Zimbabwe holocaust

For those of you who've been stirred by the film 'Mugabe & the white African' here's an article written by Ben Freeth posted on November 17th, an edited version of which appeared in The Spectator.

'Whenever I look at the charred ruin of what a few weeks ago was our home, and see on my bed when I close my eyes the flames that engulfed everything we owned, I can not help thinking of the flames that, to the nationalists of Germany, were the final solution to the Jewish question sixty years ago.

My wife’s grandfather, Landale Train, used to tell us of when, as a South African prisoner of war next to Dachau concentration camp, he used to smell the sweet sickly smoke of the burning Jews from the crematorium incinerators. The very word, “holocaust,” comes, I understand, from the Hebrew word “olah” which when translated to the Greek is holokausten. It means “a burnt offering to the Lord.” ...'

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reeling the fish in

A few days ago someone was speaking to me about fishing.

I can't for the life of me think just who it was, or even what the context was. I think it was maybe in the course of visiting folk in connection with a funeral.

Everything about it's a blur (I have little interest in fishing). Except I remember distinctly (and it stuck in my mind) the person explaining how he (or probably she) had been told that when, once you've thrown out your line, you feel the fish start to 'nibble', then you should pull on it hard and reel the fish in.

That's all I remember about that part of the conversation. As I say, fishing's not my forte. But that bit stuck in my mind for some reason.

Stick with me and you'll see why I'm telling you this!

Today I was out for lunch with some of the local leaders of different churches. Once most of them had gone, I ended up having a time of prayer with Douglas, who was hosting the thing, and with Clive - who'd come along at the end, specifically for a time of prayer.

Clive used to work here, a good while back, and presently works for UCCF in Edinburgh. He often pops in and uses one of the rooms in our halls as a quiet place to work. I've a lot of time for the guy. He and Douglas and I have really benefited much from time in prayer together before.

We were praying for a while. And as we prayed, Clive comes out with this -

He's been given a 'picture' as he prays, and he's recognising before the Lord what the picture is: it's the picture of a fisherman, who's feeling a nibble at the end of his line, and while I'm still getting over my total surprise, Clive's praying for me.

He knows that the picture's been given for me and he's praying the Lord would enable me now to be seeing there are all these 'nibbles' (interest on the part of different folk, folk just taking a taste, as it were), and to be able boldly to pull on the line and reel them in.

That's twice in a matter of days. The same picture. The same lesson. And spelled out quite plainly by Clive, who knew nothing at all of what had gone on before.

My instinct has always, I think, been to go very 'softly, softly' with those who are showing some interest in the gospel. To give the fish some slack, as it were, in terms of the fishing analogy.

And here, it seemed, was the Lord saying very clearly that that's not how it works. And not how he means me to be.

It was like he was urging me to be a good deal bolder, firmer, more direct, in summoning folk to Christ. To 'reel' folk in.

These are days of some urgency. That's for sure.

And these times of prayer that we share are times when the Lord draws near in a powerful, personal way.

Scary in a way. But altogether thrilling, too.

Mugabe and the braveheart Scots

The film. "Mugabe and the white African." It continues to be on my mind. A lot.

Remember I wrote that - " although they live those thousands of miles away, I don't want to let them down. I want to live here as they are living there. I'm involved in the same basic conflict."?

Well, maybe you don't remember! But it's there in my previous post.

'I'm involved in the same basic conflict.' I've been pondering that quite a bit. And am more persuaded of the truth of that than ever. There are some striking parallels between what's going on in Zimbabwe, and the conflict that we are involved in here in Scotland.

Zimbabwe, until quite recently, was known as the so-called 'bread-basket' of Africa. A country fertile and rich and producing the food which fed any number of peoples.

Isn't that, in a slightly different sense, what Scotland used to be? The 'bread-basket' of the world. The 'land of the book', feeding the world with the bread of life?

And isn't what's happened across the years in Scotland, pretty much what's been going on in the land of Zimbabwe? Hasn't our nation been hugely impoverished by the blind and greedy dictator which our godless and secular culture has grown to become?

And are not we, who love the Lord, and cherish the Scriptures as the very Word of God - are not we the 'farmers' who must likewise stand our ground and plead the cause of righteousness and truth?

Don't our children and grandchildren depend on us for this? Aren't there teeming multitudes today, now starved of God's Word, who know, deep down, that something's wrong, that this is not the way it's meant to be, but don't know what to do?

Aren't there countless thousands through our land who sense with some discomfort that there's something deeply troubling in the soft, permissive, 'so-correct' society in which they live?

But the thing is so pervasive and the pressures so insistent that they don't know what to do or where to start or how to change the course of things at all.

Aren't there countless multitudes who long that there'd be someone who would stand against this tyranny, the 'Mugabe of the mindset' which has foisted all its evil on our land?

And isn't that what just exactly we're called to be and to do in these days?

Isn't the conflict essentially the same? It simply takes a different form.

In Zimbabwe the dictator's a man. Here in our nation the thing which does the dictating is more of a mindset than anything else: a monster of the mind, a secular and self-affirming outlook or philosophy which has grown down through the years and now, it seems, entirely rules the roost.

It's the same basic conflict. The effects are in essence the same. A land and a people so hugely and sorely impoverished.

And looking for the few remaining 'farmers' to stand their ground, to stand against the currents of the present age and see our land restored to true prosperity in Christ.

This little bit from the pen of an early disciple of Jesus has impressed itself on my heart again.

"Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you.

For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him, since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have."

We're all in this together.

the white African & Mugabe

Tonight I was able to go and see the film.

'Mugabe & the white African'.

Make sure you do, too, if you get even half a chance. It's powerful, moving, stirring, disturbing. It warrants the accolades it's already been given. It should, indeed, be right up there on the short-list for Oscar Nomination.

Here, in the fairly immediate aftermath of watching the film - here, in headline form, is something of the impact that it had on me.

Pain. I'll get this over with first. I found it upsetting. I kept thinking - that's my family, those are my people.

There were tears running down my cheeks through the second half of the film. And part of the reason for that was the pain I felt for them. I know them. And I felt within my spirit the pain of the trials these folk have been through. I wept unashamedly for them.

Humility. It was humbling to see Christ in these ordinary people. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Which has everything to do with the tough business of living for Christ in the world of today.

If you've always wondered what 'the fruit of the Spirit' looks like, go see the film. You'll see it in Mike and Angela: you'll see it in Ben and Laura. It's all there. All of it.

Humbling indeed. Movingly so.

Pride. A rightful pride, I hope. Pride in the fact that here were my folk showing the way to the world.

How do you respond to dictators? How do you deal with oppression?

The western way has too often and too easily been to send in the bombs and exercise military muscle.

Too often we've thought the only alternative way is a passive submission or averting our eyes and hoping it all goes away.

Here I was watching the Jesus way. No meek lying down and letting the guy simply trample all over the land. But no angry, violent resistance either.

This is the way of the cross. Standing up for the rights of others. Standing up for the cause of truth. Standing up for justice when the rule of law has gone. Standing up for the poor and oppressed. But without any vindictiveness. Just real compassion.

And prepared to take the suffering which comes. Beatings and torture, losing all worldly goods, losing, perhaps, your own life.

The way of the cross. The way of Jesus. I was proud of these folk that they show to the world what it means that Jesus is Lord.

I was proud of my Gran who years ago on my eighteenth birthday wrote me a short, simple letter in which she quoted words of the prophet Micah.

"What does the Lord require of you but to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God."

Proud that she'd pointed me forward like that. Proud that my relatives know how to live like that.

Proud of my Lord, that he's shown us the best way to live.

Gratitude. Gratitude for Mike and Angela and the way they've lived their lives on the basis of their confidence in Christ.

Gratitude for Ben and Laura and their warm, courageous faith - ready to risk all, including their own dear children - as they seek justice for the peoples of the land.

Gratitude for my forbears and the prayers by which they perpetuated their faith in the generations of their family.

I share a great-grandfather with Angela. The Rev John G Train, a fine, godly man, who preached the good news of Jesus without fear or favour, and who left behind a legacy of vibrant faith.

And gratitude, too, for the courage of the folk who made the film, at considerable risk to themselves: and who didn't gloss over the faith of these folk at the heart of all that they did.

Inspiration. I found it hugely inspiring. These are my people, I kept thinking.

Not just family. But the people of God, the people of whom I'm a part. This is where I belong and how I mean to live.

I stand with these folk, I pray for these folk, I serve with these folk. These are my people.

And although they live those thousands of miles away, I don't want to let them down. I want to live here as they are living there. I'm involved in the same basic conflict.

Something deep in my spirit was stirred again.

I think there's a verse in the book of Daniel which puts it well. The people who know their God shall do great exploits.

If you don't know what that means, you don't know what you're missing!

And you need to watch this film!

Mugabe & the white African

If you get the chance to see this film - make sure you take it!

The film, which documents the bold struggle for justice in Zimbabwe on the part of some of my wider family, has already won a number of awards and is currently short-listed (final 15) for the Oscar Academy Award Nomination. (It's that good!).

Here's the synopsis -

Michael Campbell is one of a handful of white farmers still left in Zimbabwe since President Robert Mugabe began enforcing his controversial land seizure program, an initiative intended to reclaim white-owned land and redistribute it to poor black Zimbabweans.

Since 2000, formerly thriving farms that employed thousands, now sit derelict while poverty and hunger are rife amongst the majority of the country's citizens; but 74-year-old Mike refuses to back down.

Set against the backdrop of the tumultuous 2008 presidential election, 'Mugabe and the White African' follows Mike and son-in-law Ben Freeth's harrowing attempt to take Mugabe to an international court for racism and violation of their human rights.

It is an unprecedented case, upon which rests not only Mike and his family's future, but also the future of millions of ordinary Zimbabweans who continue to suffer at the hands of one of the world’s most infamous tyrants.

The directors of the film underline - “This is a really important film for Zimbabwe and perhaps the only insight into what is going on inside that country today.”

If you're in or around London, two cinemas there are showing the film as follows:

The Empire Leicester Square

http://www.empirecinemas.co.uk/

8th - 14th January

ICA http://www.ica.org.uk/

8th - 21st January

It's also being shown in Edinburgh at The Film House between today (8th January) and Monday (11th January). http://www.filmhousecinema.com/

They don't have a marketing budget, so publicity depends on word of mouth.

'Time Out' called it “Surely one of the best documentaries of the year.”

'Empire' magazine described it as "Compelling, nerve shattering, tremendously moving cinema.”

When it was shown at the BFI in October it received two standing ovations.

I mean, when did you last see a film where that happened?

Go on, make sure you see it!

big church

The last couple of nights I've been away. Hence the absence of any posts here.

I was away at an annual conference, attended (despite the weather) by most of the 240 folk who had registered in advance. That shows, I guess, the weight of importance attached to the time by those who made it there.

It's a full and concentrated 46 hours which we spend with one another.

5 full sessions of rich and enriching instruction (4 of them by Ted Donnelly, pictured): 2 evenings filled with the chance to catch a flavour of all that the Lord is doing up and down the land and throughout the world and then to join together in prayer and bring all these matters before the Lord: and odd little pockets of 'free time' in between. Snatches at best.

I thought I'd have had the chance to catch up on some much needed sleep. But it didn't work out like that. One of the constant benefits of these days apart is the chance to talk. And that went on, for myself, in virtually every waking moment and on both of the evenings it went on well on into the night.

It crossed my mind that this is really what big church actually is. Brothers and sisters, from all different parts of the land - and far beyond as well (there was a young Scottish woman who's now serving the Lord in Australia, for instance) - dwelling together in unity.

All sorts of different backgrounds. All sorts of different settings. All sorts of different perspectives and insights and views on things. All sorts of different denominational traits.

But a common mind. A common heart. A common purpose. A common delight in the Lord Jesus Christ. A common recourse to the Bible. A common commitment to see his kingdom come. A common resolve to be teaching his Word and expounding the truths of Scripture. A common awareness that prayer is our primary work.

Anyone who knows me at all knows that I'm earthed day by day in the life of wee church here. For good reasons. The local church is the hope of the world.

It's Bill Hybels, I think, who speaks in those terms. And he's right. I'm persuaded of that.

And as a result I've not had all that much time (in any sense) for big church. Partly because the big church dimension within the denomination is often a very real struggle.

I sit in these big church meetings (in the denominational sense), and I often think - I think I must live on a totally different planet from you guys!

And as a result there's all the more encouragement to slip back into an exclusively wee church mode. Immersing myself in the life of the local church.

But these last few days have been big church stuff. Big church as it's surely meant to be. Big church as perhaps it will be more and more in days to come.

And I know that that's important. Crucial. (In its literal sense: it's the stuff of the cross).

I've failed my brothers and sisters in days gone by my absenting myself from such times and such gatherings as these. I've repented of that. Confessed that sin. And taken steps to remedy it as well.

I believe that this is where the big church future lies, and what, in days to come, big church will be like.

I believe there needs to be a thorough re-configuration of God's church. I believe there will be such a major re-configuration of God's church.

It's something only he can do.

But I believe that sooner than later he'll do it.

What do I mean by that re-configuration?

I mean something like the Lord's simply taking up all the different bits of his church, which has got itself so set in a denominational grid, sort of throwing it all up into the air, and seeing it re-configured in a very different way.

Throw the different letters of the word episcopal into the air and they can land as pepsi-cola. Same letters. Different configuration.

I believe something like that's got to happen in our land, so that big church is reconfigured and emerges looking much more like the sort of thing the past two days have been.

Scripture suggests that the Lord's pretty good at accomplishing things like that. Getting his people configured the way he wants them.

The early church didn't sit down and hold some high level meetings and figure out a careful 'exit strategy' in relation to the Judaism within which they worked. God did it for them.

They were scattered. Persecution scattered them.

Major storms - in their case persecution - did the reconfiguration.

Jonah only got to heathen Nineveh because ... well, because the Lord, we're told, 'threw a storm' at him.

That is one of those things about which we have to say - please, please don't try this at home! Don't start throwing storms. Only the Lord can be trusted to get it right when it comes to throwing storms.

Sometimes he has to.

Jonah would never have got there himself.

And neither will we probably.

I believe there may well be some storms that the Lord will be throwing at us in these coming days. Financial storms (in the shape of impending bankruptcy), political storms (in the form of secular legislation outlawing basic Christian convictions), and spiritual storms (in the rise of a vibrant and increasingly aggressive Islam).

These three (and more perhaps) may well combine to form the 'perfect storm' through which there'll be that thorough reconfiguration of God's church throughout our lands.

Wee church is where the hope of the world always lies. But big church, too, is vital. Big church in the sort of form I've known it these past days.

The Lord alone can bring that all to pass.

I'm not exactly looking forward to it. It's not going to be a comfortable ride. Ask Jonah.

But if it gets us where he means us all to be, then bring it on!

church

A degree of normality begins to kick in once again this week. Not that I really do 'normal' at all!

For instance - I was in seeing Mary and Joseph today. Who are getting on in years now. As you can imagine.

This season of constant festivity, for them at least, stretches on past January 1st. Jo's birthday falls on the 3rd of January. Yesterday. And he was 98.

He doesn't look it at all. And he'd been all for being out, as he generally is, at our morning worship yesterday. With the ice and the snow and the freezing cold he'd been persuaded, though, that discretion might be the better part of valour.

But it was striking to see in a couple like that just how deeply ingrained is the will to be there with the people of God on a Sunday and sharing in their worship.

Even when it's your 98th birthday. Even when there's snow and ice. Even when there are a hundred and one good excuses for not being there.

'Church' matters. They love the church.

It may be flawed in a million ways (it is). It may not always be exactly to their taste (it isn't).

But they understand, I think, that the church is the bride of Christ and if we love the Lord we will love his bride as well. They understand that it's there, in our involvement in a local church (for all its flaws, for all the things that aren't to our liking at all), it's there that our relationship with Jesus Christ is most truly and fully lived out.

Yes, there are people who call on them. Fine followers of Jesus Christ. And yes, they have good times with them as well. And maybe the chat will get round to the things of God and maybe a prayer will be said. And yes, that's 'church' as well, in a sense.

But it's not quite the same as their getting themselves to the place at the time when the people of God assemble together for worship. And it's never going to be a substitute for that either.

Mary and Joseph know that.

They know very well - far better than some who are 'Johnny-come-latelys' to the whole Jesus thing - they know very well that it's there when the people of God all gather together like that - it's there they'll be able to sing to God's praise and sound out the greatness of God: it's there that the Scriptures will be read, taught, explained, by one who's been called and anointed by God to that end: it's there that the church is most truly and fully herself.

Sure, there are loads of ways that the people of God may worship. And sure, Mary and Joseph are probably none too enamoured with some of those ways.

But they know that that's where they're called and meant to be. They know that's what 'church' is and entails.

It was pretty much the same earlier on in the day when I called in at the hospital to see another lady who had fallen over Christmas and had undergone some surgery on her leg.

She's well on in years as well. Not quite as well on as Joseph is. But getting there.

She's fairly blind. Her husband died a good few years ago. And she's not kept the best of health.

And here she was in hospital again.

But as bright as a button! Mentally more alert than half of the doctors I'd think. And in terms of her outlook, so positive, warm and upbeat.

What a tonic to call by and see her.

And what does she miss? She misses the church.

She doesn't get out on a Sunday these days. It's the Wednesday lunch-time service of worship which she now attends.

The time of day and length of service suit her needs. Plus, we hire a bus each Wednesday which does the rounds and picks up a load of folk like her. That's what makes it possible for her to come.

The people of God at worship. Singing, praying, learning. The Scriptures being read and explained and applied. And the chance as well to sit and have a meal with one another, too.

It's that she really misses. She misses the church.

Yes, we spoke of the Lord as she lay there in her bed.

And yes, there was the chance to pray there in the hospital ward.

(I should have said, she's pretty deaf as well: so the prayer would have doubtless been heard a mile away I'd have thought!)

But it's not quite the same. And, like Mary and Joseph, she knows it.

Too many today are eager, it seems, for a most unholy divorce.

Driving a wedge between Jesus and his bride.

You just can't have this Jesus without his bride.

Jo - at 98 there's nothing wrong with your sight! You see things very clearly.