An Adventure in Ministry

The past couple of days I have been away on retreat with other spiritual leaders from T he Sa l vation Army across the North West Eng l and and North wales. It was a great time of fellowship and waiting on God. The retreat’s theme was ‘Beauty in chaos’ and in one of the sessions entitled ‘ beauty in chaotic me’ and we were encouraged to think about the question ‘who am I’ Who am I? As I considered this I considered all the things I am, and I came to think of the positive and negative things that I am. I am a wife, a daughter, a step-mum, a minister, a friend etc. But I am also a coeliac, sometimes a grumpy wife, a lazy friend and a too-busy minister!! My mind also turned to the things that I am not. I considered one of my biggest desires and the fact I am not a mum…yet! When I considered this, many feelings came rushing towards me.. Feelings of shame, guilt, loss, emptiness. But Then I heard a voice, the voice told me who I am, it told me I am I AM Beloved (Jer...

It has been awhile since I have last posted a blog. This has been for many reasons, work has been busy, family life has been busy and I, a lover of routine, have found it difficult to get into the routine to sit down and write.  Ministry is fabulous. At times it can be lonely, exhausting and demanding, but God is moving in The Salvation Army (can I get an amen?!) and he is certainly moving in The Salvation Army in Mold. We are seeing lives transformed, commitments made, prayers being answered and dreams being dreamed.  We are hearing testimony of God drawing people deeper and we are seeing new members Literally being drawn off the street.  When God moves in a mighty way, the devil gets angry, and we have had our fair share of attacks; our brand new boiler has broken for the second time in three weeks and conflict has sprung up in unlikely places. But the most subtle way in which I have seen the devil attempt to work is by making people busy believing they can achi...

Over the past couple of months God has really been speaking to me about the issue of opposition and facing difficult times, and in particular the last couple of weeks has shown this to me in stark contrast. Over the Christmas period At the Salvation Army in Mold we have been incredibly blessed by the generosity of the people in our community. We regularly receive donations of food from both Sainsburys and Tesco and in the run up to Christmas we were collecting and distributing food daily. We also, with the help of generous donations from the public, were able to provide hampers to families in need to ensure that they can celebrate Christmas too. We also ran a toy appeal and were able to give children all over Flintshire a present to open on Christmas Day. All in all thousands of people were effected by the work of the Salvation Army and we pray that many of those saw the face of Jesus in the extravagant love we tried to show.  A highlight for me was on Christmas Eve as Father ...

As many of you will have noticed, over the past few weeks, shops have been filled with ghosts and ghouls, witches and monsters, and all manor of ‘scary’ things. On Monday, many people in our country will celebrate Halloween.  Now I am not a fan at all of Halloween and this time of year, for me, seems particularly dark.   The trailers at the cinemas are full of dark and scary horror films There are places people pay to visit with people dressed up in scary costumes and chase you around with knives and other weapons! Children are encouraged to go and do, one night of the year, something which they are told is incredibly dangerous the rest of the year… which is knock on a strangers door and then accept sweets from them!! The dark things in life are celebrated and revered and people even dress up to be like them! Not only all that… and that is certainly enough to give me nightmares! But there seems so much more darkness. Not only are the nights drawing...

A little while ago I wrote a very personal blog about my experience with infertility and some of the issues surrounding it (If you haven't read it, take a look here: Motherhood challenge ) I was absolutely blown away by the response to it. I received emails, texts and letters from people all over the world offering encouragement, sharing stories and asking advice. It was a very vulnerable place to be in, knowing everyone knew very personal details of my life and marriage, and it was definitely one of those 'shelter in the wings of God' moments, as, at times, it was very uncomfortable. However it highlighted to me that it was a topic often not spoken about, and over the past couple of days I have felt God calling me to share once again a few thoughts on this topic......So here it goes!  You are not abnormal! This is my biggest struggle as a christian woman tackling the minefield that is infertility.  So many times I am led to feel that I am half a woman, les...

I woke up this morning to the news of the terror attack in Nice in France with a very heavy heart. As I lay pondering the situation, I considered the recent stirring in my spirit about the things I see happening. You see, the attack in France was horrendous and with it comes the awakening of anger and sorrow But What about the other places where terroist attacks have happened? Not just to our Western ‘Friends’ but the absolute fear and devestation around the whole world. In those countries we may never even visit. Those incidents that the news doesn’t even bother to report! A very quick google search brought a worrying result… Sources told me that so far this MONTH, not including the recent terrorist attack in France. There have been nearly 80 ‘terrorist attacks’ in our world. (I’m not getting into the whole what is terrorism discussion, but you get the picture!) As I scrolled through this list that represents hundreds of lives and families, I was horrified to see ma...

Just over a year ago, after a lot of prompting from God, and a lot of support from my husband, I began writing a blog. I was coming into a new season, a season of ministry and I wanted to share my journey and experiences with those around me. In this time a song had been resounding in my heart. It was a song that had been with me through some pretty dark days, but now, as I faced a new calling, it took on a new meaning. I prayer this prayer with my whole heart, and over the past year Ephesians 3:20 has proven true God has led me to a place which is amazing, rewarding, blessed, scary and tough all at once! I have learnt so much; God has taken my passion for writing and has turned it into a ministry I never thought possible. God has taken my passion for creativity and taken me deeper and deeper into the word through it. God has taken my passion for people and put me into a place where I have the privilege of telling them about the life giving love of ...