SPIN LIKE THE WIND-the blog of Nigel James.

HARD ROCK.

I’m back on the Third Day tour bus after a 22-hour journey from home and a night’s rest at an airport hotel in El Paso, Texas. It was so good to get home for Easter-to worship at church on Easter Sunday, to spend a few days at our caravan with Gill, to have a precious family time with Bethan, my mum and dad, Rachel, Chris, and the grandkids Hannah and Joe.

After the final concert before Easter, in Calvary Chapel, Las Vegas, I stayed in the Hard Rock hotel for a day and attended the Palm Sunday service in Calvary Chapel.

Wandering around the hotel waiting to be collected by one of the pastor’s of the church, I couldn’t help reflecting that I was swimming against the tide, or more appropriately, marching to the beat of a different drum. It’s such a mistake to suggest that 21^st century people don’t want to worship, because right there in front of me was almost every extreme of contemporary idolatry you could imagine. People were gambling at the tables, drinking in the bar and ordering their drinks from scantily clad waitresses, eating in the restaurant, drinking coffee in Starbucks, pumping iron in the gym, sunbathing at the pool, having tattoos put on their bodies, buying stuff in the shops, and of course all this in the surroundings of much rock music memorabilia paying tribute to many of the rock icons of the last 40 years. In the midst of all this, I was off to celebrate the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday!

To reinforce my thinking, the pastor preached about ‘Why we worship’ and amongst other verses reminded us of the first 2 commandments:

  “Do not worship any other gods besides me. “Do not make idols of any kind, whether in the shape of birds or animals or fish. You must never worship or bow down to them, for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God who will not share your affection with any other god! Ex. 20:3-5

In case us believers get too self-righteous, we need to remember that idolatry can replace worship of the Lord very easily in the life of the church and of Christians today. We can idolise the preacher, the worship leader, the rock band, doctrine, denomination, family, partner, perhaps most of all just like those who aren’t yet believers we can idolise ourselves, our own ambitions, and our own self-determination.

I’m working on a sermon on all this….

 

GATEWAY CHILDREN'S HOME UPDATE.

Linda Murray and Evelyn Houielliebecq have just returned from a trip to visit Prasad, Sunnee and all the Gateway/Ignite team in Rajahmundry, India. Amongst the many things they accomplished on their trip was to give a gift of toiletries and personal items to every child in the Gateway Home.

Meanwhile back in Cardiff, Gill and her team of helpers (Jane, Shikala, Dave and Brenda) organised a fundraising quiz night for the Gateway School and reached £900 on the night.

MY HOPE IS YOU.

Back out on the Make Your Move tour and the band have changed the set each night of the first four shows. Making a welcome return to the list is the song ‘My Hope Is You’ which has a special place in my heart! 

I first met Third Day way back in September 1998 when they were opening up for Newsboys and I was a speaker on the ‘Step Up To The Microphone’ tour. My first ever tour of the USA, first time speaking, and in front of large crowds-all quite daunting for a man from Cardiff, Wales. Not only did all the guys in Third Day make me very welcome, their music helped me prepare each night to walk on stage and encourage the audience to enrol for Teen Mania mission trips. Amongst all the Third Day songs I listened to, there were two that have become lifelong favourites- ‘Consuming Fire’ and ‘My Hope Is You’.  ‘Consuming Fire’ influenced me so much that the ministry I helped birth in the UK is called Ignite, and I went on the write my Master’s Degree Dissertation on ‘The Fire of God in the Bible’.

‘My Hope Is You’ hasn’t brought about such obvious fruit in my life, but has been massively significant as I travel and minister throughout the world. My US cell phone has the words ‘My Hope Is You’ as the screensaver, reminding me what my life, my future, my hope is built on. Psalm 25, on which Mac based the words of the song, has often been a go-to Psalm for me:

 To you, O LORD, I lift up my soul; in you I trust, O my God. Do not let me be put to shame, nor let my enemies triumph over me.

 No one whose hope is in you will ever be put to shame, but they will be put to shame who are treacherous without excuse.

Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.

I am glad these words are sung over our audiences each night. By the way, I'm really enjoying the privilege of speaking on behalf of World Vision each night and seeing many, many children get sponsored.

 

IGNITE IN AFRICA

here's a promotional video for Ignite's ministry that I filmed with Emmanuel Jonah last week in Liberia.

LAST FEW DAYS IN LIBERIA.

              So it’s my last night in Liberia, and an opportunity to reflect on the last few days here.. On Sunday morning I preached at LCMI church where Pastors Steve and Emmanuel are based. Interestingly it was the monthly Communion at the end of the service, but less than a third of those attending came forward to receive the bread and the wine. The reason being that the rest were either not baptised, not members, or not feeling worthy to partake. Culturally very different-but the norm here in Liberia apparently.

               On Sunday afternoon and then again on Monday morning, Emmanuel and I had meetings about Ignite in Liberia and Ignite in Africa, we filmed a video greeting for the Ignite team in the UK, an Ignite introduction video for other areas of Africa, and we adapted the UK Ignite Challenge material for use in Liberia as weekly programme.

              The return to the guesthouse on Sunday evening was pretty eventful. Steve’s nephew Shadrach, a big lad of 19, lives with him, and he had been ill in the local clinic. He took a turn for the worse, we collected him and half way to the hospital the decision was made to detour to a pastor specialising in deliverance ministry. Shadrach hadn’t spoken for a day or so, and the feeling was that this had spiritual origins in a terrible dream he had over a week ago.. The deliverance pastor was a French speaker, and so Steve, Emmanuel and I joined in praying as he began to minister to Shadrach. An hour or so later, Shadrach was talking, felt better, but at the moment is still in the clinic although recovering well.

Apparently tonight, the deliverance pastor is going to spend the night with Steve ans his family as Shadrach returns to them.

                 Emmanuel was travelling back to ABC (Africa Bible College) University in the north of Liberia on Monday afternoon, whilst I went to Harbel about an hour the other side of Robertsville airport, to lead another Ignite training session. Harbel is a town completely inside an area owned by the Firestone Rubber Company. To get in there you drive through gates as if you are entering a factory, and then you see row upon row of tress with little cups attached collecting the sap from them. The training was hosted by Pastor J. Nehemiah Johnson, whom Gary and I had met on our last trip, and he fed Stephen, Wintee, our driver and I at his house before the training. The training course was notable for at least 3 nursing mothers breastfeeding their babies throughout the proceedings!

                 Driving in the beaten up old Ignite Nissan estate has been an experience. It has over 318,000 miles on the clock, and I had to help pay for a radiator replacement on Sunday because it was overheating and leaking last week. On Saturday morning Emmanuel and I were driving and it suddenly stopped. He jumped out of the car, waved a passing guy on a motorbike down and hopped on the back to find a mechanic, leaving me at the roadside with the car!

                Today has been a free day basically. I purchased a few gifts to take home with me from Sarah, the housekeeper at the ABC guesthouse here. No sooner had I done so than she came knocking at my door again and said that Emmanuel had sent a local craftsman with some wood carvings for me to buy! Having only a few US dollars remaining, I offered to trade with him, and eventually swapped 2 carved elephants for my mosquito net! I gave Sarah some things for her child, and also shared my lunch with here- boil in a bag chicken casserole and tinned vegetables.

               I have swum in the sea, written a sermon for Sunday back at City Temple, watched a TV episode on my laptop, snoozed, chatted with a elderly missionary lady from the USA, and then went to dinner with Stephen and Florence at their house. Jollof rice, cucumber, pineapple, and watermelon…and a can of coke. I took with me some of my clean tee-shirts, having deliberately brought with me enough to leave most of them for Steve and Emmanuel to use or give to friends. What with the packet food, Ignite tee-shirts, Bibles, training handouts, Seven Myths of Youth ministry books, I am going back with considerably less in my baggage than I came with.

            Internet connection is painfully slow here so will post some pictures on my return to the UK.

 

LIBERIA UPDATE.

Here's a quick update (Saturday night) from my trip so far:

*Spoken at 2 youth ministry training sessions for Ignite Liberia in the cities of Monrovia and Tubmanburg. There is real need to invest in youth in Liberia- 80% of the population are under 30. 

*Met with Samaritan’s Purse Liberia to discuss Ignite Liberia collaborating on HOPE training for youth across the nation.

*Been driving around in the Ignite Liberia Nissan estate car, with no air conditioning, and a regularly overheating radiator, on very bumpy and dusty roads (5 hours yesterday!)

*Shared experiences with several American missionaries in the mission guesthouse I am staying in for the week-most of whom are Third Day fans!

*Met with National Youth Leader for one of Liberia’s main Pentecostal denominations to discuss collaboration on Ignite Leadership Academy.

*Met with national executive committee of a small, new denomination on behalf of Elim International Missions to explore their application to join Elim Global.

*Spent valuable time with Pastor Emmanuel Jonah and Pastor Stephen Wombenyakeh, our Ignite Liberia national leadership.

*Sunday morning I preach at Liberia Christian Ministries International Church ( sounds impressive but it is a small building in a rural area outside the capital city Monrovia) -the home church of the Ignite Liberia staff.

*Monday and Tuesday-more youth leader training sessions and then some one-to-one meetings with key personnel.

 

OFF TO LIBERIA.

Tomorrow I travel via Brussels to Monrovia, Liberia, West Africa. There I link up with Emmanuel Jonah, Ignite's Africa director, to carry out youth ministry training at different venues across the country.

I'll also be visiting a Liberian Pentecostal group of churches, on behalf of Elim International Missions, to help in the process of them possibly becoming a part of Elim Global.

 

 

CITY TEMPLE CHILD SPONSORSHIP.

This coming Sunday morning I am launching a child sponsorship scheme at City Temple here in Cardiff.

FAITH CARDS

12 years after Big Ideas produced the Ignite Card as a means of young people being bolder and more determined about their faith, the Catholic church have launched a similar initiative called faith cards.

The bishop overseeing the project said this:

“Carrying a faith card takes courage, it signals to others, every time you use your wallet or purse, that you believe in God, that your life has a purpose, that you are trying to love and serve your neighbour.”

CITY TEMPLE INDIA TEAM VIDEO.

I've just put a video together for City Temple's updated website. It's of our mission trip to India last July: