Thursday, January 8, 2004

Random Dan C Lucking Trivia, 8-1-2003
Today was great. Fantastic even. And quite Random at times.

I've probably spent the least time in my room (and hence on the net) than any other day (in Sheffield) in the last month or so.

Food time was getting to the point where it was a case of I'd come out for food, then disappear vack into my room. Sometimes tried to make conversation, but it normally only entailed a few sentences each way before I was off again into my room.

Today, for a start we had TT for the second time this term- and it was great. The teaching part would probably have meant more to me if I wasn't so damn tired. Still, praise God for Nick, who woke me up this morning despite not having to. Otherwise I would have walked into TT late and felt an idiot.

The "engage" part was great. I prayed for Chris and.. stuff I said made sense, and was insightful. It was kind of exactly what he needed to hear.

That's easily my most prominent gifting of the holy spirit. The ability to say things which, to me mean barely a thing, but to the person I'm talking to, it can leave them in a profound kind of shock.

However, there are times when I try too hard. I try to hear something, rather than let it come, and end up coming out with rubbish on successive occasions, leaving me frustrated.

I can personally think of one person- who probably reads this- whom I try far too hard to "say the right things" for. It just doesn't work like that for me. And I'm sorry for subjecting you to that rubbish- not that everything I said to you was rubbish- but a lot of it was just me trying to help for some.. bizarre reason, as though I wasn't really fulfilling myself unless I did so.

Anyway. I'm over the whole trying too hard thing. I just hope I didn't do too much harm.

And when Chris prayed for me (before I did for him), he gave a few scripture passages which were immensely helpful.

Which, to a random person, probably doesn't seem a lot different from what I did- but it kind of was.

Chris used Scriptures he was familiar with in order to encourage me. Because he was familiar with the passages- something I find myself becoming less at the moment.

I, however, didn't so much give him words of knowledge, saying "I think this is what God is saying"- I just prayed stuff. And as I prayed, I felt nudged to a slightly different angle. The same subject, but given a slightly different insight- which Chris hadn't necessarily thought of.

Bah. This isn't going to make sense unless I say what I was actually praying for..

OK...

Chris, like most people, has issues of one sort or another which, on their own, lead him to be condemning towards himself. So I prayed about that first of all.

At one point I asked God to give Chris a realisation of who he is in him- that Chris is loved by God. Despite the issues he has. And believe me, that very fact knocks a huge hole in the way a lot of people percieve God. Chris struggles with his sexuality. Yes, he's gay. And God loves him. How do I know that? Well, I know it because the Holy Spirit was clearly impacting him during that time of prayer. That wouldn't happen if God didn't love him. If you strongly disbelieve the concept of God, I suggest you just ignore the reference to the holy spirit there. If it's just a subjective thing and God isn't real then God still can't hate Chris because he's not there. So either way Chris isn't on bad terms with the big guy.

Anyway. After that, Chris said "I think I have issues with pride as well". And I ended up praying "Lord, I pray that you may bring Chris to a place of security in you- I pray that he would be secure in you, so that he wouldn't need to find security in Pride, but that he wouldn't doubt himself enough to need it" Or something like that. That was the general point. Either way, I was still praying for the same thing- just throwing a new insight on it. And to be honest, it's the sort of thing I've never even thought of before. It just kind of entered my head and left my mouth. After I said that, Chris was pretty much down on the floor. For a time I was thinking "Ay up... what was that all about...?" Those words meant very little to me, but it was what Chris needed to hear.

I don't think I talk about my huddle enough on here. Let's go through some of the guys in there.

First off, we have me. I came to Christianity through a short time as a thief, basically.

Then we have Toby. Our leader. He used to be in a band- one which was starting to go quite far, and getting into all kinds of dodgy stuff. Then there was all the dodgy stuff he got up to outside the band. And now he's a huddle leader at TT, and even a cluster leader at church.

Next, Ronan. He's been up to a fair bit too in the past, but now he's probably the most enthusiastic one of the lot of us.

Then we have Chris. As I said up there, he struggles with his sexuality. "Struggles" because the majority of the Christian community in most places has a view that "homosexuals are just plain bad". Or "homosexuality is just plain wrong". Which may be true, but we're living in grace now. Believe me, you can quite happily be a homosexual and a Christian. The reason you may struggle is that people will say stuff like "to be a real Christian, you really need to get rid of that". Rubbish. If God wants to get rid of it, he will. Over time. You need not condemn yourself over something that is a part of you. Sin is a part of me. I am a sinner. Do I condemn myself? Actually, yes, quite a lot. But I shouldn't- I needn't.

Then we have the other Chris. This guy lived quite an immoral life too, as we all did. And now he's a Christian, and he even has his times when he corrects us for stuff we really shouldn't be doing.

Finally Ben. The vicar's son. He's always been a Christian, but he has strayed into immorality on various occasions.

None of us are perfect now either. We still fall. But we all love God. None of us are the stereotypical Christians who are annoyingly "perfect in every way" or other such rubbish. We're just not. And that's OK.

I put up those descriptions to give you some idea of the broad range of types of people who actually end up believing in God. And God loves them all. And there's hope for you too.

Random Dan C Lucking Trivia, 8-1-2003

Never quite got around to this part. Ended up caught up in net-preaching or something :p.

After TT I came home and found that a parcel had arrived for me- but it'd arrived after I left for TT, so I got a note which says "we're holding the item at your local Royal Mail delivery office"

I wonder if there's a ransom...

Anyway... I'm actually quite intrigued as to what it is. I assumed until just now that it was the farscape DVD I ordered on monday (the only season 3 one I don't have)- but I just checked amazon and it's not been sent yet... so it must be a random thing from a random person (probably my Dad). Which is nice, seeing as I haven't had any unexpected mail for a while. Other than bills ^^;

So I'm picking it up from the Delivery office tomorrow. Tomorrow morning. Before work. The office opens at 6 am, and closes at noon. What kind of service is that? heh.

Chris (the ugy I prayed for) cam around for tea tonight- I cooked us a chilli- and it was easily the best I've made yet. Though the meal was somewhat disrupted (for me) when the ASDA man rang me to find out where our house was.

Asda: a large supermarket chain in the UK.

We'd ordered our shopping online to stock up on a lot of the stuff we really need but have been lacking for a long time. And the delivery man was a bit confused. See, as far as he was concerned, he was at 66, Langsett. But the thing is, Langsett road is an odd road, in that it has several names, depending on which part of the road you're on. The middle bit is Langsett Road, the bit closest to town is Infirmary Road, and the bit furthest away is Middlewood Road. It's exactly the same road- the B6079, but has a different name for each section. And, you guessed it. Each section has it's own number 66. No wonder the poor guy got confused. Though I'm surprised that this is the first time it's happened.

After he eventually ended up at the right number 66 and dropped our shopping off, I got back to my Chilli, and Nick and Jude put the stuff away.

At about that time, Pippa, Liz and Beth turned up, as we'd invited them around for the evening. Chris (the other Chris, and one of our neighbours) turned up soon later, just as we started playing a game. Essentially it was similar to charades, except you get given something to act out.

.....

....I got.. "Uranus".. ^^ heh

It was a great time, there were lots of laughs. I'm not very good at remembering specifics all the time though. I just feel a bit of a buzz thinking back to it.

We watched Peter Kay (a Yorkshire stand up comedian) on DVD for a bit, and that was pretty funny. Mostly because so much of it was true. I recommend this DVD to anyone who isn't british. You'll learn a hell of a lot about how we brits work just by watching that thing :p.

Although.. er..

on second thought, our region 2, PAL DVDs won't play on your NTSC players, so that's that idea screwed ^^.

Still, here's what you could have watched: CLICK HERE

Then, after everyone left Nick, Jude, me and Joe, just ended up chatting for a bit. Which rounded the day off quite well.

That's about it. There's probably a lot of random stuff I've forgotten, but hey. I'm tired. And off to bed.

'Night.

Oh wait.

*points to post from yesterday*

..that's exactly what I'm on about. Being online for too long just ends up making me post something like that. I mean, look at it. It's pathetic- the sheer helplessness of it, as opposed to the life in this post here.

I'm still thinking about this one. Maybe I don't need to leave OB and myotaku altogether. But my life would be a whole lot better if every day was more like today- if those minor parts of life were in their minor place.

If I ever regress to that, I'm going ahead with it. But if I can maintain this kind of thing.. I'm thinking about it. That's all I can say, because I don't know a lot more myself.

'Night.
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