SPIN LIKE THE WIND-the blog of Nigel James.

SEVENS.

I'm sitting up in the early hours of the morning waiting to collect my daughter Bethan from a youth group trip to Hillsong Church in London and she's going to be another hour so I may as well write the blog now that I was going to wait until tomorrow to do!
Yesterday I had a 'guys' day at the International Rugby Sevens tournament at Twickenham Stadium in London. A good friend of mine, Rob Holder, is currently the manager of the USA Eagles national rugby team until at least after the Rugby World Cup in September and October of this year. I first met Rob back at the 1999 World Cup in Cardiff when he was over on an outreach, and we've kept in contact ever since.Here's a picture of Rob and I taken last year when I stayed with him for a couple of day- he's wearing an England rugby shirt I took as a gift. He and his wife have become big Third Day fans and I've been able to invite them along to concerts a couple of times in and around San Francisco where they live. The USA rugby team is currently taking part in the Churchill Cup tournament in England, and although they didn't have a team in the Seven-a-side tournament yesterday, most of the team went along for the fun of it. Rob got me a ticket and, in the cold and wet weather, we watched a stack of rugby. Highlights for me were very definitely two outstanding wins by the Welsh sevens team. A 22-0 thrashing of England was greeted with heaps of pleasure by the hundred or so Welsh supporters in the stadium, and by stunned silence from the 15,000 or so England fans. Then Wales qualified for the quarter-finals after beating Portugal 15-14 by scoring with the last move of the game well after the hooter had sounded. The main Welsh 15 a side team was concurrently losing an epic game 29-23 in Sydney to Australia, also from a score after the hooter had sounded. I'd never been to a Sevens tournament before and I really had a good time- especially catching up with Rob. He's got a very strategic role in USA rugby and has been offered a couple of long-term posts after the World Cup. LIke most of the sides in the World Cup, USA are based in France in the autumn and Rob has invited me over to see one of their pool games. They have been drawn in the same group as England, Samoa, Tonga and South Africa, so life for the Eagles is going to be very, very tough! Wales got to the semis of the Sevens today, and lost to the Sevens circuit leaders Fiji, who lost to close rivals New Zealand in the final.

PEOPLE, PEOPLE, PEOPLE!

The varied ministry opportunities that God provides are amazing! It's been a typical week for me really, with some time in the Ignite office, some time at home studying, meetings at City Temple, and loads of emails!
Earlier in the week, in a flying visit to the Ignite office, I was able to see a preview of a school lesson on Suffering that the Ignite Cymru Schools Team were preparing. This week and for the next 6 weeks or so, the John, Zach and Michelle are extremely busy travelling all over Wales leading Religious Education lessons in High Schools. They have prepared 2 outstanding new lesson presentations- the one on Suffering and another one on Creation. Here's the team leader, John, with his right hand man, Zach. Meanwhile, Rhiannon from the Schools Team has been taking some time away from the team to act as my assistant. She's been a great help photocopying chapters of books for my Masters course and today she's been sending some books to our Ignite contacts in the country of Liberia, and to a man on death row in a prison in Zambia. Emmanuel is our Ignite Liberia man- he just started emailing me a year or so ago, and now he uses Ignite resources to reach and disciple youth in the Liberian capital of Monrovia. Here he is with his wife.

The man on death row wrote to me last year and we have corresponded occasionally since then. He's become a Christian since being on death row, and although Zambia has the death sentence it apparently has a policy of not carrying out the executions.
Last night I spoke at Boxfresh- City Temple's older youth group. Matt Gregor is the youth pastor, and we've been friends for years.
He asked me to speak about 'How does God guide us?' and it was a fun night- party food, a quiz and then the talk. My daughter Bethan also came along, and was surprised to see me sitting there when she walked in. I've known Matt since he was 15 or so, we've done loads of youth ministry stuff together, and he's just beginning the journey of Elim ordination- with a lot of study needed.

LET IT RAIN.

At City Temple we are midway through a series of encounter meetings withJon Colyer who is a passionate and intense evangelist/pastor and a gifted worship leader. Jon's originally from Canada but now pastors a church in the Birmingham area of the UK. Jon's heart is to see revival and to see the fire of God fall on His people. In the evening meetings so far we have experienced the presence of God powerfully, seen healings and deliverance and many people coming into the fullness of the Holy Spirit. If you've never seen or heard of Jon ( he has a programme on Revelation TV in the UK) then it's well worth checking his website out and getting hold of some of his CD's. He tends to call his meetings 'Let it Rain' which seems strange when he talks so much about the fire of God- but both fire and rain are Biblical symbols of the presence of the Holy Spirit!

ANOTHER TOUGH QUESTION...ANSWERED.

Here's my answer to Josh's tough question:
It’s one of the consequences of the fall of mankind, I’m afraid. Not only have we fallen out of relationship with God, more often than not we find it difficult to enjoy positive relationships with other people as well! In simple terms, all the problems of the world could be summed up by the fact that people cannot find it in themselves to love each other. Of course, Christians should be living to a higher standard than anyone else, and we should be able to demonstrate loving relationships:
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
John 13.34-35

Unity amongst believers is vitally important, yet Josh speaks for us all when he confesses that sometimes it’s so difficult to demonstrate love to Christians who appear so difficult to get on with. I can once remember someone explaining that our challenge is to see everyone through the eyes of Jesus- if he can love them then so can we! I’d like to add to this the painful fact that sometimes people might be looking at you and me as the ones who are really difficult to love! I guess words like forgiveness, grace, mercy and patience, all come into play when we are considering this issue. I can also remember Max Lucado talking about people who were ‘EGR’. He meant in order to deal with them there would be Extra Grace Required!
Another way of looking at this is to suggest that although we are called to love one another, this doesn’t mean we have to like each other, spend loads of time with each other, and become best of friends! In other words, I’d like to offer the thought that we can ask for God’s grace to respect a person, to love them as part of the body of Christ, even if we find it hard to warm to them. Praying for them might be a good thing to do as well!
If there has been a previous dispute or disagreement that is the cause of our being unable to love a brother or sister in Christ, then we have to resolve that issue and begin to restore the relationship, but if it’s a simply a case of personalities clashing then perhaps we need to relieve ourselves from the pressure of a guilty conscience. We aren’t going to get on well with everyone, but we can have a Godly respect for everyone and treat them with grace and dignity- even if that’s not the way they treat us.
Have a read through 1 Timothy 1- although the chapter isn’t written specifically about this challenge, it’s packed full of advice about love, a good conscience, mercy, and treating others well. It also gives a warning to those who consistently fall out and disagree with other members of the body of Christ. Some people are just plain difficult to deal with. John Maxwell puts it this way- when Bob has a problem with everyone he meets, then Bob’s the problem! Peter's letters and John's first letter all include lots of good guidance about getting on with fellow believers. Galatians 5 would also challenge us on this topic.

ANOTHER TOUGH QUESTION.

My friend Josh Baker, an American baseball player, is still undergoing rehabilitation in Arizona nearly two years after I met him there. I hadn't heard from him for a while but recently he sent me another tough question to answer:
Why is it in life that there are those that cross our paths that are so difficult to love? I know that the question is simple and innocent, but thats what makes it frustrating...the thing is, I'm posing this question from the standpoint of not just loving anyone, but specifically Christians, ones that we cross paths with and interact with on a frequent basis....how is that difficult? We're told that if we love Him, He'll see it in the ways that we love others, but how come there are those certain few that love comes difficult with. I've heard the excuses of 'we're just wired different" or 'we have nothing in common' or whatever we come up with, but according to Christ, love isn't an option or an excusable action, its a command, so when it comes to love, how come those Christians exist for us?
Josh has a painful habit of asking the questions that most of us think but don't want to articulate! I'll do my best to answer this in a day or two.

HOME AGAIN... for 24 hours at least!

I've sneaked into the Ignite office on a Sunday afternoon to send some emails and do some preparatory study in readiness for 4 days of lectures commencing my Master's degree study. The final Third Day UK concert in Glasgow's famous Barrowland rock venue was great, but the journey back from Glasgow yesterday was a nightmare. Our flight to Cardiff was cancelled and the two options offered to us by BMIbaby - a flight today or a coach to Edinburgh and then a flight- both got us back into Cardiff too late for Mark Hibbert (pictured above packing the Ignite stand away) to rehearse for an evening concert he was involved in with some of his music pupils. So we flew to Birmingham and rented a car!
Highlights of the Glasgow show had to be meeting a Pentecostal Christian on the staff there who had been praying for 16 years that Christian bands would play at Barrowland. He was delighted to come into the dressing room and join our prayer time. Then, after I'd spoken about our India churches and the work in Ghana rescuing children sold into slavery in the fishing industry, the bar-staff at Barrowland collected their tips together and put them into the offering buckets!
I arrived home yesterday in time for 2 hours sleep before Gill and I hosted some old friends for an India School fundraising meal, then church this morning on the celebration of Chris Cartwight's 10th anniversary at City Temple. Under the theme 'I believe' and preaching from 2 Timothy 1.12, he set out his future manifesto. Exciting and encouraging!

COME OVER HERE AND HELP US.

Third Day in Solus Bar, Cardiff.
Another Hilton Hotel lobby, this time in Glasgow. Gary, his son Ben, Mark Hibbert from Ignite, Tai from Third Day and me are sitting around discussing the tour. Last night in Belfast we were at Whitewell Metropolitan Tabernacle with Brian Houston supporting. Before the show I was able to introduce the band to George McKim, soon to be senior pastor of the church and a one-time loyalist terrorist. In the concerts in Cardiff, Belfast and Glasgow I am sharing from stage about Paul's dream in Acts 16 when a man from Macedonia appears to him and says 'Come over here and help us'. It's a pivotal passage, because Paul's obedience to this request brings the gospel into the Western world. I've been talking about it in the context of the audience helping 2 groups of people today. Trevor King, who is co-promoting these shows with Ignite, and his Friendly Faces Foundation, are involved in helping rescue children from slavery in the fishing industry in Ghana. Ignite have been building churches around the city of Rajahmundry in India ( you can see some pictures in my gallery section or under the Indian flag on the Ignite web site.)
In Belfast, the offering to be split between these two causes was an incredible £6,000!
Scotty Wilbanks and David Carr on stage in Belfast.
Our band devotional time last night, as well as Pastor McKim praying for the guys, focused on Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane and his arrest- looking at how even in difficult, distressing times, being betrayed and deserted by those around him, Jesus was able to find good in the bad, hope in the heartbreak, and was always able to focus on God's purposes through the pain.

A CULTURAL DAY OFF.

A truly memorable concert in Cardiff last night for many reasons:
* A hot n'sweaty club gig which Third Day don't often get to play these days.
* A great attendance as far as we were concerned.
* Mac was on top form and shared very powerfully and clearly about faith in Jesus.
* We collected a good sum of money to sow into our Ignite India Church projects.
* Both Tai and Mac were very gracious in their comments about me from stage- must admit I feel a strange mix of emotions when they do that: embarassment and thankful, with a tears in my eyes.
*Gill, Bethan and Rachel were all there to enjoy the show.
*As were some of the Serious4Youth Ministry crowd all the way from Nantwich.
* Lois Richards also showed up, recently home from Brazil.
*An unexpected night at home in my own bed- felt very strange in the middle of a Third Day tour!

Today we drove from Cardiff on our day off firstly to Stonehenge which proved a big hit with band and crew alike. Then we travelled onto Oxford for a C.S.Lewis tour guided by the legendary Ron Brind who was a friend of Lewis's stepsons. The tour was very revealing, both to the guys in Third Day (Mac and Mark are big C.S.Lewis and Tolkien fans) and to me who has never been a big fan of either although I've read a couple of Lewis's books. We visited pubs, colleges, houses, all linked to C.S. Lewis's life and also went to the church he worshipped at and is buried in. Sadly, his grave is in a badly kept state, which seems such a shame. C.S.Lewis is seen as an absolutely pivotal Christian thinker in the USA, but he's a bit of a secret in the UK apart from the Narnia Chronicles. Here's Mac in one of the pubs Lewis and his friends frequented:
On the way to our Heathrow hotel, in our luxury mini-bus, Tai asked me to lead a devotion there and then, so I drew on the passion and the real life experiences of Ron Brind as he shared with us about C.S.Lewis. Using verse from 1 John that John Coles of New Wine had preached from at the New Wine conference last week, I explained that God gives us an authority and an anointing when we share directly from our own experiences of God rather than just putting forward a theory or a set of theological propositions. The devotion set us up for a frank discussion about how we talk about our faith, how the guys approach song-writing, how in general often Christianity is put forward as 'bad news avoidance' rather than good news, all earthed in verses from 1 John.
Tomorrow we fly over to Belfast.

OKAY LORD, YOU'VE GOT A GREAT SENSE OF HUMOUR!

Sitting in the same hotel lobby as yesterday, waiting for our ride down to Cardiff for tonight's concert. Last night the band played in The Royal Albert Hall which was an experience in itself. The whole day wasn't without it's challenges and relationship tensions (not between any of the Third Day entourage let it be said) but was a worthy fundraising effort for a couple of AIDS/HIV charities.
For me, however, the highlight involved Powerpoint. A couple of weeks ago at our Ignite Young Leaders weekend I ran the Powerpoint slides in one of the worship sessions and had a complete nightmare! The laptop froze and I was all over the place with the songs- one of those instances when I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Fortunately the 20 or so young people attending saw the funny side and I got a fair amount of joking afterwards. Imagine my surprise when at the Albert Hall yesterday afternoon the Production Manager came up to me and asked me for the Third Day song lyrics on Powerpoint. He'd been told I would be running the song words in the Third Day set- something they don't normally do, and certainly something I never do!
Gary turned up and was hilariously astonished when I told him of my new responsibilities!
Tai chose 4 songs with a more worshipful focus, and during the set I found myself standing next to the video technician backstage and running the song words from his laptop. No pressure there then in front of an audience of well over 2,000! I'd prepared myself to watch lead singer Mac Powell carefully on the video monitor, but then found out we were placed directly behind Brad Avery's guitar amps. For most of the songs I couldn't even hear Mac so I had to lip-read.
My son James was at the show which was a real bonus. He's never seen Third Day before, and he ended up taking photos for keyboard player Scotty Willbanks. James also got a taste of dressing room and backstage life before joining a bunch of us for food in an Italian restaurant.
Tonight's concert is in the University of my home-town Cardiff, and in this show plus Belfast and Glasgow, we are aiming to raise funds for the construction of our Ignite India churches.

FAITH?

Sitting in the hotel lobby, ready to depart for the The Royal Albert Hall, gives me a chance to reflect on the last 24 hours. Catching up with the guys in Third Day again yesterday was good fun, and the highlight was a trip down to Speakers Corner in Hyde Park with Tai, Dave Jaques and Wheels ( 2 crew guys). Seeing the 15 or so varied speakers on their soapboxes ( actually their step-ladders) was fascinating. Muslims were arguing with Christians, Christians debating with humanists, and there was a liberal sprinkling of nutters on parade as well. Unfortunately, much of the debate lacked any grace or compassion, but Tai made the perceptive comment that we were witnessing the great world-wide questions discussed and debated in a public park in the middle of London by a bunch of ordinary people. It wouldn't happen anywhere else in the world- you'd be arrested for causing a public nuisance or for blasphemy.
We gathered together later in the evening for a short devotion on faith. At the New Wine conference last week, Andy Hawthorne from The Message, in Manchester, had highlighted the fact that in the gospels the only two occasions that Jesus himself is amazed ( as opposed to him amazing others) was in response to faith- the lack of faith of his hometown and the great faith of the Roman centurion. We talked about what our faith was for this 4 concert tour of the UK and asked God to increase our faith. We'd much rather Jesus be amazed at our great faith, than amazed at our lack of it. Another great quote about faith from Bill Johnson: " Sometimes faith can start when you simply begin to doubt your own doubt."