Irreplaceable

By Charlotte Finlay

“Comparison is the thief of joy.” 

~Theodore Roosevelt

I didn’t know at first what I was going to write an entire blog post on when this first began, however God has been so clearly telling me this past week that it should be on comparison. What a massive obstacle in our lives as women!!

I know that this is something that not just teenage girls, like me struggle with, but it’s something that women of all ages, and all stages of life struggle with. I absolutely adore how we at CCV celebrate women and together are on the move to bring the kingdom to where we are in life right now. So why is it that we so often play the ‘comparison game’? Why is it that we so often want to be like our friend or our sister, be it in looks, personality or intelligence?

 I have a younger sister, Rachel. We get told all the time how alike we are, but we’re so very different. We often compare ourselves to one another, until we have to remind each other what we’re doing. It’s so easy to lose sight of God’s heart and his unique purpose for each of us, to get tangled up in a society where beauty is everything and who you are is everything. I think the reason for our comparing is this: we are constantly trying to reach unattainable expectations that we create for ourselves, and we can never quite make it to this ‘standard’. We constantly feel inadequate, or the common ‘not good enough’ and we start to believe these lies we speak to ourselves. We may wish we were more outgoing and bubbly, or funnier, or more gifted. You may look in the mirror and be able to list the imperfections but God’s list of perfections is never ending. We focus on what we don’t have and forget what we have been given. I also think our culture has a lot to do with this, in that we as women are so very good at praising others and finding the good and the wonderful in others, yet are so quick to see our own flaws. We wish all the time for her figure, her personality, her wardrobe. How are we going to be able to lift others up when we are constantly tearing ourselves down?

We constantly want to exchange ourselves in place of someone else, and we don’t realise how damaging it is to us. For when we compare ourselves to other women we are robbing ourselves of our worth and our value. When we don’t feel worthy or valuable we become less capable of changing this world and bringing joy and freedom to the lives of those around us. We don’t have time to wish we were someone else; our time is now. We are each individual and different. No one can do Charlotte like I do her, and no one can do you like you do her. You have something SO special to give! When we each know that we are irreplaceable and that what we have to give, quirks, flaws, the whole package, is needed, we are going to bring change. Society today is crying out for women who know who they are and to whom they belong; women who refuse to listen to the lies that have been spoken over them, that they aren’t pretty enough, smart enough or good enough. Society needs women who refuse to waste their precious time comparing their worth because they know that what they have to give to this world is beautiful and different and needed.

The world needs women who refuse to continue seeking their worth through the game of comparison but instead through Jesus. Your worth is more than your waist size, your face without make up, your hair in the morning, the label on your clothing. You are defined by your Father in heaven. You are His daughter with whom he is so pleased, always. Only He can determine your worth.

My New Year’s resolution this year is to not compare myself to other girls and women and to embrace my quirks and qualities (flaws included); to be at peace with who my Father made me to be. I encourage each of you reading this to do the same, for in so doing you are free to love, live with joy and make a difference in this world. So embrace YOU this year. You are irreplaceable.

True Beauty

 By Sonya Finlay

“I am a princess. All girls are. Even if they live in tiny old attics. Even if they dress in rags, even if they aren’t pretty, or smart, or young. They’re still princesses.”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess

I have always struggled a little with “feeling beautiful” but I have learned that true beauty is not about looks and so much more about the heart.  I had a very serious accident when I was three (of which I remember nothing) but it resulted in severe scarring on my face.  As I grew up, I struggled with my image and feeling I didn’t measure up.  I suppose this made me feel self-conscious and shy and I found it difficult walking into a room of people.

As I reflect, I know that I probably focused too much on my image and not enough on my identity.  Of course, as women and girls, we all want to look and feel beautiful.  But I am learning that beauty is about so much more than how we look.  You see we are all princesses, beautiful to God and treasured by him.  He does not see our scars and blemishes but smiles as He reflects on the beauty of His daughters.  When we really grasp the truth of our identity in God, we look at ourselves and others in a different light.

As I have been reflecting on this, the story of Esther has come to my mind.  Queen Esther was beautiful, but that is not why we remember her story.  We remember her story because of her courage, her compassion, her love for her people.  She reflected true beauty.

I want to make a difference in the world.  I have two beautiful daughters, but I encourage them to focus on having beautiful hearts.  I am passionate about young women grasping their identity as princesses, daughters of the King of kings.  It is so important for us to encourage and compliment each other not only on our outside beauty but also on our inside beauty.

So once we truly know our identity as God’s treasured possession – let’s focus on chasing after true beauty – beauty that has courage to stand up for those who have no voice, beauty that has compassion for the poor, the forgotten, the orphans, beauty that sees the best in others and encourages and brings joy and light.

To finish, here is a little song ‘Beautiful For Me,’ which I came across a few years ago.  It sums up how God sees us and loves us. 

http://youtu.be/orc4TuIO56s

People Watching

By Roberta Jarvis

You might not know it but I am a people watcher! I LOVE it! It’s one of my all time favourite past times and it’s up there with talking and connecting with others.

Recently I’ve been thinking …which I might add I do a LOT … about the time I spend alone with God and if I’m being REALLY honest my quiet moments have been squished into very small moments and I’m working on it (Got a great tip recently though … put a blanket over your head in the midst of the madness when the kids are surrounding you… thanks Gillie a great idea!) 

Right lets not get off track Roberta … so people watching … just like spending real quality time with God it has got to be done not when you're in the midst of the madness but when you take time to move out to the side. When you take the time to move out from the crowd and step back from what’s going on around you and observe life from a different view point, in those moments you've taken time to notice others and God can OPEN your eyes to the bigger picture! 

You might not be like me and that is great, but you may be like me and theres nothing you love more than being in the midst of a central hub of activity. Wherever you are on this scale I urge you to take time out to people watch! Now don’t be grabbing a chair, a clip board and plonk yourself smack bang in the middle of the street taking notes! Do it in a quiet non obtrusive manner, non judgemental, embracing the rhythm of the community that surrounds you. 

Let me ask you a couple of questions?! Will you be the one who takes time on a Sunday morning to notice the person who sits alone, or the young woman who hangs around the building until the very last minute, desperate to be invited back to lunch because she wants to feel part of something more?

God places the lonely in families …
Psalm 68:6 NLT

Will you see the mum who's exhausted and struggling with small children who needs support and reassurance that it’s going to be ok? Will you see the girl who's secretly crying in the toilets because she's bearing the pain of a broken down relationship? 

He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted …
Isaiah 61;1 NIV


Will you take the time to see what God sees? 

Taking the time away from the vibrant hub of activity and making yourself invisible provides a precious opportunity to make others visible!

So go, get to it and do some people watching ladies!!!

Administration. The Holy Spirit. How on earth do they combine?

by: Katja Bruyninckx

On Sundays I used to hear about 'bringing the Kingdom into your day-to-day life' and I would be all excited.

Then I would think about my job.

My admin job.

Where I sit behind a desk. I answer phone calls & emails, write up policies & procedures, print stuff, work on the website... I really struggled with the question "How on earth am I supposed to bring the Kingdom HERE?"

For a while I was convinced that the only way for me to 'help with the Kingdom' was to start volunteering in a 'real' ministry, like kids work. And to be honest: our kid's ministry scares me to bits! I've served there for a while, but afterwards I just felt completely drained (please hear me right: I love what the kids ministry is about! but a room full of balls flying around is just not for me...).

But... when I organise, bring structure, make an Excel sheet.... that is when I come to LIFE. And I really, really felt like I was a 'freak'.

About two years ago, I was having one of those 'feeling-like-a-freak-moments' and that's when this Bible verse hit me:

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. And in the church God has appointed (...) those with gifts of administration (...) (1 Corinthians 12:27-28 NIV).

It felt like I was struck by thunder: did the Bible really speak about administration? What was that all about?

That's when God started to take me on an exciting journey. He showed me that He's not interested in 'ticking-lists-for-ticking-sake' administration. It doesn't excite Him (or me!) in the least. Instead, God is interested in Administrators who join Him in creating the structures which are vital to enable and to protect life.

I think this is beautifully illustrated in the Creation story where there is a mixture of creation of new, alternated by the creation of structure (which is Administration to me). Through these verses, other Bible passages and teachings by very clever people, God showed me that He wants Administrators to be realised: they are creators. Creators of structure, but creators all the same.

God wants His Administrators to take their place in the 'dance' between them creating structure so others can create new so that Administrators can create structure and others can create new again. It is absolutely beautiful and exciting when you become part of this, because:

Printing a document transforms into releasing a teacher to teach.

Writing up a website changes into connecting a need with a solution.

Answering a phone call becomes an opportunity for a prophetic encounter.

I now realise that Administration and the Holy Spirit: it's a match made in Heaven which we get to bring into this earth! That is the kind of Administration that gets me excited. And if you're at all administratively active: that is what you called to do!

I can already hear some of you saying 'no way, I'm not doing that, in my case I'm really just entering information or making copies'. And that's exactly what the enemy wants you to think. Because the moment you start to realise the POWER of the spiritual gifting of Administration you're operating in, the enemy is in BIG TROUBLE!

I could go on for another two pages about why I believe this and what it looks like... but I won't do that here. Instead, I would like to encourage you with this: God wants us to desire all the Gifts of the Spirit. This includes Administration. So are there areas of administration in your life that could be used for His kingdom?

'Hop on the bus... God's on the move!'

By Alyson Reid

This is simply my story. It's a script that only God could write  - one that I'd never have chosen for myself and yet I totally love every day of this adventure with Him.

One regular autumn morning in 2009, just driving my 4 girls to school, I saw, in my mind, a vision of a children's choir that I felt was from God. They were singing so joyously, dancing and praising God and I felt He gave me the words 'Raise the Roof'.  It was so powerful that I was in floods of tears by the time I got to the school gate.  But I honestly had no desire whatsoever to begin a children's choir in Ballymena! So for 2 years I watched and waited, sensing there was more to come. In November 2011 I suffered a serious attack of pancreatitis and spent a week in hospital. When I was least expecting God to reveal His plans, I really believe He spoke to my heart again.

On the Friday evening that I was released from hospital I stopped at a friend's house on the way home and met a pastor from Uganda called Moses who was staying with them.   He told me about his work planting churches and building schools and that he had a children's choir who travelled the world raising awareness of the plight of vulnerable children in Uganda. The following Sunday Moses came to Causeway Coast Vineyard and afterwards we set off to see a robot milking parlour thanks to my husband Hugh! En route I played a kids worship CD in the car as we had loads of little girls in the back! When I heard 'Hop on the bus, God's on the move, there's a seat for me, there's a seat for you...' I was moved to tears again as I felt that was God revealing to me that his plan was for me to form a children's choir in Ballymena, then at some point He would bring over a choir of children from Uganda, these two choirs would sing together and through 'Raise the Roof' we would build a school in Uganda.

An enormous project! I hadn't a clue where to start! I'd never been on any mission trips overseas, I had no knowledge of Uganda, never mind how to build a school. The only thing I could offer was a "Yes Lord!"

So I gathered a group of friends round my kitchen table one Monday evening and decided to make a start. We concluded that in order to raise the £75,000 it would take to complete the project we would need to travel with the choir outside of Ballymena. I made a throw away comment 'Pity we couldn't find a bus over a hedge somewhere.' Three days later, I was in the car with my 4 girls and a friend on a really random errand, heading up a country road that I've never been on before or since, when to my absolute amazement I saw an old double decker bus peeping over a hedge in a junk yard. I drove in and told the owner my whole vision of how "I needed a bus which God would fill with singing children to build a school in Uganda!"

So Raise the Roof kids choir was formed in September 2012. Within seven months they were given their very own 30 year old Leyland double decker bus - (an exact replica of the one I felt God showed me in the junk yard because it needed to have a 'low deck' to fit into our cattle shed when not in use! God in the detail!) The bus was ferried over from England courtesy of Stena and sprayed our signature colour of bright yellow by Wrightbus, Ballymena - all as gifts in support of our project.  

In March 2013 the children sang at Stormont with The Lord Mayor Gavin Robinson  "Cast your burdens unto Jesus for He cares for you." We currently have over 70 children from all backgrounds and denominations who delight in meeting every Saturday afternoon in Ballymena to sing. They have given numerous concerts and are well on target to making this vision a reality.

In October 2013, through the African focussed charity, Fields of Life, our children had the opportunity to spend time and rehearse with a choir of young people from Uganda who were touring with Nathan Jess to build a school. We gave a joint concert in Coleraine Girls High School which was such a memorable experience for our children and the fulfilment of what God had spoken to me originally.  This is our God of 'the immeasurably more than we could ask or imagine!' (Ephesians 3:20)

When our children sing I can feel the Father's delight because He's building and creating something new - that's who He is, that's what He does best! He is building first in our own hearts, then, through the joy of young voices singing in a big yellow bus, vision and bigger dreams are spilling into the wider community and one day all the way to hundreds of children and their families in Uganda. Already our 7 year olds are asking what price is a ticket to Uganda.

God is on the move! What dreams and visions has He placed in you that makes your heart sing? It might not look like you'd planned! But take a risk .... hop on the bus.... there's a seat for me, there's a seat for YOU!