Weekend Reflections

It's been a good but pretty tiring few days but I am very glad for the recent holiday.

I spent a few days at a national denominational assembly and particularly enjoyed catching up with some friends from my YF days who are now pastors as well as my fellow children's champion Lorraine. And I got to spend two nights with my dear friends so we stayed up watching Michael McIntyre clips on youtube :-)

I had an opportunity to lead some corporate repentance using this and was pretty deluged at the break time with people asking where the thoughts came from and how they could get them to their congregations so that they too could repent. We had talked about having group discussions in our planning meetings some months ago but I felt we needed to repent if we were going to see change happen.

I was very moved when an older woman (who looked like she might have been about 96!)walking with sticks came up to me with tears in her eyes saying that she knew she had harboured critical thoughts and ungodly beliefs about children in her mind and she wanted rid of them.

Man, that's pretty significant. I didn't write anything that I, too, haven't felt in the past. I'm guilty of every one of those things at times - which is why I was able to write them! I am LONGING for the floodgates to open wide for a move of God in our nation like we have never seen before. People, get ready. God's deconstructing a lot of our false beliefs in the church in Scotland so that they can be replaced by truth.
Bring it on - it's painful and uncomfortable but we so need it.

My SP preached an absolute stormer today from James 2 verse 14 to the end of the chapter.
I knew a lot of what he was going to say as he had talked a little about it during the week but that didn't stop the tears rolling down my cheeks as I counted yet again the cost of what it means to have true faith. When we consider what we have to give up we often revert to measuring how much we have to give up compared to *them over there who need to give up more*. Why do we indulge in such self-centred reflection?

So it's been a pretty raw weekend.
Staff day away tomorrow. Wonder what that will hold?
As long as I don't have to build a raft out of oil drums and timber planks..........