Youth Work Resource

Prayer – Who Do You Pray To?

Posted by Mark Tiddy in Articles | christianity - (0 Comments)

I found this quote written by the editor of PostSecret.com on this weeks secrets

My mother has brain cancer. She was diagnosed during the holiday season last year. They told her she probably had two months to live. My mother is sitting in the room next to me, and will be here for the holidays this year.

I don’t believe in god, but I am praying for a miracle for your father. My mom got one.

I find it an interesting quote and it leaves me wondering who he is actually praying to if he doesn’t believe in God. The majority of definitions of prayer at dictionary.com talk use the word petition i.e. ‘to petition for something’ now all this is very well but who are you actually petitioning?

I guess those who don’t pray to God could have an open prayer, not directed at anyone in particular but prayed that in the emptiness surrounding there is someone or something listening out for these prayers of petition and prepared to answer them. I don’t know if I believe God answers prayers not directed at anyone particular but I suspect the answer is similar to the answer to the ‘Does God answer prayer?’ question.

Perhaps God does answer the prayer sent out into emptiness by the athiest in desparation, who knows but either way the PostSecret founder who I quoted at the beginning obviously had a undirected prayer answered whether it’s luck or God I don’t know but it’s an interesting thought…

Hillsong – Healer

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Healer

Healer

Today the CD of Hillsongs latest release (although a few months old now) arrived in the post. I only ordered it yesterday so was impressed. The thing this this CD is that I’d been debating for a while whether to get it because of it having the song ‘Healer’ on by Mike Guglielmucci.

For those that don’t know this song was (from what I gather) quite the anthem of Soul Survivor…written by a man diagnosed with terminal cancer…a song given to him by God 2 years ago. However in early september it emerged that this was a complete lie and that Mike had fooled his family, his church and the world…he’d even appeared on stage wearing tubes to give the idea that he was ill.

The difficulty is how do we respond to such a problem? The song Healer is actually very powerful, yet introduced to us through a very strange series of events. Soul Survivor have removed it from their live album and it appears to be being taken off newer prints of ‘This is our God’ but should we do this?

My initial reaction was yes however reading into the story a bit deeper and in particular the statement issued by Mike’s Father (link) which stated the following made me think a bit differently

Michael wrote the song Healer because he wanted God to set him free from his addiction but hid it behind the lie of a fabricated illness. 

So does it matter if a song was introduced by lies? I don’t think it does, the song is powerful and although not about cancer as mentioned and promoted it is about wanting God to heal us and we all have things we need God to set us free from whether it is a physical illness or any other kind of problem we need healing from, God doesn’t just heal the physical but has the ability to heal addictions, broken pasts and so much more.

I think Christians struggling with the lies of Mike Guglielmucci don’t need to throw away their CD’s with him on, tear up their music for the song and repent to God for ever singing it but in plain terms they need to get over it. When we sing a song it’s about where our hearts are at, it’s about meaning those words to God, it’s about laying ourselves on a metaphorical alter in front of God and pouring our souls out to Him. And can we do that with this song? Yes but if we need to then we must forgive Mike, pray for him in getting help and ask God to help us focus the song onto His mighty self and not the author.

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The Underground

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I’ve been going down to London now for 2 years…the last 2 academic years I’ve been there 2 days a week and this year I’m only there 1 day a week. As part of my journey from Peterborough to Waterloo (ish) I get to ride on the London Underground.

Even though I’ve been on the underground numerous times now there’s still something mysterious and exciting about it.

There’s something about waiting on a station not knowing which way or when the next train will come.

There’s something about feeling the breeze begin to blow through the tunnel onto the station as the next train approaches.

There’s something about the mysterious front lights of the train as it hurtles down the tunnel towards the station.

I don’t know what it is but there’s something exciting about waiting on the underground station for the train to arrive…and that mystery hasn’t really faded in the last two years…although now I notice that sense of mystery less often.

The funny thing is that I started writing this post with the intention of simply writing about the underground mystery however perhaps as a result of getting used to Pastor’s making ‘God-links’ out of everyday activities I wonder if God is a bit like my underground experience.

I guess the bottom line with Christianity regardless of whether you became a Christian or grew up through Christianity and gradually made that decission to follow Christ is that our journey’s are much like my tube adventures.

When we first make that committment we experience excitement, a sense of joy and a sense of mystery in not going what will come our way next but as time goes on that excitement and mystery we experience in God seems to fade away…maybe we get used to the feeling of God there, or maybe we forget what the feeling of God is but often I think it’s simply that God becomes so central in our lives He becomes nothing but a part of us.

Occasionally we may suddenly have that realisation of God’s awesome presence much like I did today with the underground but in reality God can easily just drift into our everyday life.

The thing is I don’t think that’s explicitly wrong but I don’t think it’s right…I wonder if the stage of God just lurking there gives us that luke warm attitude talked about in revelation…the neither hot nor cold approach to Christianity.

I believe that God is much much more than a feeling we experience the same way which whether I feel excitement and mystery towards the underground train or not doesn’t change the fact that the underground is part of my life however I believe it’s important to be aware of the presence of God in the foreground of our lives…God shouldn’t be something pushed to the side but should be in the forefront of everything.

I’ve been reading David Crowder’s book ‘Praise Habit: Finding God in Sunsets and Sushi’ and he talks about us living lives which live a habit of praise…a life where Jesus much like the clothes we wear are obvious to those around us and obvious to us.

So I guess my thought on the underground is that I’d love to experience that eager sense of mystery as the train approaches, as I feel the breeze and as I see the lights everytime I catch the underground however in reality I won’t but it’ll still be there and in that same way I won’t experience that excitement I found in God the first time that I really decided to follow Him…the first time I invited His Holy Spirit into my life but He will always be there and I will experience Him in all sorts of different ways…in all these ways I hope He will be in the foreground of my life.

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Faith & Ethical Banking

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The credit crunch, breakdown of banks and merging of Halifax and Lloyds TSB seems to have dominated our news the last few weeks…alongside this it seems to be becoming more and more ‘fashionable’ to recycle plastic bags…buy cotton bags instead of using plastic bags and living life in a more ethical manner.

Last year I transferred my bank accounts over to Smile (The Co-op Bank) from Natwest (crapwest) for two main reasons…firstly Natwest were annoying me and secondly the Co-op has a very clear ethical policy which includes making sure that they do not invest in the arms trade, businesses involved in animal testing or goverments/businesses do not support human rights.

Amongst this they also do not invest in companies which have a bad impact on the environment or business which are involved in genetic modifications.

Since this move I have been pondering the implications of ethical banking as a Christian, should there be a link between the bank/building society we use and our faith?

The answer I’ve concluded is yes…let me explain.

If we accept that as Christians the impact of Christ is meant to effect every aspect of our lives then part of our lives is our money and investments. If a Christian operates a business you’d expect them to treat their customers and staff in a way which would reflect the way Christ treated everyone.

The same way (in my opinion) if as Christians we can make sure that we can reflect these views and morals Jesus set out within our banking and investment principals then we should. If we decide that as a Christian war is wrong then is it right to be investing in the arms trade through our banking?

I know that it’s impossible to know what the big high-street banks like Lloyds, Halifax, HSBC, Barclays and Natwest do with our money but it is possible to know what certain banks such as The Co-operative bank, Smile and Triodos don’t do with our money.

So I put it to you that as Christians Christ should be the centre of every aspect of our lives right from the way we treat people up to the way in which we shop and bank.

Remember banking is important to Jesus…’Jesus saves!’

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Sex, Sin and Inclusion

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What started as a post exploring the topic of sex before marriage and whether it’s acceptable to expect Christian young people today to wait until marriage seems to be becoming a series.

Ben, Steve and Carl have all made interesting comments on the sex before marriage post and this post (hopefully) takes the next step forward from the sex before marriage post and explores the topic Carl bought up in his comment of how churches except (or usually fail to) people in who practicing sex before marriage (by which I mean doing it…not literally practicing…though practice does make perfect!….)

Finding the balance been excepting a person and not their sin is something only Jesus seems to have managed, those churches/Christians who are accepting get accused of being liberal and those churches/Christians are condemn the sin usually end up being way too conservative.

Now the problem is this….how do we accept someone and welcome someone into a church yet at the same time acknowledge that what they’re doing is wrong?

If we look at the character of Jesus then we see how he did it. If we take the woman at the well he first offered her love, he accepted her, he welcomed her…then eventually he moved onto tackle the sin.

This approach of acceptance and welcoming and then tackling the sin seems to be a good approach, however finding the right time zone between accepting them and tackling the sin is something which is difficult and varied because of the individuality of people.

I’ve come across many people in the past who think they cant be part of a church because they’ve got problems and issues and everytime I hear people express that opinion it drives me crazy…since when was church meant to be a place of perfect people?

The early church was made up of people with plenty of problems, Jesus didn’t preach to the perfect but the imperfect, in the Old Testament God didn’t choose the sorted people but the murderers and prostitutes.

I think this outlines the first point I want to make and that is we need to allow imperfect people into our churches, we need to be accepting and welcoming to everyone.

At the same time we need to accept that once in sinning doesn’t stop, people continue making mistakes. I guess this is one thing you accept with youth work. In an ideal world all the young people in your youth group would grow up following the bible, having amazing Christian experiences and never straying…however it’s not soul survivor everyday and young people make mistakes…they fool around with the opposite sex, they smoke things they shouldn’t and drink too much but this doesn’t mean we reject them…quite the opposite, it means we help to teach them acceptance.

It’s here the church needs to learn a lesson especially with sex, we shouldn’t turn away those involved in any kind of sin whether it’s lying or perhaps more taboo topics such as sex or homosexuality, we should accept them, show them God’s love, welcome them and then in time find a place to challenge them on their actions.

No family sees a family member with a problem, tells them about it then ignores it until it goes away, a family stands by that person, acknowledges that they need extra help at the time and supports them, helping them deal with things at their speed.

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Sex Before Marriage In The 21st Century

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A while ago I started writing a blog on sex before marriage following a comment I head from someone (Christian) who suggested that it is ridiculous to encourage young people to abstain from sex until marriage in today’s society…this was in the week leading up to a Doodles on ‘Sex and relationships’ which never happened and so as a result this blog joined the list of ‘Draft Posts’ on my blog.

The problem is that sex before marriage is a massive topic…and I’m not sure many Christians would argue the biblical basis for waiting for sex until your married and if I’m honest I think God does say to us that waiting to have sex before marriage is the best idea and I think perhaps humans have proved that when we look at the amount of problems people have because of being sexually promiscuous.

One thing I’ve become more aware of recently, particually in younger Christians (or rather my age) is that the things society seems to say is definately okay Christians seem to have bought into, the idea that it’s okay to get drunk (particually on birthdays), the idea that perhaps fooling around with the opposite sex is fine and perhaps even swearing becomes something compromised…I don’t know!

The problem with this is that we begin to separate Christianity and the importance of the bible, if we believe that the bible is God’s word and that God never changes his mind then surely sex before marriage doesn’t need to be questioned?

The thing is that we interpret this is different ways, and the problem with sexually related ‘naughties’ is that often it’s easy to twist our interpretation to fit what we want, so I believe that when we form our views on ‘how far is too far?’ or have that ‘boundaries’ conversation we need to be thinking if we genuinely believe what we’re saying or if we think we’re fiddling God’s word to suit ourselves.

I’ve often heard people say ‘it’s okay to have sex…we’re gonna get married’, the problem with this is that it’s naive, you never know what could happen in a relationship whether you’re close and everything’s cool or not and also if sex is meant to be a wedding gift from God as I’ve often heard preached then surely it’s the same as a child opening all his gifts on Christmas eve?

I’ve also heard people say that in God’s eyes once you’ve had sex you’re married…the problem with this is that it misses several points. Firstly if (as Christians) we’re meant to respect the laws of our country then whether we think sex = marriage or not the fact is we’re not married in the eyes of our country.

The second problem with that view is that actually in the bible we read ‘for this reason a man will leave his Father and Mother and be united as one with his wife’…in the sex = marriage situation I’m not convinced that there’s any leaving of mum’s and dad’s 9 times out of 10. The other problem is that actually this is (in my opinion) the wrong interpretation of marriage in the bible.

Often in biblical times before a man could marry his fiance he would have to build an extension on his parents house for them to live in (this is similar to what Jesus talks about when he discusses there being many rooms in his Father house), in other biblical times the marriage was official after sex but there was ceremonies before that (often followed by the bridge and groom going into a tent to ‘do it’ with their guests waiting outside).

Finally I think the ‘sex = marriage’ approach loses value of marriage, I do not believe that God intends sex to be the only significant different in marriage, I believe that God intends marriage to be 2 people giving themselves completely to each other, two people committing to love each other through the good and the bad times and the easy and the hard times.

However we clearly live in a society that says sex is okay, a society that pressures us to lose virginity (perhaps the film American Pie sums this view up) so is it realistic of us to expect young people to save themselves for their future missus (or mister)?

Perhaps there are more pressures around today to have sex than there has ever been but I think there are two things we need to make clear to young people on the matter of ‘sex before marriage’

Firstly we need to make it clear that it is entirely possible with God’s help – We need to help young people realise that it’s not a daunting, impossible target but something you can manage with God’s help, by being mature about boundaries with boyfriends/girlfriends and also (much life with alcohol) knowing your limits…if after kissing a girl you have an undesirable urge to have sex with her (and probably will then is that a good idea? The same goes for everything up to sex from ‘hand sex’ to ‘oral sex’.

Secondly we need to make clear the idea of God’s forgivenesss, too often young people feel guilt when they’ve made mistakes in the sexual area, and often I think the church causes that guilt without meaning too, we need to remember (particually youth workers) that we are there to not just show young people that God can help them save themselves but at the same time help young people realise that ultimately they have a loving God who will forgive them not a God who’ll turn his back on them for a mistake.

i believe that today our message of waiting for sex until marriage is no different regardless of what society says, and I believe that we need to help young people realise that, that we need to challenge societies views at the same time showing the world a loving, forgiving God.

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Writing Off Our OAP’s

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In July I’m going to see Ben Folds in Sheffield and a while ago on his ‘Rockin the suburbs’ album he wrote a song called Mr Jones which was basically about someone being forced to leave a job they’d done for years because they were too old.

Now I’ve been thinking recently about how true this is in our churches, how often do people reach a particular age and we stop them doing the children’s work because they’re ‘too old’?, how often do we decide that people are too old to serve yet tell them they can ‘still pray’?

The problem with this is that, firstly prayer becomes something that becomes almost a negative thing for someone to do, if we’re not careful it can become a ‘hmm….now what can you do for our church…you can’t do this…that wouldn’t be suitable…umm…just pray for our church’. Prayer shouldn’t be the last resort, nor something someone does when they can’t do anything else but it should be seen as the most important part of our ministry, behind everything prayer should be going on, as well as someone helping with the youth group they can (and should) be praying for the youth work they’re doing.

The second problem with the attitude above is that we automatically write off old people, have we not thought that some of them can still serve? In fact, all of them can!

It might not be suitable that they help out with the youth ministry but perhaps a less energetic role is there for them? What about encouraging them to welcome new people to church? Look out for new faces and talk to them? What about encouraging evangalising to their friends and people they meet? As many of you will know most old people can talk for hours!!!

Let’s not forget though that in some situations it can be suitable for someone elderly to continue an active role whether it’s doing children’s work, managing the friday night drop-in tuck shop or helping to move tables and chairs around the church.

We have to remember that in the bible people didn’t just reach a particular age and stop serving, they either kept going or found a ministry suitable for their current state, let’s not write off our OAP’s in churches…if they all did things I truly believe we’d see a massive change in our churches.

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