Good evening. I hope you are all well and happy, after a week back at home I'm now once again back in Eston. Simply, just wherever He needs me my Lord has placed me, so I'm ready to get on with the work that is ahead of me here in Eston.
Last week was half term and had chance to catch up with everyone back home in Wellingborough and I thought I would be able to have a rest but I ended speaking in Over 60s and doing the Home League. Not complaining though, love my home corps. So I had chance to talk to the folk about what's I'm doing in Eston and how I am getting on and it was great to be able to feedback to the people who have loved and supported me not just in the run up to essential but actually since I first arrived at Wellingborough as a nine year old boy. As I was explaining to the lovely people of Wellingborough home league about Eston Corps and all the things that go on, I did get this feeling that actually what has happened over the last six months has been really significant! I have developed, I have seen things that has rocked my pre-conception of how people live in this country and I have seen God really work in this community. It was only when I had the chance to reflect and tell others about what has gone on did I realise the enormity of what has happened. So am very happy that I was able to share with the Home league on Thursday, it helped me just as much as I hope it was interesting for them to listen to.
I've called the blog; It's Jesus. Over the last few weeks we have taken part in a course that covers the basics of Christianity called START. One of the tasks the course asks us to do is look at some images if Jesus and see what we think of them. There was this one picture that really stood out to me and it was a forensic image of what Jesus would most likely have looked like.
Here's the link to the picture- http://www.bible-reflections.net/resource/this-is-what-jesus-really-looked-like/2853/
This picture really intrigued me and still does. Not only does it slightly scare me but it really makes me think. This man we love called Jesus was a very real man. He would have looked like an ordinary bloke from Nazareth, nothing to say that He was the Son of God and yet there must have been something with this ordinary man that people would flock to His side and when He commanded people to follow they got up anf left everything behind. I don't know if Jesus actually truly looked like that or whether that is scientists trying to be clever but I look upon that image and see a Man who represents my Jesus Christ. A person who loves me, even though I do not deserve it, so much that He would endure the pain of the Cross and die for me. Who is this man? It's Jesus. I know him, I love him, I wish I could serve him beter but I know He lives in my heart. All things of this world may be thrown at me, I may be in the darkest hour in my life, I may feel that all is falling around me but all I need is Jesus. For He is the embodiment of the Love and Grace of God and through Him my many weaknesses are made strong. It's Jesus, the ordinary man, the Son of God and my friend. May I have the faith to live my life with courage and conviction and become more like Christ.
Have a good week. God bless each one of you!
Get in touch
@peggo36
pegg.j@hotmail.co.uk
Monday 24 February 2014
Tuesday 11 February 2014
Random Acts of Kindness
Good Morning all. I must apologise for not writing this last night but it is here this morning and that is what counts! So another busy week has come and gone and once again much happened.
So the week was a rather normal week. The programme carried on and people continued to come into the Salvation Army, although they may not be regular attenders, it is there church. One thing that really touched me and blessed me this week was an activity during our kid's club, Hi-5. Gary asked me to lead an activity which had the children threading beads on a bit of elastic string to make a bracelet. However, each bead represented something about Jesus. For example; one bead meant that Jesus was the Son of God and another would mean that Jesus did many miracles and I thought that the kids really responded to the task. But what really hit me was when after the club had finished, there was this lad, sitting on his own with his bracelet going through each bead and almost memorising each one. The kids that come to Hi-5, apart from a couple, none of them are "Army Kids", they don't come from a Salvation Army background and for some a church background whatsoever. So it was such a blessing to see this happen. The Salvation Army here in Eston are reaching out to Children and teaching them about the Gospel and about Christ but to see and hear a child really take in the message that was shared that evening, I found it incredible and such a moving experience.
Some of you this week may have seen on your social media sites a craze sweeping the nation called "Neknominations", where people are drinking large amounts of alcohol in a single glass by downing it in one go, videoing it and then nominating others to do the same. Now this isn't the time or place to go on a rant about it but it is quite simply stupid behaviour. But there has been a reaction to the viral stunt and it is called "Raknominations", standing for Random Acts of Kindness. People have videoed themselves doing random kind acts and nominating others to do the same. Something far more positive in my opinion. I thought about these Random Acts of Kindness people are doing and I thought I would like to do one of those but someone. put me in my place and said that actually why should we need to film it and post it all over the internet, we should just do it without looking to receive recognition and praise. The Salvation Army does it everyday, here in Eston with our food parcel ministry our acts of kindness are becoming almost a daily thing. But the difference is that the acts of kindness we show on a daily basis are not random, they are acts that have to be done because Christ compels us to do so. It says in scripture that "...Love your Neighbour as yourself...", we need to love the unlovable and we need to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. For when we do it for one those people who struggle, we do it for Jesus.
So that's this week's blog, I hope you enjoy it. I have this week to do then I'm back home for a week, I'm looking forward to the break with my family and my girlfriend.
Have a good week!
God Bless.
@peggo36
pegg.j@hotmail.co.uk
So the week was a rather normal week. The programme carried on and people continued to come into the Salvation Army, although they may not be regular attenders, it is there church. One thing that really touched me and blessed me this week was an activity during our kid's club, Hi-5. Gary asked me to lead an activity which had the children threading beads on a bit of elastic string to make a bracelet. However, each bead represented something about Jesus. For example; one bead meant that Jesus was the Son of God and another would mean that Jesus did many miracles and I thought that the kids really responded to the task. But what really hit me was when after the club had finished, there was this lad, sitting on his own with his bracelet going through each bead and almost memorising each one. The kids that come to Hi-5, apart from a couple, none of them are "Army Kids", they don't come from a Salvation Army background and for some a church background whatsoever. So it was such a blessing to see this happen. The Salvation Army here in Eston are reaching out to Children and teaching them about the Gospel and about Christ but to see and hear a child really take in the message that was shared that evening, I found it incredible and such a moving experience.
Some of you this week may have seen on your social media sites a craze sweeping the nation called "Neknominations", where people are drinking large amounts of alcohol in a single glass by downing it in one go, videoing it and then nominating others to do the same. Now this isn't the time or place to go on a rant about it but it is quite simply stupid behaviour. But there has been a reaction to the viral stunt and it is called "Raknominations", standing for Random Acts of Kindness. People have videoed themselves doing random kind acts and nominating others to do the same. Something far more positive in my opinion. I thought about these Random Acts of Kindness people are doing and I thought I would like to do one of those but someone. put me in my place and said that actually why should we need to film it and post it all over the internet, we should just do it without looking to receive recognition and praise. The Salvation Army does it everyday, here in Eston with our food parcel ministry our acts of kindness are becoming almost a daily thing. But the difference is that the acts of kindness we show on a daily basis are not random, they are acts that have to be done because Christ compels us to do so. It says in scripture that "...Love your Neighbour as yourself...", we need to love the unlovable and we need to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. For when we do it for one those people who struggle, we do it for Jesus.
So that's this week's blog, I hope you enjoy it. I have this week to do then I'm back home for a week, I'm looking forward to the break with my family and my girlfriend.
Have a good week!
God Bless.
@peggo36
pegg.j@hotmail.co.uk
Monday 3 February 2014
Where Jesus leads I'll follow on?
Hello there! Once again welcome to my blog for this week.
So what happened this week? Well other than the usual routine of the week, we have been focusing on a research project we have to do for this year. Without giving too much away, we are focusing our research on the youth around the community of Eston and surrounding areas. The one thing that has struck me whilst doing my research by talking to people or reading case studies is the obvious disadvantage the people who live in the area are in. There are high levels of unemployment, alcoholism and anti-social behaviour. But I believe that these are the type of areas that the Salvation Army should be and are reaching. If you look back at my vlog, I spoke about distribution day and how I felt it was the very reason why the Salvation Army is on this earth in the first place. In Isaiah it says:
Isaiah 61:1 NIV
"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners..."
What a mission. God has sent us, I believe as a Salvation Army to go and do that because what it says in Isaiah is still relevant today, there are still people in poverty who need the good news of the Gospel and there are still people who are suffering in the darkness of their situation. If one thing has really challenged me this year is the vulnerability and the poverty people in this, compared to others, rich country are living in.Seeing people having to choose to go hungry or keep warm, seeing people sleeping on a cold floor because authorities have not taken care to make sure they have a bed to sleep on, walking around estates which look run down but yet people call them home. Is this fair that people live like this? Throughout all of this, my God is Lord of it all. May He give me power, may He give individual corps power, may He give the whole Salvation Army power to make a difference in the world we live and the strength to challenge the injustice we see around us.
Gary preached this Sunday a sermon that got me really thinking. His theme was 'Hitting the wall' and that through our Christian lives we are going to hit a wall of pain and suffering but do we hit the wall and go on and grow from that or do we hit the wall and get stuck and fail tomove on in our spiritual life? This really got me thinking of the walls I hit and almost the ups and downs of my life. But I know that God was with me throughout it all. I suppose that's the thing about following Jesus, being his disciples means following Him no matter where Jesus leads. If you read very carefully in Scripture, the amount of times He led his disciples up the mountainside and then back down again. That's like our lives, following Jesus will take us to the peaks ans the great times, but it will also take us down to the valleys where our faith is tested. But like Gary said in his sermon on Sunday, we can either get stuck in the valley or at the wall or we can use it to grow and have a greater acceptance of the mystery of God because when we are down in the valley, we have to trust God that He'll get us back onto the mountainside through His mysterious and wonder workingGrace.
So I suppose that's my thought for the week. Now it's easy for me to write it in a blog, now I have to go and live it. Trust in God and know that His Grace is sufficient.
God bless.
@peggo36
pegg.j@hotmail.co.uk
So what happened this week? Well other than the usual routine of the week, we have been focusing on a research project we have to do for this year. Without giving too much away, we are focusing our research on the youth around the community of Eston and surrounding areas. The one thing that has struck me whilst doing my research by talking to people or reading case studies is the obvious disadvantage the people who live in the area are in. There are high levels of unemployment, alcoholism and anti-social behaviour. But I believe that these are the type of areas that the Salvation Army should be and are reaching. If you look back at my vlog, I spoke about distribution day and how I felt it was the very reason why the Salvation Army is on this earth in the first place. In Isaiah it says:
Isaiah 61:1 NIV
"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners..."
What a mission. God has sent us, I believe as a Salvation Army to go and do that because what it says in Isaiah is still relevant today, there are still people in poverty who need the good news of the Gospel and there are still people who are suffering in the darkness of their situation. If one thing has really challenged me this year is the vulnerability and the poverty people in this, compared to others, rich country are living in.Seeing people having to choose to go hungry or keep warm, seeing people sleeping on a cold floor because authorities have not taken care to make sure they have a bed to sleep on, walking around estates which look run down but yet people call them home. Is this fair that people live like this? Throughout all of this, my God is Lord of it all. May He give me power, may He give individual corps power, may He give the whole Salvation Army power to make a difference in the world we live and the strength to challenge the injustice we see around us.
Gary preached this Sunday a sermon that got me really thinking. His theme was 'Hitting the wall' and that through our Christian lives we are going to hit a wall of pain and suffering but do we hit the wall and go on and grow from that or do we hit the wall and get stuck and fail tomove on in our spiritual life? This really got me thinking of the walls I hit and almost the ups and downs of my life. But I know that God was with me throughout it all. I suppose that's the thing about following Jesus, being his disciples means following Him no matter where Jesus leads. If you read very carefully in Scripture, the amount of times He led his disciples up the mountainside and then back down again. That's like our lives, following Jesus will take us to the peaks ans the great times, but it will also take us down to the valleys where our faith is tested. But like Gary said in his sermon on Sunday, we can either get stuck in the valley or at the wall or we can use it to grow and have a greater acceptance of the mystery of God because when we are down in the valley, we have to trust God that He'll get us back onto the mountainside through His mysterious and wonder workingGrace.
So I suppose that's my thought for the week. Now it's easy for me to write it in a blog, now I have to go and live it. Trust in God and know that His Grace is sufficient.
God bless.
@peggo36
pegg.j@hotmail.co.uk
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