Although this evening we went to a youth service, which had over 3000 young people there and immediately the Holy Spirit began to work on my heart and my character. I know this is something we will see in the UK soon, but we are going to have to pay the price in order to bring it. We are pioneers! Those that do what others around us are not currently doing. We move out in front and lead the way for others to follow. Bogota has given us a great example to follow and I am excited to see what God has in store for tomorrow.

I’ll try keep you posted, please feel free to get in touch!

Much love

Ryan

Now imagine that the Father couldn’t get to the child, who is obviously in pain and crying out for help. He wants to help his child; of course He does, it is the paternal instinct. But there is a wall in the way, and not a physical wall which can be knocked down. This is an intentional wall of emotion and ignorance; the child may not even be aware of their Father reaching out in vain to hold, to comfort them. God is this Father. All He wants us to do is to let Him hold us, to let Him wipe away our tears and tell us that everything is going to be alright. A Father’s heart breaks as he watches his other children tear out the heart of his youngest; trample it into pieces. He wants to hold the accused too, the ones who nobody would ever believe were the ones to fall down first, the ones to push others down, and wipe the tears of anger from their eyes.

Psalm 91:4
“He will cover you with his feathers and under his wings you can hide,
His truth will be your shield and protection.
You will not fear any danger by night or an arrow during the day”

God is waiting with his arms open wide, hoping that one day his beloved children will sense his presence, turn and reach towards Him in return.. His heart breaks when he sees a little child chained down, their ankles and wrists bruised and sore from the shackles.

Will you allow your Daddy to pick you up, turn you upside down and tickle you? To kiss your bruises and sores better, to turn your tears of despair into tears of laughter? To hold you close is all He has ever wanted since he created you; to hold you close and tell you He loves you, and to hear you say it back. I promise you this; He will hold you so tightly when you run to Him; he will dress you in grace, in love, in security. He will sweep you off your feet and gaze into your eyes, where he sees your soul in all its beauty. Your soul, your spirit; they are so precious to your Daddy; they are his perfect creation. Your love is incredible to Him, just as His is to us.

Song of Songs 2:10
“My beloved spoke and said to me:
‘Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come with me’.

Alex R x

The same can be applied to God and experiencing him. Many people think that experiencing God, or whatever they think God is, means sitting silently in a room and praying. Or whispering in front of an altar. Or taking a vow of silence for a year to better understand the value of the whisper. But God wants us to turn the volume up. He wants us to dance and shout and laugh, and tell the world about the joy He brings. And faith in him can do this; break the shell of silence which surrounds so much of us because we have been told that ‘expressing ourselves’ is bad, and ‘fitting in with society’ is good. But there are flames burning within each and every one of our hearts; which is filled with so much goodness and light that it has to be shouted out. We must dance in the flames without the fear of being burned.

For example, you know when you’re sat in a room and you want to say something, but you’re scared that everyone will think you’re strange, stupid, and weird? This is the silence fuelled by fear, but there is no fear in love. God longs to hear you speak, He loves everything you say. Just hearing your voice is incomparable beauty to Him. So forget what is holding you back, break the silence. Shout and dance and laugh with the beauty that is God’s love, join the generation who are free of silence, free of judgement, because we need not be silent again.

‘Praise the Lord! …
Praise him with trumpet blasts;
Praise him with harps and lyres
Praise him with tambourines and dancing
Praise him with stringed instruments and flutes
Praise him with loud cymbals; praise him with crashing cymbals
Let everything that breathes praise the Lord!’ – Psalm 150

Alex R x

If you put a lid on top of a volcano (a lava resistant very strong fire-proof lid!) to try and prevent it from erupting, it would not prevent damage. Initially it seems like the safest thing to do to protect others from being hurt, but the volcano would probably explode from all the pressure and just cause an even bigger disruption and mess than what it had to do. As humans, we were born into sin & unknowingly, unintentionally consume sin and when digested, it makes our stomachs churn in a nasty way. When you eat bad food, your body wants to dispose of it to prevent you from becoming ill, so you throw it up. The enemy tries to steal this logic way of thinking so that the sin may dwell and grow inside of us for as long as possible. This is not God’s desire for us. Often it’s hard to recognise sin, as it isn’t labelled up like an out-of-date sticker on a packet of food. Nor does it grow furry with white spots or turn green (though if it wasn’t an abstract concept, it would probably be the ugliest mouldiest blob of mould like, ever!) Nevertheless, the mouldy enemy presents it to us as an appealing in-date temptation. We need to ask the Holy Spirit what it is causing the tummy ache before the enemy’s poison feasts on everything healthy within.

You can’t make a lid to stop the lava from coming out – it would still manage to melt through and leak out – escaping into the open, into the sight of others. When food doesn’t visually look like it’s gone off, we think it’ll be alright to eat. Our eyes aren’t always a reliable source, but God is – put your trust in him. Lava is hot, it burns and the human body is not capable of keeping it stored inside. God knows everything we’ve done and are going to do, we can’t hide from him. Instead we should confess and repent the sins we’ve done against him, let it break our hearts, and give the Prince the broken pieces. It is only Jesus who owns the pritt stick strong enough to hold our heart together in one piece! No sin could ever make us unworthy of God’s unfailing love and forgiveness.

God is saying…

“Do not be afraid; you will not be put to shame. Do not fear disgrace you will not be humiliated. You will forget the shame of your youth…” ~ Isaiah 54

The fear of punishment, the fear of your consequences, the fear of your trial, the fear of what you deserve, all conclude as a lie. Fear is no compatible in LOVE. If God can forget the shame of our youth, so can we. In Jesus our sins are deleted! (Hallelujah!)

“I will remember their sins no more” – Hebrews 8:12

We are product of our past but we don’t have to be prisoners of it.

Just when hope had almost slipped through my fingers, a fire ignited in me that encouraged me to firmly take hold, to open up my heart and transparently confess my wrong doings – to others, myself, and most importantly; to God. It’s like you can be sat in a car with your foot down on the accelerator – ready to go, full of petrol. However, if you haven’t turned the key, you won’t move anywhere, as the turning of the key is the starting of the ignition point – just as the confessing is the starting point that will drive you into forgiveness. He wants for us to confess these things not so He can punish us, but so we can receive our portion of forgiveness. Once my key had been turned, the knots I’d been hiding were pulled out from my mouth, I became embraced and wrapped in God’s warm mighty wings of love, every weight lifted from my shoulders, I felt like a new born pure baby in Daddy’s arms, protected and safe, nobody could force feed the knots back down into my heart. My slate which once reeled off the endless list of my sins was wiped clean, free from all dirt, smudges and blemishes. I was detoxed, clean and washed white as snow. I had been cleansed by the blood of Jesus.

Forgiveness is just one of the many beautiful, healing, restoring ingredients of Jesus’ blood. Few medicines taste nice, but Jesus’ is the sweetest! He has already given us a repeat prescription of forgiveness for free on the cross & so it’s our responsibility to be the pharmacist; we have to hand out the doses of forgiveness – whether it’s for ourselves, for others, or even if you need to forgive God. We don’t have to carry the weight of who we’ve been because we are forgiven!! We’re a treasure in the arms of Christ – know who you are – you are forgiven.

x Sarah C  x

Why are we so scared to tell the world you saved us? You were scared when you gave everything for me, for us, but you did it anyway. You put your fear aside, trampled it underfoot so we could have this choice to choose you but instead so many of us are seized by fear.

But being fearless is not the absence of fear; it is about being terrified yet taking that leap of faith anyway. We must stand at the edge of the rough and worn rock of fear, push our feet against it, push away and leap for the sky, which is not sky at all but an endless blanket of security you weaved for us which embraces us and catches our fall. Jesus, we will not fall if we leap and fall into you. You take the pain for us; you catch us until all the breath falls out of you, but you take the hurt and the sudden weight. You are the one who will not let us down, the one who will forever be waiting with open arms when we decide to fall, to land with you.

Isaiah 41:10
10 So do not fear, for I am with you;
do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you;
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Alex R

Life is amazing.

Life was created for us to enjoy and enjoy it we must … have you noticed that the word ‘joy’ is in ‘enjoy’? In order to enjoy life you need a consistency of joy. God is joyful. God is good. God is love. Love needs to be shared because there is too much for just one person; love needs to flow and surround and cradle those in need, because its quantity is unlimited.

Everyone is beautiful, the world is beautiful and life is beautiful. I am in love with love and love loves me back. Spread the joy, spread the goodness that God has given. I was made to love the world and everything in it, and so were you.

Song of Soloman 8:6
‘Love is as strong as death; jelousy is as strong as the grave
Love bursts into flames and burns like a hot fire
Even water cannot put out the flame of love’

God’s love does not need us to be rich with materialistic, meaningless things. We could lay poor, beaten and naked on the floor and his love would come to us as a golden beacon of sun. It creeps towards us like sunlight, encompasses us and consumes us until we are clothed in love, swamped in love, we are drowning in love. But in drowning we are alive, more alive than we have ever been. Without the love holding our bodies up we would sink.

The love, the water is enriched with what we need to live and it knows how to keep us whole and alive. Pure love is without fear, which means you don’t have to be worried about the little things anymore; love and faith mean you can go dance in a storm in your best dress, fearless…

God’s love is like the blood in our veins; without it we are empty and our hearts have nothing flowing in and out, we would be empty shells, which could be broken with one small touch.

Alex R x

At 10, you want to go on all the same rides as our older brothers, not until your older and taller.

At 18, you can drive, but when we come to hire a van, not until your 21 and are more responsible.

At 25, you want to get that management position, not until you have more experience.

At 30, you want to run for parliament, not until your more mature.

There will always be people around to say, ‘your too young’, ‘you can do it when your older, taller, more responsible, more experienced, more mature….’

but there is something you can do, regardless how old your are.  - You can change the world!

Jeremiah 1 v 4-10

The word of the LORD came to me, saying,
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

“Alas, Sovereign LORD,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am too young.”

But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the LORD.

Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.”

You might not feel like you have much to offer the world, but what we have to offer is not ourselves as an individual, but us with God. We can transform the lives of those we come into contact with, we impart the kingdom of God into our schools, collages, universities or workplaces. We can see a transformation that comes from the inside out.

Don’t be afraid of what you might encounter or what might happen, because the good that will come will always far out way the difficulties.

Nothing is impossible, dream big and live it!!

We seem to have gone through a lull of communication on the website over the extremely busy last 4 months, however, we are now full steam a head and will look to keep everyone as informed as possible with what’s going on.

Looking ahead, we have our Encounter weekend coming up on the last weekend in February and I know this will be amazing. We have personally been on and lead several in the past and every time God really does encounter everyone who comes with their hearts open. This is the first time that some people will be leading sessions and I know it will be a refreshing experience for everyone who comes.

If you are thinking about whether to attend or not, I want to encourage you to just go for it! The only thing you have to lose is a bit of your time, yet you have absolutely everything to gain. It really doesn’t matter about where you think your at either! We have pre-encounter teachings every Friday in the New Horizons offices in Morley, however in the past we have had people come on the encounter after hearing about it the previous day. There will be people who have known God all their lives and there will be people who are not completely sure they believe in Him and everything he represents. Yet they are all willing to have a step of faith and come along.

Then on the Sunday, we have taken over the usual New Horizons Service at Morley Town Hall and it will be given over to Freedom Generation!

We will be leading the Worship, Dance, Painting and I will be speaking – hopefully if i can get a bit more time behind a computer we can have some different video clips too. It will be great morning and a great time to either come along and meet us for the first time or bring along someone who hasn’t been before.

There will still be a group of us meeting every Friday evening in Morley and if you are interested in coming along or want to know more about what goes on then get in touch.

To try sum up some final remarks, I really believe this is a time of making your mark on eternity. What we decide to do over the next few weeks, months and years will not only shape our lives, but the world around us. Take hold of your life by the horns and make something of it, don’t allow it to start passing you by without playing your part to shape nations.

Speak to you soon

Ryan

Rachel and her mum took the kids swimming last Sunday and they had a nice time but the kids were a bit of a hand full. Elijah was crying most of the time and Naomi kept getting out to try have a run around the side of the pool – much to the despair of her mum, might I add!

All in all, I think it was a battle won in the journey of feeling comfortable around water and learning to swim (well that’s was Rachel’s declaration over the event).

Today though, Daddy was there. Rachel took Naomi in first and I followed with Elijah. Immediately on seeing the pool, Elijah starts to scream! ‘Great! What a start!’ I thought to myself and then immediately reassured him that daddy was here and he didn’t need to worry. Got him in the surprisingly warm water and he was all of a sudden quite happy. Naomi got straight back out of the pool and poised herself to make a run for it, but when she realised we were all in the water having a good time, she came straight back in with armbands flapping.

We tried swimming around a little, and by swimming I mean a cross between doggy paddle and a desperate cry for help, then made it to the other side of the pool where some little kids we jumping in. Being the dad, my response was ‘come on Naomi, are you going to jump in too!’. To put into context, Naomi still cries every time we wash her hair cause she hates the water in her face. Although, this time she seems quite happy to start off by sitting on the side and drop in. She was having so much fun I got her to stand up and said ‘Jump In Naomi!’. At this she was a little less comfortable and stood sheepishly staring at me. “you can do it, come on, it’s fun, daddy’s got you”…… and she jumped in! She didn’t take too well to her head going under the water at first, but Rach and I were cheering, giving her a cuddle, saying well done and she began to laugh “Again, Again!!”.

This whole trip for me was summed up in those few words ‘daddy’s got you’.

From the moment we started in the pool, my children were different. Now I know some swimming coaches out there will want to say that it is natural progression for a child to go back and then be comfortable in the water, and yes, I would agree with that. But today had nothing to do with Naomi’s confidence with water, it was to do with her confidence with me.

Father’s are the only people that can truly impart identity into a person. I believe this comes from the very father heart of God as our creator and the one who forms us in our mother’s wombs. Rachel is currently pregnant with our third child, so I now all about the work that goes on within the mother to form the child. But as soon as that baby is born, the words that with have the greatest impact on their life will be their father’s.

The only words I ever hope to be greater then mine in our children are those of God. He is the one who seeks out the fatherless to pour out his love and mercy. He is the one who gives life, identity and meaning to us all.

When we have our identity, it is then we decide not ‘If i should jump’ but ‘when and where shall I jump’. Life is one amazing adventure laid out before us, with the greatest limits being those we place on ourselves. God gave us a life so that we can jump into it and experience every good thing he has created. Wherever you want to go, whatever your dream is, whatever your heart yearns for, when we do it with God – ‘daddy’s got you’.

He is there to be with you every step of the way, doesn’t mean nothing bad will ever happen to us, but it does mean that nothing will every overcome us!

Live Your Life With Purpose!!

God has made you ‘for such a time as this’. Don’t sit down and watch it pass you by but grab life by the horns and go for the ride of your life.

You can transform your family, your school, your university, your workplace, your country, the world. Make a start now because it’s not long until you reach the rest of eternity.