Yearly Archives: 2009

2010: from Paul Leader

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I believe 2010 will prove to be a major turning point in many situations, and I recently received ‘The sound of the anvil’ from Paul Leader’. I have known Paul for a number of years and he is someone I trust. Here it is as he wrote it….

Hi everyone, here is the sounding out of the anvil for 2010. After releasing part of this on facebook I had feedback that the same thing was heard a few years ago. I asked who said it, and apparently I did!!! At first I was miffed but then after thought I was very chuffed, that is the sounding of the anvil, a repetetive sounding out that will over time shape something for incredible use. So here is what I sense and here for the new year…

2010 will be a significant year of shifting ground that will lead to major exposing and uncovering. It will be a time for open heavens and new wells, and the rediscovery of old wells. His eye will go too and fro through-out the earth seeking and saving what has been lost or misplaced. What has been buried will be uncovered, especially those things that the enemy has tried to keep hidden, this includes truths that have kept the Body of Christ disabled or at a place of powerlessness. There will be signs over the next twelve months such as many major archeological discoveries, and there will be major exposure of secrets behind key political events from major points of history.

There have already been key signs in the earth such as major discoveries of major oil supplies over the last few months. Headline in New York Times read, ‘ Oil Industry Sets a Brisk Pace of New Discoveries.’ The article says the discoveries have taken place in five continents, and have been due to deeper drilling through tougher rocks. There have been more than 200 discoveries this year by the giants and by the minnows. Areas include Irag’s Kurdish region, Australia, Brazil, Norway, Ghana, Russia and the Falkland Islands. I believe the Lord is ready to release fresh deposits of oil through-out the earth. There will be those who have experienced tough valley times that will make the Valley of Baca into a place of pools. These pools will be teaming with fresh deposits of oil. Gushers will spring forth through-out the world at places that have known hardship economically, physically and spiritually. And not just the major western countries either, many minnow countries will flow with fresh oil.

There has also been the discovery of more new species of plants and flowers this year than any other year. They have been growing in seclusion and only now has God allowed their discovery. At this moment there are many hidden moves of God. Many places of creativity that are yet to be unearthed and discovered. This year we will see God at work in many secluded places. God loves a hidden place, many revivals and moves begin in backwater places. Even Christ’s birth is a sign of how hidden births are high on God’s agenda. I believe we will be surprised at what comes out of Eastern Europe and France and Germany, and many small African and South American Nations, towns and villages.

It is time to pick up the staff and declare Moses is dead long live Joshua. The inheritance of land and community is waiting for us. How we did the last season will not fit this season. It is a new day with a blank canvas. It is not only the goal-posts that have been moved but the whole playing field. How we played the game before will not give us victory now!!! It is time to re-write the history books. It is time to venture where we have never been before in ways we have never gone there. This will be a season of new doors and new invitations. many will enter into new Nations for the first time. New jobs, ministry etc. Eyes and spades, site and gardens, look and dig. Get the tent ready for mobility. Static christianity has a sell-by date, it is now time for the Nomadics. It is time for the shape-shifting church and gatherings. Flowing with the contours of the land and community. The rhythm of God beat out.

The race for Christmas number one. This was a sign and very significant in that the corporate machine was beat by the power of the people. The safe sound was beat by a shout, a noise, a cry against the establishment. The Lord spoke to me concerning the sound of his church. It would no longer be enough to worship to the safe sound of the corporate machine. Infact I believe we will see a meltdown this year in the contemporary christian music scene. The corporate machine of endless safeness will begin to crumble. Our sound will not be dictated to by the machine. Major worship ‘stars’ will either lay down their guitars in obedience or will experience difficulties. What will arise will be the sound of the people. Worship will be given back to ordinary people and not controlled by the few. Prophetic sounds will be released by many who have never played an instrument. It will come with an edge. It will seem to be anti-establishment, and will clash with the machine, but in reality it will be establishing something more significant, a people worship movement that restores every member ministering.

Going back to the garden will be significant this season too. A rediscovery of what it means to know God as the Gardener. The garden is a place of creativity. It is a place of origins and firsts. It is a place of rediscovering our true image and identity. It is a place of dominion. It is a place of fruitfulness and creativity. It is a place of filling the earth. It is a place of good food. It is where man becomes a living being. It is a place of relationship and communion with God and one another. It is a place of wild wandering in the cool of the day. It is time for the garden to be revisited.

2010 is a key to the next ten year window to 2020, the year of perfect vision. What we begin to see established now will become foundational for the season ahead. New roads, new paths, new foundations, new vision. A fresh insight into all that God desires for us. Get ready for the year of exposure and uncovering.

Trust this blesses etc. Submitted in love and humility, Paul.

Christmas…

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A happy Christmas to one and all. What a time of year. A good time to reflect. On the many good things. Also on the disappointments. The entry of our God into our world signals a time for hope.

Just getting back to a podcast or two. So hope those following the series picked up on the one yesterday. Scot McKnight is doing an interesting walk through Gregory MacDonald’s book The Evangelical Universalist (the author is actually Robin Parry). A very strong argument for universalism from someone who takes Scripture as authoritative.

Probably now off-line for a few days. We have been seeking God this month about our coming year and the shape we sense for it. And I will update on this in the new year.

Eschatology #27

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At last… the microphone was on, I had a couple of hours. The first on ‘The Intermediate State’. My conclusions – well a sort of life in heaven after death, but that is not the hope, resurrection is where we are headed.’ And for the unbeliever? Shadowy, or more likely non-existence. Of course there can be a lot of disagreement with this – but then there is not too much in Scripture on it all.

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what it makes of me

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Hi – I wrote this a couple of days ago so forgive if it appears I am extending a conversation Martin has ended – for now. Perhaps, this slightly different approach will be helpful. c.

In a book I just finished one of the characters muses on comments his father had made about a community of people who live together on an island. According to his father, since they cannot easily escape one another they acquire a formality of manner and are careful with one another. They cannot and do not speak freely for fear of making lifelong enemies. Due to living on the island, making their lives there, “they held their breath and walked with care, and this made them who they were inside, constricted and small, good neighbours” (385).  And, “(he) trusted God to guide their hearts, though he knew them to be vulnerable to hate” (386). (From David Guterson, Snow Falling on Cedars, UK: Bloomsbury, 1994.)

One of the problems with church may not have much to do with what the institution calls itself or what it calls me. It may be more what church makes of me, and who I become in church.  Over many centuries the church (I speak of the overall institution here rather than individual churches) has turned itself into an island surrounded by the unsafe sea of the world, out there, the other place, with those other people, who are not us. The island of the church is the shelter for those who fear God and want to be counted among the righteous. We call ourselves the church so that we can be accorded membership in this defensive sanctuary. But in the end, what does it make of us? Who do we become within the church?  I would suggest often we become smaller and more constricted and yes, vulnerable to hate, even if it is only expressed obliquely in our aggressive zeal and assumptions of virtue.

Perhaps that is why Jesus spoke of going out into the world and making our community among the others, those who do not recognize us as members of the finest group.  We are not accorded the safety of a company huddled on its island when we head out into the world.  And of course, then we are shaped differently. Returning to the island becomes difficult. It feels awkward, close and small. We feel incapable of breathing in such a tight space. The wind of the spirit deserts us, unable to enter our lungs and animate us. And in the eyes of those remaining within the holiness of the island, we are now the other, too dangerous for fellowship on any terms.

I don’t believe Jesus calls us to create islands of security within the raging seas. We are called out to brave the elements, to seek out the lost and befriend them. We are called to make our community with those rejected by the institutions of purity and protection, as Jesus did. And in the process we are remade into someone else, perhaps much more like Jesus.

Let’s Drop the name… final

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I intend for this to be the final post (for now at least) on the idea of dropping the name. Wow – thanks for the comments, and the few private ones I received too.

Who knows if the name will ever be dropped, or if it should be dropped. We do not live in an ideal world, the kingdom shapes us, but is only here in part. The NT gives us great insights but cannot be the last word on shapes and names, but it is that text that sets our trajectory.

The problem with the word ‘church’ is it is a very powerful name. (A little technical and from memory as my books are a few hours away… skip if not interested or not accurate!! The ekklesia, the people who took responsibility for the shaping of the polis (Graeco-Roman world); it also seems this word was the OT (LXX) term for the people of God when acting to purpose (translating qahal not edah).

So the word church belongs to those who are acting with purpose, called by God. 2 or 3 who function in Jesus’ name must be church. Does the name need to be dropped? In one sense it belongs to all, so no. But the problem is it has been taken by something that is normally defined as ‘local’ church, ‘congregation’ and by so doing robs the name (and perhaps authority) from the body of Christ.

Perhaps the name cannot be redeemed at this stage, so maybe it needs to be dropped.

Here then is a summary of where I would like to see some major ground taken… without or without the name being dropped:

  • as the real issue is the taking of the name in a way which forbids others to take the name,
  • I want those who are outside of the congregational setting to be empowered to know that they are not odd, or misplaced, or outside of church, indeed
  • they might well be in the right place
  • that congregations (meetings) become just that. They become gatherings that have to justify their ongoing validity by how much they release the body. For the same people to meet there forever needs to be questioned… for the goal to grow to be questioned… for the need for property to be questioned…
  • that there are some places over a period of time that can function as Paul did in Ephesus.
  • that the missiological argument – reaching the community – be taken seriously, but any compromising methods be seen as temporary and certainly not permanent.

I think one of the most fascinating parts of this journey for me is the validity of the less-than-ideal.

A recent visit to the Catholic cathedral left me feeling that it is not a major problem at this time. Perhaps there are those who find faith there (and others who are confirmed in guilt and superstition I am sure).

But yesterday’s model is not adequate for today.

Visiting Brazil and seeing ‘churches’ in the slum areas as signs of hope, and places that reach out gave me a high respect for what they do (and I am sure there is also abusive teaching, monetary practices that do not release people).

But yesterday’s breakthrough vehicle is seldom today’s agency for the kingdom.

Where does this leave us? The enemy is never out there. The line never separates me from evil. The line runs through me too. It leaves us gladly as pilgrims (hope we don’t have to drop that name… not yet!).

Financial squeeze and pioneers

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We have come across a few rather sobered people of late. A taxi driver saying she drives around but with so little work… an honest couple struggling to find a sympathetic bank… then Kyle told me of two cases: a man who had worked at a firm for 16 years told he can keep his job but the pay will be revised to 900€ a month; another one who was told he could keep his job if he worked for a month for free! Tough times…

A pioneer in the charismatic / healing world has died. I remember hearing an old tape of Oral Roberts when I was around 16 years of age. Entitled the Fourth Man, relating to Jesus as the ‘fourth man’ in the fiery furnace in Daniel. I know there was some controversy surrounding some of his statements (what did he mean by God wil take him if he did not raise the money to save the City of Faith medical and research center?) but he was a pioneer, that inspired others to believe God for supernatural interventions. I am grateful.

Two insights. The lives of people living their lives in the economic world. People we have to connect with. Pioneers of faith who made a mark in their generation and have now gone before us. People whose faith we have to emulate.

Ban bull fighting?

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A few years ago – probably in 2005 and probably in Valencia – I made a declaration that the two major signs that would mark the turning in Spain woudl be the banning of bull fighting and Gibraltar being given back to Spain… (I appreciate that politics has never been my strong point.)

Well Giles Tremlett the Guardian reporter, and a real friend of Spain, one who has truly married the land (see his book Ghosts of Spain), reported Spanish region set to ban bullfighting. He concludes:

Campaigners hope, however, that if the ban goes ahead other Spanish regions will follow suit.

“Everywhere in Spain the majority of people say they do not like bullfights,” said Cases. “Over time, this will have to be prohibited. Otherwise we will be back in the stone age.”

Maybe this also indicates that Catalonia can give a lead to the nation.

Let’s drop the name #5

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Purposeful places

Paul taught for 2 years in the hall of Tyrannus (Acts 19:10), is it significant that this was not called ‘church’? Why do we have to label something that is serving a purpose as ‘church’. I was in the USA in Jan 09, sitting in a place where there is an amazing impartation. What a great value to have a place like that. We don’t have to see such places disappear. If we do why not also get rid of other institutions / places: libraries, universities, schools, etc. They all impart something that is needed.

So by dropping the name some places could find fresh life (and I know lose something in the process) as they discovered that they were making a real contribution to the body of Christ in terms of equipping people.

Some might last 2 years, some even longer.

When the time comes for them to cease / to change let them. The serving places are not eternal, the body of Christ is to last for ever.

Ready to move

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Worked hard yesterday but now almost ready to move. So how to change the bills for electricity and gas into our name? Heavy rain all day… go find appropriate shop: over one hour search; find shop. Take ticket to join queue. 25 or so people before us… each one taking a little longer than 6 minutes; the maths (math for US – why the difference?) means they close for lunch and we have not been seen.

But back in afternoon. Now only four people before us. Oh yes… oh no. Can’t do this here, you must phone this number. So we phone the number ‘habla ingles?’ is an ever hopeful starter to make it a little easier… but hopes dashed. (In Spanish) no you can’t do that here – got to do that through the shop. But….!!!!

Try the phone again later – this time – unless we have really messed up in the language it is done (and no mention of the aforementioned shop). A day’s work completed at 4.45 in the afternoon.

But today beds arrived, tomorrow internet, and Thursday a fridge / freezer. Makes up for the wet day and the change of bills.

Thanks for those who commented on the keys. We too saw this as very significant. New keys for the next phase, please Lord. At least he does not say ‘can’t do that here, try somewhere else’. Patience is needed, but he always answers.

Let’s drop the name #4

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King free zones

The king has a kingdom – true, but as we have no king but Jesus (remember the OT is a compromise relating to priest and king, God calling for a kingdom of priests) we need king-free zones on earth. The king attitude is ‘you need to be here at a given time’, but if our legitimacy is that we are submitting to the kingship of Jesus and are therefore part of his ekklesia, there is a freedom to explore, to run, to follow.

I remember the time when I listened to a challenging talk on being a follower of Jesus, I watched the response, and then listened to the final announcements in this monthly meeting. It focused on leaflets that were on the chairs, the encouragement to be back there next month and to bring people with us. Apparently Jesus calls us to follow him, but there is a predictable element for those who really follow – they will be back where they started in a month’s time. No following Jesus is much less predictable than that. (This is not the same as those who cannot get beyond doing their own individualised thing.)

What would we lose in dropping the name?

  • Centralisation – the church meets here being replaced by the people of God being present in and through the locality
  • Money – where does the tithe go? I will leave that one for now!!

What might we gain?

  • The possibility of the body being released in its diverse expressions of life
  • The release of ministries to serve the body in its life settings.

(Not that this blog is all one-sided of course….)

Let’s drop the name #3

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Many things are neutral. Buildings are neutral. Most people who read these blogs relate in some way to buildings. For work,for banking, shopping, and for living. Buildings can be very useful indeed, and for God’s purposes they too can be useful.

Gathering together can be neutral: ‘what was that all about?’ type of question afterwards; harmful (Paul’s statement to Corinth, although he did not then tell them not to gather); or incredibly advancing to the kingdom. Discerning the latter can be very difficult indeed, as it must be more than something that ‘touches me’.

So in these blogs I am hoping I can get beyond the rightness of ‘buildings’ or ‘meetings’. Both of which can be helpful, but neither of which can define ‘church’. So back to dropping the name.

If the name ‘church’ should not be taken by the denominationally defined group, but it belongs to the whole body of Christ, should not those local gatherings drop the name? The name should be given to the body for its use, but as it has been hijacked, and now carries baggage (‘local church’ = proper church) perhaps this means that it is almost impossible to redeem it at this stage.

It seems that the concept of ekklesia belongs to those who are in Christ (located in heaven) and, located on earth (for example, in Corinth). I know the latter definition opens for us in our global age the question whether the church has to be expressed geographically and not simply virtually… however, with my convictions about land redemption I still need a lot of convincing about that one.

So we drop the name – this happens universally (!). What might result? This is what I wish to begin to explore.

When no expression can automatically claim a level of legitimacy that illegitimates something else, there could be a major move forward as far as unity is concerned. The unity would then be in Christ, not in a style, a denomination, etc. We would also be released from trying to find unity only one way – the unity of the pastors, with the great goal of them sharing pulpits! This might be better than we have currently, but it could also simply bring us to another level only to discover that our bondage at that level is even worse than the one we are in.

Perhaps even our prayers for unity are being answered with apparent disunity. In other words if our hopes are the unity of the (local) churches this might work against the unity of the ekklesia. The latter unity also needs to take place in the right setting – that of the world and the meal table.

It seems to me that the people of God can find themselves working together in many diverse settings when they ignore the structures – is this the unity that God desires? Is he answering our prayers with the dispersing of the body from the four-wall approach?

A new apartment

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What a strange feeling. Sign a contract, pick up the keys and now get furniture in the next few weeks. Our electricity here blew last night – so no cooking, no lights, nothing till the next morning – all helps with the conviction that this is the time.

Higher up, roof terrace, and some more space.

In January we will have someone with us for a number of weeks, maybe a sign of what is to come?

A couple of shots of the main lounge… and from the roof – down the street, and space to sleep an army: once the barbecue has been cleared away.

What does the next year hold – we are full of anticipation. So hard to analyse year 1, so little to gauge for year 2, but we are sensing the hand of God on us and are ready for tomorrow.

Amazingly we have signed the contract 1 year and one day from when we signed last year. The major difference is we signed and caught a bus to the airport, to fly back on Jan 1 hoping we would get the keys as the owners had not signed… this time we have the keys.