Seeking God...

For the past month or so I've been to a few planned, spontaneous and spontaneously planned prayer meetings and it has got to the point where I really need to blog about it!

Every prayer meeting, has had a different focus and has had incredible outcomes. It's so easy to be complacent with our lives and pray for ourselves, so its great to get excited about the bigger picture, from students-twenties-revival.

It's amazing how each time we've had a prayer meeting, God has faithfully met with us, even tonight as a few of us gathered together for a last minute prayer meeting God came powerfully and showered us with words! I went feeling lethargic and wanting to be elsewhere, yet praying desperately for a change of heart when I got there and man, did my heart change. It became so apparent that God wanted to break in and break our hearts for what breaks His, to have our hearts broken for the broken. To be ruined by God, completely. As the evening continued and people continued to step out in faith, both literally and spiritually, I felt the passion growing, the excitement increasing. I truly believe we all went away with fresh hearts, filled again and a new thirst and passion for our town and for other things on our hearts.

Every prayer meeting has been an amazing chance to step out in faith, whether it be the guy stepping out and running worship or the guy praying out for the first time. Each meeting has seen new fruit and new gifts being developed.

It's an exciting time.

God has faithfully met with us as He promised and each time I leave feeling refreshed and amazed at our amazing God. This last month has been an incredible month of growth, from seminars and preaches, to prayer meetings and theological meetings.

Yeah, theology-me! It's the most hypocritical thing ever! I used to hate theology, my thinking was : "I'll keep a child like faith, keep it simple and not go near the scary stuff.", (basically I thought it was too intellectual for me!) My friend loves theology, while he was doing a year for the church he used to constantly talk to me about theology and I would just nod. But now I see the importance of theology, of asking those uncomfortable questions, thank God that friend sowed that seed in me! Just the other day we had a session on single and double pre-destination, justification, sanctification and glorification and it was brilliant. To be able to discuss and look at those difficult and potentially scary subjects and break them down was so good. I'm thirsty for more. We may not have all the answers, but theology is so much more than just searching for the answers, it really gives you another perspective on God and highlights even more how fantastic He is. Theology has helped me strengthen my relationship with God because it makes me even more aware of what He's done for me.

God is a 24/7 thing and its important to have a continuing thirst for Him.

"Never be quenched, never be satisfied and be forever hungry"

...that's what I want to be like!

My challenge: let's run after God and seek Him in everything we do.

Together on a Mission/Mobilise...

Last week I headed off to sunny Brighton for 4 days of teaching, worshipping, learning and altogether exhaustion. It was an amazing 4 days and by the end of it I was physically, mentally and emotionally drained, but spiritually soaked!

I felt like a sponge, every preach and every worship session absorbing more and more information and learning more and more about our incredible God, for me it was an impossibility to come away from it feeling empty or even deprived of God's presence.

The work didn't stop after each loaded meeting, it continued far into the night, when each night we had to walk for half an hour to get to our car. God would continue to place things on my heart or challenge me on things said previously in the day.

By the end people were moaning about how tired they were (which is understandable), but the only thing I could think was "I'd rather feel like this everyday, having had the week I've had than being comfortable and having missed out".

Tom Shaw's preach on idols saw hundreds of people released from the grip of idols and Terry's series of preaches on New Frontiers, got everyone inspired and excited about the future of the church. The celebration on the last night, saw people letting go of their inhibitions and being undignified in worship, it was great to be able to dance and jump and go crazy with giving money away to the nations and to the future of the church. By the end of the night, I was buzzing, getting overexcited and emotional about seeing the gospel spread throughout the world.

Another highlight were the seminars that I went to. They helped me to learn not only more about God, but also more about myself-which lets face it, can't be a particularly bad thing.

The first seminar Together on a Mission by Steve and Anna Van Rhyn challenged both men and women, and inspired me and I'm sure most women, to be a wall rather than a door, an analogy that looked at two different types of women:

A door: swings, not concerned with depth, worries about beauty.

The wall: Strong, secure, support etc.

It made me want to strive for being the wall. And for the men, it challenged them to take the initiative and to take responsibility. Every woman was nodding their head at those points!(a very brief summary)

The second seminar Leadership, Life and Love by Steve and Debbie Tibbert was also really motivating, I've been to my fair share of leadership talks, but this one was different. I again learnt a lot more about myself, and learnt a lot about self-leadership as well as leadership in general. What came through most for me, was the honesty that Steve and Debbie had, it was refreshing to hear them talk so openly and honestly about past mistakes and the humility they had was also inspiring to hear.

There were so many highlights and although it was a truly shattering week, I can't imagine that a single heart wasn't left unchanged and that not a single person was left untouched by God.

It really was a spectacular week, that left me desperate to learn more about God and to continue to pursue Him and seek a deeper relationship with him. I left with greater friendships, after great times with friends, I left feeling challenged by God, by myself and by others and I left a truly changed person.

Take a listen... http://www.mobilise.xtn.org/resources/mobilise2009