Book launch

I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and the mire, he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God; many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord. (Psalm 40: 1-3)

I thought I would just share that verse with you today.

It's pretty much the truth of my story.

So

I wanted to alert you to the fact that next month my book will be released.

It's called dejunk.

It is about obliterating the junk we collect in our spiritual lives

Is your Spiritual life struggling?
Is your Church life suffering?

Then you may need to minimalise the junk that clogs up space that God needs to fill.

So there will be

Less of you and more of God.

Watch this space for further news on a precise date.

If your interested in a copy please Facebook me or email me on wglacey@outlook.com

Blessings

Two years

Two years.

It’s taken me to recover from total burnout in ministry.

But.
I’m recovered,  healed, restored,  whatever you want to call it.

Last night I took to the stage to preach once again.

And

I noticed a big difference in comparison to my two-year recovery period.

The life was back in my voice.

The life was back in the words.

I felt calmer,  sharply focussed and clear in attitude,  mind and approach.

The clarity has come from a determination to see lives transformed.

That’s the end game for me.

My purpose.

My vision.

My mission.

I took the two year remission from all things church and more specifically all things Salvation Army.

I took Jesus advice literally when he invites us to come to him all of us who are all heavy laden and I will give you a real rest.

And

I should have known.

It really does work.

It works supremely well.

Not only am I now like a caged lion ready to get back to what I am called to do,  but I am changed. 

Changed completely.

Better,  stronger,  refreshed and prepared.

So.

Why do I share this little insignificant piece of information about my progress today?

Well,  when I woke up this morning I had this incredible urge that someone was in desperate need.

I have no idea who that person is.

But I just knew I had to write it and blog it.

Whoever it is.

This is what the Spirit of God says to you.

“Come to me and take a real rest.  I understand your pain. I know you’ve hit rock bottom. Lay down the battle you are experiencing, let me fight that for you. But you,  you need to recover.  You really need my kind of recovery,  a restoration of a broken spirit, a damaged heart and a tired mind. I know about your weakness,  I know about your constant striving to please people that you are never going to please. Leave that battle,  just walk away and run to me. I will give you a recovery like no other. Come to me and I will give you rest.”

Guys.

I know it is never easy to lay something down.

But I sense the urgency this day for you to do that.

O listen to the heart of a saviour who loves you and cares infinitely for you.

Step up and take a real rest.

And you will recover your life.

I don’t know who you are but I will be praying for you.


         

Who is leading you?

Every year I read an old book from start to finish.

It's a book that has had, and continues to have, a big impact on me.

The book inspires me.

It spurs me on.

It teaches me lessons I need to learn.

The book is the Cross and the switchblade by David Wilkerson.

The story of Wilkerson powerful ministry to the notorious gangs of 1950's New York.

This time.

On this year's read through.

My God spoke powerfully into my heart.

I'm about to move to Cheshire.

And I've had all kinds of ideas about how I will continue to minister there.

But.

I couldn't truly see the way forward.

Yet.

I read about how Wilkerson, when everything seemed lost, when he couldn't get to see seven boys who had brutally murdered a young polio victim in Highbridge Park, New York, felt he had met a massive block seemingly in his way. The authorities wouldn't let him see these boys without the signed permission of every parent. He had no names and addresses. He only had the name from a magazine article of one of the boys.

He needed those names and addresses of parents.

But.

He didn't have them.

He prayed this prayer.

"Lord I have reached the limit of my own humble ideas. If I am on your errand, then you must lead me from now on."

In an astonishing answer to that prayer God led them to pull up and park on a Bronx Street right outside the parents apartment of the boy who's name was revealed in the magazine article.

As I read Wilkerson's prayer today, I realised something. That I too have reached the limit of my humble resources when thinking about my future.

Suddenly a scripture appeared in my head.

"Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path. " Psalm 119: 105

And

That was quickly followed by a question.

" Who is leading you Gary?"

Right then?

I had to admit it was me leading me.

Trying to set into motion my humble ideas.

But

I became gloriously aware that I had to trust God, to lead me forward, to put my faith once again where it might get knocked down.

I got a shiver down my spine.

Letting God lead me instead of me leading me, was incredibly more exciting and sure.

So I prayed the same prayer as Wilkerson's prayed on a New York Street in 1957.

Lord, if I am on your errand, then, you must guide me. I have reached the limit of my humble ideas. Lead me where I must go for I do not know.

Maybe there are people reading this who don't know where to turn next in some situation or even in your life?

Then the message for you this morning is that when we step out on God's promise to be a lamp to our feet, and a light on our path, then doors will open on the way.

Who's leading you?

Spacious

This last week has been a brilliant week really.

It started with a new birth.

Dawn and I pulled up outside our daughter Bailey's house expecting to spend some time with her. as she opened the door her waters unexpectedly broke!

And to cut a magnificent story short,

Clark William Warner was born a few hours later.

As quick as that.

And,

He is gorgeous.

Then I have had a fantastic weeks writing on my book, one of those weeks  where the text flows from your heart at breakneck speed. Only a couple of months work to do until it is more or less complete.

Dawn and I also managed to visit Winsford SA Corps where Dawn has been appointed Pastor.We met with a few people and they made us feel so welcomed. They were so nice to us we could almost eat them.  We are so looking forward to swapping the intensity of the City of London for the Cheshire countryside. We have had three major challenges in our Officership, and we are excited by the challenge ahead for Dawn in the coming years.

For me, my own ministry is developing brilliantly under God's direction. And I know he is positioning me back in the North for some major Kingdom opportunities, so I'm busy trying to secure some part time work to aid me a bit in my ministry. So please pray for me in that quest.

Anyway back to the baby!

I got to hold him for the longest time.

He was hours old.

I was being careful and gentle and saying all that daft baby stuff like you do, when God showed me something.

He showed me, well, me.

How far I've come lately.

I was trapped by the damage that some of my experiences as an officer had inflicted on me so badly. I had really forgotten how to live, how to love life, and how to love myself basically. Yet as I sat with my new grandson in my arms I could have wept because I saw how God had held me through that mess inflicted by different people who may be leaders but are really clueless and lost.

And,

I realised something brilliant!

I've finally come out the other end.

I am finally free.

Living in the freedom Jesus won for me on the cross.

It's taken a long time to recover from the wounds inflicted by people who were meant to care for me.

But.

My life is now spacious and full again.

I'm stronger.

Rehabilitated.

Fresh and ready for the fight again.

I think that's why I'm looking forward to a new start in Cheshire. Its spacious and open, and, as much as I have loved London, which I have and always will, I have felt a bit claustrophobic lately, like the City is closing in on me.

And,

That reflects just what God has done lately in my life, he has brought me into a spacious place where I can move and breathe and spend my new healing well, He has brought me there from a place where the ungodliness of religious rules and regulations closed in on me and strangled my Officership to death.

Yeah,

I'm ready.

Ready to help people to know a God who holds us all in his arms no matter what is happening in our lives.

Change

My current writing project is well on its journey presently.

Every working day starts at 8am with my old Lenovo ThinkPad X230.

I work in an old office on the top floor of the Prayer Centre Dawn and I imagined and fruitioned when we were appointed as West London development Officers back in 2013.

Coming in every day has allowed me to watch and marvel at the transformation which has taken place.

The first Sunday service I did at the Corps that was Ealing Citadel left me cold and saddened. You have to understand Dawn and I came to London from a brilliant Church we had started where uniform wasn't important, Where worship took place every day not just on Sundays, where you could go to church at 12 midnight and find people worshipping or praying, where love acceptance and compassion was the norm. Dawn and I had always up until that point been able to create new projects from scratch. This was the very first time in our Officership we had inherited a Corps. But the situation was dire. We had been brought in to try to turn the tide of dramatic decline of the Salvation Army in West London. The first thing I saw when I entered the hall that Sunday was a lady wearing a bonnet. I nearly fainted. Then I saw a songster brigade taking there places, all five of them. The hall looked like some weird kind of heritage centre with more flags than the Royal Navy, flags which represented the Eighteen or so Corps that had closed down over the previous thirty years. The hall was really only open on a Sunday and the situation was dire. really dire.

We had been asked to turn this around.

It seemed impossible that Sunday Morning.

Dawn and I went home for our dinner that day and we don't mind saying that we seriously considered packing up and fleeing the country!

But

Four years on?

I'm sitting in a thriving Corps. Open every day, financially sound, full of people who have had their lives turned upside down by encountering a saviour they had never known. full of those who desperately need help, the homeless, the addict, the lonely, the lost.

Only one person of the original Corps survived the change.

And it was a change and a half.

I had learned very early on a very profound lesson in planting new things. This lesson stood us in good stead as this sinking ship was saved by the power of prayer and the power of God. The lesson is this. In the twenty first century, Deep change is required. You can't do incremental Change. or what some people in business call straddled change. In other words you can't hold on to things and just change a bit. many people reading this will have seen SA Corps who have tried to mix tradition and so called contemporary stuff. That is straddled change and is proven not to work. and there have been some disasters believe me.

We implemented a deep change to this project. This involved a cessation of the traditions that this particular Corps had held onto while heading further and further towards extinction and I mean a complete cessation, and a reimaging of the part we could play in saving people from destruction in the community of which we are a part, which in our case was the 3.5 million people that live in Ealing borough.

In the end.

The reimaging actually turned out to be more of a reawakening. Prayer, Hospitality, Mercy and compassion were the elements that needed to be instilled into the fabric of our work and the Spirit of God really has instilled them. Many people have been touched by the kindness of  Jesus through our amazing team and our tireless work for the kingdom.
.
Why do I bring you this little glimpse of our time at Ealing, a time I could actually write a 40000 word book on if I was so inclined?

Well recently I've been undergoing a bit of a change in my life. And when I have given myself the space to think and reflect, I realised I needed not an incremental change but a deep change. So right now I am in the process of trying to change everything about my life. I've realised the things that are important to me and have to stop wasting time on the things that really aren't. I am stripping back, which as it happens is what my book is about. I am reimagining my life.

I'm so looking forward to moving to Winsford in Cheshire not only because it is close to where most of my family live, but because it will be a complete change to the intensity that living and operating in a City like London brings. obviously I want to support Dawn in her new ministry there, but I also know God is gearing me up for some new ministry opportunities too from that area.

Its a complete change for us.

And.

I am excited to be on the journey I am on to a deep change.

And.

I guess I write this as always in the hope it may help someone to focus on their own situation right now.

Maybe you need a deep change too.

Head Space

It took a long time coming.

But.

I have had to admit that my life is digitally infected.

I had an epiphany moment the other day.

I realised that notifications are the framework for my daily living.

And.

As Jurgen Klopp would say, "it's not cool."

So.

I have embarked on a very difficult treatment.

A digital detox.

I declare I am giving up my smartphone.

On order is a new phone.

A Punkt MP01.

The thing about this phone is that the Swiss company Punkt, product range is designed to carry out a digital detox.

The phone although brilliantly designed by top industrial designer Jasper Morrison, only allows you to call and text. No email, No internet, NO camera No Facebook or twitter, The tweets the likes, the loves, the posts can wait until I reach my computer.

The idea?

A less distracted life.

By no means can I give up on emails, Facebook etc all work tools to me, but they will not be dropping onto my smartphone every five minutes distracting me from real things and real life.

While I've been waiting for my new phone, I have got an old nokia out of the draw and started.

Sitting in Nero's this morning I kept reaching for my phone. It took me a while to get over what I might be missing on my emails and social network platforms.

But after a while?

It was kind of nice.

I had a face to face conversation (Remember those) with my wife. I looked out of the window and admired the architecture of Turnham Green Church opposite.

I found I had some head space!

Further more when I had a little prayer time I found an interesting thing. I found I couldn't keep looking with one eye on my notification bar. I couldn't hold the phone in my hand to wait for the next vibration.

Someone called me mid head space but it was nice to have a conversation instead of whacking out a few sentences on a touchscreen keyboard.

I was able to engage in conversation with God in a way I haven't felt for a long time.

Head space is important in prayer.

Head space is important in life.

I'm really into my digital detox now and its as if life has been illuminated. Im reading books again, Im noticing things in my area I have just missed because my head has been too often in the screen stoop position.

I'm claiming my life back from the digital grip.

I am entering the real world of live face to face conversations.

Its also making feel more alive to the need around me.

Maybe you should try it

The Junction of a thousand roads

It’s been a mad week or so.

Dawn received her change of appointment that sees us both move to Winsford in Cheshire on July 13.

We have been to visit family in Yorkshire and Liverpool.

One of my daughters is pregnant and boy doesn’t she talk about anything else!

I’ve had to slip in and out of my various life roles constantly. Father, Brother, Husband, Son, Friend, acquaintance and so on and so on.

All of this?

While trying to reassess where I am in life.

And.

Attempting to engage with God about what he would have my future to look like, you know, which direction should I go down.

I kind of feel like I’m standing at a junction with a thousand roads ahead of me, anyone of which I could take.

It’s kind of exciting.

It’s kind of scary.

If you stand at the junction too long?

It gets a bit confusing.

I’m shouting at God ‘What would you have me do?’

Then

Without warning.

An old song from the days when I was stuck in traditional Salvation Army stuff, one of those golden nougats out of the time before my transformation out of that dark place, flew into my head straight from Heaven and landed smack bang in my mind and my heart.

"Mid all the traffic of the ways, turmoil’s without, within. Make in my heart a quiet place, and come and dwell within."

My study for my Master’s degree came flooding back. I wrote a dissertation on silence. I had written about how silence is massively important to be able to effectively join Gods mission.

Basically?

If we don’t stop and hear God?

Listen to what he is saying?

Reflect on what he is doing?

Then forget effective.

In fact, I remember at Sanctuary 21 in Durham, a prayer centre that Dawn and I planted from scratch, when one lady out of the hundreds of people that came for one to one prayer ministry with either Dawn or myself or one of the team, came into be prayed with, and she was in complete turmoil. Some serious stuff had happened in her life and she was all over the place. Before we minister to anyone we obviously pray to catch a hold of how God would want us to approach the session. When I was praying, I really felt an overwhelming feeling that God was saying, “Send her to the prayer room without her bible, without her handbag, and tell her to be silent before me, for however long it takes. I don’t want you to minister to her on this occasion I need to directly minister to her.” So, being as obedient as I could be I sent her to prayer room five to be alone with God. When I explained this to her she looked at me as if I had two heads. But she went. About three hours later she emerged out of the prayer room looking tearful but radiant. To cut a long story short, she had been incredibly touched and changed by God and he had given her a new direction.

So.

Hey.

Remembering all of this?

I stand at the junction with a thousand directions ahead of me.

Mid all the traffic of the ways, turmoil’s without, within. Make in my heart a quiet place and come and dwell therein.

I head for a silent space today in the third prayer centre we planted, a fantastic place that is testament to the power of God.

And.

I wait.

To hear where he requires of me next.

To point me to the right road.

And.

I write this today because there maybe someone out there standing at the junction of a thousand roads.

I urge you to try silence.

Get away, no notebook, no bible, no pen.

Just you with all your inner stuff. With all your anxieties, with all your thoughts.

Be still and know he is God.

Be silent.

Leadership stuff

I posted on Facebook today which is in my case not very often.

But.

Today I've been reflecting on the last few years

And

Trying to get some perspective on the future.

Nearly twenty years in leadership has gone quickly.

The picture I posted on Facebook summed up what I think is the most important thing I take from my past experiences into the future.

Life is about to change for Dawn and I.

We have some decisions to make.

And.

They are imminent.  

I mean this week imminent.

So.

I have been thinking. 

We have planted three different prayer centres. 

Liverpool Boiler Room,  Sanctuary 21 in Durham and Sanctuary in Ealing West London.

One thing I hope we have done is looked after those we are responsible for.

Of course you can't please all of the people all of the time,  but we have been blessed by the people we have tried to lead.

Hundreds of them.

And

We think God is wanting to do something fresh through us going forward.

So please intensify the prayer for us.

This week could be a rocky ride.

But

If I could leave one bit of leadership advice from my past its this.

Leadership is not about being in charge,  it's about caring for those in your charge.

And.

Any leader struggling with caring for people?

Maybe it's time to reevaluate.

Maybe it's time to change.

Yet to come

I carry fifteen years of experience in creating prayer ideas that help non churched people encounter God.

The vision God has entrusted Dawn and I with will carry on.

I am asking for those who pray for us especially all those people who have acted as our armour bearers as we have taught all things prayer across Europe over the years to pray hard for us over the coming weeks.

We know God is calling us to even more incredible things than we have already seen.

Greater things are yet to come.

Greater things are still to be done.

I'm asking for specific prayer.

That Dawn and I would be able to establish an altar wherever we end up. 

That our work will never finish touching the lives of those in desperate need. 

That God will protect us as we move forward.

That lives will be changed forever through our ministry.

Pray that people will continue to encounter God especially those who have nothing to do with any church.

God you've been so gracious to Dawn and I.  You've let us see transformation that is truly miraculous. Help us to continue to help others.  To continue to see deep wounds healed,  tears dried,  hearts restored,  lives completely transformed.

Greater things are yet to come

Still

This morning is a rare chance to take a break from my ever increasing busy schedule.

So.

I take a corner seat in an atmospheric coffee shop in West London and let my mind wander.

A couple of scriptures fly about in my head.

Both of them about being still.

Be still and know that I am God (Psalm 46 :10)

And.

Only be still and the Lord will fight for you. (Exodus 14: 14)

Being still is really hard.

Anyways what does it mean to be still?

To me it means just stop!

Step out for a while of the madness of life.

Sounds great on paper!

Not so easy in the real world.

Yet lately im learning this more and more.

Take my transition from the safety of ordained ministry in the Salvation Army, into a paid job for a while and now of course working self employed.

I want to share this with you because its kind of important.

The first thing I was faced with was I had to make some very difficult and brave choices (Some people may say stupid and daft!) But I remember reading Soren Kierkegaard’s take on the wheel of indecision saying basically if you don't make decisions you will go mad. He described a wheel of indecision that kept going round and round and challenging people to step of it. 

After all I'd gone through stepping of that wheel to step out pf officership in the SA, recently I was faced with leaving a secure, well paid job to develop and carry on with my call to speak. I was on the wheel of indecision again knowing I was carrying my marriage, Dawns ministry, and a secure life financially. Yet my calling is massive. And I knew I had to step off. 

So I handed in my notice. 

Just like that.

I had no clue what the future held.

I actually didn't know where the next penny would come from!

But hey.

I could not stand being on the wheel of indecision so hey I just jumped off.

Dawn and I hit the prayer room at the Sanctuary in Ealing on the first day of my new venture.

We prayed the Aaronic blessing over my business.

The Lord bless you and keep you

The Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you.

The Lord lift up his countenance on you

and give you peace.

We declared that the business was God's business.

The same day my trusty Blackberry passport started to ring.

Someone wondered if I could do a funeral for them.

For the three months that have followed?

My phone rings everyday with new work and new challenges.

I am working every day speaking into the lives of those who are in need.

Im being asked to speak more and more into loads of differing situations, and the Lord has showed his increase on Dawn and I.

Really?

Its pretty miraculous.

The thing about all this im sharing with you is this.

For someone today I really felt that they needed to hear this. You may be trapped in a job, a relationship or a situation that you really need to put an end to. 

Here is the thing.

Be still. 

Right now!

As hard as it is.

Stop what you are doing.

Stop fighting it.

Let the Lord fight for you.

Know that he is God.

Step off that wheel of indecision.

Don’t try and get the future taped up.

Just enjoy a new identity, a new journey.

You WILL be fine.

Act

I turned the page.

Psalm 107.

A completely beautiful piece of the reality of God’s massive love for us.

I needed it, you know, to be reminded.

To be reminded of the fact whatever type of distress, however dark the situation, however much we can’t see the way ahead, when we cry out to him he listens.

And.

Acts.

This Psalm written to celebrate the Jews return from exile in Babylon speaks about some of the different types of darkness they will have encountered in Babylon. Deepest gloom, iron chains, peril on the seas, affliction, loneliness, hopelessness amongst others.

But.

Hope that reaches epic proportions flows from these words.

The Psalm gives us the message that however extreme our calamity may seem, God is able to break through to help us.

Verse 6 & 7 kind of sum this up.

“Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble and he delivered them from their distress. He led them by a straight way to a city where they could settle.”

So.

Hey.

If you feel in distress today.

If you feel pretty hopeless or like nothing is going right for you.

If you feel unsettled or restless.

If you feel discouraged or even disillusioned.

If you feel trapped or claustrophobic.

If you feel like you are kind of losing the plot completely.

Don’t think about it, just cry out for God and then let him shower you with hope.

However extreme your thing is?

Let God help.