An Adventure in Ministry

One of my favourite verses in the Christmas story is tucked away in Luke chapter 2. In verse 19 it says: I have always fond such wonder in those verses, pondering when and why she revisited those treasured memories.  As a church we are reading through the book of Luke for advent and on day 2 I came across a similar verse further along. It is in the only stories we read of Jesus’ childhood. It was after Mary and Jospeh had lost Jesus, only to find him at the temple teaching the teachers about his father God. In verse 51 we read: Now I have had a tough few weeks. December as a minister is crazy busy as it is but there have been so many exciting, scary and difficult things to contend with too. On top of that we have come against a lot of enemy opposition including two flat tyres in ten days, a husband with a broken tooth and a baby with regular explosive poos!!  The past few weeks have provide much to think on and much to ...

After our visit to Caesarea, we moved onto Mount Carmel, a possible place where Elijah went head to head with the prophets of Baal and called fire from heaven down. It was a stunning place. There was a beautiful garden of peace and tranquillity and as we stopped in a quiet part of the gardens, I heard an Indian priest address a group of pilgrims. He called them to rise up and follow the God, who in that place, sent fire down from heaven. He called them to be true disciples of Jesus. At this my heart stirred, and I had to stop myself from shouting AMEN! As the group moved on and our guides spoke to us, they read from 1 Kings 18 and reminded us of the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. They also shared from James 5:16 “16  Therefore confess your sins  to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.   The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. ” As we sat in the place where God so miraculously answered Elijah’...