AID(an's) MEMOIR(s)

Testimony of 'Whatnot'

I’ve just finished reading a booked called Testimony of a ‘Whatnot’ by Elizabeth (Betty) Pritchard. I had a couple of connections to this book which got me reading it. Betty was a missionary in India for 40 years and served in the same part of India that Joy did her medical elective in last year. Betty also retired to Lisburn in the 1970’s with her husband Herbert where they attended Lisburn Friends Meeting. She was also a frequent speaker at Moyallon Camp and inspired many others to follow God’s call to serve Him in other countries.

So that’s what made me pick up the book but I really enjoyed reading it in the end as well. It is really well written and she is very honest about her experiences which was inspiring. There is a full review on the Ireland Yearly Meeting website and also details of how to get hold of a copy of the book but I just wanted to write one story from the book that encouraged me.

Betty talks about how over a number of years she suffered loss of hearing. Much of her work in India up to that point had involved talking to groups of women in villages sharing the Gospel with them and listening to their stories. As she became more affected by deafness she couldn’t hear what they were saying and found it difficult to speak with them properly. At first she could not understand why God had allowed her to be hindered in this way as she felt she was doing what God had called her to do. She prayed many times to be released from her suffering and hear again.

After a few years when her evangelism work with the women was becoming impossible she prayed that God would show her what else she could do to serve Him. Then she lay down and opened the magazine of Evangelical Fellowship of India, in it there was a competition to write a Christian novel with the winning entry to be published in many local languages as well as in English. It was felt that a lot of people in India were not interested in writings of theology or devotional literature but they may be affected by a story in the form of a novel. So Betty duly entered and won and had her book published.

She has subsequently written other books and Sunday School materials and now her autobiography which has touched me even after her death in a way her preaching and evangelism could not have. But Betty would not have thought of writing had it not been for her hearing loss. I was encouraged by how God used her suffering to turn her onto another path from which she has been able to affect many more people.

Trying to know God better

During my church homegroup the other night I was thinking a lot about my need to know God better. We spend a lot of time worry about “things” but if we worried about the one thing that was important, getting closer to God, then the “things” we worry about would take care of themselves. I guess it was a “consider the lilies” type of moment for me. (Matthew 6:25-34)

I’ve been reflecting since on Rob Bell’s book Velvet Elvis and what he says about binding and loosing which I wrote about on my blog (you can read it here). I talk about the importance of wrestling with God as Jacob did. It prompted me to try to make more of an effort in my prayer and Bible study times, in the words of another member of my homegroup to “expect God to be there”.

I looked again at the whole passage in Matthew 16 where Jesus tells the disciples about binding and loosing. I was struck that before Jesus talked about giving them the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven he asked the disciples “Who do you say that I am?” Peter answered “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God”. Jesus wanted to know that the disciples knew who He was and what He was all about before he gave them the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven. It’s the same with us we must know Jesus, be familiar with who He is, what He has done and what He promises to do in our lives before we can be effective witnesses for him.

Friends in the Philippines

This is an article I wrote for the Friendly Word, an Irish Quaker magazine about my recent trip to visit Friends in the Philippines…

In September, as part of a wider Asian trip, Joy Haydock (Grange Meeting) and myself spent a week in the Philippines. We visited the Quakers there and saw the work that God is doing through the Filipino Friends.

The first Friends meeting in the Philippines started in 1978 in Pasig City a suburb of the capital Manila. The church at Pasig became very large, with over 700 members, coming from all across the Metro-Manila area. In the 1990’s several meetings were formed in other parts of Manila so members could attend meetings closer to where they lived and Philippines Yearly Meeting was born. The Yearly Meeting is known as the Philippines Evangelical Friends Church (PEFC) and is now made up of 27 churches, all of them programmed and pastoral.

We stayed with Jaime and Lydia Tabingo who have been involved from the start. Jaime was the first pastor of Pasig Friends Church and is also the Executive Pastor of PEFC. His wife Lydia set up a Kindergarten and Pre-School at the church in Pasig. Jaime and Lydia have been recognised since the early 1980s as missionaries in the Phillipines by Evangelical Friends Mission in the USA. PEFC is unusual in that it has been founded and directed from the start by Filipinos and not missionaries from overseas. Staying with Jaime and Lydia gave us a great insight into the life of the Yearly Meeting and we also experienced the great warmth and kindness of the Filipino people through their generosity.

It would be impossible for me to tell you everything we saw and learnt about the Philippines and the Friends there in such a short article, but perhaps I can share two experiences, one a struggle and the other an inspiration.

We spent a lot of time with John and Lois Ocol, both of whom were at the Triennial in Dublin. They are Young Friends and John shared with us a problem for the wider society in the Philippines that had manifested itself in the Friends church too. As you will be no doubt aware many Filipinos are working abroad. Basically, anyone with the skills and the means to go overseas will leave the country, the majority do not return. Friends in the Philippines have lost many of their gifted youth leaders to the detriment of youth ministry in the churches. These young people are also potential leaders in the churches as a whole, they would have been potential elders and committee clerks but as I mentioned many will never return. I invite you to pray with John and Lois for strength and wisdom to continue their work among Young Friends despite many of their co-workers moving overseas.

Just one of the many inspirational characters we met among the Friends in Manila, was Pastor Rodel. He has been the pastor of a small church at Angono, of around 20 members that was started about a year ago. It was delightful to meet the pastor, his wife, Laya and their three children who all lived in the back of the church building, a small concrete building with a corrugated iron roof. Before he trained to be a pastor, Rodel had been an engineer. He was not content to leave his engineering past behind him when he became a pastor so he has set up a “technical mission” at the church. Every Saturday local people are invited to bring their broken electrical appliances to get repaired for free and while he is meeting his clients he has the opportunity to share the gospel with them. Some have gained a much more eternal free gift than having their television fixed, the free gift of salvation in Jesus. The pile of stereos and computers in the corner of the church is testament to the success of this mission. Please pray for Rodel, that he would touch his community with the transforming power of the love of God.

It is always a privilege to meet with Friends from other countries and even more so to visit their meetings and share with them in worship, thanksgiving and prayer. It is something I would encourage all Friends to do.

Humility in Prayer

I’ve said to a few people this summer that the thing God has been teaching me about most this summer is prayer. I was reflecting on something that was said in a sermon I heard on Sunday about prayer. The speaker was the Children’s Pastor at the church. She was speaking about a time earlier this year when she was struggling in her life. She decided to tell Sunday School class about it and ask all of them to pray for her. This really struck me as when I think of asking people to pray for me I often think of my close friends or people who are older or wiser than me. Asking your Sunday School class to pray for you is like admitting weakness is it not?

The more I reflect on it the more I wish all Sunday School teachers were like this one. When I was young I always saw my Sunday School teachers as knowing everything about God, not having any problems with anything. In some ways they were unreal, although I guess what I saw wasn’t the full picture of them. It then comes as a shock when somebody you’ve put on a spiritual pedestal has weaknesses in their personal and spiritual life too. But that’s what life’s all about.

Everyone’s going to have problems of some sort or another at some stage or another but it’s about what we do with that. This women did a great thing by facing up to her problems and humbly asking others to pray for her, admitting that she couldn’t do it all on her own, she needed God’s help and the help of praying friends. I’m sure the kids in her Sunday School class really appreciated that lesson.

Remember when Paul ask Christ to remove the thorn in his flesh, Christ said “My strength is made perfect in weakness” (II Cor 12:9)

Bluetree - Greater Things

It’s another album review. This time a band called Bluetree who started off in a Belfast church but are now full time recording artists, this is their first album called Greater Things.

I got this album a couple of weeks ago and I have listened to it over and over again. I’ve found it to be musically and spiritually inspiring. It has some of my new favourite songs on it, especially tracks 2 and 3 Burn Me Up and For You. Burn Me Up from it’s opening bars makes you want to get up and dance around the room or at least tap out the drumbeat on the nearest hard surface. For You then takes you to a place of worship and awe at the wonder of God’s grace and love. I love the way lead singer Aaron Boyd’s Belfast accent comes through strongly as he sings the chorus. I’ve heard too many non-American bands singing in American accents, but that cannot be said of Bluetree and long may that continue!

The album has a beautiful mix of rocking guitar riffs and drums and worshipful relfective lyrics, sometimes in the same song. I’m sure they’d be terrific live so I plan to see them play at some point. They have been leading worship in churches and at events round Belfast for a few years now, but they’ve moved on to bigger concerts and conferences, playing at the Rocknations and Adoration08 this summer.

This is a fantastic album that I can’t recommend enough and I look forward to much more from these guys. Check out their Myspace to hear some of their songs.

Jon Foreman - Spring and Summer

A few months ago I reviewed the first part of a solo project by the lead singer of Switchfoot, Jon Foreman, a double CD called Fall and Winter. Well, now comes the other two seasons namely Spring and Summer.

I really enjoyed Fall and Winter but for me Spring and Summer has taken things up a notch to really show the depth of Foreman’s talent. All of the songs seem to be steeped in scriptural references and spiritual metaphors and some of them are very challenging. I think it is musically even better to, the songs feel more positive and the melodies more memorable.

The Spring CD starts of with March (a prelude to Spring) which is a happy start, it moves on to Love Isn’t Made which appears to be about struggles in relationships, with backing vocals by Jon Foreman’s wife, Emily. Then In My Arms shows us the joy to be found in relationships. Baptize My Mind is one of my favourites on Spring, it’s one I found myself singing along to having only listened to it a couple of times. Next up Your Love is Strong is a beautiful song with powerful lyrics about God’s love with lines from the Lord’s prayer throughout it. The final song Revenge seems to be a throw back to the darker songs from Fall and Winter.

The Summer CD kicks off with a Mirror is Harder to Hold, which reminds me to take the log out of my own eye before looking at the speck in another’s. Resurrect Me is more like a Switchfoot song with a strong chorus. Deep in Your Eyes brings us back to the more contemplative style these CDs have been characterised by. Instead of a Show is another favourite of mine with it’s very direct challenge to the church, “Instead let there be a flood of justice, an endless procession of righteous living…instead of a show”. The next song is Foreman’s adaption of the 23rd Psalm, The House of God Forever which I’ve found myself singing along to repeatedly over the last few days. Once again Foreman keeps the production in the family with vocals provided by his sister-in-law, Sarah Masen. The CD ends with Again, a slower more thoughtful song which is really a prayer “Holy Holy, you alone are true, turn us back towards you”.

So if you liked Fall and Winter you will love Spring and Summer and you should buy this record immediately! There’s also a lot more in there for Switchfoot fans and those who just want to listen to some inspiring lyrics that speak about God’s love for us in a real way, so you should go out a buy it too!

The City Church Experience

As part of my visiting churches in Belfast I went to the Belfast City Church yesterday. I’d heard good things about it and I have often been to their non-profit making charity cafe that they run in the church building.

My overall impression was that I really enjoyed being there, they are a laidback, informal bunch with a passion to reach all sections of the community. During the course of my time there I spoke to two people suffering with drink problems and an angry young man who had been passing by the church and came in to seek refuge. I thought, how fantastic that this church could be open to this, I’m not sure how many churches could be. I think all churches want to be but if they’re honest with themselves they are not.

In reflecting on my visit, I’m not sure if it’s somewhere I could go every week. I didn’t think it was possible for a church to be too laidback and informal for me but perhaps this one was! They started 10 minutes late and lots of people wandered in and out during the worship. I know a lot of people like this more relaxed way of doing things but I think it would frustrate me after a while. Part of it is my ordered personality, maybe it’s the Air Traffic Controller in me, I like everything in its right place, but it’s also about respect for worshiping God and everyone being fully part of that. I am so thankful that City Church do what they do and I may well go back there but I’m not sure it’s the church for me.