tremors

By the time I got down to the Halls this morning there were already some people gathered there for prayer.

They hadn't exactly booked the room so I hadn't a clue they'd be there! Otherwise I might have joined them. These were some parents whose children are all at the primary school. They've been meaning to meet for long enough (I think), but had just never got it together.

Until today. It was maybe the thought that something exciting is happening along at the school which prompted them now to pray. I mean, they've been praying, I'm sure (of course they have), but now they were keen to join together to pray.

That in itself is a sign of the Spirit at work. When people come together to pray. It's always a clue, a sign, a sure and certain pointer to there being a work of God going on. Like those tiny, little tremors in advance of some big earthquake that's impending.

There's something like that going on. Lots of little 'tremors' which are harbingers of something really big. That's what it feels like these days. The sense of there being a work that God's about to do, little puffs of smoke (to change the image slightly!) suggestive of a coming, huge eruption of the lava of God's love and power.

I was later in this morning, as I say. I had to do some shopping first. Buy up the ingredients for the trifle which I'd said I'd make for a lunchtime meeting the 'Complex Team' were having here today.

We try and meet together periodically. A sort of mutual support system.

I mean, the support is always there, make no mistake: but it's good to take some time to simply 'be', when there's not the constant busy-ness of serving all the lunches and the cups of tea and coffee through the week within the 'complex' here.

A chance to pause, reflect and chat things through and pray for God's fresh working in our midst. More of the little 'tremors' which anticipate the 'big one' yet to come.

And the trifle goes down a treat!

I was on from that to the school again, for this meeting about the start of an SU group. Chris is very much the driver of this thing: he's the teacher at the school, and it's great that it comes from him.

So we were meeting in his room, after the children had gone. Hazel was there as well - she's been with SU now here in Edinburgh for a good many months: and .., well, she's just a great enthusiast. Great to have involved. And always so eager to help.

It's like the bits of a massive jigsaw all beginning to come together. Like the way folk often work at a jigsaw. Taking time to get all the bits laid out on the table. Then finding the corners, slotting them into place: and after that the edges, so that slowly a frame's built up.

It's rather like that. The frame's been put in place and the bits of the jigsaw are all ready, it seems, now to be fitted together.

That meeting of those parents here this morning was significant. A sign indeed. Another little tremor! Something big is just about to happen here!

At night I was out in the home of a couple who've been with us here for a while now, talking through the baptism of their second child which is happening soon (the baptism, I mean, not the second child!).

It was great to be able to talk for a while. Most of the time it's only fairly fleeting bursts of chat I get with them. On a Sunday, over coffee. That sort of thing. So it was great to have time in their home and to be able to talk at some length.

I suppose what struck me most in speaking with them both was the massive opportunity we have to raise up all these growing generations of our children in a way that sees them knowing Christ themselves.

There was a moment today which captured, I thought, the essence of it all.

It was as I was leaving Chris' room along at the primary school. The school was all done for the day, of course: the children all gone away. And just as I stepped out the door, one of the girls from P5 came rushing by on her scooter. I called out a 'Hi!' (using her name) as she flew along the path: and she turned and responded with a smile and a wave.

She's a lively girl, bright in every way: and she's been along to the services here before.

But life is lived at pace these days. And all we get with so many of these children here (eager and open and bright as they are) - all we get is a brief and fleeting moment in their lives to bring them Jesus Christ.

He who hesitates is lost!