March in retrospect

It's almost April! Although "April showers" are the norm in many parts of the world, I'm hopeful that it will be different for us here in Alhaurín. After many days of torrential rain in mid-March, the southern Spanish weather finally seems to be catching on to the fact that it's supposed to be spring now, and we're having warm sunny days at last.

I look back on March as an alphabet soup of leadership meetings, filled with the various tasks of missions leadership. First the KKI European leadership team came down to meet for some days of prayer and planning in Malaga. Among other things, we took time to consider how best to continue providing pastoral care for our missionaries throughout the European region, and we began to make plans to hold our next regional conference in Portugal this November.

The following week saw me in Holland, still with KKI, but this time with the international leadership team. There we had some precious times of prayer and hearing God's voice together, stimulating times of considering how we can protect ourselves from drifting from our original calling and values ( a real danger when a movement gets into its third generation of leadership) and started to plan ahead for a leadership school and an international leadership conference in the Ivory Coast next summer.

Back in Spain, my next week of leadership meetings was with the field team for YWAM Europe; a new eldership group with a heart to pray and seek God for the present and future development of our mission initiatives in this continent.

With all those leadership tasks behind us now, April will be quite a different month. I'm wrapping up all my coaching and curriculum writing, and we're busy with all kind of practical preparations for hosting and leading the next leadership development course (LDC) here in Alhaurín. Thanks for your prayers.

Shepherd and King

This morning, in my personal time with God,  I was meditating on Psalm 100. It was one of the few parts of the Bible that I knew by memory even before I came to know God personally, because verse 4 was part of the liturgy and was recited every Sunday morning in the church I grew up in. The concept of entering God's gates with thanksgiving has appeared in dozens of songs over the years. The idea of being welcomed by the King in the courts of His royal dwelling is an amazing privilege… but somehow I think that the Shepherd picture of vs 3 is even more special to me. No pomp and ceremony about that; just quiet intimacy and care. Unhurried intimacy is what we observe when we see the shepherds walking with their animals in the fields and country roads that surround Alhaurín.

And so I love the fact that both of those aspects are found in the psalm I was reading this morning:

Know that the Lord is God.

It is He who has made us (our Creator)

and we are His. (our Father)

We are His people, (our King)

the sheep of His pasture. (our Shepherd)

It reminds me of a worship song that we used to sing when I lived in France during the 1980s:

Prosternons-nous devant le Roi  Let's bow down before the King. 

Fléchissons le genou devant le Père  Kneel before the Lord our Father. 

Car Il est notre Dieu For He is our God. 

Et nous sommes le peuple de son pâturage We are the people of His pasture. 

Le troupeau que sa main conduit.  The flock guided by His hand.

The song begins with God as King and ends with God as Shepherd. Sometimes we need to recognise Him as King and embrace His authority before we can truly experience Him as the Shepherd who guides us and cares for all our needs.

Recently, one of my Alhaurin teammates was out walking the dog when she spotted our local shepherds coming towards her with a large flock of sheep and goats. Shepherding is a traditional vocation here, that continues to be passed on from one generation to another, and so we often see two shepherds together, an older one and a younger one. My friend said that she had to laugh when she saw the difference between the two shepherds: the old man was chewing leisurely on a twig, while the young man was making a call on his mobile phone. A cameo picture of a huge generational difference, and yet a reminder that God is a God for all generations. He understands and not is not the least bit threatened by our modern technology… but He also invites us not to miss out on the unhurried fellowship that previous generations knew, when the pace of life was slower.

This morning in our team meeting and prayer time, someone else commented on how the shepherd sometimes stops the traffic, so that the sheep can cross the road. Our God is always able to make a way for us, and to stop the things that would be obstacles or dangers for us in our sometimes fast-paced lives. But He also calls us to walk unhurriedly by still waters, to lie down in green pastures, and to allow Him to restore our soul. Let's make time to enjoy friendship with our Shepherd as we approach the season of Easter, the time when we remember Him also as our Saviour.

Worship as warfare

This morning in my Bible reading, I was reflecting on the topic of worship as warfare. I remember, I think it was back in the 1980s, the first time I discovered the story of Jehoshaphat's army in 2nd Chronicles 20 and began to realise the power of praise and worship in spiritual warfare. Around the same time, however, a number of books were published that promoted praising God for bad stuff (disaster, sickness, crisis, etc) in order to see the situation turned around. I remember feeling kind of uncomfortable about that, as it seemed to me that God deserved to be worshipped for who He is, rather than our seeing worship as a "magic bullet" to solve our own problems or defeat the enemy.

And therein lies the key, I guess. It makes no sense to "praise" God because my child has cancer, or because I was raped, or because my house burned down…. but if I can honestly praise God for who He is, for His unchanging character, despite the horrible or tragic circumstances I find myself in, that authentic worship is a powerful weapon that pushes back the enemy, as well as giving us strength and grace to face our difficult situation. And yes, sometimes it does bring about a complete turnaround, especially when our circumstances were largely caused by enemy oppression.

I remember back at the end of 2011 (recorded in this blog) when my Dad was critically ill in the intensive care unit, and doctors couldn't tell us from day to day whether he was going to live or die. All I could do amidst the stress and uncertainty, was to proclaim in faith that God is good, and my Dad's life was ultimately in His hands.  Some months down the road, God's goodness was proved to us, and my Dad is still with us nearly four years later.

Whatever your circumstances today, don't give up trusting and praising the character of God.

Teddi in the spotlight

In an unexpected turn of events, my YouTube cat, Teddi, has extended his fame this week by appearing in at least six Scottish newspapers - two of whom laid claim to the talented boy by calling him a "Scottish cat" and even alleging that he "spent his formative years" in Falkirk.

He appeared first in the Falkirk Herald, and you can read the article here: 
click here to read.
And then I was contacted by another newspaper, the Daily Record, who also wanted to feature him in a funny news spot on their website: click here to read.

The Daily Mail was next (click here to read) and, before we knew it, the "cat who thinks he's a dog" angle went viral: the story was featured in half a dozen more newspapers, some of them making outrageous claims that I was going to enter Teddi in talent competitions or take him to see if he could make a name for himself in Hollywood! I began to get emails saying that people had spotted Teddi on news websites as far afield as Australia and India. A friend in the USA was reading a cat lovers' website and stumbled across an article featuring one of Teddi's videos and referring to me as Tobi and Teddi's "momma." One of Teddi's YouTube videos took a thousand new hits in just a couple of days, and got a couple of new subscriptions from people in China and Canada!! Meanwhile, my handsome boy is quite oblivious to his new found fame and is working hard on his piano practice for his upcoming music video.

Time and expectation

In Psalm 5 vs 3, the author comes to the Lord in the morning, lays out requests or questions before Him, and waits in expectation. I see two implications in that simple phrase:

Waits means that he takes time; waiting isn’t quick and efficient. It involves settling and waiting for the other party to speak or act.

Expectation means that there’s a basic level of faith; the psalmist is actually expecting to hear something from the Lord

If we really want to develop intimacy with God, waiting and expectation both need to be part of what we call our quiet time.

Maybe morning isn’t the best time for some. For me, it’s the perfect time, because I’ve developed the habit of waking early and having time in the Word before the day’s activities begin. I read my Bible while drinking my morning cup of coffee. But for some people, that time of day is more like “morning rush hour,”  trying to squeeze in quiet time between making breakfast and getting the kids off to school, or getting things ready for going to work.

We need to find the time and the ways to incorporate waiting on the Lord - like my friend who prays and listens to God while he is walking the dog every morning, or people who listen to an audio Bible while commuting to work, or those who worship and wait on God while doing the ironing or taking a bath... or simply planning in time to sit in God’s presence, with no other agenda.

And we need to find ways to incorporate expectation. Some years back, I began to develop the habit of beginning my quiet time by writing the date in my notebook, even before praying or reading the Bible. It was a way of expressing my expectation that there would be something from God to write down that day. Another example would be the more classic way of beginning by praying for God to speak to you.
There are some precious promises in this psalm for those who do take refuge in the Lord. 

Why not take time to read the whole psalm and write down some of the blessings God promises for those who make time to spend alone with Him?

Treasures of darkness...

I will give you the treasures of darkness, riches stored in secret places, so that you may know that I am the Lord, the God of Israel, who summons you by name. 
Isaiah 45: 3

In its context, this was spoken to an unbeliever, the Persian Emperor Cyrus, whom God was planning to use for a special task. That’s why it says, vs 4, “You do not acknowledge me,” and vs 3, “... so that you will know I am the Lord.”

However, the phrase, “treasures of darkness,” can hold deep significance for us as believers, because it is often in the dark times of life that we can have our most meaningful experiences of who God is. When I look back at the hardest, darkest seasons of my life (there have been three of them: in 1989, in 2000 and in 2007), I notice that those were some of the times where I was most aware of God’s presence and of His speaking clearly and personally to me.

Some people have told me the opposite: they say that their dark times in life were seasons where it felt as if God was far away and it seemed like heaven was silent. Whichever way we experience it, however, our response in those dark times, dry times or hard times is critical. Will we back away from God in those seasons, or will we push in and seek His presence even more?

When we remain faithful in our “quiet times” (times alone with God) during seasons of darkness or silence, we are powerfully demonstrating our unconditional commitment to seeking God and being in relationship with Him. We will emerge from those times having discovered riches stored in secret places.  God has a rich storehouse of treasures for us, but some of those treasures, just like the diamond or the pearl, are formed in the dark places. 

Psalm 139 vs 11- 12 tell us that even the darkness is a place of light for God. It’s our choice whether we move into the light or hide alone in the place of darkness.

Dealing with distractions

When reading my Bible this morning, I was struck by Psalm 10 verse 4, which says, “In his pride, the wicked does not seek the Lord. In his thoughts there is no room for God.” This one short verse describes two things that prevent us from connecting with God:

• pride
• no room in our thoughts

Pride shows itself in the fact that the godless person thinks he or she has no need of God, and therefore doesn’t even bother to seek Him. Even as believers, though, not making time in our day for God is an expression of pride, suggesting that we don’t need Him either.

Sometimes we do plan in time for God, but we end up disappointed an discouraged because our minds wandered all over the place and we were distracted by thoughts about our plans for the day or about our problems. That’s why the Bible tells us to take our thoughts captive (2 Corinthians 10 verse 5) and make them obedient to Christ. We can do that by simply speaking it out in prayer (“In Jesus’ name, I take my thoughts captive, silencing all distractions and choosing to focus now on the Lord.”) Or we could do it in another way, such as singing some worship songs to settle our hearts and focus our thoughts on God.

However we do it, let’s deal with distractions and make room for God this year.