Off to Israel…

I’m off to Israel on a short study tour. Never been before, so looking forward to “walking where Jesus walked”…maybe on the water????  Watch this space for my views…

Our Every Nation “Expand” goals for 2009:

Here at Every Nation London we sense the Spirit leading us in this season to move in the opposite spirit to that which is so prevalent in the world at this time. Instead of shrinking back into survival mode, we hear the words from Isaiah 54:2&3 calling us to “Enlarge… stretch…do not hold back; lengthen …  strengthen …For you will spread out to the right and to the left; to… nations … cities.”

So here are some of our key Every Nation London “Expand” goals for 2009:

 

1. Plant a new church plant in Madrid, Spain (From May 2009 – led by Mel & Tanya Calingo)
2. Prepare for Gent, Belgium church plant in 2010 (Led by Trevor & Yvette Botha – www.enmgent.org)
3. Continue to support to establish our Stockholm 2008 plant, as well as our other new churches in  Dublin, Salzburg & Berlin)
4. Launch a new Greater London congregation in Brentwood, Essex (Start Sept, led by Charl & Anina Chapman, who will hand over leadership of our Stratford congregation to  Andrew & Berna Holmes from June)
5. Launch new Greater London congregation in Slough (From March 15th, led for first year or so by Trevor & Yvette Botha and a core leadership team)
6. Launch a West Sunday evening service (From March 15^th, to be led by Simon Bardone)
7. Develop strategy for our “10+10+10 by 2020” goal (10 congregations in greater London, churches in 10 cities in the UK/Ireland, and churches in 10 western European nations)
8. Further develop our ministry to the poor of Europe through our “Love Ukraine” mission. (Our first ever teenagers mission goes there in April! Led by Carol Kinne)
9. Further develop our ministry to the 3^rd world poor by partnering with the “Village of Hope”/Thembalitsha in Grabow, South Africa www.thembalitshauk.org.uk
10. Further develop our ENgage internship (Giving opportunity and training to anyone wanting to “discover their calling” through an awesome 9 month internship program here in the greatest city in the world! See www.everynation.co.uk/grow/)
11. Develop an “Live-online” Bible School option to make this life-changing teaching available as assessable as possible. (contact bibleschool@everynation.co.uk for more info.)
12. Continue to Unite in prayer with other local London churches (Diarise an awesome churches together event in the Hammersmith Town Hall on 11th June)
13. Purposefully pursue new building plan in West (Pray with us as the eldership and finance board pursue this)
14. Expand our finances (Have healthy church finances to be able to fund all of the above! Thank you to all those who have partnered with us in any way over all these years!) 

 

How will all of this happen? We see Gods answer reading in The Message Translation of Eph 3:10: Through followers of Jesus like yourselves gathered in churches, this extraordinary plan of God is becoming known and talked about even among the angels! 

Get yourself planted in Christ’s church, and join in on His great plan!

 

Living “filled” in 2009

For the past few months here in London I and our preaching team have been preaching through the book of Ephesians in a series entitled the “Letter to London”. 

Its been a massive blessing to me personally, and this past week again spoke so effectively to me as only Gods word in the scriptures can. The text included  Eph 5v18, which reads “and do not be drunk with wine which leads to debauchery (that’s Greek for”it messes up your life”), but BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT.”

I’m reminded again that the church and early disciples never accomplished anything worthwhile until they were “spirit-enabled” in Acts 2v4 – “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke in other tongues AS THE SPIRIT ENABLED THEM.“     The only way to live the Christian life is to live it “spirit-enabled / spirit-filled / spirit-empowered.”   Looking at Paul’s first trip to Ephesus in Acts 19v1, we read that the very first question Paul asked the few disciples whom he found there, was this: “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you first believed?” Wow, what a first question. They answered: “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”    Paul then introduces them to the Holy Spirit and His empowering, and they become a powerful transforming force in their idol-worshipping city and culture. (By the way, notice that these were called “disciples” before they knew or had experienced any of this. They were on a journey of spiritual discovery and growth. The whole journey from saying yes to Christ is “discipleship.”)

Just like the early disciples at Pentecost, and those in Ephesus, every disciple of Christ must at some stage come to the realisation that the only way to move ahead to follow Christ is by being “Spirit-enabled.”   The awesome thing is that this promise is for YOU!  Whatever you do in 2009, whatever your dream, make sure that you only do it “Spirit-enabled”.

Don’t just have “get drunk” moments either, but rather live “be being filled” – develop a culture of being filled and living filled daily.  May you know His amazing filling and enabling in every area of your live and ministry in 2009!

(For more, get the download of the “Living Filled in 2009″ message for free from our website at www.everynation/downloads/ )