Fuel prices come down

I watched the news today and was pleased to hear that the fuel price is going down next week by around about one Rand.
Great I thought.
Such reductions have been something of a monthly occurrence for the past few months or so.
It really does help those of us who watched in some fear the fuel prices growing to an all time high earlier this year.

With such good news at the fuel pumps shouldn't we see this reflected in the supermarkets? After all, the food prices went up and up as the fuel became more expensive.
Sadly, to my disappointment their has been no such reduction in our day to day needs from the supermarkets, bread, milk and so on.

So, living in a country that has so many people living below the poverty line, what does a reduction in fuel costs mean to them?

Here in South Africa, we are surrounded by people who are living in shacks and earning very low salaries. A large majority of such people can't afford to run cars, so fuel costs coming down have very little impact.

So, what do you think, will pressure be put on the retail market by the powers that be to bring prices down?

Manufacturing costs have gone down for the retail market; so at present, with the continued high costs for products, someones making a nice profit!

Somewhere between the real and the not!

Do we live in a dream world?

Are we always thinking about how we would like things to be rather then living in the now?

Its easy to miss out on what is before us if we're always worrying about what isn't.

Its good to have dreams but we aren't meant to live their.

(Sorry, I'm speaking to myself)

The words we speak!

Set a guard over my mouth, O Lord; keep watch over the door of my lips.
Psalm 141:3

How easy it is to tear a person down with our words?
I'm not really one for mincing my words particularly when I feel I'm in the right or that I've been wronged, but God doesn't always want me to speak out, to engage at every wronged moment.
Sometimes we are to stand up and shout, but invariably we're called to humbly wait on God.

Its not easy to decipher Gods desire in those heated moments though is it?
I guess that's why the Psalmist prayed a prayer as seen in this verse.
Maybe like me, he couldn't hold his tongue!
But God can.

The Bible Speaks Today

Why go for a modern translation?

Child-like-faith

Three Lions on the shirt!

Well done to the mighty England who went over to Germany and once again beat them.

Sadly I didn't get to see the game, it wasn't on the TV over here but I was delighted to wake up to the great news of our 1-2 win.

John Terry slotted in a late goal to win the game for us.

Keep it up ENGLAND!

Last nights sermon

So, I have good news and bad!
The good news first - I'm told that my sermon went really well last night, which I'm well pleased about. I felt the Lord placed this message on my heart and I'm excited about what may come as a result of it.
The bad news is that my church is having technical problems at the moment and my sermon couldn't be recorded. You know its only happened because I had made reference to the fact that I'm hoping to upload the audio from my sermon!!
Actually, its just one of those things. The best I can do is publish my sermon notes on Google Docs. If you want to read them you can click on the Link below:

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=ddp84qn2_3g3rbrsg9&hl=en_GB

The published version looks big, but its spaced out as I would speak it.

I do hope to be able to upload my future sermons so that you can listen to the audio but well......be patient eh!!

Saturday morning bliss

Wow, what a change from the weeks rain.
I've woken to a beautiful day in the bay, the windows are open, the sun is shining and all is well with my world.
Saturday mornings should always be like this.
I did bombard Louise this morning with my sermon structure and content; its a hard life being a preachers wife!
I've taken from her desperate expression that its time to stop preaching and I've put on some great music.
Trevor sent me a music CD comprising of all kinds of great stuff. One piece of music I've really taken too is from a band called 'Balmorhea', they are a two piece violin and piano teaming and their music is just amazing. I've managed to get a copy of one of their albums called 'Rivers Arms'; man this is great stuff to chill out too.
So the storm has calmed, that being the rain and the preaching - long live chill out tunes!

(If you like modern classical sounds, you will love Balmorhea - Rivers Arms)

Rain, rain go away...

So, most of the days this week I've woken up and wondered whether I'm back in the UK. Instead of the delightful sound of the sea I've had the sound of driving rain on my bedroom window. Weather like this makes me think of good old English summers!!
Joking aside, the country has been soaked to its core over this past week with some very un-seasonal rain. Sat in my nice comfortable, waterproof home all is well but there are a lot of people living in tin shacks that have a complete nightmare when prolonged rains like this come. Please pray for those living in the local communities around Jeffrey's.
The forecast is for dryer weather over the weekend which will be a welcome sight for many.

This Sunday sees me back preaching in my church which is really cool. I've had a bit of a break while I've been preparing for my past exam.
For some time now I've felt God leading me to preach a sermon on how He speaks to us today. So on that bases I've put together my sermon. The passage I'm preaching from is Hebrews 1:1-3:

1 Long ago God spoke many times and in many ways to our ancestors through the prophets.
2 And now in these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son. God promised everything to the Son as an inheritance, and through the Son he created the universe.
3 The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God, and he sustains everything by the mighty power of his command. When he had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honour at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven.
(NLT)

I can't say that my sermon is very exegetical more topical but the passage does start with how God speaks and I'm going on from their.
I'm hoping that it will be recorded, if it is I'll try and post a copy on YouTube or something like that and leave a link on my blog.
So watch this space, I'm hoping to be able to post all my future sermons this way so friends and family can keep up with my preaching.

Wherever you are and whatever your doing, have a great weekend

God bless ya

Dog tired!

2008 Global Leaders Summit

Here are some thoughts I was asked to put together after attending the 2008 Global Leaders Summit:

I want to start with saying that this year’s summit was great. I have been blessed with having been to both this year’s summit and last years. I found that this summit had a much more spiritual sense about it. We are leaders in God’s Church and though we can learn from the business world we must remember that our nature and function are very different to that of the business world.

Where do I start with what I felt God blessed me with from the various speakers?
In Bill Hybels first session he spoke about the need for church leaders to have to make decisions. Decisions will often affect others in either good or bad ways. In the business world one can say that we are basing those decisions on the good of the company, leaders can be firm and hard if needed under such reasoning. In the church decisions need to be made, sometimes hard decisions, but often we fear their consequences.
Bill gave us a four point plan that if applied, should help us as we seek to make wise decisions:

FRAMEWORK FOR DECISION MAKING
1. Does the bible speak about it?
2. What would smart advisers say to me concerning this decision I have to make (seek the wisdom of worthy advisers)?
3. What have I learnt from the pain of past decisions (the good ones and bad)? Try journalizing not just spiritual matters but our practicing of decision making for later reference within our future ministry.
4. What is the Holy Spirit saying to me concerning this matter?

I would actually put the point about the Spirit second but this structure, I believe could really help us as leaders.

Gary Haugen, in his session blew me away.
One point that sticks out to me is the point he made concerning the things we strive for.
“Just because I'm passionate about something's doesn't mean that God wants it for me and for those I lead”.
This links well with Bill’s points on wise decision making and made me really sit up and think. I have a number of things running around in my head about church and even my private life that will affect others, are they things that God wants or am I striving towards my will?

A theme for the conference in my eyes was “Is this doing church”?
Am I doing church by striving for the things that really only matter to me? Isn’t “doing church” actually about getting down to the things that matter to God?

I’m going to close now by giving short feedback on other sessions, hoping that if I keep it short I won’t get marked down for going over my allotted three points!!

Efrem Smith and, “Leading in new cultural realities”; what a timely word?
We are living in a multicultural world where people living with us are not only from other countries but are often people that in fact come from the same country but are very different culturally. With such a truth in mind, shouldn’t we be doing church in a way that reaches everyone regardless of colour, greed or culture?

Craig Groeschel and, “IT: How leaders can get IT and keep IT”.
“IT”, being the life and presence of the Spirit in all we do as “Church”.
We can have “IT”, we can lose “IT”, but we can get “IT” back again.
What a mind bender this paragraph is? However, what needs to be understood is the need for the Spirit to saturate every aspect of church. If we don’t have such a blessing, we need to be taking every step to get “IT”!

Bill Hybels last session on “Relentless” and his study on the life of Mother Teresa. What a way to close the conference? What an amazing lady Mother Teresa was?
I’m sure at times we’ve all felt like giving up, Mother Teresa’s life shows us someone who never did, and reminds us that we must never give up on fulfilling the will and calling God has for us.

Last words: check out John Burke’s session (on the DVD).
Messy Church! Should we make people wait until they have their life looking all together before we welcome them in to church? If they were in such a “utopia state” wouldn’t they be out of place in our churches with all of us less then perfect people?

Windswept

I love Jeffrey's Bay but I don't love the incredible winds that we get.
As I write this post I'm sat at home with the windows battened down yet still the blinds are being blow by the incredible wind outside.
One thing you never see in photo's of the bay is the wind, its an invisible force.

Jesus actually likens the Holy Spirit to the wind in the Gospel. We can hear the wind but we don't where it comes from (someone who understands weather would likely give a science lesson and explain it all but, well......)
Wind is a great picture of the Spirit though isn't it? Some days its gentle, like a slight breeze.
The Spirit is often gentle like a slight breeze in our lives, His always their gently leading us through life and reminding us of his presence.
Then there are the days like today when the wind is incredible in its strength. The wind can actually blow man made structures apart (thankfully, I'm not seeing that in the bay today).
The Spirit also has that ability; man's best efforts to order his or her life can be blown away in an instant by the Spirit if that is God's will.
What about wind as a source of compulsion? The wind blows sailing boats, kites and can even produce energy that powers so much in our lives.
The Spirit of God is also a source of power in the believers life; if harnessed we can be lead by Him into a deeper relationship with God and into becoming more like Jesus, mature in all matters of life and faith.

The Holy Spirit is just one ingredient within the grace of God; a grace that He pours out upon all who will seek Him and respond to His invitation to have an exciting relationship with Him.
The Holy Spirit is cool man, why wouldn't you want Him in your life?

I still struggle with the wind, but thinking about it as I have here does make me feel somewhat better about it.

8 The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.
(John 3:8, NLT)

13 And now you Gentiles have also heard the truth, the Good News that God saves you. And when you believed in Christ, he identified you as his own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago.
14 The Spirit is God’s guarantee that he will give us the inheritance he promised and that he has purchased us to be his own people. He did this so we would praise and glorify him.
(Ephesians 1:13-14, NLT)