Our God is a big God


I was sat amongst some friends this week and we listened to song called 'You are' by Bradford Church . We spent a few minutes thinking about the song and we were asked what the one thing was that stuck out to us . When listening to this song the words that stuck out to me was ‘You are’. In the song it talks about all the things that God is...

“You are the strength for the those in need , You are the defender of the weak Your everything we need, You are our God”

It can be so easy in our everyday lives to forget how big God is ! , We can forget that God is interested in the small things in our lives as well as the big. God is all the things above and so much more . I was challenged to try to include God in all parts of my life not just the big things.

Do we truly understand where God is or do we put Him in a box and see Him where we want Him to be. It is easy to see that God is there when we worship or when we sometimes pray, but do we see God when people are hurting or struggling? Let us show others that actually we see God in the smallest things like a baby smile or a hug to someone in need. Where will you acknowledge God this week and where are you going to take Him over the next few days?

Emily Swinburne / Richard Dawson

Changing endings

One of the things that marks the start of the Christmas season for me is the vast array of high quality and big production adverts that are released by large companies, all trying to compete for the biggest chunk of the 16 billion pounds people in the UK will spend on Christmas presents this year. The Coca Cola advert is probably the most famous, and this year the John Lewis advert has impacted lots of people with a great message of how giving is better than receiving.

I know there are many more adverts to come, but there is one that has struck such a chord with me and has reminded me why I do what I do, and why the work of Youth for Christ in the city of Nottingham and beyond is so important. It is an advert for Barnardos:

In youth work, you hear lots of stories. Some stories are funny, inspiring and happy and others are just heartbreaking. The young people that we work with are all on a journey and they all have a different story. Some of the beginnings to their stories have not been good ones. Some people in the lives of those young people think they know what the ending to their story will be. Some people in the lives of those young people have even told them what their ending will be. Some of those endings are not good.

For us at Nottingham Youth for Christ, we believe in a God who specializes in changing the endings to people’s stories. Jesus set people free, healed and restored, turned the world upside down and changed the lives of thousands even millions of people and he is still doing it today.

By listening, loving, caring, creating, laughing, hoping and praying with young people we are here to empower them to change the ending to the story they are living. Sometimes this takes years, sometimes we may never know the ending would have been different without our involvement and sometimes it doesn’t work and the ending is just as heartbreaking as the beginning. But we know we make a difference, we know God is at work in the lives of young people in our city and we are privileged to be a part of it.

Jo Dolby

eq:mission to Burton

So we have just got back from our latest eq:mission where we ended up in Burton-upon-Trent. Here is a completed set of video diaries from the weekend so you get a glimpse of what we got up to. A full review will be up soon.

You can find out more about our 30 hour missions @ www.nottinghamyfc.co.uk/eq and download a booking form for our next one.