I had a good few meetings in London today.

The youth co-ordinating group of CTE met which is, I think, the only forum that brings all Christian youth organisations together from England, Scotland and Wales. It’s great to be a part of this and share what we are doing and hear what others are doing.

Grabbing a coffee with Dave Wiles from FYT afterwards and then catching up with Lorne from Church Resources of YFC was also a great time.

Today I saw God in the ordinary everyday conversations of people I met with. It’s easy in this calling/ministry/vocation to become task orientated and compartmentalise activities into worship, or work or some other sub-section. I’ve always struggled with that. It’s easy to forget that God is part of all my life and activities – but if you remember to look and be aware, God is pretty obvious! God is in the ordinary, and that is incredibly exciting because a God that is present in the ordinary is good news because that sort of God can be found by all.

As an aside, but linked, my annual appraisal will happen soon. The YFC form always has a question that I struggle with: ‘how is your spiritual life?’ I struggle with this every time I am asked as I can’t extract my ‘spiritual life’ from the rest of my life – my life’s aim is to have a life of worship which means that all I do, whether that’s fill in a tax form, meet friend for coffee, have a business meeting I come to see as being part of my worship to God. I think this is what the first few verses of Romans 12 is all about.

The Message:

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life-your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life-and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you