Here's a challenge...

Do you know God heals the sick TODAY?

Do you know that God COULD and WOULD heal you if you were sick?

Do you know that God CAN and WILL provide for you, financially?

Do you know that God will reveal his plan for you if you ask?

I'm sick of 2 words that we use all the time. They are Faith and Belief. I don't know, it just seems that Faith and Belief are a bit wimpy, because I KNOW God exists. And if I KNOW it, why would I JUST have faith in it?!

Do you see where I'm coming from? Ok, you may say well this is symentics and just using a different word. NO, WRONG! I want everyone to say they KNOW God exists...
Does a Bee Sting hurt? YES! Is grass green? YES! Is water wet? YES! Is God REAL? YES! Does he talk the talk and walk the walk? YES!

I guess I kinda feel that if you don't get it, if you don't know it, if you don't live it, then what's the point? Stay in bed on a Sunday. Sorry, harsh I know, but God doesn't mess about.

And to the evangelicals about to hit the email button and say 'ARGH! you heretic! Telling people they shouldn't go to church! How dare you!' I say to them, maybe if you worked a bit harder at loving and discipling people, and a bit less on condemming the world then MAYBE, just MAYBE the world would be a better place.

Peace out.

Can you contemplate it?

My last post I talked about my friend Joe who tragically passed away recently. I was fortunate enough (with the help of Big Matt) to make the journey to beautiful Scotland, and see where he worked and lived, meet some of his friends and most importantly, say goodbye to him. The service was emotional, there were highs and lows, tears and laughter, lament and celebration.

I was inspired by my good friend Charlie, Joe's dad. This is a guy I respect, a lot. To be honest I haven't been able to say any thing to him. Anything I could or would say just seems insignificant, meaningless - useless.

But the whole day, I learned things from him. God the Father was in him. As he carried his son to his grave, I saw strength and brokenness. I think it was the saddest and most encouraging thing I have ever seen in my somewhat inexperianced 24 years here on earth.

It made me realise that God's son (and this isn't a direct comparison) was also taken so tragically. I guess the pain that I saw in Charlie suddenly made the words on the pages of the bible come alive, particularly these words:
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

When Jesus was dying, he was covered in the worlds sin, God couldn't look. But he knew it had to happen. But with a new perspective, the pain that God felt then must have been ... immense, and I guess it seems a little more real to me now.

But then I started to think about us ALL being God's children, and how God must see such awful things every day. Even now, writing this, I can't begin to contemplate that.

The more things I see in life, the less I try to contemplate it. Why? I think it lets me live more.

And after all, is living in wonder and awe such a bad thing?

A Rollercoaster Week

Sunday afternoon, I'm preparing to get ready to go to Clacton where THRE3 (my band) were leading worship. I had a phone call, to say that one of my dear friends, Joe Pancaldi suffered a terrible accident and had died. He was just 21.

I was broken, leading worhip with the guys that night, broke me. During the song 'Blessed be your name' I just cried, during the breakdown of the song I just about managed to say why I was upset, and why I was worshiping so hard, the song says "When the darkness closes in, Lord, Still I will say; Blessed be the name of the Lord". In these times of trial, we have to press in to worship, we can't let the devil rob us of God.

So Joey, Brother, I will see you in heaven. You have been an inspiration.
It's been a hard week. I've been trying to press in, and some times have been easier than others. I can't understand God, I've given up trying, my week continues...

A few months ago I was very blessed to meet a girl who I think is awesome. She is so on fire for God, she's just fantastic. I'm going to keep her identity secret, it isn't fair to tell you who it is, so we'll refer to her as Friend. She does live about 500 miles away, but that won't give you much of a clue! Well anyway, we were chatting on Facebook. She starts tellling me about how she's backslidden a bit lately, back smoking a lot of weed and stuff, not been to church for a few weeks etc.

She said she's having trouble giving it to God... I've been a bit dry lately, but in faith I know that God CAN work miracles through me, so I thought to myself, I'm gonna pray for her, I'm going to claim her healing.

So, rebuked everything (still on Facebook chat) completely went to town gettin all the bad stuff away from her, God's glory fell on us both (like im in my living rooom and it feels like its 100 degrees here!) She starts feeling fire! So I tell her to keep liftin her hands to him, pray, worship, open up... It's all gone a bit crazy - she feels that God is setting her free, she's feeling pain and can feel her body changing ... So I thought WOW, Pretty cool!!!

But are you ready? Because this is where God really steps in, this is a copy from facebook chat IT BLOWS MY MIND!!!...

1:39amFriend
God has taken my weed
it was siting right here in my tobacos pouch and iv js opend it for acigaret n its gone!

1:40amJason
HA HA HA HA! NO WAY! SERIOUS??

1:40amFriend
for real i had a few buds of weed lft and a bit of pollen and its all gone

1:40amJason
wow!!!!!!

1:40amFriend
thts a powerful msg

1:40amJason
You see! That's how much he wants the best for you!!!!!!!

1:40amFriend
i cnt belive my eyes!!!!!!

So God set her free! And took the temptation of more weed away, by LITERALLY TAKING THE WEED AWAY!!!!!!!!! I'm pretty blown away by that!!!!

God is Good. All the Time.