Will you sponsor me?

From 4am tomorrow morning a team of us are climbing all 15 3000ft mountains in Snowdonia in 24 hours.

This amounts to just over 30 miles, and over 12,000 feet of ascent, in a day.

We are doing it for a local Christian charity called Bread Trust, who work in Eastern Europe.

Please sponsor us via this online giving page

Vintage Virgo

I have not been "blogging" the newfrontiers conference this year like I did last year.

I found it altered the way I approached the conference and made me act and approach it more as a reporter than a participant.

Things have been very difficult recently, so I decided to just go, worship and listen.

Yesterday's session by Terry Virgo was absolutely spot on.

Engaging, funny, wise. Absolutely vintage stuff. Humble, tearful, cheeky, passionate, clear.

We finished the session by singing "There is a day"



It was goosebumps time.

The presence of God weighed heavily on the thousands present.

I wept.

It was one of those moments, when in my very being I knew the touch of God upon my life.

"and then all hurt and pain will cease, and we will be with him forever, and in His glory we will live..."

A psalm for hard times

In our cell group this week someone brought Psalm 62 as a contribution during the worship, and it effected me deeply.

⁵ Find rest, O my soul, in God alone;
my hope comes from him.

⁶ He alone is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.

⁷ My salvation and my honor depend on God;
he is my mighty rock, my refuge.

⁸ Trust in him at all times, O people;
pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge.

⁹ Lowborn men are but a breath,
the highborn are but a lie;
if weighed on a balance, they are nothing;
together they are only a breath.

¹⁰ Do not trust in extortion
or take pride in stolen goods;
though your riches increase,
do not set your heart on them.

¹¹ One thing God has spoken,
two things have I heard:
that you, O God, are strong,

¹² and that you, O Lord, are loving.
Surely you will reward each person
according to what he has done.

So much of what the world around tells us is "strong" does not seem very loving. So much of what the world around us tells us is "loving" is seen as weak.

Our God is strong. Our God is loving. And in hard times I need His love and His strength to sustain me.

Borderlands 2010

Last weekend was our regional weekend away and it was a great time. Phil Whittall gives his perspective here.

It was a bit of an odd weekend for me because my brain is pretty busy at the moment with a health issue my family is facing. I may blog about it in future, but not yet. I was not quite as "in tune" with proceedings as I normally am. In fact, sometimes it feels you're hanging on by the fingernails, rather than leaping great distances. I found worship probably the hardest, because I don't want to be inauthentic, and sometimes the greatest worship is sat down in tears rather than standing up waving your arms. That said, I didn't just want to spend the weekend in a state so it was a balancing act.

We shared a rather basic Chalet with 14 people from our midweek small group which was both great fun and gave Esther and I a very solid base from which to enjoy the weekend because people are really looking out for us.

Jeremy Simpkins spoke about the life of Joseph, and candidly described the challenges he faced. When looking at the promise over Joseph from Genesis 49

²² "Joseph is a fruitful vine,
a fruitful vine near a spring,
whose branches climb over a wall.

He made the point that vines produce fruit when vertical, rather than when they spread out across the ground. Going over a wall therefore is a challenge for the vine, but actually that is a moment of it moving towards fruitfulness.

That sounded like the kind of thing I needed to hear.

A great song...

Things have been pretty difficult recently on a personal level.

What a wonderful song full of truth