young guns

Last night i went to Revolution (ingle farm salvos youth service) and it rocked... i rocked up part way through cause i was out on the street... but it was "young guns" night, which means that it wasn't just the leaders doing every thing. they had one of the young teens doing the lights and av (part of the night), they had 2 people give testimonies (one a young teen and the other was a leader), they had a teen leading worship. Another guy (with an intellectual disability) lead one song at the beginning and the end. A 13 year old lead a dance off competition, and even cut the last round of dancing short, when some of the dancing got inappropriate, (which impressed me heaps, cause i have known this kid for ages,). Then 2 of the sort of older guys who aren't official leaders shared a word from God... it was awesome... the feel to the night was great, it was awesome to see and hear how God has been working in their lives, and how they are ready just to stand up and be counted for Christ, especially knowing their backgrounds, and knowing that that most of them don't come from the best backgrounds.... This youth group is like a family... and majority of the people there don't have the best natural family background, including some of the strong Christians there....
God is certainly doing something in that place. There is so much potential in that place, it may take a while, to scrape the dirt off and polish some of those guys, but it is worth it.... And i can't wait to see the result.

just some thoughts on ministry

There are a number of people that start "doing" stuff in ministry... and after a while they end up being burnt out... And a lot of this is from "doing" "program"
The other night i was talking to some friends about ministry, about how they wanted to just organically do mission, without set programs as such... and we came to the realisation that the best ministry to be involved in is what comes naturally to you... like for me going out on the streets and just sitting, chatting (well, mainly listening) and hanging out with people is so easy and it so natural (well, once i get pass the times where i don't want to go, or not knowing who to talk to or even how to start talking and going up and chatting to someone i don't know ... i need Christ's help with all that)
You see God has created you and has given you gifts and abilities for you to use to see the kingdom grow. All of who you are God has created you and knows everything about you... He knows how you tick and what makes you tick... and He has something in line for you that is totally up your alley... i don't think that it is all meant to be a hard slog (tho sometimes it can be)...

So i encourage you to find what comes naturally for you in ministry.... If we all did that there would be less people burning out... we'd all be working together... and everything would be coved... and we'd enjoy doing it (most of the time anyway), therefore we would be doing more out of love, than a sense of duty...
Sounds good hey...

Clutter

At the moment I have so much stuff in my room cluttering of up. There are Things just everywhere, and I have no idea where to put stuff... actually I have some idea how I want the room set up... and where I want to put things, however I don't really have the money to by the storage boxes thawers that I want which would solve a number of things... Then there is this table that i have sort of inherited from living at the house and it being left behind cause of has no real owner. It is a really nice table. solid wood. and I like it
the Problem lies in that it is reasonably big... and it takes quite a bit of room, and I have no real use for it.
I have been reading 2 Kings & 2 chronicles lately, and sitting in My room at the moment looking around and seeding all the clutter around and thing like the table which is really good but I have no use for it, got me thinking about how much we keep hold of in our lives, that clutter up our emotions, our spiritual life, and our lives in general. And sometimes some of this stuff that clutters up our life actually takes the place of Christ. we spend more the many sure it "fits" into our lives than we spend with Christ to build our relationship with Him.
We don't need to hold on to any of that stuff anymore cause Christ has heal us and has set us free, from all off it... we just have to receive the healing & the freedom that Christ offers us, which means we have to Let the stuff that clutter our lives go... So that our hands are empty to receive.. the fullness of what God has for us.
I want Christ to continually be showing me the things that clutter my life. and helping me to let them go so that I can fully reduce all that He wants to gone to me, I pray that this is your prayer as well.