Remembering to Live By Faith...

Many of you will know that it has not been an easy time recently for my family. Sadly, things have only got worse over the past couple of weeks. Please be praying for me and my family, that we would be trusting in God and knowing that he has everything in his hands.

Despite these challenges, life and work continues here in Slovenia. The next big event for us is our summer camp in July. A few of us were able to go and visit the new site last week. This is a picture of the lake next to the centre we will be staying in (the water stays at a constant 8° so I'm not sure there will be much swimming!). I was so encouraged by this visit, and I'm so thankful to God that he answered our prayers to find a new suitable location. The staff were so friendly and welcoming and I have every confidence that it will be a great place for us.

The theme of the camp this year is "By Faith", looking at Hebrews 11 and how people through history have trusted God and how he has been faithful to them. If you know anything about this chapter, you'll remember that it mentions heros of the faith like Abraham, Moses, David, Daniel and many others. This week as part of my preparation I was listening to a talk by Rico Tice about the end of the chapter, the part that many people forget about because the list of people has ended. Through the chapter the author of Hebrews has shown how God miraculously saved and led people but Rico pointed out (quoting from J.I Packer), that if we stop reading at the end of verse 35, then our theology is hopelessly skewed. Verse 36 talks about others who faced hardships, who suffered, who were tortured and who died because of their faith. We often want to place ourselves in that great list of people, but often, we find ourselves included in with the "others". This might sound really depressing, but actually this was of great comfort to me this week. Life is not perfect, we all go through hard times, but this does not mean that we give up hope or faith. It doesn't mean that God has lost control, it just means that we need to keep turning to him. We need to keep living by faith and running the race that God has set before us, because we have a great hope and future waiting for us.

Some of our friends and family may reach it before us, but in the meantime, I will continue to look to God, to trust him despite the hardships, because I know that he has it all under control.

Refreshment in Serbia...

On Wednesday I travelled for about 6 hours to Serbia for a gathering of gospel workers from across the whole region. I've never been to Serbia before so it's been quite interesting seeing the differences with Slovenia. There are still signs of the war around, for example this communication tower is next to the hotel we're in. It was bombed by NATO in 1999 and it's estimated that 50 missiles hit it!

What's amazing to me is that this gathering is made up of people from Slovenia, Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia (plus a few from Northern Ireland and other countries). Not so long ago these people were on opposite sides of the war but they have been brought together by the gospel of Christ and the desire to make his name known in this part of the world. The world may try to divide us but the gospel unites us. 

It's been fascinating to me how much Serbian I'm able to understand. Yesterday I even found myself interpreting for a lady speaking Serbian in a small group conversation! It's been a good time of building relationships and hearing how God is working in many different contexts. 

Tomorrow I will be travelling back to Slovenia, another 6 hour journey plus a couple of border controls. Please pray for safe travels for us all. The next few weeks will be quite busy as I start to focus on preparing for our youth camp in the summer. Please be praying that God would be at work and would be giving me the words to say as I prepare talks and Bible studies.