An afternoon at King’s Care

When Julia told us what Tim heard from God before the meeting; that He was going to save someone in King's Care today, I made some crack about 'one a fortnight'. Sometimes you have to be careful what you joke about.

The afternoon didn't get off to a great start. We have four fantastic strong teams of volunteers, but satan must really hate what we're doing, because the amount of things which come up and stop people being able to come is incredible. I usually have to fight a sinking feeling in my stomach the whole morning before I'm going to be on. Today we were five folks down out of a team of eleven. Everyone who volunteers does something vital; so this was a problem. But because they'd let us know a good week before, we had time to find enough people to safely run.

Over lunch, we caught up on how service users had been getting on. I shared my conversation with Mr Banjo, who's pushing seventy, and lives in a shed in the middle of nowhere with no electricity, heating or running water. All winter, he's come to us three times a week from beyond King's Lynn because, he told me, he has nothing to eat between Alpha on Wednesday night and the drop in on Sunday afternoon. We've literally kept him from starvation this winter.

We heard about Mr Smiley from Poland, who made a commitment to Jesus actually during the session two weeks ago, after coming along to Alpha a couple of times and hearing Jesus' good news. Then Julia told us about Tim's prophetic word that morning.

I find that kind of promise difficult to hear. Of course I believe God could save anyone anytime he likes, but looking round at our little band, and remembering the folks we'd soon be feeding, I thought, 'it'll take a miracle. It's just not possible.' Then we prayed, and out of somewhere a voice said, 'I wonder who it's going to be?'

Suddenly it was two o clock, time to open up. We grabbed the meal tickets and the sign in sheets and went up to the door. I love going up there and discovering the crowd of beaten faces, crumbling clothes and starving eyes; I love going up there and discovering not a sinister mob, but a little group of people I know.

In they come, a handful a go. Time to say hello. Time to catch your breath - you are going to get your meal. For two hours, you don't have to worry about buying or selling, getting mugged or getting soaked in the rain. Mr Primark Jeans and Mr Somewhere Up North come in merry, and I wave them through, trying to say something to encourage them not to cause any trouble. I think they'll be okay. It's good to see them a bit cheerful, at least.

It's Mother's day, so inside Julia is chatting to people and seeing if they'd like to use the phone to call theirs. Sounds like most people already have! Mr Hamster has made cards for us to give any mothers who come; Mark gives Mrs Lennon Specs one and she cries. Mary and Jerome are helping people get showered, their clothes washed, and new clothes from the store (almost every Sunday I find another bag left for us. Amazing).

Tom's making a lady a cup of tea when she shows him a folder full of occult writing that's doing her head in.

"What should I do with it?"
"Get rid of it!"

She rips it up and throws it in the bin. Luke and Elliot serve food all afternoon, with a couple of moments to stop and chat to a Slovakian with a degree in electrical engineering and nowhere to sleep. Alan cleans up after all of us.

Mark and Jerome go into the office to pray with Mr Beanie who looks in a really bad way. He's in court Wednesday, maybe prison Thursday; and now his sister's died. I shuttle people in and out of the building, to the loo when the showers are full, and compliment Mr Moustache as he comes out of the shower... without a moustache. It doesn't take long for our talk to turn to conspiracy theories. This week it's the Big Issue. I start to say something about how it's so hard to know who to trust, even with churches- but I've said the wrong word;

"Don't try and make me believe your ideas again."

"I wasn't-"

But he's angry and he's walked off. Rubbish.

Mark and Jerome are still with Mr Beanie in the office. Someone wants socks and I can't get them for him. After a couple of begs, he gives up and goes. Rubbish rubbish.

Mr Moustache comes back. What can I say that won't make him think the world is his enemy?

"I'm sorry Tim."

What?

"I'm sorry I shouted at you. I know you were trying to help me."

This man is incredible. He's got repentance. And I'm out of line for always trying to work on other people's ideas.

Mark comes over. Finally, he's done in there. Doesn't he know we're short staffed and I'm running around keeping everything going when he's supposed to be leading?

"Mr Beanie's become a Christian."

'What?' again.

"Are you sure? Mr Beanie?"

I'm still cynical when Jerome comes beaming up the ramp.

"Has he heard about Mr Beanie?"

They tell me the story. Mr Beanie was too scared to tell anyone the step he'd taken, so Mark got him to tell the kitchen gang. I believe.

I congratulate him as he leaves. But Mark holds him in his arms; there in the doorway; for maybe five minutes. He's whispering prayers over Mr Beanie's shoulder. Both men's eyes are scrunched shut, breathing deep and slow.

We prayed today like I've never prayed after King's Care. There's so many people God is working in. So many people opening up, listening about Jesus, asking for prayer. I have no idea what's going to happen next for these new brothers – will Mr Beanie make it to church next Sunday? Will he make to Sunday at all? I haven't seen Mr Smiley since he went off to look at a flat he'd been offered.

I've got so little to offer all these people in their unthinkable lives. But I am encouraged. Because I saw the Father working today (the best thing). And I know the good work he's started he will finish (Philippians 1.6). And I know that when I go to sleep tonight worrying about something completely different, he'll be out there in the squat, in the messed up flat, in a sleeping bag; with them.

A Christian No 1

How many times have you been invited to be a fan of the facebook group, 'Christian Music Topping the UK Charts'?

I think this campaign shows either that our motives are very wrong, or we're just completely out of touch. Is having a praise song at no 1 going to help anyone get to know Jesus? (If a Muslim song went no 1, would you suddenly think, 'I'd like to become a Muslim?') I wonder if it would have the same effect as shouty soap box preachers - making people think, 'I wish those Christians would mind their own business'. Is the real reason we want 'our' no 1 much more for our own validation than anyone else's salvation? If our motives are right, like probably a lot of 'street preachers', then it's so sad that we're wasting our effort on hopeless campaigns like this. Am I right in thinking it's because we feel so strongly that God wants to reach people with his love, and just don't know what else to do?

If that's how you're feeling, I want to encourage you. Our culture is not closed. So many people really don't mind you asking their opinion and therefore moving any conversation onto the ultimate questions. It's not weird to ask someone what they think of Jesus, or the church. They'll often be really pleased to get a chance to think and talk about the big issues of life, because our culture shies away from it. And everyone's aware of the issues- if they're avoiding them, it must be because the best answers they've heard so far make them depressed.

Like Jesus did, time and time again, bring up the conversation – ask people stuff, straight out. That communicates that you value them and are interested in their well being – which is surely the point of sharing Jesus' good news. And no doubt you'll get an opportunity to explain what you believe, or to challenge something they're heard, or to share your discoveries of truth. But just don't start there, or you'll come across as judgmental, arrogant, and not interested in the person at all. In fact, you probably won't be able to do this with anyone you care about. A friend of mine told me he finds it much easier to preach to people he doesn't know than his friends – on reflection now, it's probably because the only approach he knew was to blurt stuff out at people without getting any sense of where they're at.

And where people are at determines what is most helpful for them to move closer to Jesus: if you're profoundly cynical of all religious belief (and who can blame anyone for that?), someone trying to tell you another is only going to reinforce your cynicism. They need to see their expectations challenged – need to see the humility and altruism that knowing Jesus and believing the gospel leads to – before they might consider there is anything different and trustworthy about our beliefs. On the other hand, if you're talking to someone who is spiritually seeking and interested in what Christianity has to say, it's extremely selfish to not take a whole load of time to outline God's story and its implications for them. So again, conversation/asking questions is crucial, because how else will you discover where someone is at?

If you're keen for delirious to get a number one because you think it will make people see that 'you can be cool and be a Christian', and therefore be more open to Jesus, I want to encourage you again. There were a series of posters on the wall of my maths classroom at school, all with the heading, 'Maths is cool' (with pictures of icebergs etc). Apart from coming across as desperate (which definitely isn't cool), the posters don't work because everyone is aware that the relative 'cool-ness' of maths is unimportant. It's either positive to participate in, or not. Even if you really like maths, you'd probably never say it was cool. It doesn't have to be. I think the same is true for Christianity: no one seriously writes it off because it's uncool. If people thought it intellectually held water, improved your quality of life, and didn't mess the world up, they might be interested; but not just if we wore low slung jeans, listened to r'n'b, and said 'dude' a lot. I think we'll struggle to make Christianity seem cool (c.f. www.cool-christian-apparel.com/); and I think that doesn't matter.

I've spent so long struggling to follow Jesus in his constant, consistent, bold sharing of 'the good news of the kingdom of God'. It's such a relief to feel able to do it lots these days. And so rich an experience. Understanding that you are actually allowed to bring the subject up, not just wait until it comes round (i.e. pretty rarely, except in Uni halls at 2 in the morning) has been a big part of that. But equally important has been God healing my fears about people not liking me – you will get some negative responses, but mostly you've really got nothing to worry about. People don't treat each other like they did when they were 13 anymore. Also, Jesus really loves you, and thinks you're great. He made you; are you thinking he did a bad job? If relating to people is hard work for you full stop, get some help. It doesn't have to stay that way. And it'll help you share Jesus no end.

Life After God

These days, it's almost a relief to find a book I can pick up and just get lost in. I can't do 'proper novels' anymore – I opened 'Birds Without Wings' on the train home one holiday, salted with promise... and had to put all 800 pages back in my rucksack about 5 minutes later. Couldn't get past the first page. The main thing I learnt from studying English Literature at University is that most books are boring.

So when I opened this book in the Oxfam on Sidney Street, Cambridge, it was like sinking into a ball of baking bread. Short paragraphs at the centre of each page, with a little line drawing above. Space. Details. Thoughts. Life.

Probably the reason I love this book is it feels like I could have written it. It takes a lot of things I feel and puts them in words. "It's all about m.e.". Sure. Why do you like reading the things you do?

I just looked out the window and thought, 'I'm doing a terrible job of selling this book.' It doesn't help me if you do go and read it, but I wanted to write this because I think it might help you, and that would actually make me happy. Funny to catch yourself in the act of altruism.

So here's my pitch: this book is about what most people around you between the ages of 18 and 35 are thinking and feeling about life. It's a bunch of little stories that don't go anywhere, except down into their speakers' souls. It's people prodding around this space inside that school and telly never told them about, but seems about to eat them whole whenever they're driving somewhere alone, or last thing at night as they arrive at home. It's realising we've got to find out what life is for or we'll never get started. It's daring to speak out loud again the name of 'God', and listen how it sounds.

If you think like this, you probably already feel you need to read this book. And if you never think like this, you need to read this book to get what everyone else is thinking. Happy travels.

Faith. Healing.

Thank you for your messages of concern for my mum. Her operation went great - as far as they can tell, they got all the cancer out. Mum's back at work and still positive. Amazing. She's now deciding whether to have radiotherapy to reduce chances of a recurrence.

I can't point to a specific miraculous healing, but I can testify to answered prayer. As my friend Steph told me once, 'you never know how much worse it could have been.' Certainly this whole thing has made me trust my Father God more.

But in the way of miraculous healings, I think the hole in my eardrum, that has been there for nearly 12 months in spite of earplugs in the shower and plenty of prayer, may have healed over.

It's extremely hard to tell, because the only test I have is to hold my nose and blow - which until monday night led to me hearing a hiss in my left ear as air escaped. Ian prayed for me at small group, and when I blew there was a crackling in both ears as the pressure built up behind the eardrums... but no hiss. I tried again. Still no hiss. Um...

The word 'faith' gets slung about a lot in this area, but I've always struggled to understand what people are talking about. After a few years of consideration, I've come to the conclusion that those people don't really know what they're talking about either. I think they understand 'faith' to mean the same thing as atheists: 'clenching your fists, making a face like you're constipated, and asserting something you know to be complete rubbish.' So in that sense, I don't like 'faith' either.

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On the other hand, I think the Bible uses the word 'faith' to mean 'taking action on the basis of reasonable evidence'. 'Saved by faith' describes a person judging Jesus' claims to be intellectually and experientially verifiable; and not just stopping there, but handing over direction of their life to him. Or to put it another way, it's deciding you've seen Jesus demonstrate that he's a good guy and does actually have some involvement in reality, and so trusting him enough to follow his instructions, his example. It's a calculated risk.

The Bible says, 'without faith it is impossible to please God'. No wonder. When someone trusts you and opens up; when a friend lets you help; when the fireman looks the petrified little girl in the eyes amid the burning building, says 'trust me', and she lets him carry her out to safety; don't you feel like cheering? I like this kind of faith.

So when we come to supernatural healing, what do we do with faith? Jesus seems to think its important. Simply having a go is faith - that's an action which could leave you feeling stupid, taken on trust. I didn't feel anything as Ian prayed and put his hand over my ear; just my usual self talk of 'this could actually happen right now; this time.' More often in life, I'm noticing a confident eagerness swell in my chest that makes me want to do impossible things. I think that might be faith as well. But I have to say, the only thing I contribute to bringing it on is to consider Jesus, and other things he's done in the world (especially my world).

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Which is all to say, I can't in any way claim credit for this. And that I'm not worried about realistically assessing whether I have actually been healed. A few minutes after, I blew my nose again- and felt the hiss. All very uncertain. I took these considerations home to my housemate Tim, and he said, 'let's pray again'. So we did a couple of times, and the hiss stopped again. Yesterday the same happened - I tried it, hiss, prayed, no hiss. So I guess I'll carry on like that until my ENT appointment at the end of the month. That'll be real confirmation, either way. I don't want to 'test' the ear drum too hard and make it holy again. Is that stupid?

I have to say, though; the moments when I thought, 'I'm not going to have to have an operation now. This is actually over', were quite something. I'd wish them on anyone.

I find it strange how little I feel or react when Jesus does something mental like this. I've got this idea in my head that I ought to scream, jump around, and act like an overweight middle aged american woman; but maybe that's not from the Bible. I do honestly feel like I'm missing out though. We've agonised over my emotions before, so let's not go that way; but it does occur to me that people will have bigger reactions to miracles when they don't actually believe they're going to happen. In a sense, apart from that feeling of,' woah, my future actually looks different', I only got what I might expect to from a living God who died for me.

Anyway, it's good to be loved. I haven't been in pain from the ear thing, and honestly I haven't been dragging Mum's illness round with me like a rough sleeper's pack. She's in southampton world, I'm in norwich world, and the worlds interact only about once a week. But Jesus still got involved. He must really love us.

Chavs

Here's what I wanted to write on August 20^th: there's no such thing as Chavs. In fact, that was the only line anyone remembers from the first talk I ever did. They were called townies back then, but the idea is the same: teenagers from council estates are all violent, soulless criminals. Council House And Violence. Or at least, all violent teenagers from council estates are just violent teenagers from council estates. Like they're not human the way we are.

So in August I got to help run a 'get on top of life' course for 16-18 year olds not in education, employment or training (i.e. nowhere). I started badly.

If you throw a bunch of teenagers who've never met before into a room together, you'll get some interesting results. They're desperate for the others to accept them; they're terrified they're going to become the runt of the litter. They might be the alpha female somewhere else, but that counts for nothing here. Everyone will probably think they're desperately uncool and ignore them from now until the end of the course. That's a fate worse than death.

So when they show up, day one, does anyone speak? Not on your life. One misjudged comment could shame them forever. And the longer the silence goes on, the more scared we get. The harder it is to break. Half these kids haven't been out of the house all week. And there's still five thick minutes before anything's going to start.

Over the room from me are two Connexions advisors. I discover from the girl next to me that one helped her get here. 'Great', I say. Silence. 4 minutes 45 seconds to go. Everyone stares somewhere they won't accidentally make eye contact. I turn to the girl again. 'Is she any good at her job?'

Ha ha ha. It seems I haven't learnt so much after all.

In fact, writing this, I realise how much we're still dragging round the world with teenage glasses on. I hear friends say, 'we need to show people that Christians are cool.' Really? I sit down at a conference planning meeting and worry how I'm going to show all these professionals I know what I'm talking about. At the end, I found out two of them are student volunteers – less 'professional' than me. My friend emailed me today she wonders when she's going to start feeling like a grown up. 'I'm 24, and I'm still waiting for life to begin.' Talking to Mum and Dad, it sounds like this feeling never goes away – you never feel any older, just start noticing how young your doctor is, or the England captain.

I kind of like the fact that for the first few seconds after waking up, I don't know how old I am. I'm just me. Actually, that's how I feel when I'm spending time with Jesus. Maybe that's how I'll feel with him forever in a new heaven and a new earth.

As the day went on, I got chatting with the young people; and I got less and less scared of them. Alex with the headphones became Alex listening to the Man in the Mirror. Jo the sarcastic northerner became Jo who drinks three cans of strawberry kick and giggles all afternoon. Sullen Karla became Karla who just lost a child. Wayne who's just come out of prison became Wayne who wanted walking to the Bus stop because he got beaten up there last time. Dan with the motor bike became Dan who struggled with school, can't get a mechanic's apprenticeship 'til he's 18, can't get a job at all; and Dan who ran round the block with me in 2 minutes before our session started again.

They were still sullen, didn't listen and impossible to control. They still smoked and swore and bragged about getting into fights last night. They still wore tracksuits and lived in "forn-'ill". They were still all the things we mock and fear them for. But I wasn't afraid of them anymore. I just felt pity.

I guess what I want to write is that you don't need to be afraid of chavs. Maybe if you stop being afraid of them, like me, you'll be able to realise you're actually the one holding all the cards. You're the one with the chance of a decent job, hobbies, safety from crime (most victims of crime live in the same area as the criminals). You're the one who can afford to travel the world, and still go out for Sunday lunch every week. You don't need to look behind you as you walk for fear of being jumped by a rival gang. You can answer your phone, because no one's threatening you with seven kinds of murder if you don't get them their drug money. You've never had to go to prison or decide if you should have an abortion.

I don't believe I would make better choices than anyone else if I was born in their shoes. I've done nothing to deserve the prosperous life I enjoy. It's a gift from my secret admirer. I cannot understand why he loves me so much.

I want to say that you don't need to worry about not being grown up, everything sewn up. I think you'd never do it if you tried. So maybe we were made to let someone else look after things for us, and to enjoy it like a child. And I want to say, 'put aside childish ways' – don't live in fear anymore, and so keep all your toys to yourself. I think you can understand that's not a contradiction. You can keep using the word 'chav' if you like. But I hope you can make some your friends.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbzMsIcp6fI

Happy Birthday

I'm travelling back in time;
Songs from seventeen
The land of nine

Sweeping fields to the sky, the sea.

Old names and faces
Round some corner from new
Through changing places

Will I find you?

There's laughter ringing through my ears

But newsprint in my eyes

I see the way ahead is rich

But I want to be surprised.

I remember - you love secrets

Telling stories page by page.

Wind up my reading eagerness

More with every age.

On my first night at Uni, Tabs said to me, 'these are going to be the best years of our lives.' I think I said, 'I kind of think every year should be better than the year before.' Not easier, but better. A bigger canvas. Higher stakes. Knowing Jesus more. Just feeling happy. Since 18, I think it's been true.

18^th – SNOW! (in Southampton) Cell group – epic snowball fight on the rec. Escaping to the Wye valley. Standing over the M4 and taking a deep breath.

19^th – I can't remember this for some reason. Think it was one of those years.

20^th – At home, parents organized a surprise party while I was still in the house. One by one, friends materialised, until I twigged what was going on…

21^st – New Jars of Clay queuing Regent Street for Chinese Embassy. Bacon and sausage roll. Pedro's sombreros & chilli beef stacked with the Wolfson gang.

22^nd – Cape Town. Relaxed workshop, eating out, skyping home.

23^rd – Leading worship, Bedford. Not telling anyone, then surprise drinks in my honour.

24^th – Traversing wind chill swamp Essex Suffolk border with two staunch companions. Slipping on the mud. Frinton on sea: Grandparents, the best bookshop in the world, sunset beach and greensward. Singing worship out there for an hour. God has been good to me.