Everyday Encounter

Well guys we’ve been up and running for a bit on the website. A few things are being tweaked and changed but we are gradually getting there. You all got your website ‘flyers’ at Encounter last night so hopefully a few more people will be dropping by pretty soon. So we’re thinking its maybe about time we introduced ourselves. Use this post to comment a few things about your self like who you are (first name only required if you don’t want to post details) maybe how long you’ve been coming to Encounter and a few other details you might want to add like what school or tech you go to and what sort of music you like. Whatever you want. Its time to make yourself known. It can be as short or long as you want (within reason!)

Look forward to hearing from some of you…

Okay – so now that we are back up and running for 2007 we thought it might be good to give you guys a chance to have your say about Encounter here on the blog. Use this post to comment on what you’d like to see more of at Encounter. Also feel free to share things that you enjoyed about Encounter this year or last year! It can be anything at all from a list of the sweets you’d like to see the tuck shop stock to ideas for prayer zones!

It’s really class to see the Blog Hits increasing so quickly and we hope that some of you who are stopping by are taking up the challenge of fasting either completely or partially. Today we just wanted to stick up a quick list of things that you might want to focus some of your prayers on whilst you are preparing your hearts and making time for God during this time…

1. Pray that you would make more space for God, and know Him more

2. Pray for Encounter – the volunteers who help make it happen, the speakers, worship team, and of course all you guys who come along and bring it to life.

3. Pray for our country – bring it before God and be bold in asking for Him to move here once again

4. Pray for Churches in the local area

Keep it up guys.
Later

Read Isaiah 58v1-10 throughout your time of fasting – we’ve highlighted a few of the key verses below. It might be an idea to divide the passage up and focus on a few of the verses everyday…

6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?

7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe him,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.

9 Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,

10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.

We are standing on the edge of a brand new year – and a brand new year of Encounter. I have to be honest and say that I’m getting a little bit excited at the prospect of us ’standing on the edge of something large’… – that is, that in this new year we will see God at work both amongst and through us at Encounter, and on the bigger scale throughout our country. It’s time that we woke up and realised that with God we are always standing on the edge of something big – something much bigger than us. Everytime we come in to His presence or Encounter Him we are a part of something huge! And everytime we come together to worship Him we are part of something MASSIVE as we join with the voices and actions of many other christians all over the world and the COUNTLESS angels worshipping in heaven!
It’s 5 days to the first Encounter of 2007 and I just want to encourage all of you who are reading this to PREPARE for a new year of meeting with God by getting everything in focus and in the right perspectives. That’s why I’d like to encourage you to do something a bit different that carries your encountering of God into everyday – rather than just when we meet together on Fridays. Wait for it…

Ok so here is the idea – I want to encourage you to take part in a fast (or partial fast!) of something that isn’t food for a week. It doesn’t matter if you miss doing it this week running up to the first Encounter – you can do it at anytime.

So basically what you have to do is pick something that takes up some of your time or that you might focus quite heavily on – and either reduce how much you do that or totally stop it for a whole week. The idea is that you spend the time you save by not doing it praying, focusing on God or worshipping etc. – An example might be that you spend a lot of time on MSN or Bebo – so you might want to restrict how long you spend doing that each day or else not use them for a week. Maybe you spend all your free time playing sport/computer games or texting/phoning people – again you could reduce and/or replace these activities for one week of worshiping and refocusing on God.

Drop us a comment to let us know what your ‘fasting’ from and how your getting on! We will hopefully get a 7 day ‘Focus List’ up on here ASAP so that you have something to chew over on each day that you are fasting!