Sunday Special: Seek First His Kingdom.

Last weekend, I went to my first Celebrate Conference. My mind, body and spirit could only take one day as opposed to the whole weekend this time, but I feel so blessed with the time I've spent praising the Lord, meeting lovely people, having so many interesting conversations and just really thinking deeply about my life and my faith. And I'm looking forward to catching up with the Conference recording's over the coming weekends (and revisiting the talks I've heard on Saturday). They will be a lot to take in.

What comes next is a selection of thoughts and reflections from myself and a variety of people met at the Conference.

The Loving Father.

The word father appear over 600 times in the Old Testament and almost 400 times in the New Testament. The only more frequently appearing words are God, Lord, Christ and Jesus. Clearly, Father is an important concept in Christianity. Yet somehow not emphasised enough. Christians strive to have a relationship with Jesus, but Jesus was all about having a relationship with the Father. When He taught us to pray, He taught us to say "Our Father, who art in Heaven".

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me." (John 14: 6)

So the Father is important, but there is something fundamental that everybody should understand. God is the Loving Father who created you out of this love. You are not a mistake, a glitch in a system or a coincidence. You have been thought through. In fact, God could not have imagined a world without you. You are an indispensable part of the creation.

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well. (Psalm 139: 13-14)

The Doors.

What do the doors to your hearts and your soul look like? Here's a painting by Holman Hunt, The Light of the World, with Jesus knocking on your door. The door might be covered with overgrowth, but He still wants to come in. But there is no handle on the outside. You can only open from the inside. It's your choice.

And here is my door. With a handle on the inside. And a door chain. Though the chain is off now. So the doors can be easily opened. Oh, and the peephole. That's important for my security, just looking out who's outside, and what He wants. I would like to move beyond that to the open door stage, but I need a little more time and encouragement.

Pray like a punk.

There is place for quiet contemplative prayer, for adoration and for reflection. But sometimes, your prayer must get loud, forceful and almost angry. One of my favourite parts of the Bible is when Jesus drives the merchants out of the temple. He throws the tables over, shouts at the people, has this burning rage on his face. And this passion for the Father is what I am talking about when I talk about praying like a punk. Get lost in the Spirit. Invoke the power of the Name of Jesus.

The seventy-two returned with joy and said, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” (Luke 10:17)

And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. (Mark 16:17-18)

Christians should be so bold about their prayer, because Jesus has given us such a privilege when He let us invoke His Name. It's not something restricted to the religious. Call on the Name of Jesus. He yearns to respond to your call. 

Abandon yourself.

This might sound a little contradictory to my previous reflection, but  when you abandon yourself completely to the Lord, your life becomes much simpler and all of a sudden everything falls into place. You need to call up to the Lord, but at the same time have total trust that He will keep His promise. 

The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still. (Exodus 14:14)

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Isaiah 41:10)

I am constantly amazed by the power of this abandonment. When I feel stuck, I pray "Jesus, I abandon myself to you, Jesus, You take over." We shouldn't worry, because we do have a loving Father and He takes care of everything. Nothing is too big for Him. Nothing is too little. God will take care of your troubles, whatever they are. Just place them at the foot of the Cross. Everything has come to its fulfillment at the Cross. 

~~~

Seek First His Kingdom. Everything else second class. 

#villagelife

Patchy internet connection over the last week or so meant that I had to embrace analogue past times. Cycling, walking, reading a newspaper on the patio, drinking excessive amounts of tea and coffee, thinking about the next year, swimming in the pool and baking cakes.

In the last week, I've become fixated about cows, geese, chickens and horses. I don't see farm animals very often on my little island, so observing the daily moves of a pair of calves was a fascinating experience. I've seen farmers calmly and patiently tending to their land and animals and it reminded me how simple life can be.

But the countryside is not only its flora and fauna, but also all those sleepy little towns and villages where even the butcher's is shut down during summer, where the only people out on the streets are a group of camp children with melting ice cream and some mildly drunk bearded men talking philosophy. Towns and villages with the loveliest women working at a post office and delicious freshly caught fish available at a scruffily looking fishmonger's. 

I'll make a quick visit to Warsaw this week and I'll be interested in the contrast with this idyllic village life and a business of a city. I am not a fan on the Polish capital, not only because it's hard to find such blissful peacefulness over there. But everything is good in moderation. And hopefully I'll get a chance to get a taste of its apparently buzzing vegan culinary scene.

Detox.

I'm spending holidays in the heart of the Polish countryside. The internet connection here is less than satisfactory to say the least and this prompted me to a reflection on the use of the internet.

I've read a number of articles by people who either ditched the internet completely for a prolonged period of time, or got rid off the internet from their house and only ever used it at work or when out and about.

Many claimed that they have become more thoughtful, more focused and generally felt more mentally healthy than when staying online. Some claimed that it was a tedious and not so beneficial an experiment, given that they felt isolated from normal life, which these days happens as much off- as on-line.

Before going on holidays, I've actually logged off Facebook on my phone and my laptop, so no notifications are coming through to me at the moment and I don't feel the urge to constantly scroll down my home page in search for something interesting to look at or read.

But going off the internet grid completely is not something that I am particularly keen on. I've lived for ages without Facebook account, but this was not sustainable: whether I like it or not, people do use Facebook to communicate with each other and I do want to be a part of it.

After an extensive read of different experiences of reducing internet use in one way or another, I've come up with a system that will allow me to reap the benefits, but hopefully also limit the negative effects of constant online presence.

Lo and behold, here it comes.

I liked the idea of getting rid of the internet from my house, but this is not feasible. What is actually doable is using the internet intentionally. So going on the internet with a well defined purpose, rather than freely roaming around. For instance, when I turned my laptop on to write this blog post, I knew that this is the main reason why I'm online. I also knew that I had to buy a few specific bits on ebay and check a few pieces of information. I've even produced a hand-written list of things that I want to do when I get a chance to be online. So being online has become something that I need to make the time for, rather than the default mode.

It's so easy to just reach for your phone these days and start aimlessly go through page after page of stuff that does not really enrich your life in any way. Instead, I finally have a chance to read newspapers, think about stuff, appreciate the nature and make the most of the time with my family. I do rely on the internet in many respects, Google Maps are extremely convenient for instance when you need to find the way quickly or when you need to find the nearest cafe serving crepes, but other than that I'm trying to take over the reigns of my internet use.

Once I'm back at work, I plan to have clearly defined times of internet use. No more binge watching Netflix shows or looking at shoes I'll never buy anyway. Instead, a defined slot of time with defined tasks to accomplish.

You might think that this is unduly restrictive, but the fact of the matter is that humans are wired to have restrictions. Our brains love structure. And this will provide me with a structure to get things done efficiently. I also hope that this little experiment of mine will also free up some space in my brain to do some proper thinking and really excel at what I'm doing. 

In any case, I treat this more or less forceful internet detox as a blessing. No, I can't have proper Skype conversation with Mr Magic, and no, I cannot watch even most enriching YouTube videos without constant interruption, but I read a lot, go on walks with my dog and appreciate the surroundings, which is impossible with out face stuck to the screen.

Don't fret, though, I'll be back next week, hopefully with some pictures of the beautiful Polish countryside.

I leave you with this quote from Gretchen Rubin:

Turn off your email; turn off your phone; disconnect from the Internet; figure out a way to set limits so you can concentrate when you need to, and disengage when you need to. Technology is a good servant but a bad master.

Finally reading for pleasure only !!!

For various complicated reasons I had to shut down my blog a few months ago, but here I come again, with slightly changed address, different background picture and a different colour scheme. Truly exciting times.

I've been out and about recently, collecting beautiful memories, taking ridiculous number of pictures and acquiring random items to remind me of all those places. When I was not out and about, I indulged myself in binge-watching Big Bang Theory, random art projects and solving logic puzzles. I'm also proud to announce that I'm about to finish reading Anna Karenina. I had my first go at reading this book when I was at first year at uni and since then I've made four attempts at it. This time, using my generous teacher holidays, I persevered till the end, despite extremely dull parts dwellings on agricultural theory of 19th century Russia. I still have War and Peace waiting on the window-sill, but I think it will need to wait until next summer (or summer after next): I'm not sure I'll be able to take such a big book again any time soon.

On the note of reading, I have to say that being busy all year with planning lessons, reading about education, marking and doing all the adulting stuff, I've forgot how enjoyable reading fiction (and not only), but most importantly reading exclusively for pleasure was. 

I've been devouring book after book recently. I've read The Shepherd's Crown by my beloved Terry Pratchett, Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman, then moved on to two randomly chosen books which turned out surprisingly enjoyable (The Knot by Mark Watson and The Truth by Michael Palin) and now with Anna Karenina almost finished, I'm moving away from fiction to Cal Newport's Deep work.

Now, that last book is a choice that was born through listening to some really interesting podcasts. The series is called You 2.0 and it really got me thinking about how I work and what I can do to make my work easier, more enjoyable and at the same time more efficient. You can listen to the podcasts here, I really do recommend them. I will probably write on the topic of reinventing yourself for a fuller life soon.

I'm glad I'm back on here now, I need a vent somewhere to release all those unruly thoughts that inevitably cloud my head, especially now that I have both time and headspace to do a lot of deep thinking. So brace yourself for a jolly good ride with me!

Till then!