Episode 65 - Here Comes the Election...

It's election time in Papua New Guinea. Having just been through a general election here in Britain, we know something of the chaos that can be caused during the election season. But I suspect that this is only a shadow of what things are like in Papua New Guinea right now. I heard from a friend in Goroka this week who said Goroka was crazy and very noisy at the moment. I can only imagine. And so I thought rather than speculating, I'd give you this link (just click on the word link Mum) to the blog of some friends of mine whom I worked with in CRMF, to hear first hand a little of how the elections effect both them and the work of CRMF.

Episode 64 – Tiredness Kills

At the moment I get tired very easily and as a consequence I spend a lot of my time in a state of tiredness. But the truth is that even before I became ill I spent much, maybe even most of my time in a state of tiredness. And even more bizarrely this was at least in a way, by choice. I chose to sleep less because I wanted to do more. Trying to cram as much into each day as I could. I’ll just do a bit more at work and then push my whole evening back, I’ll just write a couple more e-mails, one more pint, or even just one more episode on TV. But as I did more, my tiredness meant that I got less out of it. 

Read the Signs...

As I’ve become tired increasingly easily recently, I seem to have become more aware of the effects of tiredness that I somehow ignored before (perhaps seeing them as some kind of weakness to be overcome). Sure it means that you have less energy and it’s a bit harder to do things, but it’s much more than that, it effects everything. It makes me less able to think clearly. More likely to make bad decisions. It makes it harder to concentrate. Harder to communicate. It makes me more likely to not say what I mean. It makes me more emotionally sensitive and more likely to misunderstand others words and actions. It makes me more likely to hurt and more likely to hurt others. I become less me. And yet I would choose to be like this. As this has become less of a choice for me I think hard about what I can do to reduce my tiredness without stopping living my life, and I hope that when the choice is mine again, I chose to reject this life of tiredness that I have become accustomed to.

Episode 63 – God of This Land

When I was in Papua New Guinea and I drove through the streets, visited the villages and walked through the market places one thought would often come to my mind. What does God want to do in this place? I often wondered what God’s desire for Papua New Guinea and its people was. What He wanted their future to look like. What changes He’d like to make to their culture, their politics, and their lives. And what I could do to help this happen. I had many, many different thoughts about this during my time in PNG, but two things always stayed the same; God’s ultimate desire was for the people of PNG to know Him, and that this always started with those who already knew Him. Furthermore it was always those who both knew God and who knew the culture of PNG intimately who were in the best place to make these changes.

Something I drew once

I have to confess that since coming back to England, when I drive through the streets, visit town centres and walk to the shops, the thought of what God wants to do here in England has very rarely come to my mind. To be honest I don’t know why that is, but I do know that I want it to change. I want God to move in this place as much as I do in PNG and I know that His desire here is for people to come to know Him just like it is in PNG. Furthermore it is those who both know God and who know the culture of Britain intimately who are in the best place to make these changes – and this time, that’s me! I don’t know how long I’ll be here, or what God wants me to do while I am here, but I know now is the time to ask Him!

Episode 62 – Inertia

Inertia is the scientific term for the resistance to a change in movement. It's the reason that when a driver stomps on the accelerator pedal in the car all the passengers get thrown back in their seats, or if the driver slams on the breaks everyone gets thrown forward. It’s the tendency for something to stay in its current state even if the world around it changes. The last couple of weeks have been pretty big for me as I wrote about in my last blog, even if nothing has really happened. My health is pretty much the same as it has been for months, but I have found a new understanding of what I can and can’t do. This new understanding seems to have coincided with a movement in my heart. 

The last few months have been a time of waiting. The premise has been simple; I’m not well, I don’t have the strength, energy or wherewithal to do much, so I will simply wait until I am better. And rightfully so, this I believe was always supposed to be a time of waiting and God has done much within me during this time. But I have started to feel that God is telling me that this time of waiting is drawing to a close. Now before you get too excited, by this I do not necessarily mean that He is telling me that I am soon to get better. What I do feel is God prompting me that now is the time to stop waiting for change to happen and to start embracing what change has already occurred. To make the most of what I have now, in preparation of what is to come. 

I sometimes think God must feel like this with me...

I’ll be honest, this scares me. A lot. I don’t really feel like I can do much at all, regardless of whether or not I want to. I still get tired quickly, and have a tendency to fall over, and find it difficult to concentrate or even follow a basic conversation. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know who this new version of myself is and that I have to relearn who I am and how to do everything all over again. And to be even more honest, much of me doesn’t want to change, because it’s scary and where I am right now is safe. I don’t feel I can do anything, and if I don’t try, I can’t fail. 

I don’t feel like I have the strength to live life, nor the ability. But I suspect that that is rather the point. I don’t. As God told Paul in the bible, God’s strength is made perfect in weakness. It is only when I can’t do things that I really let God do them, to allow Him to more fully work in me to achieve His purposes. Because when I can’t, I know that God can. So it’s time to start doing again. Only small things at first and definitely only in His strength, but it’s still time to start moving. Now what to do first? I guess that Tax Return I’ve been avoiding for two months would be a good place to start…