SPIN LIKE THE WIND-the life of Nigel James: encouraging people to follow Jesus.

STUDY!

I'm currently on a couple of weeks of study for my Master's degree- this week "Pauline Pneumatology' and next week 'The Spirit in the Old Testament' - I'm enjoying the seminars greatly and looking forward to writing 2 research papers over the coming months. Not sure what the subjects will be yet, but over the last couple of days I've been drawn towards Paul's metaphors for the Holy Spirit- a seal, and a guarantee/deposit in particular, so it may well be that I delve deeper into them.

IGNITEHOPE HIGHLIGHTS.

I've now posted a photo album of the IgniteHope weekend. Here are some personal memories:
*The non-stop work of Mike, Ruth, Ben, John and Nathan. Legends!
*The Community Policeman in Ely joining one of the social action teams on his day off, so impressed was he with the idea.
*Getting all the young people and team leaders to stand up and clap along to 'We Will Rock You' each morning before I started the teaching.
*350 people booked in by the Thursday morning before, 800 people squeezed into the marquee 36 hours later on the Friday night.
*YFriday on the Friday night and Saturday morning really encouraging the young people to get stuck in and work hard for the Lord-And they gave me a copy of their new CD/DVD.
*Seeing the wide variety of churches involved.
*Spending some time with Jeremiah from New England, back in Cardiff to see what we were up to.
*The enthusiasm and commitment of the team leaders-they'd all payed for the privilege of being involved.
*Teams bringing unchurched people back in with them in the evenings and some of them giving their lives to Christ.
*Chatting to Andy Hawthorne about India- he wants to give some tithed money from The Message Trust to build an Ignite India church.
*Loads of volunteer stewards from City Temple.
*Flares party band on the Monday night-my kind of music.
*Having Naomi Hill back involved with Ignite for the weekend.
*Our team pastor, Nick Bradshaw-doing a great job and loving it.
*My wife Gill working on the Ignite merchandise stand all weekend.
*Visiting 11 projects in the afternoons, first with Nathan, then John and Jeremiah, then Nathan again, and seeing loads of stuff going on.
*A great picture of the church- gathering young people in the morning for worship and teaching, calling out place names and seeing the teams meet up and head to the social action projects in these communities and take the love of Jesus, watching them all come back in the evening and hearing the good news stories of what had been going on and seeing people come to Jesus.

MORE THAN WE COULD HAVE HOPED FOR.

The IgniteHope weekend exceeded every expectation. With over 450 young people meeting each morning for worship and teaching, over 100 adult volunteers involved, and nearly 800 people in total gathering for the evening meetings. Each afternoon, over 20 teams went back into their local communities to engage in social action projects- graffiti clean up, gardening, painting, car washing, rubbish removal, and loads of fun days. I managed to visit a total of eleven different projects and was amazed at the enthusiasm and the energy of the young people I saw. I'll post a gallery of the weekend soon, but here's a photo of me in a rare moment of relaxation with my grand-daughter Hannah. There have been so many stories told about the weekend already- not least about the 31 young people who gave their lives to Christ in the evening meetings. In another post I'll list some of the great things that we heard about over the 4 day duration of IgniteHope.

MOVING FROM THE ENCOUNTER INTO THE CALL.

I've just posted a new sermon which I've been preaching a few times both sides of the Atlantic. It opens up the Call of Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 6 and challenges us to move from the intimate, cleansing encounter with God into his full purposes and destiny for our life. The version in 'Some of My Sermons' is from City Temple, where I gave a fairly short edition of the talk and moved quickly into ministry time.

IGNITEHOPE coming soon!

This coming weekend sees Ignite embark upon the IgniteHope weekend where we are gathering 500 young people in Sophia Gardens in the centre of Cardiff for an extravaganza of worship, teaching, evangelism and social action. I'll be speaking each morning and preparing the young people to head out each afternoon in social action teams all over Cardiff, the Vale of Glamorgan and some of the South Wales valleys. Teams will be litter-picking, graffiti cleaning, running kids clubs, doing gardening for the elderly, to name just a few things. In the evenings they'll pour back into Sophia Gardens for an evangelistic programme with speakers such as Andy Hawthorne, Naomi Hill and Dai Hankey. Late night concerts finish the day off with Superhero, YFriday and 29th Chapter.
IgniteHope has been a massive undertaking, and I must pay tribute to the team in the Ignite office who have put this together under the wise leadership of Gary Smith. So well done Nathan, John, Ben, Mike and Ruth- all volunteers who have given of their time, their talents, and their passion, to ensure that IgniteHope will be a truly transforming weekend in the lives of Christian young people, those who are not yet Christians, and in communities all over South Wales.

END OF A BUSY WEEK.

The last couple of days have been a bit hectic! Tuesday evening I went with Scotty Wilbanks to eat with the guys in DecembeRadio and then we watched them play in a late-night showcase. They did a very cool thing- bringing a number of people from the Christian radio industry up on stage to sit in on various songs as a thanks for helping with a couple of number 1 hits. Wednesday morning I was up early to catch a flight to Fort Wayne via Chicago. Had a great conversation with one of the Compassion International staff about the value of child sponsorship, on the Chicago flight. In Fort Wayne for just 24 hours, I was staying with my buddy Andy Booth but speaking at the Campus Ministry meeting at IPFW. Ben Gates, the Campus Ministry Chaplain has become a good friend over the last few years- and we are leading a student mission trip to India this June. I met the team and briefed them, as well as talking at the main Campus Ministry meeting. It felt great at Nashville airport to have a married couple come up to me, ask if I was Nigel James and say that they were going to read my book on their flight home!