Finding Opportunities To Feast On God.

One thing's for sure: the last seven weeks have been more hectic than I thought they'd be. The transition from student to 'regular working person' is a marked one for anybody. But I suspect the way my time is divided up between two jobs (and the nature of one of those jobs) makes it particularly challenging.

One thing I've learnt so far: you need to fight to devote time to the things which matter to you. Fight for time with God. Fight for time to read, for time to blog, socialise, rest, and to do the most important thing, not the most urgent thing. Even within the two days a week I have for Life Church I'm learning to constantly look for opportunities to appropriately involve others and to delegate. It's even a challenge to find times to feast on God, despite the nature of a lot of my work!

You know, I'm not sure I could handle the pressures of handling the business of the church alongside everything else without everything God taught me on Frontier Project (now FP-Impact). Or without what he taught me through leading a large student work whilst a full-time student. It's funny how God deliberately leads you on a certain path, and though we often have no idea what he is up to, we later see glorious glimpses of wisdom in how he has led us.

Anyway, the pace of life is balanced out by a few lifesavers - these regular appointments in the diary are so welcome! Yes, in some ways they make life more hectic (you end up with the same amount of work to do and less time to do it in) but it is so worth it!

Wessex leaders' gatherings.
The Newfrontiers Wessex Region is one of the reasons I was so excited to be 'coming home'. The men who lead it are excellent, many of them good friends, and once a month leaders from the 17 different churches get together to socialise, pray, worship and hear vision for the future. Ten there are other 'sub-regional' gatherings where we gather in smaller groups at a separate gathering once a month or so. Both gatherings are amazing times to be together and bring one another on - I certainly feel myself being beckoned on to a new depth of relationship with God every time I meet with them!

Prayer & Fasting
As I approach this week's prayer and fasting I'm well aware of my need to get away, be with others facing similar circumstances and get before God. I love being with friends in Newfrontiers and I'm particularly looking forward to seeing some Sheffield friends this week. I'm normally in the church office Wednesday-Thursday, so I've only had to take one day's leave from my other job to get there, which isn't bad. I'm looking forward to seeing Peterborough Community Church's new facility too (I couldn't make the last Prayer and Fasting - a little thing called a dissertation got in the way! So this will be my first time at the new venue). I expect Sarah D will want to bring us a full blog-update on what happened (you know you want to Sarah D) so I will leave it to her.

So, between now and next Monday there are two Sundays at Life Church, two days as an engineer, two at Prayer & Fasting and one in the church office. A bit different to normal, but boy, do I need it!