We have been back in N.Ireland a year now and, as with all passing of time, in some ways it seems it can’t be a year yet and in other ways it seems like we have been here for ages. The former because sometimes we still feel like the new kids on the block, the latter because in many ways we feel ‘at home’ here now.

I sat in church yesterday and looked around and thought how blessed we are to be here. I am thankful to have the first year behind us, for it was a year of transition and that I don’t find easy. I am thankful that we each have found a niche here where we can feel at home and at ease. I am thankful for the many new friends we have made – they have made us feel so welcome. I am thankful for the many old friends we have managed to see again – they are people we have a history with. I am thankful for the ‘old’ friends from Switzerland who have remained in touch with us – and for those who have come to visit us – they have helped us still feel connected.

And I am thankful for my garden – and for the fact that there I have my own roses – what a joy!

Roses in my garden

And sitting in our garden is our cat – how amazing for this family who were flat-dwellers in Switzerland for 17 years to find themselves in a suburban house with a garden which has its own roses and a cat!

KFC our cat

 

And so for friends, roses and cats I am thankful – for they have all helped me in the emotional roller coaster called transition.

I’m back! It’s been a very long time since I’ve blogged and part of the reason is that I have been taking some distance learning courses with  CCEF  as well as starting a part-time job. Now I have taken a break in the distance learning, having completed the first certificate, and am beginning to get used to the rhythm of my job.

I want to share here one of the papers I wrote for one of my courses – a response paper to the book ‘Relationships: a Mess Worth Making’ by Paul Tripp and Tim Lane.

‘When I live out of a biblical sense of who I am (identity) and rest in who God is (worship), I will be able to build a healthy relationship with you.’ (‘Relationships – a Mess Worth Making’ p.57.)

 Many of our relationship problems come out of our forgetting our identity – who we are in Christ. In II Peter 1 Peter tells us that God’s ‘divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness’ – and yet we can become ‘ineffective and unproductive’ when we forget that we have ’been cleansed from his past sins’. This is why we need the daily grace of personal ministry.

When I forget who I am in Christ, I look for my identity in other things – and that effects the way I relate to other people. This can happen in apparently insignificant ways in those microcosms of seconds which Lane and Tripp talk about. For example, the other day my husband walked into the room where I had been working on the computer. He wanted to share his day with me, to communicate with me. Was I happy? No! I was annoyed at what I perceived as his insensitivity to the importance of what I was doing and his readiness to interrupt it just so that I could listen to him! I was telling myself that I deserved him to respect me and what I was doing and that his interruption was an indication of a lack of that respect which I deserved! I responded curtly and he could tell I was annoyed – though he had no idea why! 

What should my response have been? Remembering that I am a child of the King, totally accepted and loved by him, I do not need the respect and affirmation of others. Therefore I am free to reach out to them and welcome their ‘interruptions’ into my life.

On a bigger scale, I have begun to see that in my relationship with my husband and daughters, I have a need to be needed. What I have fondly perceived as my servant heart – a desire to serve others and meet their needs – can so often become a need to be needed. I enjoy serving – as long as others need me and appreciate me!

As our daughters are growing up and leaving the nest, the reality of this need to be needed has been painfully brought home to me. Part of the reason why I struggle with the impending empty nest is that I no longer feel needed – and that was where I was deriving so much of my identity. What will I do when they fly the nest? Who will I be? I will be what I have always been – a child of God, loved and chosen by the King to worship, love and serve Him, first and foremost, and then others whom He chooses to bring into my life.

The issue of worship is the other side of who I am. Part of my calling is to worship Him – which is only a logical response to who he is and what he has done for me in Christ. He has given me ‘everything I need for life and godliness’ and that includes what I need for this stage of parenting, for this phase of my life. I don’t need the respect of my husband and I don’t need to be needed by my daughters – I have everything I need in Christ and when I recognise that and rest in that fact, I will stop demanding from others what they cannot give me – ‘the inward rest of soul that only God can give’ (p.59). 

Resting in who God is means that I will worship him as Creator. I will therefore not try to recreate others in my image but will learn to be thankful for how God has made them. I will worship him as Sovereign and therefore I will not try to take his place in writing their story but will learn to appreciate their differences. I will worship him as Saviour and therefore I will take my sin seriously rather than focus on the sin of others.

‘Only when I remember who I am and worship God for who he is can I respond to you with patient, gentle, hopeful, and courageous love.’ (p.65).

Today is Mothers’ Day in the UK and I am reflecting on the wonderful privilege of being a mother. Contrary to what our culture tells us, it is one of the highest callings in the world. I am so thankful that God gave me two daughters and I have learned so much through trying to parent them in a way which honours God and helps them grow up to love and honour Him too.

I often remember a teacher at school used to say that it wasn’t fair that the students who came first in an examination also got a prize for it – they had already got their reward through coming first. I must confess that I feel the same way about Mothers’ Day – why should I get presents for it when I have already been giving the amazing privilege of being a mother?

Thank-you, Gemma and Claire-Lise, for making me a mother and teaching me so much in the process!

This morning I was reading the old, familiar Bible story of the raising of Lazarus from the dead when something struck me: Jesus said to his disciples ‘For your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.’

Jesus had heard of the death of Lazarus two days earlier and the New Testament records ‘So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was’. Does that make sense to you? Should it not read ‘So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he rushed to his bedside and healed him’? This was someone he loved, as demonstrated by the tears he shed at his graveside. So why did he not rush to heal him? He loved Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, too – so why didn’t he spare them the pain of losing their only brother?

I believe the key is in this phrase ‘For your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.’ For the sake of his disciples, but also for the sake of Lazarus, Mary and Martha, Jesus chose to wait after he heard of Lazarus’ illness. In that intervening period, Lazarus died. And when Jesus arrived at their home, it was a scene of mourning, tears and profound pain – even confusion, because both sisters told Jesus that if he had been there, their brother would not have died.

Jesus could have rushed to Lazarus’ bedside and healed him. But he was planning something better. What he did was, of course, an even greater miracle because he raised Lazarus from the dead. But the goal of it was also something greater – what did he mean ‘for your sake’? He wanted the disciples, as well as Lazarus, Mary and Martha, to learn something – and I believe we as his present day disciples can learn the same lesson from the story: sometimes we don’t understand what the Lord is doing in our lives – especially when he doesn’t give us what we ask for – but he is always planning something better than we could ask for or imagine. His goal was  ’so that you may believe’ – he wanted the disciples and Lazarus, Mary and Martha to move another step forward in their faith in him.

Don’t we see this throughout the Bible? Joseph didn’t understand why he was thrown into a pit and left for dead, then sold to traders and taken to Egypt where he was thrown into prison – but he trusted God and he was ultimately used to rescue God’s children from famine and certain death. Moses didn’t understand why he had to spend 40 years in the wilderness  but he trusted God and became the means of the deliverance of the children of Israel out of Egypt. And so it goes on and on….Countless people throughout the story of the Bible learned to trust God when they didn’t understand their circumstances.

As we do that, then the process becomes not only ‘for our sake’ but also ‘for his sake’. Jesus had told his disciples ‘This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it’.  The miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus brought glory to God, which was the whole aim of Jesus’ life. He lived, not to please himself, but to please his Father and to bring glory to him. And as his disciples increased in their faith, this also brought glory to God.

And so it is with us. As we learn to take another step forward in trusting God, the result is something ‘for our sake’ but also ‘for God’s sake’ – his glory.

We have had some wild weather up here recently on the North Coast – you can read all about it on Alan’s blog. And we thought we had more extreme weather in Switzerland!

Many years ago we used to sing a song called ‘Christmas is a time for love’. It was full of nostalgia and idealism and created the kind of warm fuzzy feelings many of us, if we are honest, associate with this time of year.

We want Christmas to be a special time of love and peace and joy – a time when we can forget about the realities of our present-day lives and remember….what? The fuzzy happiness of our childhoods? Days gone by which were happier than today? Days which were free of the responsibilities of adulthood? The Christmas we got that special present we were dreaming of? The Christmas we fell in love? What is it about Christmas that makes us long for something else – and what are we longing for?

Some of it may be a spiritual thing. The well-known Christmas carol ‘I heard the bells on Christmas Day’ which talks about ‘Peace on earth, goodwill to men’ was written by Longfellow in 1864. He had known personal tragedy as his wife had died in an accidental fire in 1861. The first Christmas after Fanny’s death, Longfellow wrote, “How inexpressibly sad are all holidays.” A year after the incident, he wrote, “I can make no record of these days. Better leave them wrapped in silence. Perhaps someday God will give me peace.” Longfellow’s journal entry for December 25th 1862 reads: “‘A merry Christmas’ say the children, but that is no more for me.” But in 1864 he wrote the words we know so well, which of course are taken from Luke’s gospel chapter 2 verse 14 which – as we heard from Alan in his sermon yesterday morning – is more accurately translated as follows: ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests’.

God doesn’t promise peace at Christmas – He promises peace for those on whom his favor rests. Does that mean a life free from worry or fear or illness or grief? Clearly not, as Christians suffer all of these just as much as non-Christians do. So why do we have this longing for peace at Christmas? It seems to be a common theme, even just as a temporary measure, as Alan reminded in his sermon of the soldiers who stopped fighting on Christmas Day during the First World War and offered each other gifts. Who among us have caught ourselves hoping that Christmas Day will be free from the stresses of the other 364 days of the year? I found myself recently praying with someone for a family member who was facing the prospect of ill health and asking God that this cloud would not hang over them on Christmas Day. Why?

Since this is our first Christmas since moving back to the UK for 17 years, I have found myself yearning for the traditions which made Christmas special in Switzerland – our annual trip to the Christmas market at Montreux, Christmas caroling parties with old friends, enjoying hot chestnuts as we walked through the streets to do our Christmas shopping, eating fondue on Christmas Eve…. Why do we long for such things? Why such nostalgia?

Perhaps all of the reasons we have looked at are mixed in to the yearning we have, but I can’t help but think that underpinning all of these longings is a greater yearning which is common to all of us – a yearning for something better than this life, a hope that there might be something more permanent, a longing that the fairy tale might just turn out to true after all and we might all live happily ever after.

In a blog entry called ‘Paradoxical Yearning’ Gemma talked recently about this kind of thing when she said: ‘I am longing to be back in Geneva, or just some undefined place, with my old friends; I am also longing to move forward and simply enjoy the many developing friendships that I have here. In writing this though, no yearning is stronger for the day when we will all be together, reunited with each other and with the One our hearts truly yearn for. ”And there we’ll find our home, our life before the throne”…could it be that this discomfort I am feeling in being uprooted from my friendships in Geneva, this difficulty I am experiencing in digging roots here, is a mere reflection of the feeling that as Christians, we have, in looking forward to Heaven? That God has planted a hope and a longing for something that is not of this world, so that here in this life we lift our eyes to his Kingdom rather than dwell on earthly things?’

Whether it is homesickness or the nostalgia that comes at this time of year or the disappointed hope that makes us yearn for something more’, I think we are all expressing in our own ways a longing for something unseen, something spiritual, something eternal. The Bible says that ‘God has set eternity in the hearts of men’ (Ecclesiastes 3:11). I believe that God himself has given us that yearning and it will not be satisfied until we know him. That is why other things, no matter how wonderful they may be, no matter how much we have longed for them, always turn out to be a little bit less than we had hoped for. Only God can satisfy that longing which he has placed in our hearts. But He has promised to satisfy us – and that eternally. As St. Augustine said: ‘Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee’.

I am almost at the end of my first course with CCEF which was called ‘Dynamics of Biblical Change’ and was taught by David Powlison. I must say that I have thoroughly enjoyed it and am very grateful to have the opportunity to benefit from the teaching of the tutors at CCEF. If you would like to know more about David Powlison, there is an excellent article about him at http://theologica.blogspot.com/2005/03/david-powlison.html His teaching is dense, it is hard work to sift through it all because every word is significant – but it is well worth the effort. I have benefited enormously from this course and it has been something I have been able to put into practice in my life right away, as well as something I will continue to implement for the rest of my life. As he concludes the course, David Powlison says the following:

The dynamic of biblical change is God claiming who you are.

You can start to become familiar with that dynamic by starting with some dinky thing (like the traffic jam I mentioned in an earlier post) and your dinky reactions to it (like grumbling and complaining). Finding the way of escape in the little stuff has a ripple effect in your understanding of the big stuff.

I find this very exciting and very challenging at the same time.

Last night I witnessed the phenomenon of a major Ladies’ Event at PBC – called Extreme Makeover. Around 7.30pm, about 350 ladies arrived at the church which had been transformed into a twinkling Christmas scene – lights and Christmas trees everywhere, candles in every nook and cranny, outside, inside, and everywhere in between. As the ladies arrived, they chatted in the foyer while they enjoyed a glass of hot mulled punch. Then we were seated around tables in the sanctuary which, too, had been transformed into what seemed like a busy restaurant as ladies sat down at their tables and were served by the men of the church – dressed as waiters, tuxedos and all:-)

Throughout the course of the evening, we watched the unfolding of a drama. A lady was on ’stage’, disheveled and discouraged by the thought of all she had to do before Christmas. She was sitting in her ‘living room’ which was in a similar state of disrepair. As she wallowed in her despair, a friend called to visit – and she initiated a series of events which led to the complete makeover of both the lady and her living room.

Ladies arrived on stage to do all kinds of things: one made a beautiful Christmas wreath; another made a table decoration; another put her (amazing) creative skills to work by preparing some floral centrepieces; another set to work on the table which she set with great elegance in the course of the evening; another wrapped presents in unique and beautiful ways; another made cinnamon cookies which could be used as Christmas decorations.

The ‘curtains closed’ for the interval, during which we were treated to some lovely Christmas music.

As the curtains opened after the interval…….the whole stage had been transformed into a beautifully decorated, cosy room ready to welcome any number of Christmas guests – and the lady, of course, had also had her own makeover and was looking relaxed, beautiful and extremely elegant.

The evening drew to a close with a short talk by one of the PBC ladies who shared with us the real meaning of Christmas – Jesus coming to earth to redeem us, to rescue us, to allow us to begin over again. She talked about the Christmas shoe boxes which children in El Salvador (and lots of other countries of the world) receive at Christmas time. Sometimes they are so taken with the pretty box and ribbons that they think that is the gift – how sad if they were not to open it! Similarly, she said, how tragic if we were not to open the gift which God gives us at Christmas time – the gift of His one and only Son, Jesus.

As she finished, we had one last solo – a beautiful prayer of blessing on us all.

It was an amazing, enjoyable evening. But one of the most amazing things for me, as I witnessed my very first ladies’ event of such magnitude at PBC, was to see the army of women (and not a few men!) who worked together to make this event happen. From those who baked the shortbread, to those who made the punch, not forgetting all those who laid tables and prepared the food and drinks to go on them, everyone who wrapped gifts for the tables, all those who made table decorations – not to mention all the other decorations, both inside and outside, and of course the actresses and narrator of the play, the musicians and soloists, as well as all those behind the scenes like the men who worked the sound system, took videos, etc, etc, etc.

There were obviously many, many people involved in the preparations, the event itself, and the clearing up afterwards. That was amazing enough – that all those people were prepared to give all that time to put on an event for the women of our community. But what was perhaps even more amazing was that I never heard a grumble or a complaint – everyone worked together with harmony and yes! with sheer joy!

Isn’t that one of the gifts of the church? That Christ has given us brothers and sisters with whom we learn to relate in the bad times as well as the good (in the times we need makeovers of all kinds in our lives as well as the calmer, healthier, happier times) – and with these brothers and sisters we learn to work together, each one using the gifts which God has given them, for the common good.

Alan preached two good sermons yesterday – on Nehemiah in the morning and on Galatians in the evening. In both, he mentioned how that, as Christians, we are called to be different – but not in an outward way, rather in an inward way which will express itself in a demonstration of the fruit of the Spirit. It got me thinking…..

We are not called to be different in the way we dress, unless that has to do with modesty v immodesty. We don’t have to show we are Christians by wearing weird clothes or having hairstyles which make us stand out as different. We are not called to be different by the places we frequent unless that has to do with morality v immorality. We are not called to be different by the things we eat or drink unless that has to do with the glory of God or offending a weaker Christian.

But we are called to be different by the way we react and interact with others around us. I am currently taking a distance-learning course with CCEF and am learning a lot from David Powlison. One of his favourite images is of a traffic jam and how we each react differently when caught in traffic. Imagine you are caught in a traffic jam at ten minutes to twelve when you have a very important appointment at 12 – whether it be a medical appointment, a business meeting, or an important meeting with an old friend. There is no sign of the traffic clearing and your mobile phone has just died so yo can’t even contact anyone to explain your delay. How do you react? With burning anger at the traffic or at the company doing the roadworks which is causing the traffic jam? With paralyzing anxiety because you don’t want to offend or upset the person you are supposed to be meeting? With great relief because you didn’t want to keep that medical appointment anyway? All of these reactions, David Powlison would suggest, are sinful and come from what is ruling our hearts at that particular moment on that particular morning on that particular road.

As Alan said yesterday, quoting Paul Tripp, most of our lives are spent in the mundane moments of everyday choices. We only ever make two or three major, life-changing decisions in our lives. So what do we do in the middle of the traffic jam? That is where we display – or don’t display – the fruit of the Spirit. That is where we can choose to allow God to take that moment to show us our hearts and what is ruling them (be it our own comfort, the affirmation and acceptance of others, fear of man, our need to feel we are in control, our own pride etc). In that moment, God can rescue us from ourselves and begin to transform us into His image so that we can truly begin to display the fruit of the Spirit.

May God have mercy on us and teach us His grace in those moments in our lives!

Gemma turned 20 yesterday – the same weekend as we celebrated Westlake’s 20th birthday!

As I say in my post entitled ‘Happy Birthday, Westlake!’, our lives were entwined for 17 years with the lives of Westlake – and this is a vivid reminder of that fact. Gemma was just 2 when we left N.Ireland to go to Switzerland so most of her childhood was spent there. She grew up in the international environment of Westlake, where she had many friends from many different countries; she was educated mainly in the Swiss system where she had many Swiss friends; and today she is continuing her education in Queen’s University in Belfast, where she is reading French, Psychology and Ethno-musicology. Her chosen subjects reflect her diverse interests and alongside them, she continues to develop her interest in music, particularly in the area of leading worship in our new church. Gemma is a fun-loving, bubbly girl who loves life and loves people. But she also loves God and it is a joy for us to see her using her gifts and talents to serve Him in music but also in reaching out to her friends and showing them the compassion and the love of Christ.

Happy Birthday, Gemma! May you continue to love life, love people and love God!