Prayer Life

It was freezing.

The day had actually been a hot one, a golden day in Brussels. But by midnight it was cold.

Very cold. I had put a T shirt and shorts on because of the heat. By midnight I wished I had put something much warmer on.The match was a bit of a farce given the earlier events.The terrible events that had preceded the kick off.

I had so looked forward to the European cup final between Liverpool and Juventus. I’d left Liverpool on a coach the day before the game and had enjoyed the night before in Brussels with about 30000 other Scousers, singing, messing around, I couldn't wait for the match. I got into the Heysel stadium in Brussels, about two hours before the kick off.

The atmosphere was strange.

You could feel a kind of heaviness.

Almost evil.

Before long? All hell broke loose. Fighting and rioting ended with 600 people injured and 39 People dead.

I was sitting in the stands away from the trouble.

I was 23 years of age.

As I watched a wall in the stadium collapse, I was horrified. It took an age to come to terms with what I saw.That was on the 29^th may 1985. By the time the match had started and finished, it was about midnight. It was freezing.

Fast forward to 2005.

Dawn and I were asked to return to the stadium where I had sat freezing and dumbfounded 20 years before.

In between those years I had experienced an encounter with Jesus that had completely changed the course of my life. I had become a Salvation Army Officer and sent back to my beloved home city for my first appointment where we planted Liverpool Boiler Room. We had built an amazing relationship with a lady called Sue Sinclair, an amazing woman of God. She leads a prayer movement of people who have prayed for the city of Liverpool and wider including many international cities and situations speaking into the prophetic flow of life for many years. She was leading a group of people over to Brussels to pray and to ask for forgiveness for our cities’ part in the disaster I had witnessed all those years before. Sue had asked us if we would go especially because I had been there at the stadium that night.

I felt a bit reluctant.

It had been an ordeal for a young guy of 23 all those years ago. I had come to terms with it. God had done some amazing healing work in my life by then. He had healed me from much of the hurt and mess that had been left by my earlier Godless life. However I wasn’t sure what it would feel like to go back to that stadium.

I really wasn't sure.

Yet somehow I felt compelled to go.

No matter how I felt.

I was overwhelmed with the need to go, like something was pushing me to go.

I agreed to go.

It turned out to be a watershed event for me. One which not only put closure on something that had landed badly into my life that night, but one that unexpectedly yet profoundly taught me the seriously vital nature of prayer. It began a new journey for me as God showed me the true power of prayer, how it opens doors, how it can change things.

What I am about to share with you sounds so ideal. It sounds like one of those Christian miraculous stories that can either make you feel the awesomeness of God or cringe!

And I want to say that on my prayer journey, it doesn't always happen like this.

God answers prayer in infinitely variable ways.

But.

I believe God had to show me this to help me to see the reason why he has used me to study and experience prayer, teach on it and carry it out as the basis of my ministry in the years since 2005.

Dawn and I travelled to London from Liverpool and boarded the Euro Star at Waterloo station and headed under the English Channel towards Brussels.

It took a couple of hours from the centre of London to the Centre of Brussels. We holed up for the night in a beautiful Brussels hotel. We had arranged to meet the rest of the team from Liverpool who had flown over from John Lennon Airport the following day.  The arrangement entailed us meeting at a café near to the Heysel Stadium which is located a few miles from the City Centre. I had it in my head that this was a highly organised trip. I was wrong. It was a group of people fuelled by the passion of faith. When we met these amazing people in the café they were discussing their strategy. The complexity of the strategy amounted to lets stand outside the stadium and pray. I quickly realised there was no agenda, no plan, just prayer. As we approached the stadium which had been rebuilt since I was last there on that tragic night, and was now a space age arena, breathtaking in its stature, it also became apparent that there was a football match on. It turned out to be a world cup qualifier between Belgium and Serbia. There was police, stewards, camera crews and other officials milling about, mixed in with the thousands of people arriving to watch the match. We were kind of discouraged as we couldn’t get near the stadium as there was an outer fence that you had to show a ticket to someone to get through. So we formed a circle amongst the crowds on the street corner and we prayed passionately that we could somehow get nearer the stadium as we felt God had brought us this far for a purpose. We just weren't sure what that was other than prayer. As we were praying the leader of the group, Sue, stopped a guy who was just walking down the street with his hands in his pockets dressed in a dark grey suit, she seemed to talk to him for ages. She came back with the guy and she was excited. As it turned out, amongst thousands of people, Sue had spoken to the Stadium manager, the guy who ran the whole operation at Heysel. She had told him that we were from Liverpool and had come to pray about the Heysel disaster in 1985. She excitedly told us that the guy had agreed that we could pray in the stadium! He took us to the players entrance of the stadium and asked us to wait. He came back with a steward who he instructed to take us wherever we wanted to go in the stadium. So this bunch of prayer people from Liverpool were escorted into the players entrance, down the tunnel, out onto the pitch at Heysel! We walked around the running track to the corner of the stadium where the wall had collapsed on that horrendous night. We were standing right on the very spot. There was a plaque in memorium to the people who had lost their lives at the game that night. We began to pray, sitting behind us in the stands were about three thousand stewards getting their instructions for the night. As we prayed a lady with us began to sing. As she sang a beautiful song of praise, what I can only describe as an atmosphere of electric spiritual presence descended on us. As she sang and we cried together and asked for forgiveness from God for the part the supporters of the team from our city had played that fateful night, you could see the stewards one by one taking their hats off and bowing their heads which was an amazing sight.

There was an amazing outcome for us that night, a feeling that God had done something amazing in the healing of our city.

But.

There was something incredible happening in my heart.

God had showed me in dramatic form just what the power of prayer can do.

It opens doors.

It clears paths.

We shouldn't have really been allowed to even get near the stadium. But God had miraculously opened the doors.

And?

That night?

I knew.

That prayer was the key to our ministry.

That we were to make prayer the length, the depth, the width and the breadth of our mission.

Prayer, faith and risk taking go hand in hand.

I saw it.

That night.

I dropped to my knees and committed the rest of my life to championing the cause of prayer, firstly in my own walk with God then secondly to devote my ministry to making prayer a mission.

It’s not always been as dramatic and as clear as that night.   

       

But.

I saw enough that night to know God has every situation in his hands.

And.

It was inscribed on my soul that night that if we are not praying, if the church treats prayer as an ecclesiastical add-on or a liturgical ritual or in the worst case scenario as something we just do, then forget any mission happening.

Forget it.

Prayer opens doors.

Why?

Because we are engaging in the essence of our relationship with Jesus. He is the mission, the cause, the purpose the Alpha and the omega.

And.

If we are not at least talking and listening with him relentlessly? Then last person out hand the key in.

This Easter allow God to lay an Easter morning in your soul.

Let that awakening involve a shake-up of our prayer lives.

Take your relationship to levels you never thought possible.

God opened doors at Heysel that night physically to show me what he can do for me, but even more importantly what he Can do for those souls that haven’t had an Easter morning, those souls that are broken or even worse lost.

Prayer seriously opens closed, locked, blocked hearts.

I pray we will understand that more and more as Christ rises in our souls.

Happy Easter.

Gaz

Winning the war

Watching the team i've followed since birth, Liverpool FC, is never dull. I've followed them all over the world during my life time. This year is gearing up to be a special year. A year we could win our nineteenth league title.
Last Sunday I watched them beat Manchester City 3-2. It was torture watching it.

Following the game our Captain, Steven Gerrard, Gave a past match interview in which when asked whether Liverpool were now in pole position to win the league reminded the reporter that we have won nothing yet.

In my head dropped this cliché.

"We won the battle today but we haven't won the war."

There have been times in the last few years particularly that i've lost battles. I've won a few too.

I'm talking about life.

The enemy wants my soul.

I know that for sure.

So every day on my christian journey I encounter battles.

I admit.

Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose.

But.

They are just battles.

The war?

Well that's a different matter.

Easter is a good time to be reminded that the war has been won already.

Even this week I lost a battle.

But.

I reached out for the victory through repentance and found salvation.

I read Psalm 41.

Go on have a read today.

You see David in the same battle for his soul.

David sometimes lost battles.

But he knew there was a victory in the war.

Which brings me to today.

Are you in one of those battles just now?

Do you feel like your losing?

Two things to consider.

Repentance is vital.

Building spiritual protection around your soul through engaging with God no matter what is also advisable.

We may lose a few battles?

But through Jesus we will win the war.

Blessings today.
 

Citadelica

I stood looking at the front of the Salvation Army Hall.

It was dusk.

The frontage, a bit retro, a bit intimidating,  loomed large, casting an evening shadow about half way across the road.

The Citadel.

Citadel?

A word that sounds so utterly regal.

A word that speaks of safety inside.

A protective retreat for the forces.

A protective shield for our communities.

Of course the word citadel, comes from the Latin word civis, meaning citizen. Many say the citadel is the strongest part of the town and the last line of defence in a city system. 

Citadel.

So many Salvation Army Corps call themselves a citadel. 

Loads of them have it in their names.

And.

As I stood in the dim light of dusk looking up at a real time Citadel.

I wonder.

Inside the spaces of my wondering I feel a question surface.

Are we?

A citadel?

Am I a citadel?

A last line of defence for our communities?

The strongest part of town?

Cos.

The Citadel ain't really the building.

Is it.

In fact?

It's us.

We are it.

The citadel.

And in the dusk.

I ask myself am I really the strongest part of town?

Would I defend my community to the last?

Yeah.

I wonder.

We are not talking about doing Salvation Army for Salvation Army's sake.

No.

We are talking about defending our community  in Spiritual terms.

Battling to establish peace and justice.

By pushing back the dark forces of this world with a depth of love that can only come from the heart of Jesus. Stopping at nothing to turn our attention on the needs and the cries of the broken. Stocking up our armoury with the weapons of love acceptance and compassion, sharpening our approach with the communion of  Gods incessant love. Advancing the war with open arms and an open door.

Yeah.

Sounds like a citadel to me.

The strongest part of town.

The last line of defence.

So a call from God to the Salvation Army asks this.

Will you be a citadel?

Will you?

Can you?

Are you?

Dusk turns into night.

I walk on.

I know I've heard  from God.

He is astonishing. 

West London Development project Update 2

This last few weeks a lot has happened regarding our third planting of a prayer center here in Ealing West London.

Here is the update.

Fasten your seat belts!

I've now completed a 46 page document outlining the blueprint and business plan for planting the new center for prayer and mission in West London. The aim of this is to allow us to open some doors for further funding. and its looking good.

Last week I met with the architect who is working on the design of the prayer center and the plan is looking fab!

And!

At last!

Work has begun on the transformation of the tired old building in Leeland Road, Ealing, London.

And hopefully it will be completed in a few months time.

The prayer rhythm has been established and its such a blessing to have people popping in nearly every day now to pray at 10am each day. Sometimes its just Dawn and myself, but increasingly that is a rare thing!

Its so brilliant to see that very needy people are starting to be drawn on a daily basis to the building even though it is closed, asking for help and information. Fantastic new connections have been made over the last month, with the other churches in Ealing, with social agencies, with street workers, all of which want to work with us and us with them.

The Charity shop in Ealing has a new manager as Nicky Joyce has come to work full time as West London Project Hun Coordinator. Nicky is doing a fabulous job to revamp the approach of the charity shop and that should be opening soon complete with a prayer hatch of its own!

Hayes will receive a new leader into our team in July and is an important part of the West London project.

God is showing up in unexpected and astonishing ways.

We have decided with our DHQ to keep the word Sanctuary in our name as a project and so it will be simply known as Sanctuary West London.

Really exciting.

Last week Dawn and I visited the scene of our first plant, my home city, Liverpool where we  visited Liverpool Valley Corps on official SA business and then in the evening were blessed to attend a Boiler Room reunion where we met with many people who we have had the pleasure of working with and ministering to. Then in the same week we had a visit from a group of young people with there leaders from the Sanctuary 21 project which Dawn and I planted and established over the last five years. it was great to be blessed in this way and to see many people who have been touched by God through our ministry progressing brilliantly in their faith.

And as we look back we see the amazing hand of God at work in knitting together new expressions of Salvation Army that have seen lives reached and touched, not to mention changed forever.

And we trust him for the future as we have to work hard to turn around a desperate situation for the Salvation Army along the Uxbridge Road corridor in West London.

But with God?

There is everything to play for!