Encounter part 2 (Hot Prayer)

On my way to church this morning I nearly got obliterated.

If you've ever been to Benidorm, you will know that the road that stretches beside the full length of the beach is like a motorway for mobility scooters!

And this morning a nice shiny white,double seated, top of the range mobility scooter missed me by a fraction as it swooped onto the motor.... sorry I mean walkway.

I love Benidorm

Dawn and I were on the way to a church service we had been invited to as a result of the encounter I mentioned in my previous blog.

We had already been on a reconnaissance mission the day before to they and find the little church called "The English Church."

We walked off the scooter motorway into a labyrinth of really dirty back streets in the notorious Loix area on the eastern end of the sweeping beach which fronts the sky scraping skyline of the City of Benidorm. 

The sign was outside the church. 

"Welcome communion at 10 am."

We went into the stiflingly hot little church room that sat between two cafes that were already thronged with people having their morning coffees. 

There was about twenty people in the church.

There was a lady whacking a tune out of the piano at the front as people gathered. I think I picked out, the splendor of the King somewhere in that tune! But I couldn't be totally sure.

There was never the less a surprisingly thin atmosphere.

So thin you could really sense God massively.

I could see people from England, Belgium, Korea, South Africa that were mixed with locals including a Spanish policeman.

People were so friendly.

It was good to be there.

Then the pastor approached Dawn and I.

He held out his hand to greet us. He says, "I believe you guys are Salvation Army Ministers?" "yeah" I replied. 

And the next thing he said really made my spirit drop a notch.

"You do realize it's communion? I know Salvationists don't believe in communion, and I wouldn't want to offend you." and he added, " you can leave now if you want to?"

Wouldn't want to offend you!

Being a person who doesn't give a shabby shilling about archaic doctrinal differences, and really feel the need to not focus at all on that stuff and just focus on a needy world who need a saviour, I just said "charge up the bread and fruit juice mate, I just want to share in this with you guys today."

He kind of nodded embarrassedly, and made a quick getaway to a person coming through the doors!

As the service progresses, I began to wonder why the Lord had drawn us to this place, and why I'd felt so expectant and excited as we set out through the streets of Benidorm to find this place. 

Now I felt a bit bewildered.

I didn't catch the sermon.

But my mind kind of went to a very clear place. 

"Why have you drawn us here Lord," I felt myself asking.

I clearly heard a response. "adventure." the voice in my heart was saying.

And I have to admit it was an adventure. From someone spoofing my "Micah 6:8" tattoo in a swimming pool, to this very moment had been an adventure. And I began to see that I had followed God, even though I didn't know where it would lead me.

Why can the church so very often be too frightened to stray away from often stifling politics, systems and traditions?

I get so tired of people saying that these systems create order, without them there would be chaos.

Chaos!

Systems prevent chaos?

Is someone having a laugh?

What tradition, the bad kind of tradition, actually does is exterminate the spirit of adventure.

Instead of producing fired up chance takers, what systems, traditions, and politics do is produce robots.

Robotic Christians!

And that does not mix very well with the Spirit of God.

With God, you never know what is around the corner. The trouble is we far too often subject ourselves, or worse, let ourselves be subjected by others, to have to know what's around the corner before we go there.

Someone has a vision or even an idea, the system says, "how much will it cost? What will the outcome be?

That's not faith, that's business.

If Christianity has no adventure, it doesn't have a faith.

And that's not good, not good at all.

Is it?

Faith means we don't know what's around the corner. But faith means we have to believe there is something around the corner!

That's so exciting. It's the lifeblood of the Christian journey.

I had no idea why God would implore me to go to this little back street church this morning, no idea what was around the corner.

But it is so exciting to try and find out.

My mind snapped back into the reality of the church room, as the pastor invited us to take a slice of bread and a thimble full of some red liquid, that he assured me was fruit juice. It tasted like oven cleaner, but the point was I was sharing in something special, in something intimate with people who I had never met.

The pastor asked people to just pray when we felt like it.

The church was Hot.

Soon the prayer was hot as person after person launched into the most amazing prayer time I think i've been in for ages. The Spirit of of God was so thick now in the room I felt woozy. (And before you think it, it definitely wasn't the oven cleaner!)

The Spanish policeman got up and prayed so fervently for Benidorm, that it would be touched by God in a big way, he also prayed for the church that it would be freed from the chains of religion, which when you think about it is a pretty big prayer to pray here in Spain.

That prayer touched me deep down inside, because I really believe it's that type of fervent prayer for our cities, towns, villages, and nations that God is requiring now more than ever.

And that I think is the reason I was drawn to this place today.

I came out today sharpened and clear in my vision for my own Christian work and ministry.

POST SCRIPT

I want to share with you this tonight.

Do not be afraid to follow your spiritual dreams and visions.

If God asks you to push a door. Don't procrastinate! Push it.

That's so exciting.

The exciting part of Christianity I would say.

It's also a bit scary, it's sometimes easy, sometimes hard, it can be mundane, it can also be life enriching or Even life changing.

It's adventurous!

I declare tonight I do not want to be a robot!

Robots do the same thing day in day out!

Robotic Christians experience the same things year after year.

Don't do it!

If that's your experience of Christianity right now, that's boring isn't it?

That can change right now?

A guy at my church, a new Christian with an amazing story, well couple of stories now, is so full of adventure. On his way to work every morning Gary has seen a crippled guy struggling to walk up one of the hills that Gary travels on. The bible has totally gripped Gary. He knows that what he reads in there has changed his life forever. He also knows that action is required as a Christian. So he said to me one night, "Gaz, I can't drive by this guy anymore, Im going to stop and offer him a lift." Gary has been picking this guy up now every morning he can, for a couple of months now, and he's started sharing about God now, which I find so moving and amazing, considering when I first met Gary three years ago, his first statement to me was, "I don't believe in all that God stuff and never will." that is another story for another time maybe, but a couple of weeks ago he said to me regarding picking this guy up, "you never know where it will lead."

I think that should be the mission statement for Christianity. You don't know where it will lead. I think that because with God, he leads us to the most amazing places in life, sometimes the most bizarre places, the most amazing encounters we could ever imagine.

If we let him!

Or even dare to follow him?

The important thing is we can be adventurous in our faith because we don't know where it will lead but here's the clincher.

God does!

Has your faith or even your life, become unadventurous and encounterless?

Robotic?

If it has then change it.

Step into your dreams and visions, push doors, walk down blind alleys, turn corners that you have no idea what's around them. Don't wait for everything to be shaped by a system or for everything to be sorted first.

All those things will remain unexplored dreams and visions if you don't just follow God into them.

Who knows where it will lead.

I pray this will help someone tonight?

Massive blessings