Making Time For God

First of all, before I talk about today's service, I want to mention what turned up on Thursday ...

C.S. Lewis' Surprised by Joy; Lucas Unleashed, by Jeff Lucas; and a beautiful Holding Cross

And I was only expecting one of those things to turn up. Surprised by Joy. Because I ordered it with some of my birthday money. But when it turned up, I was also surprised by Kate, who is more well known in our house for sending the kids lovely cards and bits and bobs through Post Pals, but this time, the surprise was for me!

The book by Jeff Lucas looks fantastic, and I can't wait to read it! I'm getting a little queue of Christian books waiting for me now! :o) And the holding cross is just beautiful. Inside the blue leaflet which came with the cross (pictured above), it explains that the cross is made with olive wood from the Holy Land, and it is deliberately made uneven, to fit in the palm of the hand ...

Perfect fit!

It also explains that I can either just hold the cross, as a form of prayer, if I don't have the words to convey what I want to say, or I can hold the cross and pray for myself or for others. The leaflet is also filled with lots of beautiful verses, and the ones which spoke to me the most, I am including here:

In times of distress: As I hang on to the cross, Lord, hang on to me.

Our need of Christ's love and mercy: As I hold this cross, Lord, fill me with your strength and peace.

Resurrection hope: As I hold this cross, Lord, I rejoice in the knowledge that our evil and sin do not have the last word, and that your love is indestructible.

Lord, however fearful I may be,
I know that nothing can separate me from your love;
neither death, nor life,
angels nor principalities,
things present, nor things to come,
evil powers, heights, depths,
or anything else in all creation - nothing at all!
Based on Romans 8:31-39

I LOVE how just holding this cross in my hand can be enough to make contact with God. I'm sure there will be times ahead where I struggle to find the words to know how to pray effectively, and in those times, it will be such a comfort to know that I can just hold my cross, open my heart, and talk to God without words.

Thank you very much, Kate!

I would love to be able to track one down for my mother-in-law, because after speaking to her on Friday evening, I know that she is struggling with the burden of responsibility and worry over her mother, Marge. She can't sleep properly for worrying, and I was so sad when she said to me that she feels that she is praying, but that Jesus isn't listening. I tried to reassure her as best I could with my clumsy words, but I think if she could have a holding cross, and read the leaflet and the incredibly relevant verses, I think it would help her a lot. The cross leaflet has a website link, so I'm going to start there.

Okay, so onto today's Church service. Despite setting TWO (count em, one, TWO!) alarms last night, I still overslept this morning, so we had a mad dash to get to the Church on time, but we JUST made it! Phew!

Today's service focused on 1) Argentina, and the missionary work being done there; 2) Making Time for God.

We sang some more beautiful hymns today, and after starting us off with some prayers, the missionaries gave their talk to the congregation. As I understand it, the English speaker, Paul, is a local man, but I don't think the Spanish speaker, his wife Norma, is. They work together in an area of Argentina called Corrientes, spreading the word of Jesus to the local children. They run a Christian school, above a Baptist Church, and they also go out into the community, and they encourage the older children they work with to help spread God's word themselves.

It was a very interesting talk, especially as it was led by the Spanish speaker, Norma, and then translated immediately, phrase by phrase, by Paul. Seren was a bit thrown by that, but I think it gave their talk an extra flavour, hearing about their work in Argentina, and seeing their photos, while hearing the local language as well.

And I think that this hymn was particularly suited to their talk:


Here I Am Lord

They obviously heard God's call to spread His word in Argentina, and are bringing so many children to know Jesus. Thank you Lord for Paul and Norma!

But the chorus also resonated especially strongly in me, as well:

Here I am, Lord, It is I Lord.
I have heard You calling in the night.
I will go, Lord, If You lead me.
I will hold Your people in my heart.

I loved standing in God's Church and singing out loud Here I am, Lord! And yes, I did hear Him calling, calling me back to His Church. And now I'm back on my journey, I WILL go Lord, if He leads me.

But that wasn't the end of the service, oh no, that was just the family section! Once the children had finished colouring in their Argentinian flags, it was time for Seren to go to KatCh, and then Paul got up to speak again, to preach about Making Time for God.

We read from Ephesians, and the message today was that although we all have busy, stressful, manic lives, we have to remember to make time for God. He gave the example of Daniel (you know, as in Daniel in the Lion's Den?), who although he was in a position of great responsibility, one of three administrators for an entire kingdom, still found time to pray to God three times a day. And received God's power because of his devotion.

I was really pleased to think that since I got my Bible, I have been reading it every day before I go to sleep, and I've finished Genesis and last night, I just finished Exodus. So each night, I go to sleep with God's word in my heart and mind. I also find that I am praying at various times during the day, just short bursts, maybe like the equivalent of sending God a text message; and then at other times, I feel the need to sit quietly and say a longer prayer. And I love it! I love making time for God.

Maybe today's sermon was God's way of acknowledging my efforts to make time for Him.

After the service today, I had to stay behind to talk with the minister about starting the Alpha Course! Yay! There will probably be eight of us doing the course together, and I met four of them today when we got together to discuss when would be the best night of the week to hold our classes.

The plan is to start the classes on a Thursday evening, with the first class being held on 25th February, at a Church member's house. We'll have a meal first (I owned up to being vegetarian and wheat intolerant, with a blush or two, but the Church member said that's fine, and one of my course-mates said that her husband is wheat-intolerant too, so she knows a little about it. Phew!), and then we'll get down to studying.

Today's sermon theme was very appropriate when we were trying to settle on a time that was relatively suitable for all of us, as we all have many other commitments, and a lot of us had to re-jig things to get to the class on the one day we could all manage it.

Adrian wasn't overly happy when I told him that the class would be held from 7 pm to 9.30 pm on a Thursday night, because Thursdays are already our busiest nights, what with Seren going to her dance class from 5.30 to 6.30 pm, and then me going to Slimming World from 7 pm to 8 pm. Adrian spends most of the evening in the car as it is, bless him.

So I've had to re-jig things a bit, like a lot of my fellow course-mates, and I think the plan now will be to drop Seren off at dancing at 5.30 pm, then me to dash to Slimming World and weigh and go, and then go back and pick Seren up from dancing, and then Adrian can drop me off at the Church member's house for 7 pm. Phew! I said I'd get a taxi back home afterwards though, because bringing the kids out at 9.30 pm to pick me up, especially on a school night, isn't really very good for them.

So again, I was making time for God.

And, I just have to tell you that I am so proud of Seren for what she said in KatCh this morning! They were talking about people praying to God when they need help, specifically using the example of Paul and Silas's imprisonment, and the KatCh leader told me that Seren shared with everyone about how she prayed to Jesus to help her when she was so ill during December! Everyone was very interested to hear her story, and the KatCh leader was very pleased! :o) My little girl was just made to love God!

I'll leave you today with the Text for the Week (taken from the Church pamphlet):

Teach me your way, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth; Give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name. Psalm 86 v 11-13