Church Experience in Paris

 Night View of Eiffel Tower, Paris

I guess you must be intrigued by the title. For those who have little idea about France’s spirituality, France is descried as ‘mission graveyard’, especially for Paris because of the highly materialist society.

I was in Paris to visit two of my fellow interns this holiday, and I went to their church (in which their father is the pastor at that church) on Sunday. This church isn’t what the church building you have in your mind, we met at a local café shop! Maybe you are thinking it must be a really big café in order to cater the whole church; in fact there were only 20 people (max) in this church! We didn’t have a band playing during worship; in fact there wasn’t anyone playing any instrument at all (apart from the tiny little instrument that was played by my friends’ father)! Worship was sang by just vocals (us interns sang Here For You in English to kick start the worship), and occasionally followed the song that are played by iPod. If it were in St. Aldates with no band, no instruments, songs played through iPod, it’s gonna be disaster! None of the leaders would allow this to happen. But don’t look down on this little church, it taught me a lot!

What I saw were 20 authentic worshippers praising God, prayers came out naturally from their mouths. Even though I don’t understand French at all, I could feel the passion that they have for God, for the people and for the nation. It just kept on going and going for ages, worshipping and praying and praising. During worship, one of the ladies had a Scripture of Revelations 3:7-12 – Jesus spoke to the church in Philadelphia:

And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: ‘The words of the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens. “‘I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut. I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name. Behold, I will make those of the synagogue of Satan who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie—behold, I will make them come and bow down before your feet, and they will learn that I have loved you. Because you have kept my word about patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world, to try those who dwell on the earth. I am coming soon. Hold fast what you have, so that no one may seize your crown. The one who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God. Never shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

Revelations 3:7-12

The lady spoke from the French bible, but when I read my English translation I was in tears, because I know that it was what God was saying to His beloved church who perseveres in the mist of sufferings. I know of the story of this church from them how previously church leaders were corrupted and turned against each other because of sin. They are broken people because they were betrayed by those they once trusted. But there is one thing that doesn’t change, their love for God, which can be shown fully in their worship. I am humbled by their faithfulness, their heart for God, their love for one another and their willingness to trust Christians again. I am also humbled by my friends’ father who simply perseveres, remind faithful to do what God has entrusted him to do – minister to the sheep whom God has given him. They are just simple people with pure and sincere hearts.

I looked back to this tern being an intern at St. Aldates, there are times that I just don’t feel like doing what I am doing, especially those ‘tasks’ are so tiny that nobody would notice! But if we are not faithful to small things He has encountered us, how would God entrust us with big things? A couple weeks ago I asked God to show me what it is on His heart. It seems He has already answered me through this trip, in His own way, as usual.

03.01.2013

Paris / Oxford

Move

St. Giles Street, Oxford on Thursday Morning

It was Hungry worship and praying meeting last night. In one part of the session we did Prayer Walking, we walked inside the church building independently and randomly and prayed for our city at the same time. I was praying with my eyes opened because I didn’t want to pump into someone or something while I was walking! I was asking God what He thinks about Oxford; what is in His heart at the moment; what He wants us to do in this city and I asked Him to move our hearts of what moves His, to stir up our desires for His glory and to change our hearts to be online with His.

While I was still walking I suddenly realised there is something in the church building that I haven’t noticed before: like at the top bit of the pillars at church there are some flowers sculpture, random female faces sculpture above the banner etc. I haven’t seen them before, they were there for donkey years but I have never noticed them until now!

We have been passing by our cities but it seems to me that we miss out the details at times! I think God is telling me that if we look into the parts that are generally being ignored by most people, we will find His will and discover the beauty of it. For me this is definitely a challenge, I am definitely not good at looking into details. However I believe if we are willing to do so, God will let us see His way through His eyes, change our minds to be online with His mind and we will discover the hidden beauty that He has set before us to find.

Lord, moves our hearts of what moves yours; breaks our hearts of what breaks yours; makes this place be what you want it to be and let your will be done in us for the sake of the name of Jesus, amen.

29.11.2012

Oxford

Hungry and Afterthought

At the end of every month’s Wednesday night, we have a prayer and worship session called Hungry. We were helping with the Mighty Warriors Party for the little children (which itself was amazing!) so we arrived late. Worship has already started by the time we arrived and everyone was singing at the top of their voices worshiping God. It doesn’t take long for me to feel the overwhelming sense of God’s presence at the whole church, and it grew stronger and stronger and it was so strong that I simply just couldn’t stop throwing myself into His presence. Everyone was singing with eyes closed, in awe. My spirit was lifted up as worship continued and the lyrics of the songs became so real to me and I could feel my spirit was on fire, a great sense of hunger and desire for Him. It is really hard to use any words to describe being in God’s presence, but once you have felt it you would understand what I mean by it – satisfaction to your soul.

Without doubt this is the reason why this prayer and worship session is called Hungry – hunger for God’s presence. I believe this is what we are called to do as Christians, worship God and hunger for Him. As Church we not just hunger for His presence whenever we worship Him, we hunger to see Him changing people’s heart and lives, we hunger to see His glory being shone, we hunger to see Him doing great things in our cities. Near the end of the Hungry Charlie invited us to come forward to have a 20 seconds prayer to lift up our burdens to God, I went forward and prayed that God will set our heart on fire for Him and the people we love and care for. Fire that not just consumes but also transforms, being the light which shone His glory. This reminds me the chorus of one of the Tim Hughes song:

Consuming fire fan into flame

A passion for Your name

Spirit of God fall in this place

Lord, have Your way

Lord, have Your way with us

06.11.2012

Oxford

Stand!

In the Men’s Breakfast we are going through a series of Sitting, Walking & Standing and this time it’s about Standing. I always thought stand means standing firm as it is written in Ephesians 6 concerning The Armor of God:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. … Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth…

Ephesians 6:10-11, 13-14

Paul uses “stand” 4 times in this passage to show the importance of standing. And there are tonnes of examples in the Bible that describe what standing firm means, like in the book of Daniel etc. Interesting enough the first thing that the guy who did the sharing said was stand by, or stand with, somebody. The sharing reminded me an experience I had with Jeremy in our final year at university.

I remember it was February time, we happened to study the same module that term which was a bit weird considering we were doing different course and we were in different year group (he was in his 3^rd while I was in my 4^th year). But apart from those two hours of lecture per week, we hardly see each other. I wasn’t involved in International Ministry as much as I used to be, only Globe I was still serving, while it was the only event that Jeremy decided to stop going. I stopped going to CU for a bit because of some reasons, and we both went to different churches! We used to see each other at least 3 times a week for International stuff but at that moment it seems we were just on different planets! One day after lecture we had a brief chat and decided we had to meet up for some man chat on Saturday as it was the only time we were both free.

We met up at a local pub, had some steak for dinner, with a pint of beer in our hands (standard!) and we chatted! I couldn’t stop telling him how frustrated I was with my dissertation. My dissertation topic was about computer programming for robots. In my opinion, it was boring! I had to spend hours and hours to understand what the monkey it was all about, and couldn’t understand it. Once I started to understand the theory and wanted to do some practical bits – writing programs, it didn’t work! I mean what robots and computers do are to do exactly what you tell them to do, and it wasn’t the case! I was stuck in one part of the program, which was the most important part of all, for 6 weeks, after spending at least 30 hours on it! I wasn’t particularly happy with my supervisor at the point because I didn’t think he was helping me, and there were a lot of stuff happening too at the same time. Anyways you can imagine what it was like for me to be able to express all my feelings over the table. I was so thankful that Jeremy just sat there listening to all that, and that was exactly what I needed – just listen. I actually felt a lot better after lavishing all out even though the problems were still there!

After I calmed myself down a bit, I started to ask Jeremy how he was doing. From that point onwards the table completely changed. Being the listener and responder before, Jeremy became the one who lavished everything out, and I became the listener instead. It was very interesting that we both struggled with something, but different area of our lives; and because of these differences we had, we actually could encourage each other and pray together for His comfort even though we were broken inside somehow. I didn’t realise this until I walked home by myself that night, that we could actually stand by someone knowing that we are broken and in need at the same time. We are interdependent of each other!

There is a wonderful picture in the early church in Acts 4 that at one point there was no needy person in church.

There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.

Acts 4:34-35

This is the picture that we normally have: wealthy people sold everything they had and gave them to the poor. I believe it is the correct description why there was no needy person among them. However I also believe there is something deeper than that. The picture we have above describes some givers and some receivers, the rich and the poor, by wealth. However I believe everyone is both giver and receiver, like me and Jeremy’s experience. Church shouldn’t just encourage the rich to give more, but also encourage the poor that there is someone in them can be offered too, not materialist stuff but characters and experiences. God made every single person special in His own unique way, and there is always something we can learn from one another even though none of us is perfect (not even close!) because we all are made in the image of God; and since we are made in God’s image it also means we inherit His character and even we are sinful from the core of our hearts, we are the reflection of His own character. We are dependent of God and interdependent to one another, and only this idea is understood, the Church will never be the Bride that fully reflects her beauty.


P.S. miss you bro!

26.10.2012
Oxford

Snapshots at Christ Church

Christ Church College on a Sunny Saturday Afternoon

Sun Shining Through the Garden Gate of Christ Church

Snapshot of a Beautiful White Dog