#htrinity.ie

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Rob Jones - Hearing the voice of God

Hearing the voice of God is a highly personal and therefore is difficult to teach or even to explain. It would be much easier if God would speak to us always in an audible voice, or through a text message or email,  although the problem then would be to understand how to apply what He said! In The Bible there is a man called Elijah, who once needed to hear from God while sitting in a cave at Mount Horeb. First a great wind blew, “but the Lord was not in the wind” (1 Kings 19:11). Second, there was an earthquake, but “the Lord was not in the earthquake” either. The same was true with the fire. Finally, “after the fire a still, small voice” came to him, and this proved to be the voice of God. Elijah's experience in hearing the “still, small voice” was meant to remind him and us that God's desire is to speak to us from within, in a way that is intimate, valued and treasured. This is not to say that God cant speak audibly, rather for most of us the experience of hearing God is from within and it is God's desire that we develop spiritual ears that we might hear Him speak through any situation, agency or person, no matter how humble the source.

  There are many ways God speaks to us, such as through the Church, scripture, prayer and each other. For most of us hearing and discerning this still, small voice is a struggle. So as we sense God speaking to us, its important to test what we are sensing from God and put it through filters. These filters or tests include asking ourselves, does what we are sensing come into line with scripture? Is it flowing with the character of God? Does it resonate with how God has made me as a son or daughter? Also its really important to seek advice from Godly friends or leaders to help you in the discernment of what you are sensing. I’m sure as Elijah sat in that cave and couldn’t hear God speak, he must have asked himself  “Why cant I hear?”. I think for many of us we go through periods of asking the same question? In these times its really good to ask, firstly, do I have a sense that I belong to God and that he is my Father that longs to communicate with me? If you don’t, ask God to show you this sense of belonging through his son, Jesus. If you have this sense of belonging but still cant hear, ask God to help you hear.  Make sure you set time aside to really listen and ask yourself, is there something in my life that is stopping me from hearing? Such as something you have done or a way of life that is contrary to Gods way for your life?

  Its really significant to know that from Genesis to Revelation, it has been the heartbeat desire of God to dwell among His people. One important aspect of that is communication and intimacy, out of which we can learn to hear His voice. As our relationship with God grows, we will not only find it easier to hear God’s voice, we will also be able to discern when it is His voice that is calling us too.  There was another man in the bible called Samuel who also faced a problem in hearing God’s voice, but his problem was a bit different.  He had no trouble hearing God voice, but he had difficulty discerning the source.  One night while lying in the temple, God called out to Samuel three different times.  Each time, Samuel’s response was correct in that he answered, “Here I am”, but he thought it was Eli, the high priest, who was calling him.  In 1 Samuel 3:7, we begin to understand the problem when we read, “Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD: The word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.”  Because Samuel did not yet know God, he was unable to realise that the voice he was hearing came from the Lord.  As Samuel’s relationship with God grew, he would eventually develop a deeper understading of what it means to hear and act upon hearing God speak. The same is true for us today, we must develop this deeper understanding.

 Written by Robert Jones

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Malawi Update: Nicola Spendlove

So I've been in Malawi for a week now (the first five days of the trip were spent on many many buses, but that's a story for another day!). If i could sum up the trip so far in one word, it would be challenge.

From the challenges of teaching a class despite the ever present language barrier, to meeting people whose stories make me take a long hard look at my own life back home. It's safe to say I never before truly understood how blessed i am- to have a safe home, to have a wealth of opportunities, to not truly know what hunger feels like.

I was challenged yesterday when I went to a clinic outreach and watched girls my age test positive for the HIV virus. I was challenged on Wednesday when I served bowls of porridge to my nursery class and watched it being stolen before my eyes by starving teenagers. Mostly I am continuously challenged by the ability of this wonderful community to dance, sing, smile and be generous in the face of these long standing issues.

I think of the things that ruin my day at home and feel embarrassed that I can let my spirit be knocked by so little- my new Malawian friends are teaching me so much about joy in the face of adversity. I don't know much chichewa (the local language) but every day I tell them that they are kongola (beautiful) because they truly, truly are.

God is very present with me on this trip. Our bus broke down in the middle of the night on top of a mountain and just as I began to panic a vicar in the back row stood up and simply said 'thank you Jesus', and from then to rescue time six hours later I felt a peace that I have never before experienced.Last Sunday on top of a mountain I sang worship songs alone (God help anyone who heard!!) and felt like Jesus was standing right next to me.

Today, the most incredible thing happened. I had been talking to God about how lonely I was without a church community, and out of the blue a local girl asked me if i would be interested in coming to church with her family this Sunday! I didn't once mention God to her- so very incredible, I was just floored. What a faithful and present God we serve!! I know that I owe much of this to your prayers and I thank you for them from the bottom of my heart.

Keenan and I are at a crossroads about where to spend your generous donations. Already we gave the community in Tanzania (who we met briefly on our journey here and will be returning to in a months time) clothes, toys and school supplies- in fact, two suitcases full. They were overwhelmed! In this community we have about eight hundred euro to give. Everywhere we turn we see a need and it leaves us torn- are we better supporting healthcare or education? Who can possibly say? I've been praying for wisdom and guidance, if you could pray as well I would really appreciate it as I feel a bit out of my depth with this responsibility!

Finally, I would love to share something I read today with you. I just finished a wonderful book by heidi baker, a missionary in Mozambique, called 'Compelled by love'. There have been times in the past week where I've felt frustrated at how small a difference I can make in five weeks. I've felt insignificant and wondered why I would even try, as all I can be is a drop in a seemingly endless ocean. And sometimes I feel like that in my homelife as well- I am sure many of you can relate. Heidi baker shares a wonderful mother Teresa quote that really soothed my heart: 'yes, you are just a drop in the ocean. But without that drop, the ocean wouldn't look the same.'

Missing you all, and to quote our main man Paul in philippians, 'I thank God everytime I think of you.

Nicola

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Love that knows no bounds...

“By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us” 1 John 3:16

A few Sunday mornings ago, we had our first ‘Uncover’ bible study that looks at the Gospel of Luke. This week’s study looked at the story of the healing of the paralytic man.

Just to give you a background to why I chose to write about this...well, maybe you, like I was, are reading this and thinking “Man, I’ve heard this story so many times...Jesus heals this guy who they lower down through the roof, Jesus forgives his sins and hey presto, he walks home a new man”. But I found there is so much more to this story than just a man being healed...

Someone in our study pointed out that in our children’s bibles growing up, we saw an almost clinical picture of this man and his friends; the man being lowered through a neatly cut hole in the roof with some ropes which they somehow happened to have nearby! Really easy, right? In fact, delving into this passage from the beginning shows us, it’s possible that this man’s friends may have travelled quite a distance to bring him to Jesus – maybe 4-5 days from Judea to Galilee. I can’t imagine how difficult it must have been to carry this man on a mat for a couple of days; the men leaving their responsibilities (family, jobs) behind for a few days to carry this man through hot desert plains on a mat?!

But even more than that, as a paralytic, society would have considered their friend an outcast – society perhaps even believing his sin or the sins of his parents had brought this paralysis upon himself. Not only isolated, his very being would have been considered shameful and he was not worthy of engaging with. What a sorrowful place to be found in alone?

    But regardless of all of this, these men decide to bring their friend to Jesus...in the hopes that all the crazy stories they had heard of late could possibly be true, this man who calls himself the Messiah, was capable of healing. Finally, the group reach their journey’s end but they realise that it’s totally jam-packed. There were too many people trying to capture Jesus’ attention – it was a hopeless situation. But these guys persist, they go up on the roof and start tearing it apart just in the hopes that Jesus can do something...

I guess reading this story again with fresh eyes, I was just so struck by the friends’ compassion  - as a community of friends literally taking on and bearing the weight of someone else’s burden. There’s something so beautiful about that. Doing for this man what he could never have done for himself, by himself. Not because of anything they would get in return. Just to love someone.

They were relentless in their pursuit of wholeness for their friend.

 I’m so challenged by these men who remain nameless. It’s got me asking myself so many questions. Do I love people as sacrificially as these guys did? Do I pray for and “bear the weight” of others through tough times and rejoice with them in the good? Am I so moved by compassion for people in my community that I have to, need to love them proactively? And in this way, does my life depict to others, the incredibly vast love that Christ has shown me?

“This is the God of the gospel of grace. A God who, out of love for us, sent the only Son He ever had wrapped in our skin. He learned how to walk, stumbled and fell, cried for His milk, sweated blood in the night, was lashed with a whip and showered with spit, was fixed to a cross, and died whispering forgiveness on us all.” Brennan Manning, the Ragamuffin Gospel

 Naomi Sloane

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Fridge Treasures

As I listened to Scott Evans’s talk last week, I was struck by (and quite honestly, a bit disappointed by) what a crucial component of discipleship forgiveness forms. I’m not going to lie, sometimes I get a real sinister kick out of holding a grudge. There’s something about the bitter taste of feeling that the world owes you something that has, at many points in my life, sat very comfortably with me. And so, I’ve held on to disagreements and wrongdoings that were well past their sell by date, storing them up as ammunition for when that person next puts a foot wrong, or worse, when that person dares to excel. This is something that causes me great pain to acknowledge, but as we’ve discussed in church a lot recently, in order to know where to go next, we have to first know where we are now. There have been times when I’ve even justified withholding forgiveness because ‘sure I’m only protecting myself’.

Scott included a line in his talk last week where he asked us to imagine what it would look like if God treated us the way we treated the people who wronged us. Immediately, my mind went back to my school days. The thought of Jesus throwing me a dirty look across a classroom, or pettily withholding his laughter at one of my jokes (just, you know, as a passive aggressive way of letting me know we weren’t quite alright with each other) was; once I got past the giggle inducing image of Jesus patrolling around in a High School uniform; enough to break my heart. It sickens me that someone in receipt of such boundless grace could show such loveless hostility. I really enjoyed Emma Rothwell’s blog post about rejoicing in Jesus not being like Margaret Thatcher, and I would like to add to that my joy at Jesus not being like Regina George from the film Mean Girls.

I’ve been thinking about why we’re called to forgive. Beyond the obvious reason of showing love and healing to others, I really believe that forgiveness is an act of love and healing for ourselves. A wise person once told me (by which I do mean I found this quote on bebo ten years ago) ‘not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and expecting them to die’. When I reflect on the tension and unease, that anger and bitterness inflicts on my body, I yearn to be free of it. Whenever I have resolved arguments in the past, the feeling of freedom that comes with seeing the person I have disagreed with and not feeling negatively towards them is greatly liberating. In my experience, this is the nature of what God calls us to do- to make small sacrifices for others that ultimately benefit us ourselves in ways we didn’t expect.

I was telling my small group this week a story, about a time that I really believe God called me to put right the relationship between myself and a friend who I felt at the time had really wronged me. I sent a text to this friend admitting to and apologising for the things I had done to contribute to our friendship falling apart. Four years on, we’re both free from the bitterness that consumed us during that time in our relationship, and I now consider this friend one of my closest. In the grand scheme of the mercy God has shown me, swallowing my pride and sending a text seems laughable. I’m so immature in my faith, and I have such a tremendous journey ahead of me in the realm of forgiveness that the thought of it hurts my head. But I think of Scott’s analogy of treasuring crappy pictures on a lovely fridge, and I smile. I imagine God picking up my silly text message, hanging it on His fridge, and saying ‘wow darling, that’s just fantastic’. 

Nicola Spendlove

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Money: A Conversation Starter

I am not good at trusting in God to provide for me financially. However, in church we’ve been thinking a lot about figuring out where we are in order to know how to get somewhere else. Let me share with you a bit about where I am in relation to my attitude to money, and some things I’ve been learning too:

Firstly, some dark, twisty, reasoning dominates my thinking on the subject. I begin with the fact that I can put my trust in God, but that I have to meet him half way - I do need to put effort into making money. A good first principle. However, around step two I tell myself that while God certainly is capable of providing for me if he wanted to, he actually needs to occupy himself with providing for holier people who do more important things than I do. In a moment of devilish genius I’ve found a way to tell God what he ought to do but since I’ve convinced myself that I’m being humble it seems ok.

Secondly, I grew up in a house where Margaret Thatcher is a hero. It took me about a year in college to figure out that this is a view that is not generally shared:

Scene: Grungy student flat with stolen traffic cone and election poster. A group of students sporting woollen jumpers and owl-size spectacles gathers round a wise oracle, a 4th year guy who grinds his own coffee and smokes cigars. Also present, Emma, fresh from the country in rugby shirt and wellies, chewing contemplatively on a blade of grass.

Coffee oracle: The disenfranchised can only have a voice in a socialist democracy!

Everyone: (murmurs of assent, energetically nodding heads)

Emma: (removes blade of grass) But sure, like Margaret Thatcher says, don’t we all have to look after ourselves? There is no society, every man for himself and all that.

Coffee oracle: (spitting in fury) Margaret Thatcher was a soulless, evil hag who used the sweat of the working man to oil the wheels of her oppressive, capitalist machine!

Emma: (eyes darting round for help, ears pounding with the sound of pins dropping around the planet) Eh… ha, ha. I was being… ironic.

…

Coffee oracle and Everyone: (Raucous laughter) You’re hilarious Emma!

Emma: (to all) Yes. Ha ha. I am a hilarious Marxist! (to self) What are they talking about? Daddy?

  Following inevitable crumbling of parental world-view, Emma buys massive glasses.

  All joking aside, I was raised to believe that money is hard-earned and that working to build financial security for yourself is a really noble thing. I was taught that getting a hand-out is not character building because you can’t learn a lesson about perseverance or reward from a freebee.

So what I have I been learning? Church is making me wonder if perhaps we need more of an “effort, not earning” attitude to money. By a circuitous route, involving a lot of fear and a few “career changes” this past year, God has brought me to an undeserved, dream job. This has blown apart my funny money ideas.

In the first place, God has provided financial security for me and yet I know there are better, holier Christians out there who are struggling. Prepare for the obvious: God does not use money to show us who he is most pleased with. He does teach us lessons using money, in times of need or plenty. What we have to try to remember is that learning something about dependence on him is more important than having money. I know that is quite a tiresome thing to hear from a person with financial security if you are really struggling, but I’m going to say it anyway because it’s true even if I only see it now from a position of luxury.

Secondly, God does not think like Margaret Thatcher. I didn’t cry the whole way through Les Misérables at the cinema, and I am a serious movie-bawler. Right at the end though, Valjean meets the priest as he is walking home to God. It is the priest who extended life-course changing mercy at the start of the movie and I wept because I felt like I was looking at something very much like Jesus. Margaret Thatcher’s politics are not cool, and not because I’m trying to be a trendy revolutionary, but because it doesn’t allow for this irrational, selfless giving that God seems to enjoy freaking us out with.

And that’s all I’ve got right now.

Emma Rothwell

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Scott Hill Continued our Advent Sermon Series on Sunday by looking at John the Baptist's Song. Scott asked two questions - 1) Why did Jesus need someone to prepare the way for him and 2)  How did John prepare the way for Jesus? This was a brilliant talk with loads of context and depth that really brings clarity to John's life and actions. You can listen above or download it here.

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Generosity - Niamh Allen

A good friend emailed me last Sunday morning after hearing a sermon on the multiplication of the bread (he was thousands of miles away from us reflecting on the same passage in Holy Trinity!). He made the simple observation that that miracle was possible because the men gave something – because they were ready to share what little they had, it could be multiplied. How exciting to be an active and essential part of this miracle, and many others, and to see the necessity of our generosity in many of God’s works!

 So why do we often seem to have an excuse not to give? What about the widow’s two copper coins in Mark 12 – surely she had more excuse than us not to give, and yet she gave willingly everything she owned. So surely we can delight in being able to give even when we feel tired, burned out, broke, or even broken.

For many like her, generosity comes so naturally, independent of faith, upbringing or moral beliefs. But as Christians we are not just encouraged to be generous, we are called to be, regardless of whether it is our natural inclination or not! 2 Corinthians 9 vs. 6-7 says; “The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”

  This does not just mean tithing, which is quite easily quantified. It is more pervasive than that. It is about having an attitude of generosity – let’s not be people who go to the free food/ free drink party empty handed, or people who consider our free time too precious to donate. Let’s not carefully evaluate how “deserving” someone is before we give, or pay our debts begrudgingly and exactly. Instead let’s cultivate a habit of giving without counting, and repaying more than we owe. Let’s challenge our possessiveness over money, stuff, time and consider these only ours to give, not ours to keep.  Let’s strive to be a generous community; generous not just with our money and our things, but with our time, our love and our forgiveness, and thus let God work miracles through us. In the words of the prophet Kahlil Gibran, let’s be “those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue; …through the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their eyes He smiles upon the earth.” 

Niamh Allen

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Aoibhe McDonnell - Religion

Aoibhe Mc Donnell following on from her talk last week -

Religion, when misunderstood, misused and misrepresented, can wreak havoc. When I think of my ‘religion’ I feel left with the crumpled structures of religious practice. But there is also this insistent notion that to leave these behind would be quitting something prematurely. I am still convinced there is something truly valuable left to find.

 My thoughts are these:

To become subject to religious practices (what these practices may be, is another post entirely!) is to abdicate a position of understanding and privilege. The goal is not the perfect practice; the practice brings us closer to the Goal.

But to scorn these practices is to over-estimate our ability to grow without food and to strengthen without exercise and to learn without study.

That Jesus acted from this understanding can be seen in his disputes with the Pharisees in the early chapters of Mark. They loved their religion; He loved the good that it could bring when practiced truly.

Jesus’ actions were inspired by His conversations with His Father but His routines and rhythms were informed by religion-practiced-in-community.

Although He had strong disagreements with the Pharisees (disagreements to the point of death), He was clear to state that He did not come to do away with the Law but to fulfill it, to reveal it’s intended purpose and power.

What does it look like to apply Jesus’ understanding of purposeful powerful religion to our weekly-wide-world?; to our culture where the folk-memories of community religion still remain? The echoes of this religion seem still to provide an access point to look for God. And we can see the search for transcendence (the desire to be lost in another, only to be utterly found) in all of the culture’s searchings: is this the soul longing for a conversation with a Father about what is good?

 What does it look like to practice pure religion? And learn it? And use it? And actually experience these verses:

Matthew 11:28-30

"Are you tired?

Worn out?

Burned out on religion?

Come to Me.

Get away with Me and you'll recover your life.

I'll show you how to take a real rest.

Walk with Me and work with Me

—watch how I do it.

LEARN THE UNFORCED RHYTHMS OF GRACE.

I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you.

Keep company with Me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Aoibhe Mc Donnell

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This Sunday, Rob Jones spoke about the woman at the well in John 4.

With the women at the well, Jesus:

Accepts her

Cares for her

Takes seriously her struggle,

Challenges her gracefully

Invites her

Inspires her

  “Living in community is inevitably a choice to lie down on God’s operating table and open our hearts to the Holy Spirit’s healing through one another. It is an invitation to spiritual surgery, made all the messier by our inexperience in using and submitting to the “surgical tools” of gracious truth-telling and patient listening. It surprises me how the Spirit shows up again and again to help us through these messy surgeries. God’s strength is made perfect in our weakness”

- The Intentional Christian Community Handbook: For Idealists, Hypocrites, and Wannabe Disciples of Jesus by David Janzen

  You can listen above or download it here

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Cultivating Passion

Greg Fromholz spoke last Sunday on Cultivating Passion. "Freedom is the sound of crashing tables in sacred spaces" - Greg

Quote: “Faith is the highest passion in a human being.”-Soren Kierkegaard 

You can listen above or download it here

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Scott Hill spoke on Sunday about 'hearing from God". A really good foundation and practical follow through of an illusive subject. well worth a listen if you missed it! You can listen above or download here

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Scott Evans spoke on Sunday with a talk entitled; Your Exodus, Their Exile.

 Thoughts on Moses, Jacob and God being in the rain. 

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Nicola Spendlove Malawi Update:

 Just wanted to send you on a quick funding update! So we just had a meeting with the coordinator about how to sustainably invest the money Holy Trinity gave us. Here is what we are doing with your generous donations: 

1. We are buying school supplies (copy books and pens) for every single child in the primary school we are working with here in Malawi. When we were teaching we were shocked to see many kids didn't even have a pencil or a scrap of paper for themselves, so this will change a lot. 2. We will be able to single handedly fund the painting and decoration of the new nursery school block. This new block is important because at the moment 1-6 year olds are all in the same classroom which makes lesson planning close to impossible! Funding to build the block has already been secured. 3. My absolute favourite- in August, the final year in primary school will be getting their state exam results. It is expected that one or two will get high enough grades to qualify for entry to secondary school- but it is far too expensive to afford. We will be able to offer TWO FULL SCHOLARSHIPS to boarding school. This could change the whole course of these kids' lives and I can't describe how exciting that is!! No one deserves that chance more than these precious kids. 4. We will be able to buy toys for the nursery class- they currently have none at all. I'm sure you can imagine how special that will be for the small ones! 5. We have brought two suitcases full of clothes, books and school supplies for the kids in Tanzania already. We had some funds left over and we bought a few football kits and bottles of nail polish (the most coveted items in this village) to give as gifts to a few kids here in Malawi who we noticed being bullied and left out. We wanted to let them know that they were special to us, and to the Holy Trinity community too. Thank you so much!! I'm so excited!!

Nicola Spendlove

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This Sunday, Andrew spoke on what we can learn from the spiritual rhythms that Jesus lived by and also considered the question : is busyness next to godliness? 

Andrew Asked 3 good questions:

1) On a scale of 1-10 (1=not busy & 10 = very busy) are you on an average day?

2) How much is your answer to question 1 based on your own choices to be busy or to do with circumstances that make you busy?

3) Is the lifestyle of busyness next to Godliness?

Bill Johnston "Busyness is the enemies way to remove the sabbath day of rest"

Andrew Somerville - "nothing will give your soul rest, like hanging out with God".

You can listen above or download it here

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Jack Heaslip was our guest speaker on Sunday looking at Romans 8. Aisling McCormick has written an excellent reflection on some of the ideas from this sermon. See below.

  You can listen above or download the talk here

  “For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Romans 8, vss. 20-28)

Arriving home from Holy Trinity today, I opened the front door, took one look at my flat and thought, “Ugh, what a mess!” I began to regret inviting 5 friends over to mine for a late lunch! As I started to do a quick clean up before my guests arrived, I began to reflect back to the words spoken only an hour before that Ruth-Anne had read for us beautifully and from which the preacher Rvd Jack (‘Preach it, Bro’) Heaslip had explicated a couple of important ‘nuggets’ for us to chew on! Romans 8.

We all know and have experienced that life is full of difficulties and ambiguities. One can easily become consumed with those big questions, ‘Why is there suffering?’ ‘Why so much discrimination and injustice?’, etc. Many turn to Christians and ask them why does their God ‘allow’ these things happen? What should we say? Jack suggested that the best answer he has found to life’s difficult questions is “I don’t know”. So often we find ourselves needing to find an answer and try to defend God and attempt to tackle that question about why does God let these things happen to us or to others. But the thing is, it’s ok to live in uncertainty and confusion, the messiness; it is a natural part of life. It was encouraging to hear someone who’s been a pastor and leader, and mature in the ministry say that it’s ok, life is messy, things often don’t work out the way you hoped they would. I’ve come to learn that God is right there with me in the messiness. Beauty can be found in brokenness, holiness can be discovered in times of uncertainty and integrity can be built amid ambiguity.

Pretty regularly I have the feeling that I will be happier and more fulfilled in life if I ‘get there’, if I reach that point where things are a little less fuzzy and grey and more clear. It’s not so much about possessions or having stuff, but more about sorting out issues, problems, relationships, etc. and ‘being in a good place’. What is that, really? Jack exclaimed that if one finds themselves at a point where they’ve got everything sorted and are completely certain about everything in life, one is probably a corpse in a mortuary somewhere! Paul wrote to the first-century church in Rome, “But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have?” Jesus calls us to live in this uncertainty, it’s in this place, we find we are really living; we learn and find fulfillment!

The BBC News magazine published an article today about a word-wide study done about happiness. The results show that people can make themselves happier through leading a pro-active life; taking risks and just getting stuck in! Professor Ruut Veenhoven, professor of social conditions for human happiness at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam explains the negative correlation discovered among those interviewed between working towards set goals in life and happiness in life!

"Though it is generally assumed that you need goals to lead a happy life, evidence is mixed. The reason seems to be that unhappy people are more aware of their goals, because they seek to change their life for the better."

So, forget about constantly needing to improve yourself, don’t get too caught up in reaching that goal, whether it’s with work, relationships, or trying to keep up with those around you.  Let yourself go, be yourself, live life with all the messiness. Embrace the messiness, because “in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” (vs 37) and nothing can separate us from Gods love. He (and hopefully others) won’t love you any more if you have your life sorted!

And with this in mind, I turned to see books out on the table, wilting flowers in a vase, half-folded laundry, cereal left out and milk spilt on the table and thought – these are signs that I am living in this house! The pristine, immaculately clean house which I think I want would actually be a sign that I am not really living in that house!! Well, that’s my excuse anyway! This is similar in life – we shouldn’t feel we need to present ourselves like we have it all sorted, sometimes we experience real life when things are a bit all over the place!

Aisling McCormick

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Scott Hill concluded our sermon series "When Jesus came down the mountain", by looking at Matthew chapter 12 on how Jesus dealt with conflict especially with his family. You can listen above or download it here