Wisdom part 2

Check out these bits from Proverbs…

“I call to you, to all of you! I raise my voice to all people.
Listen to me! For I have important things to tell you. Everything I say is right,”
“Wisdom shouts in the streets. She cries out in the public square…
Come and listen to my counsel. I’ll share my heart with you and make you wise.”
“I called you so often, but you wouldn’t come. I reached out to you, but you paid no attention.”

Wisdom is trying to speak all the time – Jesus, with the help of the Holy Spirit is trying to talk to us. Are we listening? Have you ever seen Bruce Almighty? There’s a bit at the start where he prays for God to show him a sign and then God uses all kinds of stuff to try to speak to him…road signs, TV ads, songs on the radio and even his pager. Bruce is oblivious to it all and refuses to answer his pager!! How often does God try to speak to me and I don’t notice? How much am I missing? Here’s a challenge for you – this next week, make a conscious effort to listen to God. Expect for Him to speak to you any time, any place, through anything!!

Wisdom part 1

Imagine if you took a guy from the Amazon who’d lived there all his life and put him in the middle of London without explaining how stuff works in England. He’d probably find the world a very scary, overwhelming and confusing place to be. He’d have no clue about money, buying stuff, finding somewhere to live, crossing the road even!!! Living in a world created by God without understanding God’s rules and ways of doing things can also be scary, confusing and overwhelming. The Bible says there are 2 types of wisdom – human wisdom and God’s wisdom. In order to thrive in God’s world we need to follow God’s wisdom, not our own!


Where do we get God’s wisdom? Check out a book in the Bible called Proverbs. (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Proverbs%201%20;&version=65; or if you’re too lazy to read it you can listen to the audio version here http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/audio ) The first 7 chapters talk about how important wisdom is, all the benefits of having wisdom etc. Then in Chapter 8 it talks about wisdom like a person…

“I, Wisdom…”, “I love all who love me. Those who search for me will surely find me.” At first glance it looks like the author is just being poetic but then you get to this bit…

“The Lord formed me from the beginning, before he created anything else. I was appointed in ages past, at the very first, before the earth began.”

Compare that with these bits from Genesis 1 and John 1…

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.”

“In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone.”

The Word is a nickname for Jesus. Proverbs isn’t just talking about knowledge, it’s talking about Jesus and about the Holy Spirit. It isn’t just saying ‘get real brainy’; it’s saying ‘get to know Jesus’!!! Jesus is the source of godly wisdom. If you want to know God’s way of doing things then get to know Jesus.

The Boss

Here's a little something someone wrote on the prayer room wall...
Date: Today
From: The Boss
Subject: Yourself
Reference: Life

I am your God. Today I will be handling all your problems. Please remember that I DO NOT need your help. If life happens to deliver a situation to you that you cannot handle, DO NOT attempt to resolve it. Kindly put it in the SFGTD (something for God to do) box. All situations WILL be resolved, but in my time not yours. Once the matter is placed in the box, do not hold onto it by worrying about it. Instead, focus on all the wonderful things that are present in your life right now.

eyes wide shut

Well, we're back from conference and had a great time. My talk seemed to go well and I got to lead worship one night too. Truth and treating went really well. We got to chat to a few people and one group even got to pray for healing with one guy on his doorstep.

We are currently at the start of a month of prayer in our church. We've kicked the month off with a week of 24/7 prayer and it's going great. The youth have really got into it and are putting the rest of us to shame with their passion!!! I spent a night in the prayer room with a few others over the weekend and though I found it easy to stay awake, found it really hard to actually pray. I really wanted for God to speak to me and had lots I wanted to pray about but just couldn't for some reason. I spent another couple of hours in there last night and that time didn't try to pray or listen, I just focused on being with God. I had an awesome couple of hours!!! I'm starting to see now that God wants me to be still and just be in his presence right now. It's time to just rest in Him and stop trying so hard!

Another thing I've been realising recently is that we're not called to make converts, we are called to make disciples. What does that mean? We're not called to get people to 'pray the prayer'. Though it's important to preach Christ crucified and to challenge people to make a commitment to Him, my focus should be on helping them to become a follower of Jesus. I need to teach people how to pray, how to worship, morality, what God's Kingdom looks like... Discipleship is so important. Recently I've got a little frustrated that I don't get to spend time with many young people right now. But it's quality not quantity that counts! I'd much rather get to spend a lot of time really pouring into a few people - seeing them transformed and then transforming others - than to have shallow connections with loads of people. Jesus had a small group that he spent loads of time with and he taught them to go out and change the world. I want to do the same!