 60:1 - "ARISE [from the depression and prostration in which circumstances have kept you - rise to a new life]! Shine (be radiant with the glory of the Lord), for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you!" You could take this scripture in any way God uses it to minister to you. But, let me share with you some of the messages that come through for me - and, hopefully one thing, if not all, will resonate with you. The first point I will make is that there is an assurance of the power and presence of God in your life, announced by this scripture. This year is loaded with blessings, favour, challenges and opportunities for you to unleash all of God's light in the darkness around you and bring glory to God. A call to action - to prepare your minds for action and take positive action. This is a call that affects the way you live in every area of life. It is a call to holiness; a call to mind your language; a call to repent in the way you treat others, etc. Peter writes (1Peter 1:13 - 16 MSG), "So roll up your sleeves, put your mind in gear, be totally ready to receive the gift that's coming when Jesus arrives. Don't lazily slip back into those old grooves of evil, doing just what you feel like doing. You didn't know any better then; you do now. As obedient children, let yourselves be pulled into a way of life shaped by God's life, a life energetic and blazing with holiness. God said, "I am holy; you be holy." Your response to this call from God is key in bringing God's glory to a desperate world. A call to reject the negative circumstances of life and accept the goodness of God. Don't settle for less; don't just accept anything life throws at you; take your destiny in your hands and resolve to go into the depths of God. Even the prodigal son changed the negative circumstances of his life when he resolved to Arise. "But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father..." Luke 15:17 (NKJV - emphasis mine) Implicit in this call is the fact that you are capable to making it, whatever "it" is in your life. At the very place where you had failed previously, you will now succeed. A call to commit to doing the basics of the Christian life: Prayer (finding time to be with God daily), being aware of and praying about the concerns in our communities, our nation and our world. Bible study - Let the word of God dwell in you richly in all wisdom. "Every part of Scripture is God- breathed and useful one way or another-- showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God's way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us." (2Timothy 3:16 - 17 The Message) Sharing the good news of salvation and God's heart of compassion with the world. In this year you have the opportunity to practice true religion (James 1:27), using your gifts and blessings to help the poor and needy, intervene (speak up) for the oppressed, go beyond yourself and get involved in the bigger plans of God in your community and the world. So, whatever your situation, understand that the motivation to arise is predicated on the nature of the Father (Psalms 103:8 "The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love."). Resolve to arise, and when you arise, circumstances will conspire in your favour to help you reach your goal and bring glory to God.

Not Forgotten

Last Saturday I participated in a fund raising concert organised Catholic Youths in my Community and supported by young people from my church. The benefiting charity was Friends of the Holy Land – a UK charity that supports suffering Christians in the Holy Land.

While I was there, I started to think about the coming of Jesus into the world and made some notes about the announcement by the angels and earlier prophecies about His coming.

An earlier prophecy had proclaimed that “the people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.” (Isaiah 9:2)  Then He entered our world of darkness. “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men on whom His favour rests”, the heavenly hosts sang at His birth (Luke 2:14).

Jesus touched people one-on-one in various ways that said, “God has not forgotten you” – even if the darkness (of their situation) had lasted several years. He brought us God's peace through His conciliatory death on the cross. He established, actually re-established our relationship, the family and friendship we have with God when we accept Jesus as Lord. 

Yesterday, I went to drop off a few goodies in contribution to hamper baskets my church, in collaboration with a local school, is giving out to some needy families in our community this Christmas. I was both happy and humbled by the response from church members.

It was after that it hit me. The efforts of charities like Friends of the Holy Land and my church are just ways to say to a needy and suffering world, “you are not forgotten”. And we should do so without judging or waiting for the needy to be beggars. It is also about how we respond to those we think are less deserving, even unlovable.

This season as we celebrate that peace and the unmerited favour of God, could you, in your little corner, find ways to share God’s love and peace with someone – to let people around you know they are not forgotten? It might not always involve money and gifts and I am sure that God will show you some creative ways to do this if you ask Him.

One more thing. May be, you need to receive God’s message of peace to you through a son, daughter, wife, husband, mother, sibling, friend or neighbour who wants to bring resolution to a longstanding conflict or tension. Or it could be they just want to show you that they care. How will you respond to God when He shows up and says, “you are not forgotten?”

Christianity 101 - The Basics

Christianity 101 - The Basics "This is what the Lord says: "Stop at the crossroads and look around. Ask for the old, godly way, and walk in it. Travel its path, and you will find rest for your souls." - Jeremiah 6:16 NLT As you come to the end of this year and look forward to 2012, I thought I should share with you some thoughts that have been on my mind lately. Hopefully, it might give you just one thing to focus on as you make your New Year resolutions, if you do so. Or, it could be that as you renew your covenant with God in the New Year you consider revisiting the basic (and fundamental) principles of the Christian life. Over the past few weeks I have continuously received one message. The message is: "knowing the basics and doing them right." Wherever I have turned - comments on the winner of a tennis match, Sunday messages, TV programmes - this message has popped up and got me thinking quite a bit on the basics of the Christian life. As a child growing up in a Pentecostal church setting, I recall singing a simple song that captured the basics in growing and maintaining your relationship with God, once you became a Christian. These were the words we song: Read your bible, pray everyday, Pray everyday, pray everyday. Read your bible, pray everyday, If you want to grow. Sadly, these are the two vital areas where some of us are failing and many more find very challenging. If you could just think that praying and reading the bible are not favours you do for God or your pastor, it is your life. And, may be you need to prioritise them more highly. It's no use to keep saying "I know I don't pray that much", as if an 'honest' confession of weakness ever changed anything. It only provides a justification for the way you choose to live. I know that sounds a bit harsh, and perhaps, it is meant to be a bit punchy. You learn to pray by praying. You pray more and grow your prayer life by praying. You seek God's face through prayer. It is the first cry you let out as a 'baby' Christian. You cry out and take in God's air into your spiritual lungs. You overcome through prayer.  You hear from God through His word. You catch a vision by hearing from Him. You clarify that vision by hearing from Him. You implement that vision to his glory by following his directions. There are numerous resources available these days to help us read the bible, including daily reading plans. Get into fellowship with other Christians who will help and challenge you to a daily life of prayer, bible reading and being comfortable with your Christian identity. May be then it would be easier for you to witness to that identity and the source of it. "Christianity is Relationships". That was the conclusion of several Christian leaders meeting at a summit years ago. The primary of these relationships is the one we have with God and the one way to grow and maintain that is through communication (spending time in prayer in His presence and listening to His voice through His written word). Getting things right in all other relationships - family, friends, church, work, community, society, global networks - depend and build on the success of your relationship with God. As you approach 2012, I wish that you would not set impossible dreams for yourself, just the one task of doing the basics of the Christian life and getting that right. Do that and see what God will do with your life.

Moving with the Cloud?

Moving with the Cloud? The LORD used this cloud to tell the Israelites when to move their camp and where to set it up again. As long as the cloud covered the tent, the Israelites did not break camp. But when the cloud moved, they followed it, and wherever it stopped, they camped and stayed there, whether it was only one night, a few days, a month, or even a year. As long as the cloud remained over the tent, the Israelites stayed where they were. But when the cloud moved, so did the Israelites. They obeyed the LORD's commands and went wherever he directed Moses. (Numbers 9:18 – 23 CEV) I thought of what to share with you this week and resolved to share from my current experience. I have been at a place lately where I so much want God to speak clearly to me on a number of issues. I wish I could tell you that His voice has been unmistakably clear and that I now have clarity on these issues – I don’t. Well, not yet. I have been itching to take some major steps and get into action in one or two areas, yet even after praying a long time, a heaviness still remains and I feel even more compelled to keep praying. As time has gone on, I realised my attention has been so focussed on the immediate issues; I almost missed the voice of God speaking to me all the time. For several days the scripture above has been on my heart and when I finally read it, I realised that to continually experience God’s resident presence (“Shekinah” in Rabbinic Hebrew), I have to move with His cloud. I have to move at the command and prompts of His Spirit who indwells me. I have to be obedient and move in sync with Him – even when that means staying action or a certain activity as long as His “cloud” tarries. I can assure you this is not easy for me and it is a real test of obedience. Being the kind of person I am, I would rather be involved in some activity that convinces me I am being “productive”. We do not have a physical “cloud”; we have the Holy Spirit who guides us. It is not our place to linger at the spot where He has been or try to guess where He may go next and attempt to run ahead of Him. What is important is for us to know where His cloud is and to follow it, whether it is a rest stop, slow run or quick action. And He may not always give us any reasons for what He does. The experience of the Israelites in the wilderness is not as far-fetched as you might think. You only need to recall that we are sojourners and pilgrims in this world, on a journey to our destination. And to successfully navigate our way through sometimes strange and difficult paths, we need a guide – and who better for a guide that He who owns the universe. On one of my recent trips, I was invited to a prayer camp located in a remote area. I followed the directions called out to me on my mobile phone (I was not the one driving, though) up to a point where the path got very confusing. However, I needed no further phone-in directions from that point because a member of the church that runs the camp came out to join me in the car and showed us the way. And the point here being that to get to my destination, I needed to rely entirely on my guide – I (and my driver) had to follow his directions, turning as many times as he ordered. In fact, at one point he asked us to stop, while he got down, went ahead of us to take down a gate barrier to let the car drive through. Roy Gane writes, “God’s leadership calls for readiness to move at any time, and also patience to stay put until He directs otherwise. For an individual who wants to set his or her own agenda, this arrangement can be intensely irritating and unsettling. But it is fine for someone who wants to be with God more than anything else. The Lord does not merely give His people a detailed map of their “journey” that shows when they reach “rest stops”, “filling stations”, and their final destination. He Himself is their map. Even when His will doesn’t make sense from your human perspective, your obedience will reveal that His will was right.” I don’t know about you and where you are at the moment. I do hope that this helps you somehow. As for me, I will wait for as long as what I consider to be God’s check, the heaviness in my spirit, remains.

Pearl from an Irritant

"...Our present troubles ... produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever!" (2Corinthians 4:17 NLT) I don't know about you but I cannot tolerate a grain of sand in my eye. It is very irritating and I do everything, including enlisting another person's help, to get it out. It is not the same for the Oyster. An Oyster creates pearl from a grain of sand. The grain of sand is an irritant to the Oyster. The process of producing pearl involves the Oyster producing a chemical, in response to the irritation, which provides a smooth protective coating encasing the sand. This process provides relief for the oyster, but also results in a much valued and beautiful pearl. It is not only a grain of sand in the eye that causes irritation - and the most irritating things in our lives might not be physical. I don't know what your irritations are. Could be the behaviour/actions of a friend, colleague, family or church member. Could be the critic you'd rather avoid. Could be real suffering that you have to endure for the Lord's name. Whatever the irritation, it is possible to respond in ways that produce a stream of patience and goodness from your life, bringing glory to God and blessings to you and others. Paul wrote to the Romans (chapter 12 verse 21) "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." The worst of critics could help you develop a godly character. Irritating images of suffering and injustice could evoke in you a passionate righteous response that meets the needs of thousands of deprived people and leads to the fulfilment of God's purpose for your life. Irritating children, family members or life situation could drive you to your knees where you realise that the spiritual root of certain physical situations can only be dealt with by prayer and fasting! (See Matthew 17:21 - NKJV) Still, your source of irritation might not disappear as fast as you wished, but it would have motivated you to have a deeper fellowship with the Lord and so have His peace in your heart. A mishap or suffering in life could, amongst other benefits, help you refocus on important priorities and eternal values. Paul writes, "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." (Romans 8:18 NIV) I have the feeling that some irritations that come (or yet to come) your way could produce within you a righteous response that produces the pearl of patience, meekness, peace, greater depth of knowledge and skill. Do you realise that God is at work in your life to not only bring relief from irritations, but also bring about transformation (of character) and develop skills that are valuable to you and others long after the original irritation is gone? "These tests have come to prove your faith and to show that it is good. Gold, which can be destroyed, is tested by fire. Your faith is worth much more than gold and it must be tested also. Then your faith will bring thanks and shining-greatness and honour to Jesus Christ when He comes again." (1Peter 1:7 New Life Version) What is your response to the irritations of life?