Moving to Kingston – Part 2

The Multicoloured Pen
This brings me back to my earlier reference to the multicoloured pen. While staying in Steve Brading’s home I greatly enjoyed hours of prayer with Steve. One day he asked if I was familiar with such pens. I was. In fact I am very familiar with them, since I use one all the time and always underline my sermon notes in red and green, a fact that Steve did not know.

His question awoke my interest. It was almost like entering my ‘passcode’. He had my full attention. He said, “I’ve just seen a vision of such a pen and its colour has just changed from red to green. I believe God is giving you the green light!”

So simple, yet so powerful! I had God’s word. “Go.”

The next day I was following my Robert Murray McCheyne Bible reading plan and the verse I was lead to was 2 Chronicles 5:1, which said, “Thus all the work that Solomon performed for the house of the Lord was finished.” Again this passage resonated with me because God first spoke to me decades ago about building a house for God from the passage in 1 Chronicles 29 where Solomon was originally called to build and I had associated this not only with Newfrontiers, but also with Church of Christ the King.

Now it seemed that God was saying to me that my part in the house was completed.

I then turned to the next part of my McCheyne Bible reading in the New Testament, which was from Luke 19 where the disciples were sent by Jesus to fetch a donkey for His use. If anybody questioned them, their reply was to be that they were untying it because the Lord needed it. As I read these words I felt extraordinarily ‘untied’, released, needed and freshly commissioned!

On the day that I was to share this news with the Church of Christ the King elders and staff (a day of some emotion, I confess,) my morning readings took me from Genesis 12, Abraham’s call to leave his home and go to a place that God would show him; through Nehemiah 1, Nehemiah’s call to leave his location and go and rebuild the house of God; to Acts 11 where Peter explained to his fellow apostles his strange guidance to go to Cornelius’s home, followed at the end the chapter by the birth of the Antioch church where Christians who had left Jerusalem had planted what became a vibrant new apostolic base of huge significance. There are times when your Bible reading seems written especially for you!

Time for Action
As a result, having spoken to the elders and the church in Brighton, my apostolic team and the elders of the church to which I am going, Wendy and I have put our house on the market and (as I write) are looking for a new house in Kingston-Upon-Thames, South West London where there is a delightful church of about 120 adults meeting in a small school, a great group full of faith who have wonderful promises from God and which I believe God wants to make into a very significant church, located as it is in a densely populated part of London, near a university. I have growing faith that God wants it to become a great Antioch base, seeing many saved, discipled and sent to the nations, a base from which I can continue my wider ministry.

Happily the church and its elders are very positive about our coming to them and we feel very excited about the church’s future and the part we can play there.

LHR and LGW
I readily acknowledge the fact that Kingston is very close to and virtually equidistant from London Heathrow and London Gatwick, which makes it even more attractive. I anticipate that for some time I hope to continue visiting our several Newfrontiers apostolic centres around the world as well as responding to increasing invitations from other groups who are asking me to speak at their churches and conferences.

So this continues to be a time of considerable transition. I am personally filled with excitement and anticipation about our multiplied apostolic teams, the promise of exponential growth in Newfrontiers and a new adventure that takes Wendy and me into a completely new location, even into London which I never anticipated, having reckoned that I would probably finish my course in Brighton.

Loose Ends
Of course there are many loose ends and many unanswered questions, as there were when we originally joined approximately 35 people in Seaford or the group of 38 at Brighton that ultimately grew into Church of Christ the King and provided my base for work with the burgeoning Newfrontiers family. I am looking confidently to God that He will make the way clear and meet all our needs.

Life certainly isn’t boring and God keeps providing abundant grace. As Wendy and I recently travelled in the southern hemisphere we actually slept in 26 different places over three months (four of them being on overnight flights!). I wrote to Nigel, “I feel like I am seventy going on 49!” Like Caleb, I feel like going and getting that mountain! I believe I am going with promises from God. It should be exciting. Perhaps some of you should come with us and join us in the adventure.