The words of this great old hymn have been sung throughout the world in church buildings, church services, in the homes and cars of individual Christians, during times of blessing and times are hardship. Yet these words are so much more than the lyrics to a song. These are the words of a life story!

Each of us have a story. Some have their story in the public eye, some keep their story in private, some have had movies made about their story while others have written books about their story. No matter who we are though, there is a story behind our lives.

One day someone is going to ask you to tell your story. It could be a new friend, a significant other. It may be an employer or someone you manage. It may happen soon, it may not happen for many years, but one thing is guaranteed, one day someone will want to know your story!

For Fanny Crosby there was only one theme behind her story, that was the assurance, grace, peace and hope of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Her story wasn’t about song writing, it wasn’t about all she could achieve. It wasn’t about becoming popular or famous, it was about one thing, the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The way you tell your story reveals what has touched your heart and changed your life. Fanny Crosby had the perfect story to tell. A heart that had been touched by the gospel and a life that had been changed by the saving grace of Jesus Christ. Is your story similar to Mrs Crosby’s or do you have a different story to tell?

One day, the almighty creator, God the father will ask you for your story; unless your story tells of a life that has been born of the spirit of God and washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, the rest will have all been in vain!

Is it time to change your story?

One rotten apple can spoil a bag of good apples. It’s an age-old proverb of wisdom. No one ever argues with it, everyone is in agreement that the damage that one piece of rotten fruit can do to many pieces of healthy fruit.

The problem is not believing this piece of wisdom, but identifying when an apple is rotten before it starts to destroy other apples close by. So often we only realize that an apple is rotten aftr it is too late.

John wrote about this problem to his friend Gaius. For the church which Gaius pastored had fell foul to one rotten apple. This apple came in the name of Diotrephes. A man who desired to be the leader and sort to eliminate anyone who he thought was a threat to this leadership. When preachers would come from out-of-town he would encourage people to not be welcoming. He gossiped about and accused men of God all in an effort to help himself. This man was truly a rotten apple. He had influenced others and now people had a bad taste in their mouths about church, leaders and even the gospel of Jesus Christ.

John urges the people to not let this rotten apple influence them, but instead discern what is right by what is good. If someone is trying to influence people to act in a way that is contrary to the life of Jesus Christ, then that person is a rotten apple, and follow John words of advice, stay well clear! In fact run for your lives because if you are not careful the rot will spread and before you know it, you will also be a rotten apple.

Who are you spending your time with? Who are you listening to? Who is influencing you? If you are finding yourself becoming gossips, becoming negative, becoming bitter or always finding fault, chances are there’s a rotten apple not too far away. Run from them and follow what is good!

Twice a day there is a transition between light and darkness. Almost like the changing of the guard or someone handing one shift of employment unto someone else.

Each evening it seems as if darkness expels light from sight. It seems as if darkness is just too powerful for the light. However, darkness only occurs when the light disappears. Each day the dark of night is only possible because the light has been removed from sight. However, as soon as a light is shone, the darkness has no place in which to stand.

The enemy of your soul tries to flood your life with darkness. He consumes your life with things that will take ‘The Light’ out of your sight. It will try to scare you, spook you and confuse you, but one shine of light and the power of darkness is eliminated!

Jesus Christ has come to be that light that distinguishes the darkness. When His light is around there is no need to be scared, spooked or confused. His light shows the way, illuminates your life and expells the darkness.

Don’t let the enemy take ‘The Light’ out of sight. Keep His light near, hold on tight because in that moment of sudden darkness His light will shine and guide you safely through.

While it is nice to feel loved and blessed by so many I have never been a big birthday guy. However, while I don’t celebrate my physical birthday too much, there is another birthday I do think is worth celebrating.

This week I had another birthday. 24 years ago I gave my life back to Jesus Christ and my life was forever changed as I became born again. From that moment on I had a new type of life, the life of Christ living within me. That same night I received what many call the baptism of the Holy Spirit where something unique happened to me and I received an in-filling of what can only be described as an overwhelming sense of Gods spirit that has never left me.

16 years ago on the same day I heard a voice that can only be described as the voice of God asking me to set my life aside and partner with him as a minister of the Gospel. I accepted the challenge and today I am living the very life He called me to back in 1995.

Physical birthdays are nice, but spiritual birthdays are really worth celebrating. What good is a physical birthday if you have never been born again?

I’m thankful for the life change that happened in me, and for the life change we are seeing in others.

Has your life been changed?

 There are some people in this world with what we call big hearts. Usually these are people who either have a lot of compassion or become very passionate about a cause. These types of people normally have a lot to give and can spread their passion or compassion over a wide variety of causes.

 However, no matter how big your heart is, there are always people, things and causes for which there is no room! Often something bigger, better, more shinny comes along and takes the place of something that had a place in your heart. A new car, a new job, a new flame, a new cause.

 So many though, have fallen away from a deep relationship with their savior Jesus Christ because they just crowded Him out. The urgent priority, the new cause, the work that just needed to be done, excitement of a new job, the demands of parenthood, all bumped God out of His place in their hearts. It wasn’t on purpose, it was intentional, it just happened.

 This is why John the Apostle urges us to keep at arms length anything that may bump the Lord from His rightful place in your heart. The heart that doesn’t have a place for the Lord is a heart that will never be settled, it will be a heart that will always struggle to find a place for anything. Yet, a heart that has the Lord firmly placed at the center is a heart that has peace, a heart that finds understanding and a heart that gains wisdom. It is a heart that others admire and priorities give way to.

In my experience I have found that May & June are the time people tend to transition most. As a ministry leader and then as an associate Pastor I learned and recognized that this time of year was the time when volunteers quit, people wanted to try new things or people left the churches we were at. However, it was also a time when new people would come on board, new volunteers would be found and your ministry was the new thing people wanted to try.

For any leader this is a bitter sweet time. Transition is hard. Change can be difficult and sometimes you feel people are making the wrong decision in their transition. Yet transition is something every ministry has to embrace. Big churches, small churches, urban churches or rural churches all experience it.

However, I encourage you to embrace this time. Transition shows health and life. Your body transitions and changes because it is alive. The trees and plants transition during this time because they are alive and so the church, which is the body of Christ, will transition and change because it is alive.

This doesn’t mean everything should change and everyone should move on to other things, but it does mean when you see a change in the wind or a new season arriving embrace it and work with it because more than likely God is moving the pieces around to perfectly align you for a new fruitful season of blessing.

Throughout the life of Abraham we see so many ups and downs. Yet one of the biggest lows for Abraham was a prayer that went unanswered year after year. On Sunday we dealt with the subject of why God isn’t answering some of our prayers. For Abraham it was the prayer of a son. Maybe for you it is the prayer of a loved one who has run away from God. Maybe it is a prayer for healing to a broken marriage. Some may pray for a better job or career. Others it may be a prayer to overcome depression or anxiety. Whatever you prayer today, there are just some that seem to go unanswered. However, just because you do not have an answer today does not mean God is not listening, and it does not mean he is saying no.

Below is a video of our talk on Sunday, I hope it brings some clarity and freedom to your prayer struggle.

I love to hear the story of a self made millionaire. Someone who went from rags to riches. Someone who through sheer blood sweat and tears made a name for themselves.

The reason for this I think is the way I was raised by my father. We didn’t have a lot of money growing up. I never received an allowance and we were always the last to get any new gadget. For example we didn’t get a VCR player until something called DVD’s were coming on the market.

As a child I would often resent the fact that I didn’t get what other kids got. I didn’t like the fact that if I wanted any money I’d have to go out and earn it. I realized that if I wanted to be a millionaire, I’d have to be a self made one.

After paying my way through college, paying for my first car and insurance and paying for my own wedding I started to realize the value of how I was raised.

I would look at my friends who had been given plenty as a child, they were not stable. I noticed others who had been given large down payments for their first home, or daddy had paid for their lavish wedding and seeing many who collapsed under the weight of problems when things got hard. I started to thank God that I had missed out on the free hand-outs because even though I didn’t have as much as others I knew I could survive through anything, even the loss of a job, home or support.

So when we made the decision to plant a church it came as not surprise to me that we wouldn’t get the free handouts some planters get. Did I want the handouts? Oh yes. Was it best for the course of our church to get those free handouts? Oh no.

You see planting Generation Church required more blood, sweat and tears that I’ve ever experienced. However, as I look back at our first four months of existence I’m starting to realize that there is a true grit in our church, and that is to fulfill the mission and vision of God at all costs! In the beginning it was just plain tough, but now we are starting to see a little bit of momentum. Those days of sweat and nights of tears we sowed are now starting to reap a harvest and I am so excited for the days ahead. They won’t get easier, in fact I know the larger we grow the harder it becomes, but we’ll know that those early days of working through college, doing a paper round, saving for a wedding, and self funding a church plant will be the foundation that no storm will be able to shake.

So if you’re one of those people like me who realizes that if you want anything in life you’re going to have to work for it, know this. Know that God sees those days, months and years where all you sow is blood, sweat and tears. He see’s that you watered them with countless hours of prayer and He will cause the growth!

No storm in life will be able to shake you!

That was the question I couldn’t answer at the time.

Last night I ran into someone I haven’t seen in a while. The last time I saw them they were going through the biggest trial of their lives. They had moved to Maryland because of their employment and their wife thought this was the perfect time to end their marriage.

I remember praying with this person, trying to help them understand what was happening and trying to put a plan together to win her back! This person fasted for days, prayed like never before, read a ton of books on marriage and tried to understand his wife. However, there was no fairly tale end to this story. The wife demanded a divorce, the man was crushed and the question he asked me haunted me for months, ‘Why isn’t God answering my prayer?’

To be honest I had no idea! I mean why doesn’t God answer some prayers when quite clearly the bible says ask and it shall be given.

However, as I look back on that situation it is now clear what was going on. This man was going through a trial, so his focus became about that trial. The purpose behind the prayer was the trial. The focus on the fasting was the trial. The change in attitude towards his wife was because of the trial. This was a good man who wanted to save his marriage, but in the midst of a trial so often our focus becomes the trial. We try this and that to stop the pain, when in reality our focus should be Jesus not the trial.

Sometimes God allows a prayer not to be answered in order to take us to a place where our focus becomes him and him alone. A place where we pray just to talk to him not pray to get something. Where we fast to go deeper with him, not to get a breakthrough. Where we treat people well because we the temple of God’s Holy Spirit, not trying to convince others we have changed.

I think some people don’t receive their answer to prayer because God is looking for a response from them, but sometimes we can be focused on our trial that we miss what God is actually trying to do through us!

So today, if you are going through a trial! Take your focus off it, put it on Jesus and ask him to do through you what we needs to do!

3. Ride the storm!

When a perfect storm comes your way there is only one approach you can take that will enable you live through it to tell your story and that is to ride the storm. By riding the storm I mean go along with the storms flow. It the storm is blow to the left, steer to the left, if to the right, steer to the right.

I am an avid golfer. Coming from England I understand what it takes to play golf in adverse weather. When the wind blows there are two thoughts that must be in your head at you play each shot, swing slower and play with the wind, not against the wind. The hard you swing in the wind the further your ball goes off course, the more you play against the wind the less your ball makes progress. So use the wind for your advantage.

The same goes in life. Roll with the waves, sail with the wind. When the storm passes you may be a little of course, but you will have survived and be in the shape you need to get back on course.

This past week, Generation Church went through a mini storm. By Friday it was clear our worship team was going to be depleted to just a drummer and electric guitar player. No vocals, no lead! Sickness & vacation had hit our team. While you can plan for vacation, you can’t plan for sudden sickness. We had three choices, fight it, ignore it or ride it! We decided to ride it! It wasn’t easy, but Sunday morning came and we had a full worship set, our worship leader Raquel (my wife) made a miracle recovery and we had a great worship set. We made contingency plans, but we didn’t fight it, we rode it, and the result was a miracle, literally a miracle! I’m sure if we had tried to fight it we probably would have failed, if we had ignored it, there would not have been a miracle, but we rode it, listened to God and let the storm take us where it needed to go, the result, a miracle!

So if you are going through a storm in your life, don’t swim against the waves, don’t let the waves roll over your head, but surf those waves and show that storm it will not break you, but you will tame it!