February 2012 Newsletter

Soil does not prepare itself!

The parable of the sower in Matthew 13 is one of the most familiar passages in the Bible. We all know how it begins: 'A sower went out to sow….' and in the story Jesus tells of four types of soil and the different ways in which they react to the seed that is sown. Having read this recently I would like to share with you a couple of things I saw for the first time.

The story is about the Sower, the seed and the soil.

The sower in the parable is Jesus, although it could have been any member of the Trinity as Jesus tells us in John 15 that his Father is the gardener. In Romans 5:5 where we read about the Holy Spirit pouring the Father's love into our hearts, the words used are similar to the picture of sowing seed.


Luke tells us that the seed is the word of God or, as Jesus puts it in Matthew 11, it is the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven. It is the treasure that the Father carries in his heart which he wants to reveal to his children. In bible times when seed was being sown the sower did not place one seed every few centimetres in carefully prepared holes. He broadcast it extravagantly all over the place. He carried a big basketful of seed and flung handfuls out as he walked across his field.

One of the things which struck me recently was that all of the seed had the same potential. It was mere chance whether it landed on soil, in thorns, on the path or amongst the rocks. The seed which fell on the path had the opportunity to produce fruit taken from it, but if that same seed had fallen a metre or so to one side it would have gone on to produce fruit. All of the God's secrets, all of his treasure, has the same potential to produce fruit in our lives.

When Jesus is talking about the soil he is talking about the state of our heart. The pathway depicts the hard hearted, those that lack understanding or who are not fully prepared. The rocky areas are those which are not as hard as the path but the soil is not deep enough to let the roots take a permanent hold. The seed sprouts up quickly then withers as there are no deep roots. The thorny areas are those where the seed faces competition which eventually overwhelms it. And then there is the good soil which enables the seed to produce fruit, albeit in different measures.

So often we look at others and describe them as one of the four soil types. But, I think, that within our own heart there is a bit of each. There are parts of our hearts that are hard, stony, prickly or good and able to produce fruit.

Now, I'm not a gardener but one thing I have observed is that the soil does not make itself ready for the planting of the seed. Before it can be planted the soil must be weeded, dug out, have the stones removed and be fed with manure and compost. Only when it is ready will the gardener plant the seed. Maybe when we have read this story in the past we have felt that we are the ones who have to make our lives ready for the seed. But soil does not prepare itself. As I have said there are parts of our hearts that are hard, stony or thorny. Why not let the gardener come alongside and lovingly prepare the field of your life? Let him break up the hard-hearted areas in order to turn them into good soil. Let him soften the rocky places so that the roots of the seed can go deep and let him pull out the competing thorns so you are free from the pressures of the world. Let the gardener do his job!

This makes it sound as if it is all up to the gardener. We, however, have the choice - are we going to give him permission to come and work in the garden of our lives? We can choose to harden our heart or we can decide to pursue him eagerly, submitting our lives to him. As much as he wants to, he will only come once we make that decision and invite him.

Finally, can I ask you to remember two things? Firstly, within any field there is much more good soil than there are pathways, rocks or thorns. Choose to let the gardener gently prepare you to receive that treasure which has so much potential for fruit. Secondly, don't be discouraged when the fruit seems minimal - it is, after all, fruit!

January 2012 Newsletter

Encounters with Father

Over Christmas we had the opportunity of visiting Bethel Church, Redding, CA and went to the Christmas day service. If you would like to read a bit more about that then you can do so on the blog (www.afathertoyou.com/blog).

Being at Bethel prompted me to read the story of Jacob and his encounters with God, firstly at Bethel and then maybe twenty years later at Peniel. This month I want to look briefly at these two powerful encounters where Jacob met with God and was changed.

Bethel
Jacob is on the run (Genesis 28). He has stolen his brother's birthright, tricked his father and generally upset everyone. Now that his father, Isaac, has died Jacob fears that his brother will take revenge and kill him in order to get his inheritance back. So one night, aided and abetted by his mother, he takes off to go and live with his uncle until the trouble has passed. He is frightened, has nothing and is unsure of what the future may hold.

On his first night away from home he has a dream of a ladder going from earth to heaven with angels going up and down it. But the dream is not about the angels or the ladder; it is an encounter with God. God comes to this deceitful young man, not to tell him off and send him back home to meet justice but to affirm their relationship. God reminds Jacob that he is the God of his father, Isaac, and his grandfather, Abraham and then goes on to tell him that he is also his God as well. God is going to be to Jacob everything he was to Abraham and Isaac. In this encounter Jacob meets God for himself, not as someone who is distant and angry but as someone who will be with him, who will look after him, will keep him safe and most importantly will bless him and his family. Jacob did not inherit a secondhand faith. He came into his own relationship with God as he walked into the love and presence of a loving Father. It was such a powerful encounter that he named the place 'Bethel' which means the house of God.

Even as he runs, he meets a God of love. He found what John talks about in John 14:23 where we read that, because of his love God longs to make his home in our hearts. At the time of his greatest need, Jacob experienced the Father's love.

Peniel
Jacob needed his encounter at Bethel, given what was to follow. For more than twenty years he plays a cat and mouse game trying to outwit his uncle. Several long years pass before Jacob decides to run again, this time away from Laban and back home.... to Esau!

On the way, he has another nighttime encounter with God (Genesis 32) which was not as comfortable as the first. He meets a man and they fight all night. Here he is fighting with God who almost allows him to win. Just as Jacob thinks he is winning God reaches out his hand and cripples him by putting his hip out of joint. Even disabled, Jacob refuses to let go until God has blessed him. He has a face to face encounter with God where the blessing is as a result of a struggle.

Our Bethel and Peniel encounters
What about us?

There are times in our lives when God meets us and we encounter his love; we discover he is our Father and that, no matter what, he is loving us. Each of us needs to know God is our Father, that he is with us, that he will keep us safe and that we can live in the centre of his blessing. We may be running away. Like Jacob, we may feel that our lives are a mess but we can still walk into the manifest presence of God and experience his unconditional love. He lavishes his love on us simply because he is our Father and we are his children.

However, there are times, as we go deeper in his love, that we find ourselves in our 'Peniel' encounter. These are the times when we have to wrestle with God and pursue him for his blessings. These are the seasons when we recognise that a transformation is needed in our lives and that we are going to have to fight for it. It is the process Paul talks about in Ephesians 3 when he says that, for us to be rooted and established in love, we need to be strengthened in order that we may contain the love he has for us. The 'Peniel' encounters will strengthen us and deepen our relationship with the Father in a way that our 'Bethel' encounters won't.

Jacob had to have Bethel before he could face Peniel later on. He needed to know the unconditional love of the Father before it was tested in the struggle. We, too, need to experience the unconditional love of the Father and allow that to become our unshakeable foundation. As we face challenging times we can either run from them or we can embrace them as an opportunity to go deeper in his love. The reality is Peniel will happen to us just as it happened to Jacob. If we are living in Father's love then those situations can become opportunities for us to grow more deeply in his love.

December 2011 Newsletter

Focus on Receiving

Verse of the month
“We love because he first loved us.” (1 John 4:19 ESV)

December. The time of year when we start to think about Christmas and what we might give people. What would we like to give them? What would they want? What shall we give people to eat? (on all the various occasions when food is served!) Lots of questions which all need to be thought through and answered.

It is easy to make giving something we have to do, rather than something we want to do. There is so much to organise, so many places to go and so much to think about. By the time Christmas Eve arrives I imagine many people are asking that sneaky question – ‘is it all worth it?’

But Christmas is a time of giving as we remember the greatest gift of all. We remember the Godhead stepping into humanity and a child being born who would become the way for us to know the Father.

God is a generous giver. He delights in giving good things to his children. As Psalm 34:10 says “no good thing is held back from those who seek him”. The greatest thing he has given us is his love and he wants us to encounter him for who he is. He is our Father and he wants us to know that we are his children; accepted and loved, not because of what we do but because of who we are.

In the midst of all the giving can we pause and focus for a while on receiving? He wants us to focus more on receiving his love than giving it. It is only as we are living in his love that it will overflow to those around us. We can’t give what we have not first received and the more we receive the more we will have to give. So my encouragement is to receive, receive and then receive some more. It is only then that giving and sharing his love will become natural. 

I wish you all a very happy and enjoyable Christmas.

November 2011 newsletter

The Poor and Needy

Verse of the month
“There will always be poor people in the land. Therefore I command you to be open-handed toward your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land.” (Deuteronomy 15:11 NIV)

Throughout the Bible, there is one group of people for whom special provision is made and that is the poor and needy. God gave instructions to the people of Israel to care for those who could not fend for themselves. This is beautifully portrayed in the story of Ruth where she was able to gather the grain left over by the harvesters. In fact Boaz instructs his men to pull some extra stalks out of the bundles so she would be able to have plenty!

In Mark 14:7 Jesus reminds us that the poor will always be with us. Throughout his life he urges us to care for those less fortunate than ourselves as he, like his Father, does not want to see people in need of the basic essentials of life.

They may not know that God is their Father, but he loves and cares for them as much as he does for us.

This month we look at three places where people are seeking to care for the poor and needy and to share the Father's compassion with them in very practical ways.

Cambodia

Mirjam Ruitenberg, a qualified nurse from Holland, has just returned to Cambodia where she is working in the Mercy Medical Centre; a clinic which seeks to help the poorest of the poor. Cambodia is a country with a very high percentage of orphans who are struggling to look after themselves and, in some cases, their family members, whilst living in extreme poverty. The country has been forgotten by the West for many years, but despite a more stable government, there is still a significant portion of the country living below the recognised poverty line.

The clinic was started in 2000 with a passion for providing quality care and for training health workers to provide physical, spiritual and psychological care. Mirjam will be working in the clinic training Cambodian nurses and sharing the Father's love with them.

http://mercymedcambodia.org/

Uganda - Living and Dying in the Father’s Arms

Debbie Newman started Helping Hands in 2004 as a response to Father’s love for the many needy children she met in Uganda. Debbie writes:

"Every time we drive into one of the villages where we work in Uganda I am blown away by the lengths that our Father will go to so that a child can know His love. He literally throws away hundreds of pounds on flights and vaccinations just to send us to share his love with some children running around in bare feet! It is a such a joy and such a privilege.

Doreen was one of his loved ones who had lost a lot of her brain function as a result of malaria when she was seven. In the process she was thrown out by her step-father and only her half blind grandmother cared enough to take her in. We met her wandering around four years ago, covered in her own filth and flies. Father’s love sees through everything and we could do nothing but love her and hold her. We have been honoured to help this forgotten daughter for the last four years and were privileged to love her all the way to the Father’s arms in heaven this summer when it all got too much for her body. She was 13 years old."

www.helpinghands-uk.org

Hungary

The Mennyei Manna food programme was established in May 2006 by Steve and Cary Matthews and is a village support programme working in remote rural villages in the North Eastern region of Hungary. This area is extremely poor as the economy, largely based on agriculture and coal mining, has collapsed, leaving many people without the opportunity of work and suffering hardship. Roma Gypsy families in the region face racial prejudice and are struggling to afford even the most basic provisions. Food and fuel for heating are expensive and it is not uncommon for the poorest and most vulnerable to go hungry.

The Mennyei Manna food programme provides basic food supplies of bread and milk to more than 70 families, widows and orphans. Sometimes this is the only food they have!

Mennyei Manna is a twofold act of love; the bread and milk are obviously a very necessary practical help. However, there is also a great sense of something deeper happening. Friendships are being built on a foundation of love and trust as the villagers are shown that they matter. The programme is an amazing opportunity to show and share the Father’s love through prayer, hugs and conversation. Mennyei Manna is a key to opening hearts, it is a genuine demonstration of Father’s love, and is changing lives. The lost are being saved, the prodigals are coming home and hope is being restored.

“All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I had been eager to do all along.” (Galatians 2:10 NIV)