A word for the Salvation Army on frustration

Every morning I have to park in a city multi storey.

I park on level 4.

Every working day.

The thing is I have to jump a lift up to level seven which takes to me the city street level.

It's a lift (elevator) that could tell a million stories.

It's a lift that you could say has different seasons.

And the season we are in right now as I write?

The student season.

Loads of students use it to access one of the colleges. Located right on the ground level of the car park.

So when I get in it in the morning it can be found to be crammed with highly active students. The air is thick with heavy perfume and deodorant which seems to just overwhelm the brutally small space.

Or?

Without fail?

If no students are in?

It's guaranteed they have pressed every button so that the lift stops on every level on the way up.

It's an old trick.

And one that for some people is so frustrating.

I've seen people get so mad and the old comments about "young people today" come rolling out of funnily angry people.

I just laugh.

It's no good getting frustrated.

Frustration gets you off to a bad start.

Frustration can easily make you take your eye of the game.

The only worrying thing is whether you can make it to level 7 without getting gassed by the perfume and eau de toilette that fills the entire lift cabin space.

I've managed to make it so far!

This morning was a, "Stop at every level" morning.

As I came out of the cheap aluminium doors on level 7 into the semi-fresh air of the awakening city this morning I had this amazing kind of clarity in my head and I heard God speak into my momentary clarity of thought.

It's amazing how many frustrated Salvationists, in fact how many frustrated Christians there are.

I've met some this week.

People Who have been sucked in by the most trivial things.

And I've got to be honest I've fell for it myself on many an occasion.

Things that deflect our focus.

Things that cause us to take our eye of the mission.

Take our eyes off Jesus.

Trivial things.

A bit like stopping at every floor in a lift in a multi-storey car park.

Massively trivial.

A bit annoying but trivial.

Which brings me to a word that God slapped into my life this morning. A word he asked me to communicate to my own denomination.

So here goes.

Hey Salvation Army.

We are in times right now that require the focus to be shifted from the trivia to the spiritual. The battle is shifting into a dimension never experienced before. The Spirit of God says, drop your meaningless battles and join the real fight. The fight for the souls of people. Reflect and think, and then stop yourselves being drawn into the tempting snare that frustration embraces. Do not lose heart. Do not lose faith. Do not lose the fighting Spirit I instilled into you at the beginning. Trivia stifles the energy of my Spiritual mission. Do not be drawn by it. Focus on the things that are blessed. Focus on me. Focus on the fight. Focus on pure love. Don't get pulled off the track by things you can't control. Brush them aside and follow me. When the focus is on me there is massive ground to be taken, the positioning is already taken care of, there is territory to be regained, there are stolen lives to be returned to the creator. This work is the work I have given you. Trivial frustration is holding you back. The Spirit of God says the door is unlocked but frustration is preventing you from walking through it.
Set your minds on the things of God. Set your course on the mission. Set your life on the track that moves.

I've spent a few minutes just thinking of the trivial stuff that I can't control.

Stuff that goes on around me.

It can be frustrating.

Really frustrating.

But.

There is work to be done.

Relationships to be built.

Prayers to be prayed.

Compassion to be shown.

Sickness to be healed.

Lost lives to be rescued.

Plenty to be getting on with!

So don't let frustration that little troubles cause slow us down.

There really isn't time for that.

Blessings guys.

Like Jesus?

So we have managed to get one of the relentless stream of homeless guys that come to S21 housed.

Lee, a 24 year old lad who has already been in prison for four years and was released about a year ago has been living on the street since his release.

He has a little boy who he gets to see only now and then.

He misses him badly.

Lee is a lad whose life history from birth to now is just a tangled mess of rejection and trouble. It's a history that pains you to even hear.

He is anti-establishment, can be violent and has a number of addictions.

Strip away all of that?

He is a really likeable lad.

The S21 staff love him like son.

He is a massive part of our family and community.

One of the street homeless workers we have based at S21, Donna, was responsible for getting lee into a bedsit. I witnessed a conversation she was having with Lee in S21 the other day.

She was letting him know in no uncertain terms that this was a chance for him to change his life around. She was telling him that he had to stop fighting. She said to him,"What happens when your son says I want to be like my daddy?" Donna was telling him that he had to become a good role model for his son, and that if his little son saw his daddy fighting then he would more than likely get himself into fights too.

As I listened to Donna giving Lee all she had got, I suddenly thought about my own relationship with Jesus.

I want to be like my daddy?

Do I?

Now at the expense of sounding like I use that highly cheesy preaching technique of quoting lines from songs! I so dislike that, it really irritates me!
But the line of a song, a blast from the past, a song I probably haven't sang, heard or thought about for about twenty years came singing into my ears out of thin air.

The song?

To be like Jesus this hope possess me. (I think it's an old Salvation Army song or something?)

I had this horrible flashback to when I was a young Salvationist but with absolutely no relationship with Jesus.

I would sing those words then go out of the doors and be anything but like Jesus!

And as for the "This hope possesses me" bit? Well I don't think I even gave being like Jesus a second thought.

Right now I'm in a rich vein of relationship with Jesus.

Yet when I heard those words "I want to be like my daddy," I had a complete surge of urge to get to know him yet deeper, and then deeper, and then deeper still.

Am I like him?

Wow! Now there is a question.

Does that hope possess me?

O boy! There is another question!

I so so so so so so hope so!

My mind wandered off to scripture.

Matthew 16: 13-20

13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”
14 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

15 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. 18 And I tell you that you are Peter,[b] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades[c] will not overcome it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be[d] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be[e] loosed in heaven.” 20 Then he ordered his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.

So here Jesus is challenging the disciples with "who are the people outside of this group saying I am?"

Then he zooms the question around to them. "So, who do you say I am."

And we know Simon Peter presses the right answer button. "You are the Messiah the son of the living God."

I love the fact that as Simon Peter says with assurance that Jesus is the messiah, Jesus then is able to do something with him, in fact he goes as far to say that on him, Peter, he would build his Church.

And I think recognition of who Jesus is is the first step to becoming like him.

And from there God can do extraordinary things through us like building his church.

I spoke on this in our S21 service yesterday morning. And as I looked at the sea of broken lives sat on the couches and round the tables as I whacked a sermon out, drug addicts, people who have been used and severely abused, homeless, desperately needy people, I saw the potential earthquake of church building that could happen through these amazing people.

I was telling them that similar to Jesus asking the disciples "who do people say that the Son of man is?" The world today is the same, some people say Jesus is a mythical character, some say he is a concept, some say he is an inconvenience, some say he is an outright problem, some come right out and say he is just nothing really.

But Jesus turns the question to his disciples.

"Who do you say I am?"

And I felt God nudge me and say Just put that question out this morning on your blog will you please Gaz?"

Do we wanna be like your daddy?

Does that hope possess us?

I pray today that Jesus ain't just a concept, a myth, an inconvenience, or a pain in the neck to us.

I pray that we can say with assurance.

You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.

Then yeah, on us he will continue to build his church.

Blessings today.

Living out the Exodus!

Do you know when you do something for God with the best of intentions and you seem to have gained a victory, then within a short space of time the enemy comes after you and tries to scupper the victory?

I've had a fair few experiences of that since becoming a Christian.

Lately I've been at peace much more than I have ever been in my life.

My heart has been heavily compassionate.

My mind has been still and calm.

I've been able to think clearly and act wisely.

Which has been a real blessing especially when dealing daily with front line mission, face to face with poverty, destruction of lives and other peoples darkness every day.

I've felt the closest that I have ever been to God.

Honestly the closest ever.

Then.

Whack!

I catch sight of the enemy approaching fast. Obviously not happy with the strength of my spiritual life.

Things that I have done with a compassionate heart to help people and help situations come back to you in a negative way.

You know what I mean?

I guess you do.

And one of the reactions that happens is you start to doubt why you even bothered to follow what you believe God had said for you to do. And then you think if only I had kept my nose out! Or if only I hadn't got involved or pursued that venture etc.

But I am staying fixed on God.

No matter what.

It is no coincidence that my wife gave me a scripture this morning. it was from the parting of the Red Sea account in Exodus. The Israelites are being pursued by the Egyptians who aren't happy at the freedom that God's people have gained.

Exodus 14: 13

Moses answered the people. "Do not be afraid Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you, you need only to be still."

Then God says to Moses.

"Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on."

The only trouble was in this situation was there was a blockage of huge proportions in the way of moving on.

The Red Sea itself.

But you guys know the rest of the story. You don't need a drawn out sermonic script on it this morning!

Reading this whole riveting account of this amazing slice of biblical accounting, God really reminded me today of a couple of things that I feel compelled to share with my now ever growing readership! (By the way thank you guys for all the blessings you give me in the form of encouragement and feedback especially through email, Facebook and twitter) and I think maybe it would be good for you to read Exodus 14 for yourself today to see what God is speaking to you through it.

Firstly he reminded me of this simple message from the scripture.

God will not put us through anything that we cannot handle, or put us through something we cannot get through.

Secondly, you know when we do things for God and start to wish we hadn't done that? We start to think like the Israelites (verses 11-12) when they said things like, "Didn't we say to you (Moses) leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians, it would be better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!"

We start to think like that don't we?

I know I'm guilty of that sometimes.

We say "why did we follow God on that? It would have been better if we had stayed where we were."

Well today I want to say out loud. God says, "trust me and keep moving!"

Moses was right, the Lord is fighting for us and will deal with the enemy.

Whatever is happening on our lives right now, if we are thinking, "I wish I hadn't done that for God? If we are thinking, "it would have been better to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert?"

This scripture clearly shows that there will be no death in desert for us if we follow God.

No death at all.

Just life.

And life in all it's fullness.

And freedom in Jesus.

Forever.

Blessings, grace and mercy today.