Trinity rooms

This week in College we have been learning about trinity. It's a big subject, but one I have thoroughly enjoyed researching as the understanding of it developed in church history. Now, as part of trinity week we are not only studying trinity, but also engaging with it, and it has been done by setting up trinity rooms upstairs which we visit instead of the last hour of lectures and chapel.


The first room is the Holy Spirit room. The room has fans blowing in it, a fire curtain, walls with the fruits of the Spirit on...

I drew this on my hand to remember the fruits of the Spirit (Gal 5:22-3)

and a lectio devina on Acts 2. Now, I'd spoken on Acts 2 up in Teeside, read a few commentaries on it, and heard the odd sermon about it. I figured I knew all about it, and reading it again would be a waste of time, yet I felt I should so I did. I read through it slowly as a lectio devina repeating it and soaking it in. It was at this point that I learnt so much more from that chapter, and was able to engulf myself within the text as though I was there. Message in short: no matter how many times you've read a bit of the Bible, it can still speak to you:
"For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart" (Heb 4:12).


In that same room today we were praising out in tongues, and people were prophesying over one another. I felt it hard to pray in tongues (I've a cold atm, and found it hard to breath), so I decided to sing in tongues instead and just enjoy doing it. When I sang and let go it became easy to sing in tongues again. I learnt from that day that the Holy Spirit is personal, he meets us where we are and carries us in ways which are unique. If we step out in faith and trust Him, he will carry us.


Once you go through the Holy Spirit you get to the Son. In that room the Passion of the Christ is playing in the background (silenced) with a cross on the wall and different pictures everywhere of Jesus (so we can ask who Jesus really is?). Finally there was a mirror so we could look at our lives and think about how we reflect Christ. Through the Son we can get to the Father (through the sacrifice of the cross).


The father's room had a huge banqueting table, and each person had a place with their name on it. On the table was all this food. it was beautiful, Christ paid that huge cost for us to enter into the Father's presence. That utterly Holy other Father is accessible to us if we only choose to trust in Jesus' sacrifice for us. I remember being truly amazed at what was there in that room. In the background Matt Redman's "The Father's Song" (that video made me weep uncontrollably last year when I knew that the father loved me as I am, and came to meet me) played and there were bean bags everywhere. Now, in the corner was a cloak and some slippers so we could dress like the prodigal son with the robe and the shoes.  In the chapel where I had been uncontrollably weeping I had not tried these on, but now they were in the corner available, and no one was waiting to wear them. There was chance to put them on. 


Despite the opportunity I still felt silly trying it on. What is people looked at me, or thought me strange clothing myself? And yet I felt compelled to try those on, and know that I am welcome into the Father's house to eat His best calf - though I am filthy. To add to this I want to tell you about that morning. I had walked the 3 miles into college in the rain with a non-waterproof coat and my trainers (which have holes in). For the remainder of that day I had taken off my damp coat to dry, and taken off my soaked socks and shoes. I had spent all of that day, and only that day, bare-footed because it was too damp, and I entered the Father's room with no shoes and no coat. I was inadequate, and yet He clothed me. So here I was, and I put on the coat and beautiful slippers. They warmed my cold feet, and undressed torso. It felt great, so I just laid down on a bean bag, and knew I was accepted by the Father, knew I was loved (which God has been saying a lot to both me, and some others at KTC this month). Finally there was a lass lying down, so I took the cloak and shoes I had been given and laid it on top of her.


There is so much beauty in the Father's house, and it is free for me, and so I openly share it with you reader.
Ask the Holy Spirit to give you access to the Father through the sacrifice of the Son, and you too can enter into a relationship with God, 1 yet 3 - the trinity.


God guide
xSx

Update:

Since starting this blog I became a Counsellor. You can read more on blog on subjects like Therapy at:

 www.simonslistening.co.uk 

Sweets

imagine a box of this, 600g of yummy sweets. Would you give them away?

I was blessed this Christmas with lots of lovely gifts. Its a great time of year for family, giving and receiving (remember the first six letters in it though).


One of the things I received was a box of sweets. 600g of Rowntrees pick and mix - a huge amount, the kind that no man should be able to get through in an evening, even hungry bible college students.


Anyhow, I spoke this weekend at Teeside on "The early church, based on Acts, responding to the Holy Spirit". This was my first time lecturing, and so in preparation I spent a long time preparing, and was doing final adjustments in my room the night before we left to lecture. I decided that I needed a sugar rush to keep me going, and because they are lovely, so started eating the sweets as I was rehearsing.


As I was eating them my flatmate entered the room. He had a deadline in, and was planning on staying up most of that evening to work on his essay, so naturally I greeted him and offered him some sweets. As he took the box I felt that little voice say to me "why don't you give Jon all of the sweets?". In my heart I replied; no, I'll offer it to him and he can take as much as he liked. As I was responding to that little voice, he dove in and took a second handful (so I worked extra hard to suppress that voice). Jon left, and I carried on working and prepping (having a few sweets every now and again) - all the while that voice kept asking me to give the sweets to Jon. "No, I said; It's almost dinner, I'll give them to him after and have a few to keep me going".

After a while my other flatmates came in. I greeted them, had a little chat and offered them both some sweets (which they took), but again that voice was encouraging me to give the sweets to Jon - "Not yet", I said in my heart, "I will give it to him later". They left me alone to carry on prepping on how the Spirit leads the church then and now. Alone I carried on working, and that little voice was still reminding me, but I kept my heart hard and said no.


At this point the doorbell rang. It was my dad. I had left a small bag of presents in the car  over Christmas, and we had previously agreed that he could bring them over on that day (though I had completely forgotten). The second I saw the bag I was amazed because poking out the top was an identical box. Dad came in and had a chat, then he had to leave (always great seeing him), and then once he had left I was able to embrace what had happened. I was a hypocrite, there was me about to lecture on how we should respond to the Holy Spirit like they do in Acts - and I had suppressed that "God guiding" voice.


I gave the full box to Jon to eat, and he was surprised. In the evening (I woke up at 1am to a text) he was still working, but that box with its sugary content had helped keep him up. Furthermore, Rowntree's 'pick and mix' are his favourite sweet and he used to buy them all the time. I did not follow God's will because the nudge felt too small, and too strange. Why would the creator of the world use fruit gums? I disobeyed because it was easy to do so. I know God guides, but I didn't "practice what I preach". Fortunately, God has grace. He showed me the end, how he would have provided if I'd've had a little faith in his nudges, and the sweets got to Jon. Praise God that he uses us, even when our faith is weak or we don't recognise him. We can trust God, so let us all learn to recognise his voice, and respond in faith knowing that he knows all things, and is good.

Update:

Since starting this blog I became a Counsellor. You can read more on blog on subjects like Therapy at:

 www.simonslistening.co.uk