Back to Batchwood

Last Friday I took a group from the current September DTS (Discipleship Training School) to Batchwood (a local club). Where we give out water and lollies to the folks coming and going to the club, and talk with the people we meet if they want to. A group of us goes there most Friday’s and it’s always really good. 

It’s been a few months since I last went, as I was away leading a short-term mission trip, so it was really nice to see the bouncers again and catch up with them, they always enjoy having us come down. The club was not as busy as it has been, but everyone who came with me ended up in significant conversations with people. I spent about 45 minutes chatting with a guy called Matt before him and his mates headed off. His comment to me was that it is really nice to be able to talk with someone who listens. He had some really deep questions that he wanted to talk about, but said he has found it really difficult to find anyone to be able to talk with. He was really open to God and very close to actually making a commitment to follow Christ.

One of the guys we talked with (on the left)

We did not manage to pass out all the water that we took, but we certainly blessed a few people, including all the taxi drivers that come and wait for the club goer’s at the end of the night. It is really nice to go and reach out, and do something that people do not fully understand, but really appreciate. So many said that it was really cool what we were doing. We all had a lot of fun, and I ended up going to bed about 5am on Saturday.

Something Matt said to me really got me thinking, “You get two types of people, those who listen to listen and those who listen to talk.” If Christians are really going to be people who make a difference to the those around us then we need to get good at listening to them, and hearing where they’re at and what’s going on in their lives, not just engaging with people to try and tell them things that maybe they are not in a place to hear.

Being in Church is great, being with other Christians and encouraging each other, but we need to get out there as well. I really believe that Jesus is walking the streets, and you see so much of God’s heart for you and those you meet when you go on that walk with Jesus.

A Gathering in London

I spent the last week (6^th-12^th November) in London at a DTS (Discipleship Training School) Gathering. What is this you ask? Well it is a coming together of a number of different DTS’s from different Youth With A Mission (YWAM) bases from around the UK together with two Schools Of Evangelism (SOE) (one from Norway, the other from Carlisle). This was organized by the Forever team (which I am helping with part-time at the moment, www.forever2012.com) and is run as a week of teaching on evangelism and also actual outreach in partnership with the churches in the local area.  We are focusing on cities that are hosting Olympic events at the moment, so they have been run in Cardiff, Newcastle, Manchester, Weymouth/Portland and now London, with the next in Coventry in March.

Numbers can vary from gathering to gathering, but we had over 200 people join us in London in an area called Tower Hamlets. It was an incredible and encouraging week for all involved. The churches really loved to have us alongside them and everyone really wanted to get stuck-in to what was going on and didn’t want to miss God. In the end we had hundreds of stories of how God touched people’s lives in the area through a big range of outreach activities such as: prayer walking, litter picking, various sports and art outreaches, and treasure hunting (asking God who to talk to and going out and talking to them). Also something as simple as engaging people for a chat and hot chocolate on a sofa in a park. Everyone really enjoyed the range and different things that they got involved with and it was a really good time of listening to the local community and blessing the area.

The week was very significant for me, with God speaking more about the next few years and also having my heart broken for people in a new, deeper way. On the Thursday afternoon we had some free time, so I asked God what I should do. He told me to go for a walk (which ended up being about 7 miles!) After an hour of walking, while praying for the places I wandered through, I felt God ask me to buy a bag of lollies and that I should give them out as I walked back toward the church we were staying in, because He wanted to show me some things. 

As I kept walking I offered lollies to all sorts of people, but most of them didn’t take any. The majority of people who did take them were those that wouldn’t normally be noticed. I got to bless people sweeping the streets, people who are homeless, young and old etc. I approached a group of young guys, probably between 16 and 20, and offered them lollies to which they asked, “So why are you doing this then?” A very good question as it probably does not happen very often! When I told them God had told me to do it they did a double take and thanked me for my craziness, it was great! 

I also stopped to talk with a woman who was working trying to sign people up to support St Mungo’s (a homeless charity). We talked for about half-an-hour, in which she told me that she was once a Christian and that meeting someone like me gave her hope in people again. 

But the conversation that really broke my heart was the last guy I met. He was sitting on a bench, drunk, and threw his can of drink in my direction as I walked toward him. When he spotted me he looked really confused, I offered him a lollie and as he took it he also took off his hat and made space for me on his bench. He seemed so crushed, so hopeless, his first comment to me was “well I guess this means that God hasn’t given up on me yet.” We sat and talked for 45 minutes, or so, about God and what had happened in his life. He told me he was an ex-Catholic priest and from what he said he had been greatly crushed recently. What broke my heart most was that he stopped part way through our conversation and started yelling, almost sobbing, that he was a Son of God, but he was in despair as he didn’t know how to come back. I prayed with him a number of times during that encounter and when we parted he managed to stand up straight after a bit of a struggle and I gave him a hug and blessed him. He told me as we parted that before I sat down he was going to end his life that night, but now he was having second thoughts and thanked me for giving him hope. It was really interesting for me to be there with him, as he was seeing God through me, he kept looking at me and saying things like “you look like an angel.” My heart broke, I felt a bit more of what God’s heart is for the broken in this world, and it hurts!

I talked with a good friend of mine when I got back to the church, as I had questions and needed to pray with someone myself. The thing he said that really stuck with me was, “Jesus is walking the streets looking for the broken wanting to reach out to them, and he needs our help to do that.”

How can we just sit back and not do anything when God is weeping? When we ask God to break our hearts for what breaks His, are we really ready for what this means?

That's My King!

I was passed this the other day, and it really inspired me and lifted my spirit, so I wanted to share it. You may have seen it before! It speaks for itself, watch and enjoy :)

That's My King! from Albert Martin on Vimeo.

A Week of Prayer

We have just come to the end of an amazing week of 24/7 prayer on the campus. The best thing was that when we first started talking about having a week of prayer we thought it should be focused on the U.K. but when we got together, prayed and asked God how the week should look we felt He said that we shouldn’t have a focus, but that it was about Him and intimacy with Him. This by far has been my favourite week of prayer that I’ve ever done because we had no agenda. The week was His, not ours.

It was such a special time for everyone who came. We had a small team to cover the prayer room for every hour which meant that everyone else here was free to come and go as they pleased. Allowing them to spend time with God, no pressure and only His agenda. It was a time of freedom for a number of people, and God spoke a lot about who He is, and who we are. A time of firming up our identity in Him individually and as a campus. 

As the week started we felt like we should have a day of pure worship. So on the Wednesday we set up some times of live worship and had an ipod at the ready to cover the rest. In the end the ipod didn’t get used much as many people came in and picked up the guitar to play and worship, which was awesome! By the end of the week God had spoken a number of very specific things for this next season for us as a campus and also a number of things for the U.K. as we move toward the Olympics.

All in all it was an incredible week. The younger people on the campus stood up and declared that they are not satisfied with where they are and want to see more of God. That they want to see God’s kingdom move in this world. All of the people who made up the core team and organized this were under 35, most in their late teens or early 20’s. God is awesome.

Reflection of identity

I finished staffing a Discipleship Training School (DTS) about a month ago and after the trainees graduated I suddenly found myself quickly moving from doing a lot of stuff to doing very little. This was difficult for me because I like to be busy, as it makes me feel needed and effective. I discovered that I’d been believing some lies, that ‘what I do is who I am’ and ‘what I do makes me valuable and important’! It was only when I slowed down that I realised this. I was suddenly thinking, “Oh no! now what do I do? I need to be doing something or people will not want me around.”

It was in this struggle that God spoke to me and asked me a question; he asked me “Why are you doing what you do? Does being a DTS leader define who you are? Or are you defined by your character, who I made you and gifted you as?” Then God took me to a verse in the Gospel of Mark where He says to Jesus “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” Even though I had read this verse a number of times before and had been told that God said this to Jesus prior to Him doing any ministry, I was greatly challenged because this thought went through my head ‘So God is pleased with me not because I do things, but simply because I am who I am.’ This was my revelation; I don’t need to do things to please God or to be accepted by Him, but he accepts me whether or not I do things. He accepts me for simply being me, just as I am.

As we spend time with God and discover more of who He is and who we are in Him, we will find our peace. It is not the things we do that define us, but who we are. Why should we strive to be recognised and accepted by the world, trying to show the people around us that we are good at this or needed in that, when we are already accepted and good at what God wants us to be? No one can be better than you at being you and the only way we find out about who we are is by spending time with God, in His word and seeing who He is.

A School Graduates

The Discipleship Training School (DTS) I have been staffing graduated at the start of September, which was such an amazing evening. It was really good to look back over the 6 months of the school and see the growth of all the trainees, and us as staff also. It’s funny, just because you are staffing a DTS definitely does not mean you have all the answers. I have certainly grown and been more challenged doing this school than when I was a trainee a little over a year ago.

It was such an amazing experience to be able to hand each of the trainees their certificate and bless them. They have all come such a long way since we started the school and I have had so much fun living and traveling with them all. The thing I loved most about the graduation was to hear each of the trainees tell the community here at Youth With a Mission Harpenden (YWAM Harpenden) what God has done in their lives over the time of the course.

Being a part of this school, part of this process, has really brought home to me how powerful discipleship actually is. Staffing the school  really helps to bring to life what Jesus did with his followers and the transformation you see with all of them after Jesus has gone to heaven. Being on both ends of the process of the DTS has really opened my eyes to what it means to really speak truth into someone’s life and talk through the hard stuff, to truely challenge someone to grow. I really appreciate those people in my life who challenge me and bring correction to me in areas of my character that are a little rough!

Discipleship is such an amazing gift that God has given us, and brings such amazing revelation about who God is and transformation in the lives of those we invest into, it is such a privilege and a hard thing to do at times, but it is so worth it.

DTS Outreach

I have been a bit silent the last few months, but what an amazing few months it has been! I have spent the summer taking a small team of people to 5 different nations on a short-term mission outreach. We started off in Macedonia, then moved to Romania, from there we headed over to Israel and Palestine before heading back to the UK, where we spent our time in Manchester.

It was one of those experiences that I will always look back on in amazement, one of my favourite summers so far! The group we took were from a discipleship training school (DTS) that I have been involved with this year. This trip was the practical part of their course, where they got to put into practice the things they have learnt. I have massively enjoyed working alongside the trainees and have seen God work some amazing things in their lives, some amazing transformation, both in them and in myself also. I have certainly been stretched a lot doing this school, and I am really looking forward to staffing the next school in January.

The whole trip gave us chances to do a good range of ministry, ranging from simply face painting and balloon modelling in local parks, picking up litter, to speaking in churches, doing dramas on the streets, and praying for people to be healed all the way to intercession and prayer walking.

The most incredible thing about this outreach was how much we saw God provide for us as a team. We felt strongly that God had spoken to us about going to all these different places, but we did not have the funds to be able to go everywhere, so we left the base in faith, trusting that God had spoken to us as a school. The best story about this provision was halfway through our trip when we were on our way to Israel. When we got on the plane the guy we were going to see still did not have any accommodation for us, but by the time we landed he had found us a place and not only that, it was free for us to stay! Even more incredible was that we were also given a place to stay for free when we reached Manchester, but not only that, we were given a gift of Tesco vouchers which covered food for our entire stay in Manchester. It has been a real journey of learning more about what it really means to step out in faith, and to trust in the word of God and to act on it, even if it does not make sense.

We also saw God move in some pretty amazing ways in all these countries, people were so open to talking with us about what faith is and who God is. We saw God move in power and heal whole villages of people, as well as so many people inviting God to be part of their lives. We saw God transform others as well as ourselves. I know that everyone on the team was massively impacted by the amount that we saw God do when we stepped out in faith.

One of my favourite examples of this happened in Romania. We did a lot of work in some of the local gypsy villages there. They are the poorest group of people in the country and really cannot afford anything, including medical care. You often find that a whole village will get together to be able to buy a horse to help with the work. We were able to do some teaching with the kids, helping them get a basic education. This lead to the kids taking us into the village they live in to meet their families and because we had people in our team from South Korea and Africa, we were instant celebrities! This lead to us being able to do a drama and pray for a few people for different pain they had. The fun thing was God healed those few people and so the kids started to run through the village telling everyone what had happened, taking us with them. We were able to pray for people with sight problems, kidney pain, back pain, joint pain, other illnesses, and they were all healed, every single one! I got to pray with one woman, with her grandkids, who was so sick she did not have the strength to even raise a hand. We were told she had been like this for a few weeks, but once she had been prayed for she got up and started doing stuff, she even went to draw water from the well in the village. We saw God turn the village upside down while we were there, one of the women even wanted to turn her house into a church.

Another incredible experience was when we were in Palestine, just outside Bethlehem. We did a lot more intercession in Israel and Palestine than anything else. One evening we felt God had told us to go to worship and pray in an area called Shepherd’s field, where it is thought that the angels appeared to the shepherds when Jesus was born. So we went, and it was the most powerful worship time I have ever experienced. God showed us prophetic pictures for the nation, He gave us words to speak out over the situation that is happening, we ended up staying for about 5 hours. It was such a special time for everyone, we all left having met God in a very different way to what we had ever experienced before.

It has really been an amazing few months, and I know that my relationship with God has grown greatly, and so has that of those who were with me. It still amazes me how truly awesome God is and the way he provides when we think that it is impossible. I am constantly seeing more of who God is and who I am. It is such a humbling experience, doing what I am doing, but I love it and am so excited to be able to do the things God has called me to in this season.

God is so good.