Mind Body Spirit...

So what is this Mind Body Spirit, well it is a new age spiritualist festival. What did we do? Well we hired a stand for the week as we felt that God wanted us to be there. We did two different things, the main thing was what we called "Creation prayer" basically asking God who the person was, what he wanted to say to them, how he sees them. The other thing we did was healing prayer.

It was such an amazing week, we prayed for over 500 people at the stand, as well as so many more during the week around the festival. The thing that we all took away from the this is that God just broke your heart for people, he is so for reaching out and touching people, I have no idea how many people we actually prayed for and talked to during the week, but the biggest thing God wanted to say to people was that he loved them. And as you told people this, after sharing words of encouragement, knowledge etc, people would just break down. The theme of the festival was Love, and people just needed to know that It was God who truly loves them. The whole experience just blew me away, so many people so hungry to know truth. We were given 100 gospels of John, and we left the festival having given them all away, but we did not just give them to anyone, we gave them to people we had significant conversations with, people who God told us to. We had a number of people come to faith as well, and we were able to give them info on local church and how to find out more. The other cool thing was there were three other Christian stands, one called the Jesus experience, who are a group of Messianic Jews, who do similar stuff to us, but using the Jesus Deck as a tool for sharing the gospel, one that did dream interpretation, the only stand in the place which did, and the other was a massage place. All the other stands you had to pay for, but all the Christian stands were for free, we had a verse before we started from Isaiah which says come and buy bread without money! And we sent people between the different Christian stands and prayed for each other and worshiped together. It was amazing.

I want to share two particular stories from the week which really ruined me, but there were so many, I would never be able to put them al here.

The first we prayed for a lady, and I have never had an experience like it, we were praying and asking God who she is, and what he wanted to say to her, and I had the deepest ache in the depths of my spirit while praying. It was an ache of longing, we had a picture of Jesus just weeping, crying out for her, desperate for her, and that is what I was feeling. We had some other really specific words for her, and also got to pray healing for her, which was instant. She broke down and kept asking if we tell other people what we were telling her. The amazing thing about the week was that no two was the same, God knows everyone intimately and we saw that. She went away after we sat and talked for a while with a Gospel to read to find out more about who Jesus is. Time after time we just shared truth with people and you saw them transform before your eyes, they would light up with hope.

The other story I want to share really broke my heart. We were praying for a woman for healing, as she told us that basically her immune system had stopped working properly, so her body was basically rejecting itself. so we prayed for healing and I really felt God give me the word rejection, that she felt rejected by her family and the other things in her life, and she told us yes and that she had accepted it. So we prayed some more and God said she needed to forgive those people, and also to repent for accepting the rejection, which she did not seem keen to do, we talked with her a bit longer, so she prayed forgiveness, but you could see it was not from her heart she just spoke the words. Because she had accepted the lie that she is rejected her body was physically reacting to what she believed in her spirit. As she left my heart broke, because I know God wanted her to be free, but she was not willing to accept it. It really challenged me, to see how desperately God wanted her to be free, but that she did not see it.

It was the most amazing time, and I know that I will not see things the same again. To see God touch so many lives in so many ways, to see how desperately he wants to share with people, but how gentle he is in that as well, he never forced his way in, he offered and waited.

My prayer is that all those seeds would be protected and grow, our link outside the festival was with alpha, each card we gave to people had the alpha site on the back and we told people that if they want to find out more about Jesus that is a really good way to do that.

God is so amazing, I can not truly express here what happened over the week, but He touched so many lives, like I said he is amazing.

Our Light...

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."


This is a quote from A Return To Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles by Marianne Williamson.


This quote has always challenged and inspired me to think about what my own light is, what does it mean to be a child of God? and what is this Glory of God within us?


So what does it mean to let our lights shine, simply to show the world who God is, his spirit is within us, the spirit that brings life, and I do not mean the everyday, I mean life in all that it can be, in fullness, after all Jesus said himself that he came so that we could all have life and life in its fullness. For me this means that that hole that I felt, always wanting to find something to fill it, but never managing to, has been filled. I have peace and satisfaction with life, knowing that God, who created everything, loves me and accepts me. That in itself is a humbling thought! "I am unworthy, but not worthless" is what someone said to me last week. In fact I am so very uniquely valuable, we all are, as God himself gave the most precious thing he could to save me. I think that living the truth of this is one way to let our light shine, not cutting myself down, but in-fact acknowledging that God actually does see me as valuable enough to give himself for me, he actually likes who I am. No matter what that looks like, he still loves me and accepts me.


The other way to live the glory of God that is found within us is to know what the purpose that God created us for, which is to be expressions of who he is on this earth. We do something on the YWAM (youth with a mission) base I work on that we call freedom prayer, which is basically asking God who we are, who he created, and then asking God what is getting in the way, what lies we have in our lives that stop us living this. Fear of what other people think is probably the biggest thing that holds us from living this as real! I know it has been in my life, but God is so good, and I love him so much, he has freed me from so much in my past.


I think that is the key to life, it is living in the love that God has for us, we can never be rejected by him, as he has adopted us as his children, and promises never to leave us, and God is always true to his word. And when we live in that love, other things do not seem so big anymore. There is great security in it, and all the things that God says about himself become more real. As we live in that freedom, that security, other people want to come round it, as they feel safe, it gives them a place where they can ask questions and find freedom also. That is what I see when I look at this quote. As we live in the reality of who God calls us to be, it releases others around us to also be able to live in that freedom. I have found this to be true in my own life, as I have spent time around people who are really on fire for God, I find they have a deep passion for living life, and it is infectious, I also want this. It challenges me, but also greatly encourages me that maybe I can also have that, and I have found over these last couple of years this to be true. As I spend time round people who are living in the freedom of God's love, I find it rubs off, and I am also able to live in that freedom, and then I notice people round me, who I can speak encouragement to also, and see them move into greater freedom. It is one bit cycle really...


Needless to say I love God, I certainly do not have all the answers, far from it, I still do not understand a lot of things that happen, but I love God and trust that he sees more than me, and I want to know more of who he is. It is a really exciting journey.

A Week In Cambridge

So we headed to Cambridge for a week with the April 2011 DTS (Discipleship Training School) which I am helping to lead. It was a time of real strengthening of friendships as a team, we all had such fun together. The city itself is so beautiful, with the university area and all the old town, buildings several hundred years old. We just don't make them like that anymore. The city is also full of bikes, simply because it is easier to get around on a bike.

We joined up with the YWAM team in Cambridge and got the chance to do a number of things during the week. The really cool thing about the week was that this is the first time that YWAM in Cambridge has had a team come and join them, and the week we were there another team had come over from the States, so there were a lot of us!

The first couple of days was spent working with a new church plant, we ended up going door to door to talk about the church and offer prayer for people. i was so surprised at how open people were, and how many people truly wanted prayer over some really significant things in their lives, we even got to pray for healing for people.

The other few days were spent doing a lot of prayer round the city, as the team in Cambridge have launched a new 24/7 prayer initiative for the next few weeks, with the aim of establishing a permanent prayer house in the city. This was really amazing, being able to write down things that God had said. I also found out that nearly 20 years before God had spoken about the establishing of a prayer house in the city, so to see the vision and dreams being walked toward is amazing.

All in all the team and I had such an amazing time, it was a really good way to be able to spend time together encouraging each other and actively practicing some of the things that have been taught during the school so far.

The team :)

Walking With God...

I am in Cambridge this week and found myself with an evening free so, since I lived here until I was almost 9 (which in actual fact is over 15 years ago!), decided that I would go for a walk with God round the area I lived. It was so much fun, and I got to see God do so many random things.

I started off popping into a local tesco, to get a couple of bits for the team I am with, and ended up having a conversation with a lady about the little pocket bags you can now get, and was able to bless her before she left. After that I walked down the main street and stopped to talk to a couple at a bus stop outside the church that my family was at when we did live here. I asked if they knew where the road that I used to live on was, and found out they were also visiting the area, but thankfully they had a map with them, so we were able to find it on the map, and we blessed each other as we parted company. So after I found my old street, I did a crazy thing and knocked on the door of the house I used to live in, and was greeted by a really lovely lady, who must have been in her 50's. We talked for a few minutes about the house and what had changed, and she said that If I wanted to see it I could come back during the day when her husband was also around, but I did et to bless her before wandering off. I headed toward my old primary school, but was not entirely sure where I was going, but I could not find anyone to ask, so asked God instead and then headed in the direction I felt was right, and got there without getting lost! Thanks God. It was so much smaller than I remember it, in fact everything was, but I guess I have gotten a bit bigger since. I then headed back to where we are staying and on the way asked God if there was anyone I could pray for before I finished my walk, and he lead me to a leisure centre, where i met two guys, Ben, who was about 3 inches taller than me and well built, and Dave, who was in a wheelchair. When I asked them if I could pray for them they immediately said yes, so I asked if there was anything specific, to which they said no, just a general prayer of blessing. So I got to pray for them, just like I had asked God, it was so amazing, to see an answer to prayer like that.

Like I said, I had so much fun, and even came away with about 30p in my pocket, as I kept finding coins whenever I stopped, God is just awesome. I think the biggest thing for me during this walk was taking a step of faith on those little prompts that I felt were from God, such as knocking on the door of the house I used to live in, or asking those two guys if I could pray for them. It's funny, when you do step out and follow what you feel God is saying, you see God touch the people you meet, but he also touches you as well, it is such an encouragement, such a faith boost.

I think this quote from William Temple sums up my walk.

"When I pray, coincidences happen, and when I don't, they don't."

A Weekend In Crawley!

So we headed down to a place called Crawley for the easter weekend to help out with a new church plant, aimed at the Portuguese speaking community (mainly Brazilians) in the area. The church has been planted by a couple who work out of the Holmsted manor YWAM base, which was the first base here in the UK. Such a beautiful place to spend the easter weekend, especially with the weather we had.

The team spent Saturday doing a mix of evangelism, basically inviting people to the church for the easter service, and also serving some of the local people by helping to clear gardens etc, it was so much fun. I got to sit and chat with a guy who had not been to church for nearly 15 years. He suffers from sinus headaches, and so is going in for an operation in a few weeks, he was really open for talking, and I felt I should ask him if he believes in prayer. His answer to me was that he could not remember the last time he did pray. So I asked him if he was open to me praying for him there and then, for his operation etc, and his face lit up, so I got to pray with him in the middle of the town, it was amazing. I love doing this sort of thing, and I had a revelation during the time that we were in Crawley, that in actual fact, I really do love it, sharing with people the hope that I have, and being able to pray for them, there is such life in it.

On Sunday we spent the morning planning the church service, which they hold in the afternoon. The team ran the whole thing, which was such a blessing for the guys who have planted the church as they normally do everything as a couple. So to have a team who could do worship, testimony, preaching and the kids work was an amazing easter gift for them. It was also a lot of fun for all of us, and I know that the simple act of sharing what God is doing is such a faith building exercise for both us and the people you share with. I am sure that there were a few nerves especially  as a few of the team had never done anything like this weekend before, but we all left having had an amazing time, with stories of God. Such a great way to bond as a team; to be encouraged, and encourage others.

I think that one of the highlights for al f us as a team was simply the amount of food we were given, the Brazilians know how to do a BBQ, full of meat, meat and more meat. Such a great time of fellowship.

Phil Went To A Club!

I want to start this with a question, what were you doing last Friday?

I found myself at a place called Batchwood, which is a club close to the base. I am helping to run some of the outreach from here that focuses on reaching out to the people who go to the clubs, basically handing out water and lollies’. It leads to some really interesting conversations, as the clubbers try to understand why a group of people would come and spend time at the club and give out stuff for free. We do this at least once every two weeks (on Fridays) and I took with me a group from the new DTS (Discipleship training school) that started here at Harpenden two weeks ago, for which I am full time staff. It is always so much fun, and the guys who came with me all came away raving about it, which is always nice!

The guys who own the club always enjoy having us come and spend time, and you get to have some really deep conversations with the bouncers and taxi drivers about who God is and what life is. I reckon they think we are a bit crazy heading down and spending our night round the club, but they really enjoy the lollies. One of the girls who came with me ended up in an amazing conversation with a girl who had recently come down from Durham. She had been going to a church there that does similar things at some of the local clubs in that city. We got to chat with her about where she was at and encourage her. I love it when God brings people together, so we invited her to come to the church that meets on the base on a Sunday evening. The night was full of other conversations ranging from drunk people thinking we were crazy to the girl above, and one of the bouncers asking some really deep things about what it is to be a Christian, but most are short, kind of double take passing chats about why we are doing what we are doing, most people think we are nuts, but at the same time tells us they have a lot of respect for what we are doing.

I always enjoying going, chatting and sharing with people, as it really challenges me in my faith, and where I am at with God, and keeps me pressing into him.

A quote from Phil Jones (one of the DTS trainees) – “I thought that it was a fun way to serve people, and one where it is love that is received. I initially thought it would be fairly pointless, but now I think that doing it consistently will see that love go deeper for the guys who are meet regularly, especially the staff. Even just going once I was asked by a lot of people why I was doing it, which both challenged and encouraged me to want to go again.”

Amazing Miricles

I am constantly amazed by God's faithfulness, and his willingness to be apart of our lives.

This little story started last November, when I was helping to run a week of evangelism in Newcastle. We had a time of praying for people to ask God to heal them, which was incredible in itself, seeing God really touch people, setting them free from so many different things. There was one girl in particular that we prayed for, she had cysts on her ovaries, which she has had all her life, and the doctors had told her were incurable. Obviously there was no way to tell at the time what God had done, but she said she felt peace, so we thanked God.

Its been about 6 months since we prayed for her, and last week I got a facebook message from her to tell me she had been back to her doctor in Spain for a regular check. When he ran the tests he had found no sign of the damage, and he was unable to explain what had happened. Such an amazing story, and one that I will not forget.

The most amazing thing is, I had not really thought about it much since we had said goodbye at the end of that week. But she had obviously not forgotten about the prayer and nor had God. I was completely blown away when I got the message, God is so good. I really think it shows God's joy at being able to be involved with us, and how much he just wants us to take that step and ask. The more I hear about the things God does, the more convinced I am that he really does want to be right there with us, involved in both the good times and the bad.