After a conversation with our CS I can now let you know that the long awaited post about our orders will be posted tomorrow at noon (GMT+1)
So, soon and very soon ….
Orders will be official tomorrow
Wednesday, April 15th, 2009Thank You!
Saturday, March 28th, 2009I am deeply moved by all the kind words and prayers we are receiving on Facebook, and via email today as we are getting ready for maybe one of the most important meetings of our lives (well at least for the next couple of years!).
Keep praying guys, we really need it!
And all the emails and comments do really tell me that come what may, we will enter into this great adventure surrounded by friends and supporters!
Today is the day ….
Saturday, March 28th, 2009
At two o’clock today we will commence our appointments consultation.
Trying to be prepared is very hard as we do not know what to prepare for, so if you have the time, pray for us on this very important day.
I have woken up every half hour through the night and Hanna has unfortunately contracted a stomach bug of some kind and has been very ill.
But today we need our top form no matter how we feel. Pray that we will be surrounded and filled by God’s peace and that he will give us the wisdom to ask all the right questions.
Here we go!
Patience
Thursday, March 12th, 2009
Pa-tience ['pā sh ens]
noun.
1. The capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble or suffering without getting angry or upset.
2. chiefly British term for solitaire
As we are still waiting to find out about where we are going to be posted we find ourselves living in the twilight zone. It is a place where everyone else have shifted gear and are moving towards a goal but we are still treading water.
We pray for patience!
Appointments
Monday, February 16th, 2009The room was full of electric nervous energy. Not that anything was going to change… At the same time everything is about to change for the majority of the people in the room.
It was a weird place to be as a spectator. I knew our appointments where not among the brown envelopes on the table, I was nervous anyway…..
Lord I pray for all my friends that they will be catapultet into the most exciting adventure of their lives!
NCD Resources
Friday, February 13th, 2009As many have been given their new appointments only to discover that their new appointments includes “Getting your head around NCD”
I thought I would repost my NCD links and recourses for you to enjoy!
If you are going to read one book on NCD, I would recommend you to start with Color your world with NCD. Another book that I would warmly recommend is The Threefold art of Experiencing God. That gets deeper into the concept of the trinity in a very helpful way.
The other book that is extremely helpful both for Sermon material and for useful devotional material is the 3 Colors of Love.
The idea of a truly Trinitarian faith I find a revolutionary one, where every aspect of church is truly immersed in the fullness of the trinity and not unbalanced by focusing on only one aspect of God’s love.
I hope you find these books as helpful as I have.
Remember
Monday, February 9th, 2009I lost my keys, again, I need to be writing an essay, I need to go to the library, and I must hurry to get my kids, and I cannot find my keys. Frantically I look through the flat, no luck….
Hang on a minute, what good is it to be a friend of an omniscient ruler of the universe if He can’t help you locate the keys….
Father, I have lost the keys, please help me find them…. Then I do something strange, I don’t stop and listen, I keep looking I keep rummaging through the children’s toys, I am getting angry and sad. Why would God not help me, is he holding out on me? An hour later, I sigh in defeat. – I can’t do this! As I start working up courage to go tell Margret that I lost yet another set of keys, I feel a stirring in my spirit, my eyes focus and I am looking at my keys, right there on the kitchen counter, under a paper from Angelina’s school.
If I had only stopped and listened from the beginning. If I had only trusted in God’s heart.
I vow to myself, again, to remember that God answers prayer and that I must live that way.
Advent
Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008
So this is Christmas….. Christmas music pouring out of my speakers, christmas lights appearing in window after window around us and Advent koinonia at the college. One thousand and one sermons about waiting. It seems that no matter how old we all get, we are all holding our breath until Christmas eve (well Christmas day for all of you non Scandinavians).
It seems like waiting on God is the thing to do, so collectively we sit down silently and twiddle our thumbs (for about 10 minutes until we are so bored that we have to get up and do something). Today in Spiritual formation we where treated to a video that had us just sit and wait. There was a lot of giggling and people’s embarrassed looks as they where trying to figure out if the multimedia was malfunctioning or if we where really supposed to look at a black screen.
Before I say anything else I want to point out that I DO believe that we need to slow down, I do believe that God is a 3 mph God and not a 60 mph Mtv God. However I also believe that waiting is so much more than sitting silently anticipating God’s next move.
When I was a whole lot younger and impatient (being just slightly less impatient now) my good friend and mentor Mr. Brown asked me this question: “Patrik, what does a waiter do?” and after my lame reply: “waiting” he explained to me how waiting is a verb, something you do actively, not unlike a waiter in a restaurant whose only concern it is to make sure that the one he is waiting on is completely content, being ready to fulfill any of his desires.
Waiting is a posture of the heart, wearing your towel, ready to serve the Lord. To please him and make sure that he is completely cared for, we do this in worship, in loving words and by listening carefully for any clues to our masters wishes, trying to anticipate and provide his every need before it is spoken. Not out of duty like a servant who is paid but out of love like a servant set free who chooses to remain at his masters feet out of loyalty and love. or more like a lover who’s only desire is to please his beloved.
This advent let’s WAIT upon the Lord!
Chim Chimeny, Chim Chim Cherooo
Wednesday, October 29th, 2008As Cadets at the Salvation Army college we have the privilige of meeting a lot of officers. Some newly commissioned, some old in the game and some retired. What strikes me is how many of these officers seem to be burnt out and jaded. I do understand that being a Salvation Army Officer is hard work but surely it is also blessed work.
I saw an add yesterday on the train that said:
“if you like your job don’t bother with this add”
I prayed a prayer that I would never want to bother with that add. I want to be like the guy in Mary Poppins singing:
“Chim chimeny, chim chimeny, chim chim cheroo, I do what I like and I like what I do!”
Surely Officership is a privilege. To have a job where part of your work description is to spend quality time with God. A vocation where you are expected to spend time growing and maturing your faith, reading devotional books, praying, praising and functioning in your gifts.
I do understand that there are jobs that are less pleasant and some even unpleasant but we have that in common with the chimney sweep. I think that sometimes we get so busy with the dirty work that we forget to look around us and enjoy the majestic view. Like the chimney sweep we are “on top of the world” even if we do have our hands in the dirt!
New beginnings
Saturday, September 27th, 2008The College has come alive again with the Prayer Warriors invading the campus and all the Witnesses returning from placement 4. The Warriors seems to be a good natured and fun filled session and we are looking forward to much interaction with them over the next year.
The campus is buzzing with stories of the placements and talk of our next placement. I heard the following conversation in the hallway yesterday
M: What’s in the envelope
D: Placement five
M: Cool where are you going?
D: Sainsbury’s!
Welcome weekend is finally here and we have started on the next stage of our journey towards officership. School starts with inductions and song practice just like last year. only slightly truncated as we get going with a full schedule allready second week.
his week we started practicing the sessional song again with Nicola leading the practice, what a difference! For the first time I really enjoyed song practice and for the first time the song came to life and actually spoke to my heart about who we are as a session and who we want to be as officers.
Anyways, my last sermon at Southwark was also a tribute to our session and a passionate plea for everyone to be the gospel! You can listen to it here.
