Fast For The Curious: Stokeyo Drift

Right so we’ve established my ignorant beginnings and the reason why this series is being written now as well as how I gained a level of consciousness about its importance.

To re-state for personal context purposes I’ve got baptised in February 1994 after taking a relationship with Jesus a bit more intentionally in the later summer of 1993. I’ve done the university thing from 1996-1999 and I’m just getting settled into London from August 1999 onwards. Things are looking good for me there. It’s a familiar place to me now, I’m feeling at home and building good relationships as well as getting involved in church activities. Surely everything was set for me to enjoy some good years in the capital city.

A number of factors merged to give me the opportunity of travelling up to Stoke-on-Trent. I had written a letter to someone I admire who was involved in Christian media up in the area. That letter was sent over a year previously and I’d almost forgotten about it as I settled in London after university.

I was involved in the Youth Anniversary for that year being asked to ‘preach’ a sermonette alongside some other brother (don’t worry Shane, I won’t expose you by mentioning your name here … oh hold on a minute ...). I have never been formally trained or personally mentored in the area of sermons. Having a knack of talking and being educated left most people assuming that I’d know what it is to preach and I’d be alright on any given occasion. Like a lot of the spiritual stuff that I’ve gone through, especially initially, it was mostly self-taught or Spirit-led without personal intervention – call it what you will.

I’ve never had the best recollection of that sermon, but I am my own worst critic. As well as the sermon, though, the rest of the day featured a presentation made by Hughie about a National Youth Evangelism initiative for which he was looking for volunteers. Thanks to my mentor at the time, Ritson Shields, I was already involved in an evangelism initiative and was exhilarated by the experience. Not sure if I’ve mentioned before that evangelism is not a natural passion for me – it has not bee something to which I am naturally drawn, but thanks to Ritson the interest was there and that was how I got involved in the local initiative.

Hughie was the dude to whom I’d sent the letter. Hearing him propose something on a bigger scale to what I was doing locally and a possible gateway to exploring the media I approached him and he recalled the letter sent to him sometime before. A fasting and planning weekend was scheduled for the end of the year in Stoke-on-Trent and so he said that would be a good time to discuss matters further.

This fasting weekend had enormous implications for my life. One aspect of that was my concept of fasting.

We’ll find out exactly what took place over that weekend that changed a substantial amount for me personally and spiritually in the next blog entry. What’s worth noting here though is just how crucial relationships are in our spiritual growth. As I mentioned earlier sometimes as new born Christians left to our own desires our initial excitement about God can peter out into a mundane double life of church attendance and mundane day to day living with a veneer of religiosity. God in His wisdom has given us men and women who model what it is to follow Christ and the Scriptures are replete with instructions for those relationships to be in place to encourage the whole Body to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Identifying these people may not always be easy, but it is definitely worthwhile. Meanwhile if you’ve done the trip for a while then you should be able to appreciate those who have not made the trip as yet as well as those new to the trip – the angst and issues of following Christ. Do me, them and most importantly God a favour and reach out to them if at all possible, befriend them, forbear them and contribute to their understanding of God that may lead to life-changing experiences as the Christ they see in you becomes a part of them over time.

Don’t forget to come back for more soon.

For His Name's Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Mentor Birthday and Other Things

It’s good to reminisce now and again. I was just sitting here putting together the strands to various blogs and interspersed in all the writing and sorting I looked back on some of the earlier blog entries on this blog. It’s quite something reading about how I introduced my family and some social justice issues. Man, back in the day I could write. That’s not to say I’ve dropped the ball, it is to say I have hope to continue writing when I read stuff like that.

I was thinking about combining two strands of thought and making one blog, but on further consideration I thought it better to just leave it to two separate blogs so I can get on with the series on fasting on a different trend to keeping you up to date with a couple of things worth mentioning.

First it’s worth mentioning that as you read in yesterday’s blog I really began to take fasting a bit more seriously when I loved in London. During that time I had my first real spiritual mentor. Previously I was more or less left to my own devices in terms of being grounded in a relationship with God. It was Ritson Shields who took me under his wing and supported practically as well as in other ways to help me grow in my relationship with God. He helped me to get excited about some of the things of God and there’s no doubt that he helped me have a greater appreciation for exploring the things of God and taking my teaching passion seriously and wider than the denominational setting.

I say all this because today is his birthday. (OK it was today when I wrote even if it’s yesterday when I blog it!) Not quite sure how old he is, but I’m sure that’s completely irrelevant. This blog allows me to publicly declare my appreciation and love of him. There are times I wish we were physically closer as for all the benefit of modern communications, nothing beats intimate personal contact.

So on this his birthday I trust he had a good one and if you don’t have other followers of Christ that you can count on to help in your journey, please find them because they are worth their weight in gold. We were never meant to do this journey solo and ideally our local church is meant to be that expression of intimacy and grace that allows us to grow together closer to Christ and each other. I know realistically the ideal remains a challenge, but it is still possible to have close relationships in the Lord that echo Paul and Barnabas, Peter and John and other famous double-acts and group settings.

I thank God for you Ritson and trust that others will come to know the benefits of being mentored into growing in love with Christ as you have mentored me, sir.

I also thought I’d use this entry to again promote some of the other blogs to which I contribute. All year long my reading has increased a great deal and I’ve enjoyed that fact with one or two books standing out above the rest. I may have made private notes about them here and there, but I am looking to begin reviewing the books a lot more as there are so many values and other things of interest to gain from them. So where pertinent I’m putting up book reviews together, some on this blog and some on the sister blog Among Friends. Recently I finished reading the biography of Billy Joel by Bill Smith called I Go To Extremes and it gives me great pleasure to commend to you the review I’ve written on it. Look out for more reviews from time to time.

In terms of settling at home, I’m a lot closer than I was two months ago, but it’s still a longer process than I thought. Things at work are picking up slightly and I feel a bit better for that. One outlet of that will be greater activity on the web from me on the North Staffs YMCA site, so be sure to check it out as and when stuff changes. As well as all that I’m going through some challenging times personally in terms of getting focussed only on what God wants me to do. I’m sure I’ll blog on that sooner or later. Speaking of blogging later, there’ll be more on the current series of fasting very shortly. As ever thanks for your time in reading.

For His Name's Sake

Shalom

dmcd