I’ll be working on a new worship project at Peak Studios in Bradford UK next week with some friends and members of my family to produce something special about the Presence of God. Here are two thoughts to steer you towards better creative output.
Firebrand FITT Notes
In my professional role as an NHS Exercise Practitioner, I’ve had the privilege of helping over 6000 patients one on one in the last 6 years to: improve their general health, lose weight, recover from open-heart surgery, reverse chronic metabolic diseases like diabetes, overcome depression and start walking again from life-threatening morbid obesity – the list goes on and on.
During that time I’ve met people from virtually every walk of life, most of whom wanted to lose weight and improve their health through physical activity.
Here’s some info for you if you are currently unhappy with your health/weight and how you might make that all-important move from being inactive to even moderately active. If you have any questions please leave them in the comments box and I’ll reply asap, otherwise I advise asking your GP about GP Exercise Referral/Prescription services in your area.
Hold On
Sometimes, you’ve just got to…
Snow Leopard Revelation
I remember Mike Bickle once saying that one way of recognising that the Holy Spirit is speaking to us as we read the Bible (The Spirit of wisdom and revelation – Eph.1:17) is that you can be reading a passage you have read a hundred times before and then suddenly you notice something for the first time about it that leaves you touched/moved/challenged/corrected/rebuked/motivated or inspired.
Perfect Devotion (1)
Some great thoughts from Psalm 27 from a brother in Africa. Awesome
There are some Psalms I read and I just think, that is how my relationship with God should be. That’s the thirst and desire and God-centredness and single-mindedness and joy that I need and want. A heart completely secure in and sold out to the Father. They’re very inspiring Psalms. But I also find them convicting and condemning. Because my relationship with God is only very rarely anything even approaching that and usually a thousand miles away from that sort of devotion.
But… what it I don’t jump straight into the Psalmist shoes? What if I don’t straight-line the Psalms to me but first look at them as Jesus Psalms? Three examples (first one below and a couple more to come):
Psalm 27
Deep down I do want to have that “one thing” focus on the Lord (v4) but I know that most of the time I don’t. I’m also…
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Garden Wild
I found a great e-book to download for free this week to do with manhood and masculinity, particularly as it relates to men working. It’s written by a guy called Richard Phillips and is called Masculine Mandate.
There are some really interesting thoughts in the book but none more so than the area surrounding Phillips’ disagreement with John Eldredge’s big thought in Wild at Heart about the core of mans’ heart.
In Phillips’ first chapter he writes:
#FN Worship Projects
Drip Feed Devotion
The drip feed imagery of Matthew 4:4 in the Message is really helpful in understanding what Jesus was meaning about how to read the bible and build a healthy devotional life:
“It takes more than bread to stay alive. It takes a steady stream of words from God’s mouth.”
I was in hospital this week for an ankle operation and within 10 seconds of the Anesthetist putting a intro-venous line into my hand and starting the flow of drugs, I was gone – totally asleep and oblivious to pain and trauma allowing the Surgeon to do his work.
George Herbert’s Love (III)
Love (III) From The Temple
by George Herbert
Love bade me welcome, yet my soul drew back,
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack’d anything.
“A guest,” I answer’d, “worthy to be here”;
Love said, “You shall be he.”
“I, the unkind, the ungrateful? ah my dear,
I cannot look on thee.”
Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
“Who made the eyes but I?”
“Truth, Lord, but I have marr’d them; let my shame
Go where it doth deserve.”
“And know you not,” says Love, “who bore the blame?”
“My dear, then I will serve.”
“You must sit down,” says Love, “and taste my meat.”
So I did sit and eat.
New Firebrand Notes
Dear Reader
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be working on a new updated blog site to capture not only thoughts and ideas, but to generate healthy, helpful forums for discussion about a whole bunch of topics.
Firebrand Notes are rooted in the knowledge of Who Jesus really is – to me, to you and to the Cosmos. It is rooted in a passion to make Him known, really known, because He is often not known at all or known in a way that makes Him seem less desirable than He is in reality.
firebrandnotes.com 