riversmeeting
a church in carrick-on-shannonArchive for Prayer
Praying for Myanmar
Myanmar protesters are now protesting not only their collective freedom but in favour of releasing the political prisoners that have been taken in the past month.
Please pray that this struggle will not be ended lightly or in haste so that the government will feel more pressure to change. Also pray that more people will join us in this spiritual battle to help Myanmar.
Thanks to all the encouragement and help with this and I hope you will continue to care about these kinds of issues and join me in prayer in the future.
church without walls and the end of the one- man- band
Checking out the Northumbria Community, we try to live by this rule.
Summary of the Rule of the Northumbria Community -
A Way for LivingThis is the Rule we embrace. This is the Rule we will keep: we say YES to AVAILABILITY; we say YES to VULNERABILITY.
We are called to be AVAILABLE to God and to others:
Firstly to be available to God in the cell of our own heart when we can be turned towards Him, and seek His face;
then to be available to others in a call to exercise hospitality, recognising that in welcoming others we honour and welcome the Christ Himself;
then to be available to others through participation in His care and concern for them, by praying and interceding for their situations in the power of the Holy Spirit;
then to be available for participation in mission of various kinds according to the calling and initiatives of the Spirit.We are called to intentional, deliberate VULNERABILITY:
We embrace the vulnerability of being teachable expressed in:
a discipline of prayer;
in exposure to Scripture;
a willingness to be accountable to others in ordering our ways and our heart in order to effect change.We embrace the responsibility of taking the heretical imperative:
by speaking out when necessary or asking awkward questions that will often upset the status quo;
by making relationships the priority, and not reputation.We embrace the challenge to live as church without walls, living openly amongst unbelievers and other believers in a way that the life of God in ours can be seen, challenged or questioned. This will involve us building friendships outside our Christian ghettos or club-mentality, not with ulterior evangelistic motives, but because we genuinely care.
Ireland is full of water

(Moy river. Photo by Jan)
The one desire which grows more and more is to give … Giving and receiving are at bottom one thing, dependent upon whether one lives open or closed. Living openly one becomes a medium, a transmitter, living thus, as a river, one experiences life to the full, flows along with the current of life, and dies in order to live again as an ocean.
~ Henry Miller
Why do we pray?
We just got back from the Ballina 24/7 prayer room. Amazing experience: the whole church building was covered with beautiful flower displays (in a seperate event). There was a huge flow of people that came for the flower festival, but many passed through a quiet corner into the prayer room itself. It was simply stunning. Lucy Butler had created a strange and beautiful environment for worship. Read the rest of this entry »
Thinking God
Those who believe in God, but without passion in the heart, without anguish of mind, without uncertainty, without doubt and even at times without despair, believe only in the idea of God, and not in God himself. – Miguel de Unamuno
Been reading and re-reading this quote over the past couple of days. It’s strange, but it both challenges and comforts me at the same time. It’s weird how a statement so confrontational on one hand is so reassuring on the other.
Life is filled with challenges, and often our faith feels under fire, but this we know: the testing of our faith produces good fruit, and the twelve guys closest to Jesus weren’t frighten to tell him that they believed but they needed help with their unbelief. We all struggle, we all wrestle with issues of belief and faith – its that passionate pursuit, that anguish of mind that gives place to hope and a way for faith. Keep pressing and believing!
Gareth Gilpin


