About Me

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Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire, United Kingdom
Broadcaster, musician, song writer, tea drinker and curry lover.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Shattered

It's exactly two weeks since my life and my dreams were shattered. Now you might say that's over-exaggerating, and you have every right to say that. However, I have every right to disagree with you.

The last 5 years here in Southern Oregon have been a blur, but a wonderful one. I have a new home, a new "family", a new life. Now I have been forced by the U.S. government to return to the UK and start the visa process from scratch all over again.

Now is not the time, and this is not the place to discuss the immigration authorities and the government. Believe me, I have plenty to say about them, but I'm not saying it here. 

I do struggle with why this has happened to me now, and I'm not sure I'll ever understand why. When I see what this is doing to my close family here, let alone myself, there are plenty of questions about the injustice of it all. Why would God send me back to England for anything between six months and a year, with nothing, to try and rebuild my life with no guarantee that I'm going to get back in. Makes no sense.

However, I have to be obedient to God, even though leaving my home here is the last thing on earth I want to do. I can't go back grudgingly and ungratefully. After all, I will be seeing family and close friends for the first time in years. It would be unfair to them to go back with a bad attitude.
So, it's all about obedience and positivity, but that's hard. Very hard. And I don't like it.

Please pray for me as I get things ready to leave, as I have to clear out and leave an apartment I love, leave my job and livelihood, leave behind the church and friends I love dearly, try to find storage for the stuff I will be keeping. And please pray that as my employers file papers to get me back once I get back to the UK, that they will be able to do it promptly and successfully. And of course, pray for provision of so many things which I need from God like never before.

I leave my job on March 2nd, leave Medford for Olympia WA on March 14th or thereabouts, and my flight for the UK is March 27th.
You can follow my progress in more detail on the blog here ,while the posts on this blog will be of a more general nature. 

Take the journey with me, and please pray me through it.

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Coming soon...

Just in case you are wondering what became of the "Filling In The Blanks" series a year ago, I will be starting it up again soon. The next part of the series will deal with my second year with the British Youth For Christ band "TVB".
 It takes some time to dredge back all the way to 1994, so you'll forgive me if it takes a while. Also I need to be in just the right mood to do these flashbacks. Anyway, I think I'll be ready for the next one soon, so stand by for tales of the new line-up, a return visit to Croatia, secret weeping sessions behind the equipment van,  recording the TVB album, and much more.


Stay tuned....

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

The Real World

A few weeks back I posted something on Facebook, which, not untypically, received some response. One such response referred to what happens in the "real world", the suggestion seemingly being that the point I was making was not grounded in this "real world" but was some form of unrealistic "pie in the sky" ideal.
That set me thinking. A lot of people these days see Christians and Christian beliefs as unrealistic, old-fashioned, even offensive...and certainly out of step with current postmodern world philosophies.
Having mulled this over for a few weeks, I cannot but come to the conclusion that if being a Christian and holding to what the Bible teaches is out of step with the Real World, then I definitely don't want to be a part of that world. Far from it. We Christians are called to be as "out-of-step" as it takes to hold true to what God teaches through His Word.
Much of what Jesus said while he was on earth was the complete opposite to what people expected to hear, or were maybe wanting to hear. Love your enemies, sell all your possessions, pray for your persecutors  etc. etc. Incidentally, all of these were, of course, in their own context, but you see my point.  Jesus' Biblical principles hold no less true today, and maybe are just as "out-of-step" as ever.
I then got to thinking -- what actually IS the "Real World"? Of course, on this modern-day God-less earth we are referring to whatever is popular, what is perceived to be morally or intellectually "right" by human standards. 
It may be a real world to those who don't know God, but isn't the truth more that it is God's world that is - in fact - real, and the one constructed by humans to justify the way we have decided to live - apart from God - is out of step with Biblical reality?
So, which world really IS "real"?