Travels, Trust and Bacon

We’re dreaming and plotting and scheming. We have some pretty outrageous dreams, some that are definitely wildly impossible, and others that will probably come to be. Others we could make happen ourselves, still more that it would definitely take a miracle. I want to live life so that if God doesn’t show up I’d fall flat on my face. I don’t want to live a life that I can make happen in my own power.

Five years ago this week I went to China for a month. I was just about to head off to William Booth College to train as to be a Salvation Army officer. I had zero money and a little bit of time. I asked God if he could give me a trip, somewhere amazing, one last stint at seeing the world before I probably would lose that opportunity forever. I love travelling. I love seeing different parts of the world. I love culture, I love language, I love food. Miraculously God bankrolled me to spend a month travelling between Hong Kong, Macau, Beijing and Taiwan. I loved it. Major dream come true.

While I was in Beijing, we wanted to go to church. If I weren’t there, the family I was travelling with would have gone to worship with the underground church, but I was too white, and would have drawn too much attention to them and put them in danger. I was devastated. Another one of my life dreams is working with the underground church. I did get to meet with, hear stories from, pray with and encourage a lady who is part of the underground church. Precious moments.

Instead we went to the state church. The token gesture that ticks the ‘church’ box, without any life or power. What was devastating was that I recognised it. It was like so many churches I’ve been to. And Jesus wasn’t there.

I don’t want to be part of a church that doesn’t even recognise that Jesus has slipped out the back door, unwelcome and unnoticed. I don’t want to dream dreams that will let me live like that.

We’ve been asking God to show us where to go next after our Sabbath year, how do we lead our people forward, what does he have in store for us. On our journey, God has led us out of slavery in Egypt, walked us through the wildnerness learning to live free, he’s taken us to the river and asked us if we dare to cross. We’ve said yes, and are waiting at the river bank, looking at the promised land. But we don’t know what’s on the other side. We can’t see where we’re going. What programme, if any should we resurrect. Is there something completely new for us to do?

We’re sitting in Joshua 3, with the people of Israel, getting ready to cross the river. God is clear to Joshua. The priests are to carry the ark of the covenant – to bring the presence of God, right at the front, and to follow it. ‘Then you will know which way to go, since you have never been this way before.’ (Josh 3:4) Again, God splits open the waters, the leaders stand in the gap and the people move forward.

God has been very clear with us, this next season he’s not going to show Xander and I what to do, he’s going to show our people. I’m not sure if it’s more or less frightening to take the lead, or to share it. But our people know God. They hear from him. They are dreamers. They trust God. They love him, and each other, and us. God has shown us pictures of what is on the other side of the river. It’s a good land that the Lord our God is giving to us (Deut 1:25). It’s fruitful. There’s work for us there. There are giants there, but our God is bigger and the battle belongs to the Lord. And so we trust.

I recently read this beautiful quote by Emily Bronte:

‘I have dreamt in my life, dreams that have stayed with me ever after and changed my ideas; they have gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.’

Most of the dreams so far involve bacon. It’s a good land the Lord our God is giving to us.