SPIN LIKE THE WIND-the blog of Nigel James.

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."

BACK ON THE ROAD AGAIN.

Tomorrow I head up to a London hotel in readiness to connect with Third Day when they fly into the UK on Sunday morning. Their UK tour features shows in:
London Monday 7th May
Cardiff Tuesday 8th May
Glasgow Thursday 10th May
Belfast Friday 11th May

Hopefully I'll get on line and let you know how the devotional times and the concerts are going.

BROKERS OF ANOTHER WORLD.

Just back from the New Wine Network Leaders conference in Harrogate, Yorkshire. I was there with Gary Smith from Ignite, Chris Cartwright from City Temple, and Paul Francis from Glenwood church in Cardiff. We were all incredibly impacted by the teaching of Bill Johnson from Bethel Church, Redding, California. The miraculous happens at his church regularly and especially out amongst the local community. He's full of rich wisdom and memorable phrases including the title of this blog entry. Here's a selection of them from just one talk:

* Desperation moves the resources of Heaven.
* We keep crucifying the resurrected man in the name of discipleship.
* There's a confusion between our assignment and our destiny. Our destiny, which is heaven, is certain. Our assignment, which is to display heaven, that's uncertain.
* Jesus didn't die so we could do church, he wants us to disciple nations.
* In a sense, Jesus was showing what a man could do empowered by God.
* The way to stay encouraged is to stay connected with what God is doing.
* Don't pray for a breakthrough, but pray TO BE a breakthrough.
* God has positioned us to carry and release his purposes and his will. WE KNOW what these are we just need to believe them and release them.
* Christianity must be recognised by its fire and passion, not by its disciplines.
* We need Character and Power. Don't fall for just having character, because the world will only change by the power of God not by nice people.

I could go on and on... check out his church website for downloadable sermons, or read some of his books.

YOUNG LEADERS.

You don't have to trawl too deeply through the Bible to find out that as well as using some extremely elderly characters to serve Him, God also uses young people. Think David the shepherd boy, Mary the teenage mother of Jesus, Joseph and his multicoloured coat, Jeremiah saying he'd never be a good speaker, Esther risking her life for her nation, the young man Mark fleeing the scene of Jesus' arrest only to end up writing a gospel. I'm firmly committed to identifying, equipping, encouraging and releasing young people into Christian leadership in all its fullness, and this weekend is a good example. It's the time of year when we meet up with our young leaders from the Flames of Fire conference in the summer. Ignite runs the youth and young adult programme at the week, which for years has been Flames of Fire but from next year will be known as New Wine Cymru. Some of these leaders we know well and have been on our team for a few years, but a whole bunch this weekend are joining us for the first time- transitioning from being one of the 'crowd' to one of the leadership team. Including our own Ignite office team we'll have close to 30 people here for most of the weekend. We'll be giving them loads of input about leadership characteristics, expectations, attitude but most of all we'll be getting to know them and welcoming them to the world of leadership.

JANET FROST

This is a special blog entry devoted to Janet Frost. Janet was personally devastated that I omitted to mention her at all in the previous blog despite mentioning her husband and sons. So this is all about Janet. Janet has been a great friend to Gill and I and she is just as much a 'character' as her husband Mark. Here are 10 of her best attributes:
*Passionate supporter of all things Welsh, despite being born in England.
*Thrilled that her boys are Welsh, not English.
*Loved it when her husband no longer played cricket for money but just for the love of the game.
*Thoroughbred long-distance runner, wearing the very latest in sleek athletic attire.
*Great admirer of her husband's jokes and games.
*Never yet been on a winning female team in any quiz game when Mark and I have been in the opposing male team.
*Has been known to text me complaining about the plumbing in her house- apparently the plumber's called Nigel as well. Yeah, yeah, we believe that old excuse.
*Could earn a living as a Steffi Graf lookalike.
*A legendary flute player-she's magic.
*Models for 'Fatface'-Clothing that's built to withstand the demands of an active lifestyle.

No wonder she's one of my favourite people!

SMILES AND GROANS

What's put a smile on my face recently... and what's brought on a groan.

Smile -England eventually winning a decent game in the Cricket World Cup.
Groan- coach Duncan Fletcher resigning (actually brought on more of a sigh than a groan.)
Smile-Peter Moores appointed the new coach. Mark Frost and I toured India with him as part of the Christians in Sport team in 1990. I remember a marathon joke telling session with the three of us plus a few others at the back of a bus on the way to the Taj Mahal.
Groan-bumpy greens on the golf course I played with Gill on Saturday.
Groan- the slow play of the three guys in front of us.
Groan- the way I'm playing with my new clubs.
Groan- just why do I play golf?
Smile- lunch with the Davies's and the Frosts on Sunday.
Smile- The Frost boys cheeky grins.
Groan- how I felt after one bowl of dessert too many.
Smile- Graham Davies admitting he 'lost it' when his eldest daughter didn't take enough money to the last Ignite event and he had to drive all the way back to give her some. A kindred spirit I thought to myself!
Smile-whirling the youngest Davies girl around my head in the garden.
Smile-Mark Frost reminding me and Graham about us leading a Christmas service together and him having the responsibility of playing a video clip. We introduced the video, turned the light off and he couldn't find the button to press on the video player.
Smile- Mark Frost confessing to Graham Davies and I that if it weren't so unhealthy he'd love to smoke a pipe.
Smile - the worship band at church last night, they were really laying down some serious licks!
Groan- realising the amount of reading I've still to do in preparation for my first Masters study week.
Smile- seeing Rev. Nigel James on the City Temple news sheet.
Smile - remembering I'm just 14 days away from Third Day's UK tour.
Groan- waking up at 4.30am when the taxi arrived to take our son James to Bristol Airport for his flight to Dublin. (he's working there for a few weeks and came home for the weekend.)
Smile- meeting with good friend Rob Burns this lunchtime and discovering we are both in a transitional stage in ministry and feel the same mix of frustration, excitement, uncertainty, perserverance and sense of 'wilderness'.
PICTURES- from the top: Peter Moores- the new England cricket coach, Graham Davies- once a Cambridge University and Neath rugby player whose favourite chorus is 'Open Our Eyes Lord' as he proved by singing it every time he led worship at a Christians in Sport Bible study, Mark Frost -possibly no-one exists who gets more pleasure from silly family games and corny jokes, Rob Burns- ex-Wolves footballer who is now a missionary into Wales from the USA and armed with a big folder of diplomas and certificates has dedicated his life to discipling others. I'm proud to know Peter Moores a little bit, and very proud to call the other 3 guys my friends.

THE REVEREND WAS STUCK IN THE TOILET.

Well! I got ordained on Monday night at the Elim National Conference in Minehead. It was a pretty special occasion really, with the National Leadership Team of Elim laying hands on the 26 ordinands and praying for us. Jeff Lucas then delivered a great message to the 3,000 or so people attending the conference.
My wife Gill and my parents travelled across to Minehead from Cardiff for the ordination, the stewards in the venue were all from City Temple in Cardiff, the rest of the leadership team from the church were all present, as was Gary Smith my long-time colleague at Ignite. The suit and tie were required dress for the occasion but didn't stay on for the rest of the week.
A little earlier in the day I needed to be assisted by Chris Cartwright- good friend and senior pastor at City Temple. I'd locked myself in the bathroom and the lock was jammed, with me wearing only a towel. After much struggling with the lock we seemed to have no alternative but for Chris to hand me some clothes through the window and for me to climb out. He tried one final time to open the lock and it worked. The assembled gathering in the evening were amused to hear me thanking Chris for rescuing me- not spiritually but from the toilet!

HOW CAN THEY HEAR ABOUT HIM UNLESS SOMEONE TELLS THEM?

In the midst of study and research for my Masters, plus some family time, and attending two funerals this week,at last I've got around to adding some audio sermons to this site. You can see them in the 'Some of my Sermons' sidebar. Most of them have been preached at City Temple over the last few months or so, and I'll be adding more from time to time. Hope you enjoy them!

JUST LIKE JESUS.

Great quote from Max Lucado in the book that Gill and I have been reading:
'God loves you just the way you are, but he refuses to leave you that way. He wants you to be just like Jesus.'