Steelpoort mission

We were invited by Pastor Neels Beukes from Steelpoort to go and minister with them in their surrounding areas. I asked the F.A.B. ministry team to come and experience this with us. FAB(Faith a Blaze) is a fulltime schools ministry team and they were very excited and imediatly joined the road trip. These trips are always extremely fun, but challenging at the same time. We were able to minister with several schools, bussiness people and pasters. We also had the privelage of ministering at the youth group and sharing and imparting a deeper passion for their schools and town! God is doing Great things and we first need to recognise that and join in with what He has allready started! God dreams over every person, family and nation, those are the dreams we should first seek. “seek first the Kingdom of God…” Many a time we try and fit God into what we are doing, He just doesnt fit, and this was part of what we are realising. God has plans, and we need to slot into His dreams for our family, community and Nation!

the challenge of living!

I have learnt that just to breath does not mean you are experiencing life to the fullest. We all know the saying:”you have never really lived until you have almost died”.  This may be true, but I don’t want to be motivated by the thought of death to want to live life to the fullest! The word life inspires me with such words as – CHALLENGING, FUN, EXCITEMENT, EMOTIONS, LAUGHTER, REALITY! There is more to life than just existing through our normal bleak everyday routines! One day I promised myself not to take this life for granted, to start noticing  everything around me, the beauty, the sadness, the hope or lack of it, the smiles, the happiness, just experiencing every emotion and facing every challenge life has to offer with hope, faith and courage! Mostly I break that promise to myself and forget to live that way due to a choice to worry about tomorrow, but every now and again I would get it right and get a glimpse of what most people believe what true living should feel like!

As Christians we were born to live a certain lifestyle. Most Christians would say yes, a lifestyle of victory, although I agree to a certain extent, I believe in saying that we miss the true essence and beauty of the Christian life! In my perception, to focus on living a life of victory means that we will be entirely self focused, what we need to do to get victory, what we deserve as Christians, what is naturally coming to us and what are our rights as Christians. This is all an inward focus! I believe that the destiny and purpose of Christians firstly is to live a life of servanthood!  Immediately this forces an outward focus. The perception of this is that there is no victory in serving others. The perception is that to serve has the same meaning as “being stepped on”! This perception is a lie from the depths of hell to keep us from living that life, and we believe this lie because of our natural human desire to want to live in victory. When we look at the life of Jesus we realise that a servant life is not one that got Him stepped on, but one that ultimately got Him sitting at the right hand of God and ruling with Him on His throne.

You see, to find that life of true victory, firstly we need to change our perception of victory. Victory is not just financial freedom or earthly power, it is not a life separated from pain, trouble or turmoil. The life I seek is a life of joy, a life of favour, a life filled with inner peace and full of love, we need to find the key first. This key is hidden deep within a life lived through unselfishness, unconditional acceptance and love, undeniable faith, hope and unexplainable faith. Throughout the bible this life is promised and even more, but we always miss the key, that is to pay the price of living a life of servanthood! To firstly love God with all your heart, mind and soul, to love your neighbour as yourself, to serve one another in love and to give to Him with a joyful heart. We will find many more examples in the word of God where He calls upon Christians to live with an outward focus and not to fill their own needs, but to firstly fill the needs of others, and then the awesome promise comes that He will fulfil all our needs and give us a life of abundance and the desires of our hearts.

God’s desire is that His love for people is shown through the life of his body, that His servanthood characteristics are seen through His body. The fact is that most of the time we don’t even look like His body. This I am convinced of through one scripture, “they will know you are my disciples through the love you show to one another”. Yes, we love one another, but usually that love is very shallow and conditional. Let us explore this statement for a moment. We are usually very judgemental of people, on their looks, performance and actions, but our attitude can all change in a moment when we see they are Christians or they walk into the same church as us. We can work well with those in the same organisation or church as us, get along well and even become very close friends, but that all changes in a second if one makes a mistake, messes up or leaves that organisation. Then the depth of that love is truly tested and often comes up short! To quote the words of Jesus “the greatest love that can be shown is that one man gives his life for his brother”. This speaks about a love for another being greater than the love for your own life. This is not inward focused, this is not about myself, but about others! This is the love and servanthood lifestyle that got Jesus the victory and in turn gave us all that same victory. But we need to realise that this victory is accessed through faith, grace and that same lifestyle of unconditional love and servanthood!

If anybody thinks in anyway that this lifestyle would be boring, uneventful, unsatisfying or bleak, then I have news for you. This is the ultimate extreme life anyone can live. Every morning you are greeted with an excitement because you know your day is planned by God, this alone means that only He is in charge of every situation and event. Every moment throughout the day is filled with the expectation and knowing that at any time something amazing and mind-blowing can happen!  It is an expectation of miracles happening around every corner. Even if the day offers challenges or disappointment, the knowing that I am His son brings an inner peace none can explain and gives you strength to endure and come out the other side so strong that only God can get the glory! A life of victory is not based on how good I perform, but is based on the fact that because I am His child, I already have victory, and there is nothing I have to prove to show that I have it, just a life to serve others in love imparts it!

God is all-powerful, God is love, God is peace, God is Grace, God IS!!!! Living this life in unconditional love and servanthood gives God the opportunity to prove it to all!

God bless you all and may the peace, love and favour of God be with you and your loved ones always!

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