Filed under Books …

Apr 17 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Faith, Friends, Jesus, Pilgrims Progress, Prayer, Religion

Resist the lion!

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour; Whom resist stedfast in the faith (1 Peter 5:8-9 KJV)

My friend actor Russ Boulter sent this to my Facebook page. He said it was worth hanging on in with – and it certainly is. Longer than most videos for blogging, I urge you to cut out 7 minutes (or at least 5) to watch this. The verse above kept coming to mind as I looked at it.

It’s so important that we stick together, remembering our fight is never against flesh and blood. It’s vital that we go out at all costs for the lost and wounded, and never give up!

I get that feeling that someone reading this today (caught between the crocs and the lions?) needs to know – We’re on the winning side!

I love reading Pilgrim’s Progress – Bunyan assures us that though the lions roar, they’re chained!

“Fear not the lions, for they are chained, and are placed there for trial of faith where it is, and for discovery of those that had none. Keep in the midst of the path, no hurt shall come unto thee…”

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Apr 04 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Faith, Jesus, Marriage, Prayer, Religion

Needs overrule the golden rule

Very often when talking to couples preparing for marriage, or those struggling through it, I recommend a book called ‘His Needs, Her Needs‘ by Willard F Harley. Dr Harley lists the emotional needs of men and women. He writes about the invisible ‘love bank’ inside all of us which needs to keep on being filled up – because life is making withdrawals all the time. I don’t agree with his lists, but the concept of emotional needs is undeniable. It’s not wrong to have needs, in fact we were all made with physical needs, spiritual needs, relational intimacy needs.

If you were to stop the average person in the street, “What was the first thing that was bad in the Bible?” most who even had pub quiz knowledge of the story would say, “It was the snake. That snake who got them to eat the forbidden fruit.”

Wrong. Phone a friend. Or use a lifeline, or better still, read Genesis 2:18

God said, “It’s not good for the man to be alone.”

So God invented marriage, where Husband and wife vow to be the primary person on earth who meets the other’s needs – for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer…. till death us do part. These public pledges are so important. Did you know it’s illegal to be married in a locked church? The idea is that anyone could walk in off the street and join in the service and hear these words being publicly proclaimed (I’ve had that on one or two occasions in conducting weddings where we were joined by gentlemen of the road!). But we prove the reality of the words in daily action and thoughts, not just on the big day – but on lots of little days.

I’d been married many years before I even discovered this concept of meeting Zoe’s needs. Until then, I’d just tried to follow the golden rule – treat her as I’d like to be treated. However that only works to a point, because she actually wanted to be treated different to me! Then we went on a marriage retreat put on by Intimate Life Ministries, as part of which we looked at our own relational needs, and compared them with each others. Guess what- we were different.

In fact in a room of over 100 people, not one couple had the same top three emotional needs!I think this list is actually a lot more helpful than Harley’s. Have a look on this link, it’s an eye-opener! Which one would you most need to have met? That’s your number 1 emotional need. If you’re married, which one would your spouse most need? If you don’t even know, how are you going to meet it?

The problems start when I try to ‘fix’ my wife with what ‘fixes’ me. For instance, my number one need might be for words of Approval (okay it is – and thanks for the positive blog comments by the way, keep them coming!). So if Zoe was feeling down I’d ‘help’ by expressing how great she is. Problem? That would make me feel better but doesn’t ring her bell at all. She’s waiting for Attention - for me to make the time it takes to enter her world and find out what’s really happening – as I fly out the door telling her she’s wonderful.

I have to go beyond the golden rule and not just treat her the way I’d want to be treated, I have to discover and then treat her the way she needs to be treated!

happy-couple.jpg

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Apr 03 2008
1 Comment
Bible, Books, Faith, Friends, history, Jesus, Marathon, Prayer, Quotes, Uncategorized

The real challenge is not winning the race

I’m sitting here with my leg up. The last few weeks have seen me increasing my mileage on my runs (no special reason, not doing the London Marathon this year, though I’m considering doing something similar later in the year). Half way round a fast – for me – 8k this morning and felt a twinge in my left calf, decided to press on. By the end it was sore!

There’s a great book I’m picking up that’s got me motivated. Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an all-night runner. Wow. It’s a kind of memoir, well written, about this crazy man who has … well, let him tell you the kind of things he does.

Reading his book kind of puts a sore calf in perspective. I have over the years done a few marathons, when I was in my late teens and twenties I even did a couple of mountain marathons and even once did 50 miles over night – ended up in hospital at the end with a busted knee! The thing which struck me about the video is Dean’s line, “The real challenge is not winning the race, it’s crossing the finish line.”

A line from the book grabs me too, though I’m not sure I agree with it right now. It came as he was three quarters of the way through his first 100 mile mountain marathon, given by a Red Indian Chief manning a water station in the wilderness. ‘Pain is weakness leaving the body.’ Hmmm….. in between Ibuprofen, I’ll try to remember that!

My friend J John told a group of us once that in his home country of Cyprus, the ancients used to run a race called the milos, where competitors had to clamber over all kinds of obstacles, carrying a flame. At the end, it was the first one to cross the line with the flame still burning that got to wear the victory wreath. It’s endurance that counts, in the long run!

1 Cor 9:24 in the Message keeps me keeping on: You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally.

Great to run with you.

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Apr 01 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Community, Faith, Friends, Jesus, Prayer, Religion

Never Walk Alone

I don’t know whether my talk last Sunday was actually recorded because we’ve been having hassle with that, but the main focus was ‘Why we need each other.’ Let me summarise it.

Our culture applauds independence. But we read in Romans 12: “Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.” That means people need people. Too often we don’t realise how much we need every other member of the church – we think independence, not interdependence.

God wired all of us in such a way that we can only fulfil his purposes for our lives in community, in relationship to each other. That’s what we’re going to be looking at as a church family for the next 40 days, 40 Days of Community.

We looked at three reasons why it’s great to be in a small group with a few other friends who you get to know on a deeper level than just casual acquaintance.

1. I need others to WALK with me. In other words, I need people to help me grow spiritually. The New Testament tells us we’re to walk in the light. We’re to walk in love, we’re to walk in obedience, we’re to walk in the Holy Spirit, we’re to walk as Jesus walked, we’re to walk in wisdom.

But one of the important things is this, (it’s not in the Bible) I’m quoting from Gerry and the Pacemakers; Never Walk Alone (great song – have a listen)

2. I need others to WORK with me. The Bible says in Ephesians 2:10, “God made us to do good works, which he planned in advance for us to live our lives doing.” God put you on earth to do certain things, but you need other people to help you do those things. Otherwise, you get tired.

The reason you’re tired is twofold: a) You try to do it all. b) You try to do it all by yourself! God never meant for you to do that! You know the acronym for Team? (Together, Everyone Achieves More!).

3. I need others to WATCH OUT for me. People who’ll protect me, stand up for me when I need somebody to stand up for me, who’ll help me stay on track, who will warn me if they see me going off. Because we all have blind spots. Things in our lives we can’t see, only other people can see.

A couple of years ago, did you read about that young guy who was an experienced climber and decided he’d go climbing by himself? He thought he could do it alone – but he slipped and fell and his arm got caught. He waited five days alone. He would’ve died there, because there was nobody else to help him. The only way he got loose was to cut off his own arm below the elbow to save his life.

I’m following through a daily reading plan in Rick Warren’s book ‘Better Together’ and really looking forward to going to look at this material tonight in more depth with my L1FEgroup. We’ve been through practically every kind of personal and family crisis you could imagine and we’ve been there for each other. It’s community – it’s God’s plan, for you…

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Mar 27 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Explorers, Faith, Heaven, Jesus, poverty, Prayer, Religion, Uncategorized

Out of the jungle

I’m reading General William Booth’s classic ‘In Darkest England and the Way Out.’ (You can download it free if you follow the link). Well worth reading on its own merit – a book years ahead of its time, very influential in social policy and politics.

Booth starts by reminding his readers of Mr Stanley’s (‘Dr Livingstone I presume?’- actually he probably never said it) exploration through the Congo, the descriptions of which were being read voraciously all across Britain at the time.

Henry Morton Stanley

I just returned from speaking at a funeral and my mind went off at a tangent as it does, I was struck by certain parallels.

Stanley was describing to his readers in Victorian England what they could not perceive. ‘The Lost Continent.’ Darkest Africa. Pygmy tribes and cannibals. How could they imagine ‘forests’ (he uses the word because the word jungle hadn’t yet been coined) larger than France, where it poured rain every day and the sun rarely pierced the canopy?

Then there are the tribes Stanley encountered. They had never seen a white person before. He describes how they steadfastly refused to believe that there was, or could be, anything beyond the ‘forest’ in which they and their ancestors had roamed. How do you convince people that there is more to life than what they have seen so far? That’s the preacher’s task! As I preached at the funeral, I was pointing beyond the grave to the promise of glory. I read from Revelation 21, John the beloved’s attempts to describe his visions of that awesome reality we call heaven.

We’re living in this concrete jungle. Surrounded by what we taste, see, touch and smell. It’s easy to think this life is all there is. But our battle is not against flesh and blood, and our citizenship is in heaven, from whence we await a Saviour. He has promised that he has gone ahead of us, prepared a place for us – a real place where there will be work, rewards, relationship, perfection, glory everlasting and joy unspeakable. This world is not our home. May the Lord help us not get too attached, and as we explore through its darkness, may we point many to the only way out.

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Mar 23 2008
1 Comment
Bible, Books, Church, Faith, Heaven, history, Jesus, Prayer, TV, Uncategorized

BUT

Personally I really loved the film, Zoë didn’t like it at all – said it was one of the worst things she’d ever seen. It was called No Country for Old Men, and it swept the board at the Oscars this year. And I am not going to give the end away except to say that when it ended – all around the cinema, there was a collective “What?” People didn’t ‘get’ the ending.

A Vicar friend told me years that if I wanted to imagine a world without God, I should see a film called Seven. It is a horrible film. The thing is, the ending of it is so shocking- because you’ve been preconditioned to expect a good ending, and you don’t get a good ending. Evil triumphs. It’s awful! I was kind of in shock for days after that film. 

It’s a bit like when we watched a film called Jude - based on Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure, it’s just so depressing, and that’s the happy bits!

The thing is with these stories, we don’t want the film to have a bad ending, we don’t want to have evil triumphing. We want good and right to win the day. James Bond blows up the baddie’s lair. Hansel and Gretel push the witch in the oven, that kind of ending. Have you ever watched a film or a play or book – and at the end of it you shook your head and said, “NO – it’s not supposed to end that way! The story shouldn’t end like that.”

It’s not just in stories and films is it? In this world, people end up standing at a hospital bed or a graveside – and they say something very like that, too often. “It wasn’t supposed to end this way.” The story of a life. That’s why I think at funerals it’s such a shock, even though we know people die, we don’t want life to come to an end, yet it does. It’s so final and it’s terrible and that’s why the Bible calls death an enemy. The last enemy.

The Easter story doesn’t end at Good Friday, thank God! It doesn’t end with the whole of humanity including you and me being responsible for the death of the Son of God, and that’s it. The story is not just that God comes to earth and is rejected and is spat on and killed. If that’s where the story ends; well – it’s just a horrible story! It’s got the worst possible ending!

But…

What a fantastic little word. A word spoken by the apostle Peter in the first sermon which kicked off the church of those who follow Jesus, he said the little word changes the whole course of history. The wonderful word that changes the story, the most important word. Have you noticed that it’s always this word that changes the story?

The detective twirls his moustache – looks around the parlour – he turns to all assembled in the room. We all thought the butler did it…but!

The woman thought no-one could love her now, the man she’d secretly longed for – already spoken for… but then, the sound of hoof beats – he’s coming up to the house…

The alien space ships are triumphant, the whole world is under their command but…..

I’m a Christ follower, and you should become one too (everyone should!) because of this word, in this verse in Acts 2:24. It says…..but…God raised him from the dead! But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him!

We Christians don’t just have the dying Saviour, and the dead saviour. Wonderful as that was. Even if he gives forgiveness. Even if he offers life to the thief on the next cross to him. If he couldn’t do it, he shouldn’t offer it. If he just lived and taught and died and stayed dead – what use is that?

BUT easter-empty-tomb.jpg

This was not just another teacher! Not just a good man or a prophet! God the Father raised Jesus from the dead, to prove His claims that He really was the Son of God. Thank God for Easter!

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Feb 29 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Comedy, Faith, Friends, Jesus, Prayer, Religion, TV, Uncategorized

The wisdom of crowds?

The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations, was written by James Surowiecki to argue that decisions are often better made by a group than could have been made by any single member of the group (the whole group is smarter than even the smartest person in it). He does go on to say that it matters how the group is made up, that people in it should be allowed independence, diversity of opinion etc., rather than just advocating crowd psychology as the answer to everything. These democratic wiki days attribute a great deal of prestige to wisdom of the many, but I have to ask – is it at the expense of the individual?

What if the crowd is wrong? What if there’s just a trend, or a panic, or pressure to conform? The Bible says, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world.”

I love that bit on Life of Brian when he shouts at the crowd, ‘You’re all individuals!’ Check out the response.

I’d take issue with Brian about not having to follow anyone, and we all follow someone – even if it’s the prevailing viewpoint. Just make sure who you’re following is going the right way!

This morning I was reading with my Friday morning men’s group through the beginning of Luke’s gospel. It seems Jesus had some issues with crowds.

The home crowd liked him at first, when he was preaching good. But then he said the good news was not just for the Jewish people, but for everyone, everywhere. Suddenly the same crowd that loved his sermon hated the application and then tried to chuck him off the nearest cliff! Now that’s what I call a reaction! I’ll never moan about a letter from ‘distressed, 3rd pew back’ again.

You can spend a lot of money on a trip to Israel to walk ‘in the steps of Jesus,’ but it’s really interesting to look through the gospels and notice the STOPS of Jesus. How often he’d see not a crowd, but a person. One life at a time. A leper who’d been left on the margin by the crowd perhaps, or a bunch of fishermen and a tax collector who would not have been welcomed by the religious elite crowd, the in crowd. Very often you notice it’s the crowd that would keep a blind man sitting quiet and unhealed at the roadside, or stop a paralysed man’s friends from bringing him to Jesus.

The only crowd Jesus was happy to sit with (and vice versa) was what you’d call the wrong crowd. The comment by the righteous observers was that he hung around with ‘scum,’ as my friend Justin’s Bible version rendered this morning.

I love what Zacchaeus did when Jesus came to his town. He got above the crowd – to see Jesus! The crowd would have kept him (and his sort) away, but Jesus saw him and said, “I’m coming to your house!”

Don’t go along with the crowd, get above – look out for Jesus – and then follow him.

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Feb 25 2008
Bible, Books, Church, Faith, Friends, Jesus, Prayer, Quotes, Religion

Wrong about everything

Sometimes I read a book or hear a talk that makes me think just about everything else I’ve ever read or heard about it is wrong.

If the subject is something trivial like, say, what’s the best car on the market, or how to bake a souffle – who cares.

But when the book is about what you have devoted the greatest part of your adult life to, and which you intend to devote the rest of your life to, that’s either infuriating, exciting, terrifying or shattering. Or all of the above.

Yesterday I read a book that nearly did that, I read it in one sitting:

Gary Bishop’s book Darkest England and the way back in is phenomenal and very challenging, but left me with some, “Yes but hows” personally. I cried a couple of times reading it, was challenged by the terrible injustices of a nation like Britain where the poor are desperate to hear the gospel but hardly anyone goes with it, while we encourage consumerist Christianity that has a form of religion but denies its power. I manfully managed to shake the Holy Spirit off for a while enough to just watch a bit of TV before bed time. I can do that with a lot of books, even excellent ones.

This morning though, I picked up the book that is really doing it. That, “This is Jesus talking and I’ve come to screw you up” thing.

When you never want to just go and watch telly or just try to get on doing what you were doing anymore because now there’s an opportunity to do something greater than anything else and you’re invited to partake. I bought the the book a few weeks back, started it, then started something else. The time wasn’t right then, but now I feel like God’s talking off every page. I’m at 104 and can quite believe that by the time I’m finished, I will have to reassess everything in the light of this teaching.

What’s the book? Organic Church by Neil Cole.

BUY IT!

A mutual friend of his wrote the foreword, I’m going to get in touch with Neil Cole direct if I can and talk to him about this. One constant: Everything’s changing.

One quote is all I have time for, then I’m getting back to reading this!

If any one Christian alive today were to lead just one person to Christ every year and disciple that person so that he or she would, in turn, do the same next year, it would take only about thirty five years to reach the entire world for Christ! Suddenly world transformation seems within our grasp. But it could be even closer than that. If every Christian alive today were to reproduce in the same way, the world would be won to Christ in the next two to four years. What if all of us decided to put everything else aside and focus on truly discipling another for just the next few years in a manner that multiplies? We could finish the Great Commission in just a few years.

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Feb 21 2008
3 Comments
Books, Church, Friends, history, justice, Quotes, Religion

There but for the grace of God goes Anthony Delaney

They say everyone has a double. To have a double and a namesake appear on the same page of a paper is quite disconcerting! A number of friends have been kind enough to point me to various news sites featuring another Anthony Delaney, also 43 years of age – I know I don’t look it :)

My homeless namesake was living at Gatwick Airport for months, until magistrates found him in breach of his ASBO and brought it to an end. If you follow the link you’ll even see that they picture Tom Hanks from his overly cute 2004 film The Terminal . I was told by a nurse years ago that I look a bit like Tom Hanks, those of you who know me may agree or disagree? Let me know.

Do you know what came to mind as I read the other Mr Delaney’s sad story – knowing that if Jesus hadn’t put his hand on me and called me to follow him, I could well have ended up in as sorry a state or worse?

‘There but for the grace of God, go I.”

That well worn phrase was coined by my fellow Mancunian the C16th Protestant reformer John Bradford.

bradford.jpg

Bradford was imprisoned for his faith for many years in the Tower of London (sharing a cell at times with such luminaries as Cranmer, Ridley and Latimer). Whenever he saw a criminal going to be hanged for his crimes, he said, “There but for the grace of God goes John Bradford.”

Bradford himself was eventually burnt at Smithfield. He had been shown in a dream the night before that this would happen. He kissed the wood beforehand, and the stake, before lifting his eyes to heaven and he cried, “O England, England, repent thee of thy sins.”

He told the man dying alongside him, “Be of good comfort, brother, for we shall have a merry supper with the Lord this night.’

Unlike the other Delaney, I’m not sleeping rough tonight, thank God.

Reading about Bradford reminds me I have so much to grow in, in terms of godliness, prayerfulness and faithfulness.

Both men’s lives remind me, the grace of God really is amazing.

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Jan 26 2008
Books, Environment, justice, poverty

The end of the world as we know it?

This week I’ve been reading ‘Scared to Death – from BSE to Global Warming; why scares are costing us the Earth.’

51xo7klvjol_ss500_.jpg

Quite a long title – and a lot of read at nearly 500 pages. Well worth it though – here’s what it says about itself:

This book for the first time tells the inside story of each of the major scares of the past two decades, showing how they have followed a remarkably consistent pattern. It analyses the crucial role played in each case by scientists who have misread or manipulated the evidence; by the media and lobbyists who eagerly promote the scare without regard to the facts; and finally by the politicians and officials who come up with an absurdly disproportionate response, leaving us all to pay a colossal price, which may run into billions or even hundreds of billions of pounds. This book culminates in a chillingly detailed account of the story behind what it shows has become the greatest scare of them all: the belief that the world faces disaster through man-made global warming.

Personally, I’m convinced by much of their argument – and glad I read it in preparation for this coming talk tomorrow on ‘God and the Environment.’ We are to care for the world and be good stewards of it, but the best way is not to be like so many people blindly believe whatever gets pushed our way and sold as truth, because an ‘expert’ said it, the paper wrote it, and a politician spun it. Anyone really concerned for the planet should read this book.

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