FRESH WIND, FRESH FIRE

As we start this new year, already some of our members are talking about how they believe God is going to do some amazing things this year - but we are also very aware of satans desire to damage much and destroy what has already been done among us. Our focus for teaching this year is Living in Hope, and we know thats about keeping focussed on Him and not allowing anything to get in the way.

Fresh wind, Fresh Fire is a book thats been around for some years, written by Pastor Jim Cymbala. The sub title of the book is: what happenes when God's Spirit invades the hearts of His people. Some of his writing is a very timely reminder to our church community, and also to the wider Christian Church. Here are some reflections:-

• I could just preach God's Word as best I knew and then call the congregation to prayer and worship. The Lord would take over from there
• Those experiences showed me that I didn't need to play the preacher. Jesus called fishermen, not graduates of rabbinical schools. The main requirement was to be natural and sincere. His disciples had to depend totllay upon the Lord and His Power. In the same way, I had to stop trying to act ministerial - whatever that was. God could only use Jim Cymbala the way he is
• I began mulling over the many ideas and strategies I had heard or read on church growth. One Christian leader had told me 'Forget about the institutional church building; home meetings are where its at these days. You might as well sell your building: God is doing a new thing
• If we don't call upon the Lord, He has promised nothing - nothing at all. Its as simple as that. No matter what I preach or what we claim to believe in our heads, the future will depend upon our times of prayer
• The condition o the church may be very accurately gauged by its prayer meetings. So is the prayer meeting a grace-ometer, and from it we may judge of the amount of divine working among a people. If God be near a church, it must pray. And if He be not there, one of the first tokens of His absence will be a slothfulness in prayer (Spurgeon)
• God likes to see His people shut up to do this, that there is no hope but in prayer. Herein lies the Church's power against the world (Andrew Bonar 1853)
• Satan's main stratgy with God's people has always been to whisper, 'Don't call, don't ask, don't depend on God to do great things. You'll get along fine if you just rely on your own cleverness and energy'. The truth of the matter is that the devil is not terribly frightened of our human efforts and credentials. But he knows his kingdom will be damaged when we lift up our hearts to God
• Only when we are full of the Spirit do we feel the need for God everywhere we turn
• Our forebears back in the camp meeting days used to say that if people left a meeting talking about what a wonderful sermon the preacher gave or how beautifully the singers sang, the meetin had failed. But if people went home saying things like 'Isn't God good? He met me tonight in such a wonderful way' - it was a good meeting. There was to be sharing the stage with the Lord
• The feature that is supposed to distinguish Christian churches, Christian people, and Christian gatherings is the aroma of prayer. It doesn't matter what your tradition or my tradition is. The house is not ours anyway, it is the Father's
• If a meeting does not end with people touching God, what kind of meeting is it? We haven't really encountered God. We haven't met with the only One powerful and loving enough to change our lives.