Reasons and excuses

People are often called upon to give reasons for there actions but often those reasons sound like excuses.
For example here is the reason someone gave about why they didn't come into work. "I forgot to take in the Sunday paper, so after initially leaving the house I thought it was Sunday. By the time I had realized that it was in fact Monday, it wasn't worth coming in".
Reason or excuse?
I wonder how the shepherds explained the fact that they left their sheep on the hillside whilst they rushed off to Bethlehem to see a baby. Telling your boss that an angel told you to do it, seems a poor excuse, except of course, it happened to be true and history reveals that they did in fact have very good reason for their trip.
In John's introduction to Jesus he comments on the way in which people reacted to his coming. In Chapter 1:12 he says, “He came He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognise him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.”
Some of the stories of those who either welcomed Jesus or rejected him are outlined in the gospel narrative. Whether their actions were based on good reasons or excuses is a matter of discussion and can challenge us to look at our own responses to Jesus and to his call upon our lives.
Take Joseph for example.
Joseph who had plenty reason to separate himself from Mary and her baby. What man wouldn’t be confused and hurt by the fact that his fiancé was pregnant knowing that he wasn’t the father? On top of that the girl seems to have taken leave of her senses by claiming that no other man has been involved and the pregnancy is the result of divine intervention, the child being the longed for Messiah.
He was bound to be upset, but he didn’t go down the route of disgracing Mary either by divorcing her publicly or going even further and have her stoned for adultery, which would have been his right. However it was also his right to handle the whole thing quietly and simply walk away. As a kind and gentle man he that is what he chose to do. The Bible says, “And Joseph her husband, was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.” (Matthew 1:19)
That was the reasonable, understandable and acceptable. But through a dream God presented Joseph him with reasons to accept Mary’s story as true and to bring the boy up as his own son.
He is reassured by an angel that Mary is telling the truth and that the baby is to be called Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.
Joseph understood clearly what God expected of him, and was ready to obey! He would take Mary to be his wife and suffer the cutting remarks of a child conceived prior to their wedding. He would obey in spite of the fact that this child would be born under a cloud of adultery.
To avoid lashing out when we are hurt takes a great deal of self-control. Joseph is to be commended for the fact that he didn’t react to Mary’s news with angry impulse but with a thought-through plan that would minimise the damage and save face for everyone. It often takes self-control and good sense to do a good thing but it takes faith to do what you know is the right thing, the best thing, especially if you have the perfect excuses not to and nobody would blame you for not taking the risk.
Joseph rejected the excusable reaction but he also went beyond the reasonable reaction and accepted God’s call to make an obedient reaction.
There will be many times in life when the easiest thing will be to make a decision that comes from an emotional response or because it is the most convenient thing for us. Once made, even if we know in our hearts that we didn’t really do our best, we can ease our conscience with excuses. Then there are other times when we act with a clearer head and heart and convenience isn’t the issue but we settle for less than we feel we God is calling us to do because he calls us to go beyond the sensible, reasonable and culturally acceptable course of action.

Joseph is my kind of hero. He made no excuses and went beyond reason to be obedient to God.

God bless

Carol

Mood or Mindset

Here are Alan's notes from 27th November 2011. We probably won't have time to use them in cell groups before Christmas but it might be good to reflect on the Bible Reading and thoughts again in our own devotions. I will post notes from Sunday 4th December tomorrow

How festive are you feeling?
Do you have to get into the right mood for Christmas? What does it take for you to feel Christmassy? Cold weather? Log fires? Mince pies? Carols? Sprouts? Well maybe not sprouts!
There is essentially nothing wrong with the lovely traditions of Christmas which generate a happier atmosphere and a sense of well-being. In fact I get a bit fed up when we Christians get a bit poe faced about it all. But surely Jesus came to do more than change our mood for a season but came to change our minds and hearts for eternity.
In the Bible when the word mind is used, it does not just mean mental exercise or brain power but includes your whole attitude, your demeanour, your mind set—the whole way you live your life. It includes your internal thoughts and attitude as well as your external actions. It involves how you think, feel, and act.
In his letter to the Philippians Paul tells us that we don’t just need to know the mind of Christ, i.e, his opinion on stuff but we should have his mind. In other words it would be a really amazing thing if we could adopt his outlook, his attitudes, his response on everything.
1. Anything
“Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who being in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped but made himself nothing taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man he humbled himself and became obedient to death even to death on a cross.”
Why did Jesus Christ trade his rightful place in heaven for possibly something as inhospitable as a cavein Bethlehem. He could even have been born in the street. There is no cosy stable in the biblical account of his birth.
It was because the human race although given a perfect environment and opportunity to live for God messed it up. We messed it up so badly that with out intervention we face eventually being cut off from God, who is the source of all goodness for eternity.
But God was prepared to do anything that didn't deny his character to help us. He was prepared to take our mess upon himself so that we could get out of it. In Jesus, he placed himself in the same position as every human being and even lower.
A missionary told the story of two rugged, powerful mountain goats who met on a narrow pathway joining two mountain ridges. On one side was a chasm 1,000 feet deep; on the other, a steep cliff rising straight up. So narrow was the trail that there was no room to turn around, and the goats could not back up without falling. What would they do? Finally, instead of fighting for the right to pass, one of the goats knelt down and made himself as flat as possible. The other goat then walked over him, and they both proceeded safely.
Jesus saw us as trapped with no way to help ourselves. By dying for sinful mankind, He let us "walk over Him" so that we could experience forgiveness and receive eternal life.
2. Everything
The scale of what Jesus has done for us and wants to do for us suddenly becomes immense. When we really understand the coming of Jesus then we know we can't just adopt a mood of niceness until Boxing Day but that we must let him take hold of everything we are.
The old hymn puts it, “Love so amazing so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.
This is not about paying Jesus back for what he has done. Jesus is not a loan shark, who gives us what we need when we are down on our luck but is on out back forever getting as much out of us as he can squeeze for ever and ever.
Those of us who are parents will know that the arrival of your new baby changes everything. It bears no comparison with babysitting or helping at toddlers. You don’t just find there is a little more to do. You change. You have changed your status to mother or father. You think differently about yourself as a result. The way you live your life changes, decisions have to be made with consideration to how this will affect the baby. We know that a baby isn’t just for Christmas but for life.
Paul said this his letter to the Corinthians in the Message translatio:
“Jesus included everyone in his death so that everyone could also be included in his life, a resurrection life, a far better life than people ever lived in their own. Because of this decision we don’t evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at Jesus the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong as you know. We certainly don’t look at him that way anymore, Now we look on the inside and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start is created new . The old life is gone; a new life burgeons! Look at it! All this comes from God who settled the relationship between us and him.”
3. Anyone
You can’t say after reading Paul's words that Christianity can ever just be about getting in a good mood once a year. Do you notice in those words that Paul talks about getting a new way of looking at things? In this he not only means how we view Jesus but also how we think about other people.

The rest of that passage from 2 Corinthians says. “God settled his relationship between us and him and then called us to settle our relationships with each other. God put the world square with himself through the messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins. God has given us the task of telling everyone what he is doing. We’re Christ’s representatives. We’re speaking for Christ himself.”
If we are going to speak on behalf of someone else we had better know them and their mind, their approach.
We have seen that Jesus approach was to selflessness, servant-hood and unlimited sacrifice.
We reflect this in the last item on our Prayer Beacon list of values.
CARING
“The cross is a demonstration of the sacrificial love of Christ and we believe that he calls us to acts of compassion and social justice. Pill Corps should be a place where action is taken to minister to those who are in need or who are hurting, both in our own locality and beyond.”
God bless

Alan and Carol

SHARING

Believing that God created human beings for relationships Pill Corps is committed to being a place where authentic and honest community can be built. As a prayer beacon we want to share our prayer space as much as is logistically possible and show hospitality beyond our own fellowship in as many ways as possible.

When we make our statement that as a Prayer Beacon we want to be a sharing community, a place where authentic and honest community can be built it’s a very good intention but I suppose the next question is “Yes but what does that actually mean? What does an authentic and honest community really look like?

Anyone who has done a jigsaw knows that it is always easier to complete the puzzle if there is a picutre to follow on the box. It gives a framework and an idea of how the pieces might fit together.

In terms of what an authentic Christian community might look like 1 Thessalonians 5:12-18 is the picture on the box of the puzzle.

1. Respectful
The first thing Paul deals with is the relationship that this family has with its leadership and the relationship of leaders to their family.
It is clear from the Bible that God has ordained leadership for communities including the local church.

Leadership in the Christian community works best when two things are balanced. Those who lead work hard, provide loving care but also are prepared to give a challenging word when needed. On the other hand, it is the responsiblity of the community to value leaders and “hold them in the highest regard in love.

Personally I cannot bear laziness and I know I have to be careful because with my tendency overwork I have to watch that I'm not judgmental about other peoples work ethic. Still don't you think it shows lack of respect to the community if leaders want people to do the work of the kingdom if they are not prepared to do some of it themselves?

But at the same time it is also disrespectful of the community towards a leader if they are taken for granted. Over the years I have sadly met those who walked away from leadership, not because the work was too hard or the decision making difficult but because they just couldn't take the relentless criticism anymore. Respecting leaders doesn't mean we can't disagree with leadership, it doesn't mean we don't give feedback but we do it with courtesy and dignity.
As brother and sisters in Christ, leaders are among us and at the same time “over us in the Lord. This can be a tension apart from Christian love. It demands grace and the power of the Spirit to be evident in the whole family.
2. Building each other up.
There are some important words and phrases here about how we're supposed to be treating each other; urge, warn, encourage, help, be patient, try to be kind.

William Ward once said: “Flatter me and I may not believe you. Criticize me, and I may not like you. Ignore me, and I may not forgive you. Encourage me, and I will not forget you.”

We can all see the need to be kind and encouraging to one another but some of those words are harder words, like urge or warn. Being kind to one another doesn't mean we have nothing to offer each other by way of correction and guidance.
When we spend time trying to help an individual, one of the first things we realize is that people don’t change as fast as we want them to, which is why Paul slips in the instruction, “Be patient with everyone.”
There are people in the community who will hurt us. What do we do when that happens? Whatever you do, refuse to retaliate. Instead we should practise kindness. Kindness is an underated quality. We tend to applaud people for their talent or their vibrant personality, their wisdom or their creativity but without kindness, a community is like an engine without much oil.

3 Positive Attitudes
We can't have a good community if we're the kind of people who are always looking for things to criticize. Negativity makes us miserable. It's just easier to be close to someone who's joyful, isn't that true? It's just easier to be close to someone who's thankful.

Paul warns us not to put out the Spirit's fire. The Holy Spirit is someone's life creates positive attitudes in abundance. Paul calls them the fruit of the Spirit in his letter to the Galatians. The Greeks had a race in their Olympic games that was unique. The winner was not the runner who finished first. It was the runner who finished with his torch still lit.

Paul recognizes that a community that puts all the things he has suggested in place is a miraculous thing. It is relationships that operate on a deep level and we almost gasp at the expectations he puts before us.

He qualifies his high expectation by ending not with a call for everyone to make a greater effort at all this but by referring to the activity of God.

God is among us creating a sanctified community that shines out in the world because of the quality of the life that is shared.

It is God who creates authentic community around us as we cooperate with him. What the blessing says is, "The one who called you is faithful, and he will do it." What ultimately matters in the life of a family of beleivers is that we don't just muddle along together but we let the grace of God to truly sanctify our relationships.

God bless

Carol

Learning

"Pill Corps seeks to offer an environment where spiritual growth is encouraged through good teaching, training and equipping. As a Prayer Beacon we aim to use all our experience and our facilities to become a resource for training and development in prayer.”

When we make this statement we have to recognise that all of us who have already made Pill Corps our spiritual home are all at different stages in our understanding of God and his purposes. However we also want to be a welcoming place to people who have yet to surrender their lives to Jesus Christ as their Saviour. In fact we want that people can come among us know that they are coming to a place of discovery, a where they can ask questions and be helped to find answers.

It is said that there are five top questions that human beings really need answering.

1. What is my purpose in life?
2. Am I valuable?
3. Who is my provider?
4. Who controls my destiny?
5. What am I responsible for?

In the story of Jesus we find those questions are addressed and Jesus giving his answers to them. Of course we might want to ask why the answers of a Jewish peasant who lived 2000 years ago matter. What gives his answers to life’s questions any more weight than those of anyone else?

We would not be the first to ask such a question. People constantly challenged Jesus about his qualification to become a spiritual leader. Yet other people recognised that Jesus had a kind of natural authority. Even when he was as young as 12 people were stunned by his grip on things and the answers he was coming up with. The other thing about Jesus was that not only did he talk sense about life, he backed up what he said by doing some amazing stuff.

He surprised a lot of people by telling them that they had God’s approval even though in the eyes of society and according to some of the religious teachers they were thought to be no hopers. In fact it was widely believed that if you had a disability it was because you or your parents had done something really bad. Jesus shut a lot of them up, by restoring the sight of blind people, healing very sick people and even raising the dead!
Jesus countered some of his critics by saying, “If you don’t believe what I am saying, judge me by my actions.”

Surprisingly Jesus also talked a lot about himself. He said things like “I am the way, the truth and the life.” He was kind of setting himself up not only as having answers but being the answer to the meaning of life itself. In using the phrase I am the way, the truth and the life, he was saying that he was more than an ordinary man. He was claiming to be God in human form. That’s a pretty arrogant claim, a pretty mad claim or a pretty fraudulent claim, unless it happens to be true.

When Jesus died a horrible death by crucifixion, his followers were pretty disillusioned and wondered about the truth of all his words. But then the man who had said “I am the resurrection and the life.” rose from dead! He had done it again. He backed up his answers to questions of life by a very powerful action. If Jesus could conquer the greatest mystery of all, death itself then he was definitely worth knowing, worth following, worth committing your life and your whole eternal future to.

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that Jesus Christ really did rise from the dead, evidence from the Bible, evidence from history and evidence from experience. If we are truly assured that Jesus is not just a figure from history but alive today and who is who the Bible claims him to be then life-long learning from him about life needs to be a central part of our experience.

Those of us who have found answers to life's big questions in Jesus, long to help others to do so as well. At the same time we are all aware that there is still so much more for us to know. As disciples of Jesus we recognise that he is constantly leading us onward into a closer, deeper, stronger relationship with him. Following Jesus never becomes boring because he keeps on surprising us with the depth of his character and the height of his love.

God bless

Carol

Prayer Beacon value: PRAYING

It is obvious that a church should be about Jesus. Pill Corps believes it can be place where people can meet with Jesus and be changed by him. Prayer is not just about adding effectiveness to what we do but is about friendship with Jesus. In any relationships intimacy grows from time spent with the one we love. As a Prayer Beacon we practise a rhythm of prayer, through which people may encounter Jesus.

Bible Notes from 24th September

The writer of Psalm 84 writes with intensity about his desire to be in the presence of God, to be with Him.

Meeting with the living Jesus through the Spirit, who takes us into the presence of God, is at the heart of what we are about. If the divine presence is missing then we are missing the whole point of our existence as a church. Experiencing the presence of God is not an empty hope. In fact we can even expect more than a once in a life-time spiritual experience. We can live with him.

1. We want to dwell with him
Some relationships between boys and girls never get beyond the disastrous first date but for others there is a progression in the relationship. They don’t just want to go on dates they want to share an intimate life together for the rest of their lives.
Psalm 84 was used when pilgrims made their way to the Temple, where they believed that God’s presence rested in a special way. But David recognised that the real blessing was not a yearly visit.
v 4 says; “Blessed are those who dwell in your house they are ever praising you.”
The word dwell means linger, hang out implies that you want to stay there!

We don’t want to have appointments with Him from time to time, like a client with therapist. We don’t want to go on dates like a boy and girl starting a romance. We want to go on more than a legal arrangement of parental access to our Father God, we want to be able to live with Him, know Him, turn to Him not just for the rest of our lives here on earth but forever.

2. We want to pay any price.
And for that opportunity to be near God we are prepared to pay any price, take any position.

Psalm 84:10 “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than dwell in the tents of the wicked.”
Athough we are willing to be doorkeepers it is not what God actually offers. In His story of the prodigal son, Jesus tells us that as the son made his way home he rehearsed his speech that he would say to his father. He would beg his father to let him be a hired servant, even a slave if he could just be allowed back into his father’s household. But when the son arrived expecting that he would be a servant he was welcomed as a son and given the privileges of a son.

Paul says in Galatians, “God sent the Spirit of his son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba Father.” So you are no longer a slave but a son and since you are a son God has also made you an heir.”
We deserve to be treated as servants, to sit at the back as onlookers to the glories of heaven instead we are invited in and treated as sons and daughters of the King of Kings.

3. We need to know who is in charge
We are called to dwell with God. He lives with us, we live with Him. And that sets up a question of authority. If we are living with the Lord, we need to know who is in charge.
Jesus said; "If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be given to you.
This means that when we ask Jesus what he thinks about something he is very unlikely to say, "I don't mind, whatever." When we welcome Jesus into our lives and make room for Him to live, it is not as a silent guest with no opinions or commands, but as an authoritative head of the household whose opinions matter more to us than anyone else's and whose commands are the law of our life.

4. We sometimes feel like moving
What He offers us now is His presence but the accommodation we share with Him may sometimes be hard and difficult for a time although he promises that our permanent heavenly dwelling with Him will be perfect.

The Hebrew people during their 40 years in the desert often got mixed up. They looked back on Egypt which was their prison as a paradise. They then made the mistake of looking upon their present position as a permanent one, when God was actually moving towards the fulfilment of His promise. What they needed to do was rest in the presence of a God who was leading them to a Promised Land.

Your accommodation might be other than you would wish it. You may have unresolved problems, feel misunderstood, be in the midst of change or a million other things. The only promise Jesus gave us was; “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

God is not an acquaintance or even a friendly neighbour. He’s not just a relative we spend every Christmas with and communicate with on facebook. He is our home address and in a miraculous way, we are His.

Cell questions
1. What is your most recent experience of being aware of God’s presence in your life?

2. What description of a Christian’s relationship with God do you find best describes your own relationship with him? (e.g friendship, father and a child, shepherd and sheep, Master and servant, King and citizen etc)

3. What is the most comforting thing and the most uncomfortable thing about having Jesus living with you?

4. Jesus is not a silent guest in our lives, what has he been saying to you lately?

5. We sometimes have to live with Jesus through difficult circumstances, which at times feel permanent. Pray for anyone in the group or for people who we know are going through difficult times that they may be aware of the promise of Jesus to never leave them or forsake them.


God bless

Carol

We are looking forward to the launch of Pill Corps as a Prayer Beacon on November 11th. Emerging from the 24/7 Prayer Movement, specialist prayer centres known as Boiler Rooms have been set up in numerous places around the world. Boiler Rooms are very experimental and regularly re-invent themselves to explore new territory and structures.
In the UK Sanctuary 21 based in Durham is an exciting example of a Salvation Army Boiler Room. http://sanctuary21.co.uk/index.php

However there are now established Corps that are sensing a call to focus all the elements of their life and work through the lens of prayer. They are becoming known as Prayer Beacons. The first one in the UK is Banbury Corps. http://www.salvationarmybanbury.co.uk/prayer-beacon.php Prayer Beacons seek to apply Boiler Room principles and practices in the context of familiar and recognisable Corps settings, humbly desiring to help others to move deeper into prayer.

Pill Corps has been a praying corps for many years and the transition to a Cell based model of doing mission has strengthened this. You can read more about the Pill Corps' journey towards becoming a Prayer Beacon at http://backgroundppb.blogspot.com/

One of the things we were concerned about with adopting the title of Prayer Beacon was that it might conflict with our cell-church principles and practices or that we might find ourselves struggling with two sets of values to work from. The opposite is true. When we put our existing values as a Cell based corps alongside the Prayer Beacon values we found they matched perfectly and both express the DNA of the Salvation Army in a clear and confident way.

In our Sunday gathering and in our cells in the lead up to our launch as a Prayer Beacon we are re-visiting these values and I hope to blog the messages and cell notes as regularly as I can.

God bless

Carol

Blindness

I am reading a book by Henri Nouwen called Creative Ministry. In a chapter on teaching and learning, he refers to the writing of Bernard Longeran who referred to the fact that people often prefer darkness to light and sees how that parallels a physical condition called a scotosis which results in a scotoma, or blindspot.

Henro Nouwen comments how this works out in practice

"Scotosis means long and fierce discussions about justice and equality while we hate out teacher or ignore the needs of our fellow students. Scotosis means endless academic quarrels in a world filled with atrocities amd much talk about hunger by people suffering overweight. Scotosis allows church people to indulge in comfortable discussions about the Kingdom of God while they know that God is with the poor, the sick and the hungry and the dying."

Where do we start to change that? Perhaps it is facing up to the idea that we have been blind to our own blindness.

God bless

Carol