The illogical - the birthing place of faith

The title of this post was spoken over me just over two weeks ago after a phone call from a friend we haven't seen for over 2 and a half years. This phone call followed a one line exchange on facebook. He is a wise, wise man with a prophetic ministry. He knows what he's talking about with regard to doing the unexpected and unusual! The illogical, not the logical, is the birthing place of faith. Stable and straw. Fishes and loaves. Water and wine. Cross and resurrection...

More remarkably, this guy did not know anything of my thoughts and dreams about the future. The things I would like to see happening. The things I have loved doing and want to do more of. I'm at a place this week of stepping back in wonder and amazement at watching what God is doing amongst people who don't know him yet, to woo them and draw them in.


Just this week in my second Alpha contribution of the day (Morning then Evening!) I had the absolute pleasure of dancing (yes, DANCING!) with grown women (in a hermetically sealed room, doors and window blinds)to a song by Nick and Becky Drake. To protect the innocent I can't say much except that this was a small alpha group and I was the only one who had been part of church for any length of time yet following a comment about how, six months earlier at the holiday club service, a guest had said that the song "That's How You Made Me" had stirred up so much emotion in her that she wanted to investigate more into this ONE who had made her. She said it was such a happy song, it made her want to dance and I just found myself saying: "well, shall we?" (N & B are always on my iPod and we have speakers in our meeting rooms!!)

We danced and danced and God's presence came in this room (blinds drawn!!), I was crying out for joy and we all danced. We danced for joy, we danced with joy, we danced and experienced joy in a deep place.

Later that day, I was the speaker at the evening alpha course on one of my favourite topics - healing. We looked at the character of God to heal in the OT, we examined the mandate given to us in the NT, we looked at healing in church history and finally we looked at the values behind praying for healing. I had received four words of knowledge. I always say that these *might* be right, or they might not be! There were five people there so I reckoned we might be able to pray for one or two of the conditions (and one of them was a word I didn't recognise!) All of them were claimed!

And once the first person had experienced some relief of pain I got them to pray for the next, and so on. I was so touched when one guest said: "But surely I'm not qualified to pray?" He said he received immediate relief from an aggravating symptom and when I suggested it, he was keen to give praying a go.....my heart melted when he asked if that was OK as surely he wasn't qualified? I explained God's grace and how we are qualified through Jesus. There was more than one of us in that room with tears in our eyes as we watched someone who might have never prayed before in the name of Jesus for another person's physical pain. His prayer was simple, heartfelt, and (to my mind) prayed with child-like faith.

And so it's been a week where things have happened that I neither planned nor expected. At the same time I have felt deep, deep child-like joy like I haven't experienced for quite a while. The two seem inextricably linked.......