Winter weather...

Click on the image to enlarge and read it more easily

Over the last few days, I've come up with incontrovertible proof that I have control over the weather. On Saturday I washed my car…. and then it rained. This morning, bright and early, I washed bedding and hung it out (because the weather forecast said it would be dry all day.) Yes, you've guessed it: the rain is pouring down now, making the internet come and go at random…. Yes, it seems that even when dry weather is forecast, I have the power to cause rain - simply by washing my car or hanging out my laundry!

Whether you're in the summer or winter half of the world, enjoy your day and your weather today. There's only one more week till Christmas!

You can tell by the smell

To be honest, I don't think I'd use a food processor very often, if I had one. But there are times - like last weekend - where an industry garlic press would come in handy. It took me nearly three hours to convert a kilo of fresh garlic into four little jars of the ready-to-use minced garlic that will be my supply during the winter months!

And, as for the smell in the house…… I was glad that I wasn't planning to entertain guests on Saturday evening, because you could tell on entering my kitchen that I had spent considerable time that day in the company of garlic!
I'm often struck by the comment in Acts 4: 13 where it says that people listened to Peter and John, and they recognised that these men had been with Jesus. I wonder if the same thing could be said about my life. When people watch my behaviour or listen to my conversation, is something of the fragrance of Jesus left with them afterwards? Can they "tell by the smell" that I've spent time in the company of Jesus?

Throughout the Old and New Testaments, our prayers, our offerings, our obedience to God, our kindness to others are all compared to incense or to fragrant offerings that are pleasing to the Lord. Ephesians 5: 1-2 tells us that if we follow God's example and walk in the way of love, we will be ὀσμὴν εὐωδίας  - a fragrant aroma  that brings joy to God's heart, just like the life and sacrifice of Jesus were pleasing to the Father.

So how's your fragrance today? Can people "tell by the smell" that you've been spending time in God's presence?

Farewell Madiba

I was saddened to hear that Nelson Mandela has died at the ripe old age of 95. It signals the end of an era for the nation of South Africa, and we have so much to thank God for as we look back at the legacy of Mandela's life.
I went to South Africa for the first time in 1993, the year that this photo on the right was taken. I went with an international King's Kids team of sixty people: young people and families with a heart to pray for South Africa and to share the love of God with people of all races.  F. W. de Klerk was still president at the time, and we received an encouraging and gracious letter from his office when we wrote to tell the president about our visit and our desire to be involved in praying for the future of the nation.

De Klerk was the last president of the apartheid era and is best known for his role in supporting the transformation of South Africa into a multi-racial democracy by entering into the negotiations that ultimately resulted in all citizens, of all races, having equal voting and other rights. That process was already underway when our international team was ministering in several cities of South Africa that year, and there was a sense in the air that the nation was ripe for change. Some people were afraid that such dramatic change could never happen peacefully and that the process might end in a "bloodbath." Among other things, our young people from all over Europe, together with families from South Africa, prayed for the process of change to be a peaceful and godly one.

When those first democratic elections happened peacefully and Nelson Mandela was elected as the nation's first black president in 1994, our KKI young people were so excited and encouraged to hear the news. You would have thought that it was their prayers alone that had made such a difference! Of course, hundreds, probably thousands of people around the world had been in prayer and it was a privilege for our children and teenagers to have been part of it.

The peaceful transition to a multi-racial democracy at that time was also due largely to who Mandela was as a person. He was very outspoken in saying that you can never really embrace new freedom and a new future unless you are willing to let go of the anger, hatred and bitterness of the past. He was loved and respected by South Africans of all colours and creeds.

And so, for the almost fifteen years that I lived in South Africa, I lived in the experience of the "new South Africa" where our King's Kids outreach teams were made up of young people from all the different racial groups in the nation. Sometimes there would be as many as ten different tribal/language groups represented in our camps: English, Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu, Tswana, Sotho, Ndebele, etc, together with the languages spoken by the young people who joined us from Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe. The young people who came to our camps and outreaches had never known what it was like to stand in segregated queues at the post office, or to go swimming at separate beaches for blacks, whites and coloureds. They were living the dream of their beloved Madiba and many others like him, of all races, who had prayed and fought and believed that this "rainbow nation" could really happen.

I remember around 1996, when Mandela was still president, that our Daniel Prayer Group of children aged 5 - 16 took several weeks to pray for African presidents and to write them letters, sharing the things that God had showed the young people in prayer. Mandela was only one of the presidents who wrote back to us, thanking the children for their sincerity, their prayers and their readiness to work and pray together as young people of different races and backgrounds.

It seems hardly any time since I sat at home in Cape Town, watching Madiba's 85th birthday celebrations on the TV,  and I'm amazed to realise that it was actually a whole decade ago. He was already 95 when he died yesterday.  Madiba's life on earth has come to an end now.  It's up to the next generation of South Africans to grab hold of the future with courage and faith, acceptance and diversity. By God's grace, and with our continued prayers, the future could be even better.

There's a difference between GOOD and GODLY...

Teenage pregnancy! The statistics from many nations around the world tell us that the number of very young unmarried mothers is continuing to increase. Fifty years ago, this was a subject for great shame, and the pregnancy was often hidden from friends and neighbours. Today it may still be a cause of distress to the young mother, but it's more common now and often doesn't have the same level of shame attached to it.

This morning I was reading about a teenage pregnancy that happened a long time ago. This one took everyone by surprise because the young couple concerned were devout churchgoers and had a good reputation in their community. Perhaps the most stunned of all was the young father; in fact, he knew that he couldn't be the father, because he and his fiancée had never had sex.
When we read the story in Matthew chapter one, or when we see paintings of the nativity (where Joseph is usually shown as an old guy with a beard) we often forget that this story is actually about a teenage boy. The fact that he wasn't yet married probably meant that Joseph was around 18 or 19 at the time this happened. And Mary may even have been only 13 or 14 at the time.

What shock and betrayal this young man must have felt, when he realised that the girl he loved had been unfaithful to him and was expecting someone else's child. Oh, no doubt Mary had tried to tell him what the angel had said about her virgin birth…. but that story probably sounded unbelievably far-fetched to everyone that heard it.

And so, in the face of his disappointment and betrayal, this teenage boy did a very good thing: instead of making Mary's shame even more public, he made a loving choice to break off their engagement discreetly and not to make a big fuss about it. He must have been broken hearted, but that unselfish choice showed that young Joseph was really a good person.

Then something totally unexpected happened. As Joseph lay in bed one night - perhaps tossing and turning, shedding tears of grief over the betrayal of the girl that he loved - he finally fell asleep and began to dream. And it was a dream sent by God. In the dream, an angel spoke to Joseph, confirming that Mary's pregnancy really was something supernatural and that Joseph shouldn't hesitate to go ahead with the marriage as originally planned. So what Joseph did next went beyond simply being a "good" person. In choosing to believe and obey God, Joseph showed that he was also a godly person - a man who was willing to do things God's way, no matter what it might cost him.  (Click here to read previous reflections on the sacrifice that this young couple were making in embracing God's will for their lives.)

You see, a good person may make choices that others admire, even others who live their lives by different standards. But a godly person is allowing the Lord to direct their choices; this might sometimes mean that what they do is not the most obvious or logical thing… and it might mean that they face criticism, opposition or gossip from others around them.

As Christmas approaches, we are reminded of the sacrifice that Jesus made in coming to live on earth as a human being. We are reminded of the sacrifices that young Mary and Joseph made in order to cooperate in God's miracle of incarnation. And we are challenged anew about what we, you and I, are willing to sacrifice in the 21st century in order to see God's kingdom come in this generation. What will be our gift to Him this Christmas?

Read all about it! The life changing Christmas story!

300 young people, in 11 different countries, have read their Bibles more than 150 times this year. The last Bible reading booklet of 2013 is available now for downloading from the Challenge blog:

www.biblechallenge2013.blogspot.com

And please spread the word about Challenge 2014. My faith goal is to motivate two thousand and fourteen young people to read their Bibles during 2014. Booklets will be available in English, Spanish or French from:

www.biblechallenge2014.blogspot.com

Keeping up to date

I nearly gave my sat nav a nervous breakdown this morning. i had to go to the traffic department in Malaga and, not being sure of the way, I decided to use my GPS. Only problem was, I also decided to drive into Malaga on the new motorway from Alhaurin and the sat nav simply couldn't work out what was going on.  For at least seven minutes on the motorway, the disembodied voice instructed me to "turn left, keep right, turn left, take the exit…" in utter confusion until I reached Malaga the back way and she found herself in familiar territory again. Guess I'm going to need to go online and update the sat nav if I want up to date maps!

I wrote in a previous post (click here to read) about how tuning in to God's voice is like driving with a GPS in your car. Today I couldn't help being reminded that a sat nav is only of maximum help if we keep it up to date. (I haven't done that so far, for the simple reason that updating the maps is basically the same cost as buying a new GPS.) One of the ways that we keep our "spiritual GPS" updated is by regularly reading God's written word, the Bible, as well as regularly listening to God's spoken word. That's part of the reason I'm working at the moment on the preparations for the 2014 Bible reading challenge. My faith goal is to motivate two thousand and fourteen young people to read their Bibles regularly in 2014. Today's young people are more in need than ever of spiritual GPS's that are regularly updated.

www.biblechallenge2014.blogspot.com

Of mobility and agility...

Today is my Dad's 85th birthday. Not bad for a man who spent his 80th birthday in hospital recovering from brain surgery…. or whose family was called to the intensive care unit when he was "bleeding to death" with only hours left to live on his 83rd birthday. (See photos below.) The fact that my Dad is here to celebrate his 85th birthday today is a testimony to the amazing healing power of God….. but also a testimony to my Dad's own courage and perseverance in the face of such critical illness. I salute him today for his faith and resilience. Both of those hospital emergencies carried the threat of possible long term consequences…. such as seriously impaired mobility or mental capacity. But Dad worked hard to learn to walk again and now, in 2013, he can walk around the house or go outdoors to work in the garden.

Of course, there's a difference between mobility and agility. Mobility is being able to walk and move around; agility is something more. Perhaps my Dad's taking to the floor to dance a waltz on his 60th wedding anniversary this year went just a little beyond mobility and touched on the realm of agility. See that video by clicking here: the anniversary waltz

If you're a dog owner, "agility" means something different again, because canine agility is a well known international sport in the dog world. I don't have a dog here in Spain, but in honour of Dad's birthday and mobility, my cat Teddi has worked on a little video called, "Attempts at Agility." You'll find it below, after the hospital photos. Happy Birthday, Dad!

And if you came to my blog today to find me on video, keep scrolling down. The clip of my Senegal interview is in the previous post - the one for 28th November.

80th birthday in hospital

83rd birthday in hospital

And here, in honour of your 85th birthday…. I hope you enjoy Teddi's "Attempts at Agility."