Glass Half Empty

A glass would be anything but half empty if you left it outside these days. The rainy season has arrived and everyone knows it, each of the last 7 days has had it's share of precipitation, deluge even, and it looks to continue that way.

Recently it has become more obvious to me how deep the wounds are here. The British are famed for their stiff upper lip. That ability to grin and bear it and avoid conflict, emotions or generally anything sensitive at all costs. Yet I find here something that goes far beyond that but it is very hard to place. Perhaps it is just a complete de-sensitisation because the people here have seen so much that they have become numb. Maybe it is the ostrich move of sticking ones head in the sand and pretending that it never happened. Or somehow they have just learned to live with the loss of so much, knowing that all is not lost. For they still have their lives, if not their family, if not their dignity, if not their limbs, if not their pride, if not their happiness, they yet have life in them.

Who knows, perhaps no one, but all the same Rwanda still lives in the ashes of its past, limps on with the scars of yesteryear.

For our team to get anywhere in town we have to get a bus. 20p will get you anywhere in the city. This process involves a 15 minute walk down our local high street to the local bus station which consist of a dirt courtyard packed with people and various buses. You wait on the bus until its full and then hop off at your destination. Simple enough.

However, in the 15 minutes it takes to walk to the station you will pass people who are simply lying in the street in 30 degree heat, sometimes half on the pavement half in the road with a hand stretched out.

When you get to the bus station you have to push through the swarm of street vendors who flock to the white people. You learn the word for 'no' pretty quickly. Occasionally you will actually be grabbed (it is quite a tactile culture) by someone begging for money, though it is closer to demanding than begging really.

Once you have figured out which bus you need and get on the blind man will have managed to find his way on to the bus and will do the rounds as the bus fills up. If you turn your face from him to look out the window you will likely see more vendors trying to sell you anything from bread to USB sticks through the window. Occasionally they will disperse as though someone just started shooting at them. They don't pay taxes because none of their sales are recorded so their practice is illegal and they would rather not be caught by the heavily armed police. In their place you will find at your window a woman waving the stump of an arm that used to have a hand on the end of it gently thudding against your window, demanding your attention, your pity, your money. Eventually the bus fills and you pull away, the conductor will at some point ask for your 20p and you will place it into a scarred hand full of tattered cash. Then you arrive at your destination and start your day. There were many survivors of the genocide but none got through unscathed.

Despite all of this life goes on. They press on and most seem unaffected by what they see. In fairness most have seen far worse and the fact that the country is at peace is a blessing that outshines the scars of the past.

My Grandmother had a heart attack this week. She is several thousand miles away and I am at least 6 weeks away from being able to see her again. I am a very long way from home.

The longest Saturday of all time was probably the Saturday between good Friday and Easter Sunday. The one in whom the disciples had placed all of their hope, whom they had lived with for the past 3 years and who they believed to be the one who would win the victory of victories was brutally and publicly tortured and executed.

But Sunday came.

When all hope was lost and everything was at its darkest. After all the commotion and chaos and fireworks the ashes rested and there was the cold bitter taste of grief without a mote of hope to carry them.

Yet the tomb was empty. The resurrection, so far beyond expectation that even its evidence was met with scepticism but slowly it dawned. There was not just some hope remaining. There was the most secure, the most unwaveringly sure hope ever to have graced the face of this earth.

There is a resurrection.

There is hope like African rain that will fill your glass to overflowing. A hope in the new life, a new, unbroken body, a new heavens and a new earth. A hope that we go on beyond the veil.

Not an empty star gazing hope but a living, active and life changing hope that the glass is not half empty but filled to capacity. 

Departure

The all too familiar mixed emotions of departing for the field are here... Going on an adventure with Jesus to the other side of the world, lots of new people to get to know and build friendships with. Important and fulfilling (and occasionally frustrating and even heart breaking) work to be done.

Yet at the same time it is leaving the security of familiar England, the comfort that comes from existing friendships and family and heading into the unknown. Having done all that needs to be done in order to prepare there is the less concrete objective of saying the goodbyes and preparing mentally and spiritually for the season ahead.

While I am in Rwanda they will be commemorating the 20th anniversary of the genocide for an entire week. It is a very broken nation and within my lifetime has seen more horror than any of us would want to imagine, let alone be witness to or be a part of. Doubtless over the weeks I will be struck with different impressions of how this has affected those left behind. Not just those who are older than 20 but also the next generation of Rwandans who have been born out of fire and hold the future in their hands.

At this juncture I stand thankful for all of the support and encouragement that has enabled me to be ready to go. I am thankful also for the lessons that are yet to come, as varied and difficult as they may well be, they will be unique gifts from God.

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

Where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is error, truth;

Where there is doubt, faith;

Where there is despair, hope;

Where there is darkness, light;

And where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, Grant that I may not so much seek

To be consoled as to console;

To be understood as to understand;

To be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

- St Francis of Assisi

Action

I tend to spend a lot of time on this blog talking about justice, poverty, the impact of the gospel and the call to live a changed life as a result which is great except it is just talk. Well that is perhaps all that you the reader sees, the truth is that there is a whole lot of scheming and doing that takes place behind the front of this blog. The exciting thing for you in this post  is that the action is coming to bear, and you have the opportunity to join in!

Over the past few months I have been planning and organising a trip to Rwanda with an organisation called Tearfund. I will be heading out on the 24th of next month (Soon!) for 10 weeks to the capitol (Kigali) where I will be doing development work, mainly in the form of education and training programs to help lift people out of social, material and spiritual poverty. While I am aware that the primary recipient of change over 10 weeks will be me rather than the people I meet I am definitely a believer in Gods ability to radically change a persons life in a much shorter time frame.

If you don't know anything about Tearfund then you should go and find out more over here. The beauty of this trip is that the government, through the ICS programme is funding 90% of the trip! Amazing! What this means is that you and I have the opportunity to get involved in changing the lives of individuals who are in a place of significantly more need than we are (rather than just sitting around talking about their needs). As required by ICS I have to raise £800 by the 7th of March in order to make the trip possible. I have 200 so far but in case the there is not enough incentive purely on virtue of the fact that the money will be changing lives I have decided to take on some challenges...

So - If we manage to raise £500 by this Friday (28th) then I and two of my very good friends will shave our heads, and yes photo evidence and possibly even video will ensue.

If we manage to raise the full £800 then the hair removal will be taken to the next level - we will all get our legs waxed (oh the pain!) I can't imagine that happening without someone videoing to be honest...

In addition, once the goal is reached I will take a full 24 hours of silence (that has to be worth paying for!) to give you all some respite from my harping on!

Donating is easy and safe, you can visit my just giving page: https://www.justgiving.com/ben-currer and if you are a UK tax payer don't forget to Gift Aid :)

Lets turn the talking into some real action.

Theodicy

One day, when I was a child, I lent my relatively new bike to a friend, the friend promptly broke my prized bicycle attempting to go over a jump. In a whirlwind of tears, burning anger and shame at the fact that  I was responsible for a broken bike I ran my it back home. I discarded it on the drive and ran into the house and flung myself on the sofa, barely noticing my fathers presence on the sofa opposite. My dad asked me what was wrong ... To my shame I think I told him to piss off, or at least words to the same effect.

So pretty much a run of the mill tantrum right? Why would I be talking about this now? Because some things about the human condition don't actually change. They change their outfit, sure, but the issue itself remains the same. You, I and every child in the world still have tantrums it's just that most of us dress them up differently now that we have 'grown up'.

When you think about it we have a great number of things to have tantrums over - certainly better reasons than when we were children. We discover poverty, injustice, chronic health conditions, relationship break downs and any other form of suffering that you can think of. There is an in-built trigger of rage and sadness in each of us when we are party to and particularly when we are the target of said suffering.

Of course being grown up we now realise that there is absolutely nothing that our earthly parents can do about these problems, indeed in many cases they are in fact the source of many of these problems. So what do we do? Well all too often we perpetuate the problem, we either internalise and end up imploding turning to self loathing which in turn sabotages all of our closest relationships or we externalise and end up exploding which respectively sabotages all of our closest relationships. Not good.

So this is why I started with this story - because my bike fiasco did not end this way. In response to being told where to go my dad could have taken offence and left me to cry it out on the sofa. Fortunately for me however, I have a good father. He told me that I could tell him what happened and that he could try and help. In my infinite wisdom  I had already concluded that the damage to my bike was beyond repair and as a result there was really nothing that my dad could offer me as consolation in this situation, hence I felt the need to rebuff him. I articulated the conundrum quite effectively - 'my bike is broken'. Of course my dads knowledge of bikes was far superior to mine and so he decided that rather than solving the small problem of my bike he would fix the bigger issue of my attitude. He came over to my sofa and wrapped his arms around me.

Of course he assured me that he would do his best to fix my bike but he was far more interested in letting me know that a much healthier way for me to resolve my issues was to come to him and explain my problem rather than believing the lie that all hope was lost. I had tried to fix my bike myself and couldn't - that doesn't mean my bike is beyond repair. But more important than any of that, my relationship with my dad was of far greater value than any bike I could own. The refrain that shaped my childhood came out once again. 'I might not always like what you do but I will always love you, no matter what.'

After some time on the sofa I calmed down a bit and apologised to my dad, we went out together to get my bike and of course my dad showed me how it could be fixed easily without even needing any tools.

Ok, time to bring this back to us adults. We experience the 'broken bike' in our lives and it hurts, we don't really have any human relationships that are able to fix those hurts but we certainly try. We marry people who 'complete' us, we drink, gamble, sleep around, advance our career, work harder, get stronger be better all in an attempt to fix our broken bike. The issue is that at best we only break our bike further. We divorce, become alcoholics, get into debt, traffick modern day salves, get addicted to porn and cheat to get ahead in the game. Sooner or later we come to the end of our self destructive resources and we have to face the fact that our bike is broken and there is nothing we can do to fix it.

Now comes the equivalent of telling your dad to piss off... We blame God, we say that he cannot exist because of all this mess. We become frustrated with him and run away from him, we throw one heck of a tantrum.

Now here religion can do some seriously weird things, as Christians we often feel the need to cover up our problems. We can't possibly throw a tantrum that is beneath us. God is good and we know it but this situation makes it feel like God is not good. Both cannot be right so I will just bury the feelings and say God is great, YAY, praise the lord! We sell God short and don't actually take our frustration and anger and pain and anxiety to him we just say he is good and busily try and figure out how to patch ourselves up so we can look pretty on Sunday. We even create whole schools of theology to explain why there can be suffering  and a good God (we call it a theodicy) instead of facing our problems. Well this is a Faberge egg. We can do great at making it look pretty on the outside for a bit but it is paper thin and has absolutely no substance to it and just ends up propagating the problem. What's more this is not what the God of the bible tells us to do at all. It is some weird twisted, dismembered, decaffeinated version of what Christ has given us.

 Fortunately for all of us as good as my dad is he is not even a touch on how good God is. While we are far off trying to sort ourselves out and failing miserably he asks 'what is wrong?' it's not that he doesn't know the answer. He is giving you the opportunity to cry out and admit to him and to yourself 'my bike is BROKEN!'.

I can assure you when you make that admission to God, as painful and messy as it can be there is release. For some reason western Christianity has completely forgotten the place of lament, of unashamedly calling it like you see it. Life sucks some times and God is absolutely big enough to handle us screaming at him every now and again. When you are honest with God you give him the opportunity to wrap his arms around you and be enough for you. Now despite the fact that your bike is still in pieces on the drive things are looking better. Why? Because the far more important issue of your relationship with God is improving and that will set you free! The fact that God is also able to put your bike back together (and improve it too) becomes a small side issue by comparison to the fact that you have discovered something better than life itself. The love of God.

God of the gaps

Last night a sizeable group of us went hunting for the Aurora Borealis, to be honest I was rather sceptical from the start. I was more than happy to venture out into the cold hills surrounding Gloucester though - the stars were out in force.

We never did see the northern lights in the end, seemingly the scientists that informed various news agencies were wrong or maybe it just wasn't Gods will for us on that particular night.

Now here we have a bit of a conundrum, God Vs Science, arch enemies from the dawn of reason endlessly pitted against one another in a fight to the death. Of course some (Nietzsche) see that the fight is over 'God is dead'. Nonetheless there are myriad believers who profess otherwise and rather would see science as the losing side, never able to agree on a theory for longer than a decade or two it is simply misinterpreted data that is further misinterpreted every so often.

Of course this debate is hashed out in numerous arenas but none so severely as the existence of creation. The big bang theory and Genesis 1-3 are the weapons in this battle, forged by the most rigorous of scholars.

So with these two opponents poised ready to beat the snot out of each other what does the bookie say? What are the odds? Who is going to win, and who will die?

Now here we need to take a bit of a step back because something a bit odd is about to happen and we need to understand why. The atheist scientist largely understands his concept of God from the people who profess to follow him, naturally. The majority of the time this is Christianity and what does the scientist see the Christian doing? Well, he sees the Christian walk out into a field in the middle of the night expecting to see the northern lights. Except in the face of the disappointment of not seeing the northern lights the Christian decides to comfort himself with the sentiment that God must have not wanted to him to see the Northern lights that night. Now of course the reasonable scientist knows that there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the northern lights not being visible from that particular field that particular night. The Christian therefore must be decidedly ignorant to settle for 'God didn't want it'. This behaviour is repeated everywhere to almost any question ... How did the earth come to be? 'God made it' Why is the sky blue 'God likes blue' where did man come from? 'God made man'

The Scientist analysing the Christians behaviour comes to the perfectly reasonable explanation that the Christian is like him seeking truth except whenever he discovers a truth that is uncomfortable or cannot explain something he simply replaces that truth with God.

Thus the God of the gaps is born. There has to be a God because without him we wouldn't have an explanation for the existence of the world, a reason to live or any warm comforting thoughts to consol ourselves with.

The scientist then has a mission, close the gaps! Pursue knowledge, provide explanations and there are no longer any gaps for God to be in and he will die and then we can all be liberated to do as we please.

So we have God of the gaps in one corner of the arena and we have science in the other, after thousands of years, millions of papers, countless debates and a whole lot of media hype science lands the final blow and the God of the gaps dies! Finally!

Now depending on your perspective this point is either yet to come or has already happened but the fact that it will happen is doubtless.

At this point the scientist rejoices, finally he has killed the tyrannous God of the gaps and he can pursue pure truth. He approaches the Christian to shake his hand, a gentlemen victor. He finds the Christian rejoicing, he must be excited about his new found freedom without God. The Christian exclaims 'now I understand how God did it all it is even MORE amazing!'.

The scientist sits back, looks at all that he has learned and for the first time perceives the face of God in the complexity and detail and structure of creation and realises that the whole fight was in fact orchestrated by God in the first place in order to reveal himself. He is not the God of the gaps, he is truth that underlines every discovery ever made. And yes, that is comforting. 

Crutch

'God is just a crutch for people who cannot cope with life.'

I have heard this from many people, especially while I was studying the philosophy of religion. When people are saying this they generally mean it as a slight insult to point out the seemingly obvious flaw in religion - it is only for people who are messed up and if you are doing all right then it's essentially pointless - no healthy person walks around with a crutch, it's just wrong. The prime motive of religion is seen as resolving difficult problems  to which there is no real answer. It pursues these resolutions above the pursuit of truth and therefore the latter bends to meet the needs of the former. Thus making it null and void.

Many Christians have responded to this saying that it is not true, God is not a crutch, he is a loving father, a real, personal, powerful, active God. While I believe this sentiment is true I wouldn't respond this way.

What would I say? Well probably something along the lines of ...

Amen! I have tried doing life my own way and I have tried doing it Gods way and without a shadow of a doubt I can confirm that life without God is like trying to walk with broken legs. My legs are broken, I need a crutch. In fact I would say that a crutch is being far too generous to me ... If we are going to analogise God with a piece of medical equipment then he is a defibrillator! I am just a sack of meat and bones without him. Life is void, pleasure is meaningless and death is hopeless without God. The fact that the outcome of a life with God is a positive one is not evidence for the falsification of Gods existence, it is proof of it! To say that a system is fabricated simply because it fulfils the yearnings  of the parishioners   is an absurd use of predetermined logic.

More to the point however, when a person accuses God of being a crutch they omit a very important element of analysis. They do not reflect on their own lives. If they did so then they would very quickly realise that their legs were broken and what they really need is a crutch to lean on. A God to carry them through.  But, as a very good friend once told me 'No one is as deaf as the one who does not want to hear, no one is as blind as the one who does not want to see.'

God puts just one single condition on salvation. Acceptance. You have to accept that your legs are broken before you will be willing to take up a crutch. You have to accept that you cannot make it on your own, you don't have all the answers and you need the help of the one who does before you are ever going to take his hand and let him pull you out of the pit.

Jesus said that he did not come for the healthy but for the sick. What he meant when he said this is not that some are healthy and some are sick. He was effectively saying - I have come for those who are willing to accept the help. Those who recognise their sickness and decide to give it to me instead of just denying it, those are the people I have come for.

Hypocricy

I think many of us are familiar with the searing red hot burn that the innocent heart experiences in the face of hypocrisy. Authenticity is so often assumed (frankly why shouldn't it be - it is definitely the way things should be even if it is not the way things are. ) and the let down when the veneer peels off can be quite devastating. It can take some time to regain trust and the more times we are let down the harder it becomes to believe the hypocrite at all.

That is at least  how it starts - as we get older  and the veneer falls too many times we simply become disenfranchised, disillusioned and disinterested altogether. The norm shifts from authenticity to errancy. There are a few prime examples of this in our culture, the one that was most recently highlighted to me was that of politics.

Jeremy Paxman recently interviewed Russell Brand and the video went viral. Why? Because so many people can so readily sympathise with Brand. He is correct to say that my generation has given up on politics. So many are just so thoroughly  bemused by the hypocrisy of it all that they find themselves asking why bother? Why entertain a system that consistently produces the very antithesis of what it promises?

While I disagree with a great number of other things that Russell suggests in the interview I cannot fault him on how well he captures the despondency produced in people who consistently witness hypocrisy.

Closer to home for me however is the issue of the Church. For as long as politicians have been criticised for being hypocritical so have Christians - particularly church leaders. They are meant to be beacons of righteousness, paragons of purity, towers of truth! But we all know that if you look close enough (or wait long enough) you will inevitably see the cracks and often not little ones either - we are talking grand canyon here. You never have to wait long before you hear another story of a vicar who has been caught with child pornography or cheating on his wife. You can take one look at god TV and get blinded by the gigantic diamond ring on the hand of a man who is talking about giving sacrificially.

And this is just talking about things that get media attention, equally we will find the Christians that we know personally will uphold a moral standard with their mouth but they will live out a very different reality.

Just as it is with politics: the more you hear the less interested you become - church is a lie, God is a crutch and these people are either deceiving or deceived ... Or both.

But here is some good news...

First things first hypocrisy usually has far more to do with the expected standard than it does with the actual action. What do I mean by this? If politicians didn't make such grandiose promises while they were trying to win an election the fact that they messed up during their term would not be such a big let down. Equally if Christians didn't profess such a spotless moral code so the disparity would not seem so great in their lives. Now this is the bit where politics and Christianity part ways. The Bible is a compilation of 66 books written by messed up, broken people who were trying to follow God. The authors do not shy away from the fact that they get it wrong. Often. You can trace deception, murder, rape, adultery, pride, gluttony and just generally plain old failure throughout the pages of the bible. Christians don't (or rather I should say shouldn't) shy away from the fact that they are anything but shining examples of perfect people. Much of the disenfranchisement that people experience from Christianity is birthed from a misconception that it is about being perfect. It really isn't!

So the question then is not 'how come you fail?' everyone fails the question is more 'what does one do in the face of failure?' There is another misunderstanding here too.

To an onlooker it can be quite simple, you condemn the people who totally mess up and you pardon the ones who get it right. Simple. The problem with that is highlighted very well by Jesus himself - 'let him who is without sin cast the first stone.'. Somewhat ironically it would be incredibly hypocritical to pronounce such a judgement on anyone given that whoever it is throwing the stone will themselves have royally messed up at some point in their lives ... Who are they to judge?

The bible offers an alternative to condemnation in the face of failure. Grace. A second chance. Redemption. So while Christianity is littered with people messing it up throughout the ages it is also full of the same people being given another chance to try to do better next time. Sadly the 'trying to do better next time' is often communicated in a very judgemental way, listing off things that we all do and saying 'these are all wrong!' It gives the impression that you can't 'join the club' if you do these things. That is not the case at all... It is more saying look at all these terrible things that we all do yet seem incapable of stopping - we need to join the club to rescue us from those things!

So next time you see a Christian who sets their standard as perfection and falls short of that standard, don't leap to the conclusion that they are a hypocrite, perhaps realise that they are trying to be a better person but that it doesn't happen over night.

So what am I saying here - Christians always have a perfect motive but they are just not the best at executing the plan? No. I am not even saying that Christians are not hypocrites... Just less than they are accused of being. I would say that to be a hypocrite is to be human. No, hypocrisy is not a good thing but it is a common thing among all people. So if you have problems with Christianity because of the hypocrisy of Christians then you should feel welcome, they are not so different from you after all.

Finally I would address the distinction between a hypocritical person and a hypocritical system. Sadly for us all there are some Christians who don't just set standards for themselves but for everyone else as well. It is one thing to set perfection as your own standard but to hold other people to account on that standard is quite another thing. this is what gets us really hot under the collar. When someone is 'Holier than thou' and pronounces everyone else sinners as though they themselves were faultless, all the while trying to cover up their own shortcomings. While there may be people who call themselves Christians who behave like this it does not change the fact that this is anything but Christianity. In fact it is this group of people who Jesus most strongly opposed. The Pharisees. If people had arch enemies Jesus would have picked the Pharisees to be his. They were the religious elite who made ridiculous rules that were impossible to keep so they could puff themselves up and be 'holier than thou'. Jesus called them whitewashed tombs and a pit of vipers. Sadly there are still some Pharisees around today but try not to let them put you off Jesus even if they profess to follow him. 

Capacity

Lately I have been confronted by my limitations. This might seem quite proud in itself - how are you ever not aware of your limitations? Well perhaps it is pride that puffs you up enough that when you catch a glimpse of yourself you are shocked at just how deflated you really are.

Anyway, lately I have been confronted by my own limitations, but first some background. It is now approaching 2 years since I handed in my resignation, left my job and my home and flew off to South Africa (things have never been the same since). Before I left for South Africa I was not doing great, somewhat disillusioned, lacking drive to really do anything I was in serious need of some focus in life. Well, I certainly found it. It is amazing how much more we find ourselves able to do when given the right drive. When you find that thing that you know you can do, that you are good at doing, that you love doing and won't ever get bored of doing it can be ecstasy.

I found I was able to push myself for longer, live louder, bigger and stronger. Naturally this was not so narrow as to be limited to my work in South Africa. It spilled over into my social life, Prayer life, exercise , eating, breathing... Everything had more depth, life was just more full. My capacity was significantly bigger. I was far more busy in those 6 months than I had been in the previous 6 yet I had more time for people, more time to listen, more to invest.

This increase in capacity was much more than perhaps meets the eye. Finding that thing that you are good at ... Finding your thing is much more than discovering something about yourself. It is discovering what God has placed in you. And when you start living in line with Gods will using those gifts for his purposes it changes everything and that is good news.

It is good because that thing, that gift, no longer terminates on you, it is for a higher purpose, a deeper meaning, a fuller expression. That gift is for God, for his glory as an expression of part of who he is. It is good because the pressure is no longer on you. Let's take one example. How many men have found that they are naturally gifted in business? And how many of those men have felt that the success of their business is such a reflection of them, so dependent on them that they are willing to sacrifice so much to make it thrive ?... How many marriages has that destroyed, how many families has it torn apart? But when that gifting is recognised as being about God, rather than the man, how releasing is that? He no longer has to prove himself as the most successful business man out there, no longer has to compare himself to how everyone else is doing, no longer has to sell himself and his life and his families lives into his business because it is no longer his, but Gods.

I am not saying that recognising the gifts God has given you is permission to be lazy with them, on the contrary how much more would you want to nurture and train in a God-given skill. Neither am I saying that  God is simply a tool for getting a good work/rest balance, plenty of people do that without the help of God. What I am saying is that all your skills, and in fact every breath you take is a gift from God, not just a human function and the difference of those perspectives is like the difference between shadows and real forms.

So ... Why did I start with talking about limitations? Because the year since coming back from South Africa was one very long kick in the stomach. Because despite the fact that I had tasted and seen and lived life to the full for a time did not make me impervious to royally messing up. Being in line with God's will for your life is a matter of choice and just as being in line results in life to the full so being out of line results in chaos.

Now It is very important that you do not read what I am not writing here. I am not saying 'follow God and your life is going to be all rainbows and sunshine.' Some people would have you believe that and they are simply wrong - anyone with any amount of life experience can testify to that. Neither am I saying that if you don't follow God your life is going to be one long train wreck. - That is also perfectly possible with God.

What I am saying is that your outlook on life (irrelevant of whether your life is hard or easy)will radically change. Your talents, pleasures and laughter will have a greater capacity - because they are no longer limited by you. And your tears, aches and mourning will not be hopeless because your hope is no longer limited by you or those around you.

And yes, when you have been through a season of serious trial you still come out the other end feeling beat up and very aware of your limitations. But the good news is that whatever your limitations you can know a God who is limitless, with whom all things are possible. So I want to be honest, following God doesn't necessarily stop the storms of life and it doesn't remove the opportunities to make stupid choices. It does something far better. God can take your joys, talents and laughter and make them less hollow. And He can take your anxieties, limitations and helplessness and give you hope.

Title font used: '814yzx'

Innocence

There is a unique beauty in innocence. It is something to be treasured, marvelled at, enjoyed and protected. Fiercely.

The edges of the world seem less sharp and pointed, more accommodating and generally better when we are innocent. Why? Innocence is guiltlessness, it is having no red on your ledger, no debt owed, nothing to worry about. It is freedom. Freedom from caution, the caution that that is birthed from an expectation of attack, retribution, disappointment and pain. Innocence says that the default is good, not bad, that the outcome will be positive not negative. Innocence is the opposite of being jaded.

Innocence is often associated with naivety, negative connotations of unreality, blindness and foolishness... The waiting period before waking up to the cold harsh reality of life and the smell of ash. It is the cushion that makes you feel safe but doesn't actually break your fall or stop you from snapping your legs.

If this is what you think of innocence then you are not alone. You must have been jaded by life's kicks to the stomach. But there is yet hope. Truth is that you can change your view on the whole thing, if you choose to.

Now you might be pointing to your circumstances right now and saying 'There really is no way I can look at this mess and have any other view than my one right now - and yes I am jaded - for good reason! My Jadedness reminds me that this is what I should expect and that makes this circumstance less shocking and easier to deal with.'

Well, I have no idea what your circumstance is right now but I do know that I have been kicked in the stomach a few times and I have felt the same way about life. Hard exterior keeps me safe. But then I stumbled upon a little nugget of truth (well actually it came and found me out).

You lost your innocence? Welcome to the club, now chew on this: Your innocence can be restored.

You might think I am saying that because I don't know just how deep the pile of filth is that you lost your innocence in a long time ago, but that's not it. I am saying that because it is true, was for me and is for you - doesn't matter who you are.

His name is Jesus and he can be your innocence. Bit of a weird concept to the uninitiated so give me a second here... You, me and literally every other person out there has lost their innocence to a greater or lesser degree. All of us except for this one guy - Jesus. Now one of the most amazing things about innocence is that it holds on to hope, even in the face of the worst situations. That is what Jesus held onto - despite the fact that he knew all of us were a complete mess he held onto the hope that some would decide to choose freedom from all the entangled mess. So he gave up his innocence, took the punishment that he did not deserve, and absorbed all of the guilt of whoever would decide to make the trade.

Now here is a weird thing about guiltiness, once you have been condemned, jaded, broken - you get used to it. This is the reason that criminals so often keep re-offending - they have lost their innocence. Even though they might do their time and pay the sentence for their actions they still feel jaded even though in the eyes of the law they are now innocent. So they just keep on acting like they did before because the way they perceive themselves is not as clear cut or as quick to change as the legal system is. So they re-offend and go back to square one.

We are all exactly the same as this - we might not be breaking the laws of our country but we are all constantly breaking moral, spiritual laws that we generally agree are good. Do not steal. Do not lie. But we do!  That is why Jesus is SUCH good news because he can make you innocent again! But here is the danger - we do the same as the re-offending criminal. We get declared innocent but we don't feel that way. Well here is a lesson we Christians need to learn - tell  your feelings to line up with the truth.

The good news continues here as well. God doesn't just release us from prison and let us wander around aimlessly - he helps us. He is our crutch that lets us stand even with broken legs. If we ask him, he is faithful to restore to us what the locusts have eaten. We might not ever be what we were before but we can retrieve our innocence and we can be stronger than before we ever fell in the first place.

Even though I have done my time

And paid for my crime

Everything is not just fine

I can't get my feelings in line

Cant shake the guilt in this heart of mine

-  Oh pine my soul, pine!  -

For the ineffably divine

To make sense of this mess where there is no reason or rhyme

To his purity and innocence let my life bind

That freedom and release in him I might find

He is open, compassionate and kind

Powerful and pervading, able to renew my mind

Sets me free from the meritocracy grind

Oh my soul, let your worth by him be defined

Amazing grace! Now I can see, I am no longer blind!

Title font used: 'Euterpe'

Yoke

My head is down , remembering its place in the yoke

Compunction and terror, bahal

morally broke.

Is this a Joke?

How am I here again?!  Walking in the path of sinful men

Sitting in the seat of scoffers am I completely off my rocker?

How far can I fall, how deep does it go, have I no sense at all?

Am I just a sucker for a beating, do I still look for meaning in things that are fleeting?

Get up my soul. Stand firm. It's time to let the old man burn.

It was for freedom that Christ  set you free

 do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Remember it now and remember it well

 you have been released, no matter how far you fell.

He is your strong tower, your tower of refuge. He is the rock on which you stand and he shelters you under his wing.

Follow the Sheppard to the hiding place, tucked  away from the storm in the crevice of the mountain's shadow sing.

Surrounded by storm, fire, smoke and dust

quite yourself and trust.

/Selah/

Hear the still small voice of your loving father.

He calls you by name, feels your pain and reminds you again...

"Oh child of mine, you are known to me, even if you flee to the other side of the sea

 there is nowhere you can go that I won't be.

You are mine, my own and I will never leave you alone.

Don't you know how much this cost? Don't belittle what I have lost

My only son, that's right that's what I've done, the price I paid so you could come

Now sit down at the table take off that yoke remember you are planted by the river like a mighty oak

By the streams of living water your soul will be quenched, tread deeper and deeper get thoroughly drenched.

This grace is limitless, the ocean bottomless forget the superfluous worries of this world and fix your eyes on the prize and let your gaze rise to the skies cause I am coming back to rescue my bride.

So forget those chains of sin and put on this band of love, you are only here for a time but you were made for heaven above."

Gatekeeper

 

Who are the gatekeepers, the guards at the door of your life?

Who are the stoic fortress wardens, armed with wisdom?

Who stands watch, remains vigilant through the night?

Who sees with perspective, the inside and the out?

Who are the key keepers that discern, to enter or not?

Recently my life has come under a certain amount of trial. I say 'my life' meaning more than simply my immediate experience, because while this trial had me at the centre it affected the majority of the people connected to me.

While trials in this life are both inevitable and uncomfortable they are also often moments of decisive clarity. They provide a unique perspective on ones view of themselves but also give an opportunity for us to see how our friends and acquaintances will respond.

Jaffa Gate - Jerusalem, Israel

To borrow a parable it is often not easy to tell whether we have built our house on the rock or on the sand until the rains come down and the floods come up. If your house is still standing by then end - you built it right.  It is the storms of life that are proving of our relationships.

If we take Job as an example (no I am not likening myself to Job) he experiences a trial the like of which most of us will never have to endure, unfortunately for him the people surrounding him were less than perfect in their response. Even his wife (one of his few remaining relatives) tells him to just give up and die! Hardly the kind of encouragement needed to persist through life's trials.

Abandoned Syrian Bunker - Golan Heights, Israel

Thankfully my story is very different! Over the past few days it has become blindingly obvious how well 'insulated' I am by a great number of people around me who care, pray for and support me, often in ways that I never even see. Many of them will in fact be the ones reading this and so to you I say thank you.

Among my friends and family there are a few who have the position in my life to speak louder and clearer to me than many others, their position in my life is decided by me. They may not even realise it but they have more influence over me than most other people. They are in many ways gatekeepers that have the power to discipline, correct, encourage and shape me in ways that most will simply never be able to.

Derelict Shack - Gloucester, England 

The truth is that we all have people like this in our lives, the question is whether they are good gatekeepers or not. Are they wise, discerning, kind? Do they have your best interests at heart? For most people when they are born it is at least initially their parents who fulfil this role - they protect, nurture and direct their children. Or at least they should. Because we are all human we have all experienced disappointment with our gatekeepers, times when we needed them to be looking out for us but they were absent. Or for some of us we found out the hard way that someone we had given the role of gatekeeper to was toxic. They did not have our best interests at heart and they did not just not protect us but attacked us.

What do we do when our gatekeepers fail us? - We fall onto God.

Jobs gatekeepers were pretty useless but he cried out to God and while the response he had was not what he had hoped for it was exactly what he needed. You may have been let down by your parents right from day one but God is the father in heaven who never fails to love you. Your friends and colleagues might be like sand around you but Christ is the rock on whom you can build your life. You may be in the midst of a storm but He can be the anchor.

You may be under siege from all sides but God can be your gatekeeper.

Title font used 'Code Bold'