Palm Sunday...

After my customary Saturday morning shop, I had been invited to join some friends on Mount Immitos. As you can see it was a beautiful day, and the mountain certainly offers the most quiet of locations for those hoping to withdraw from the surrounding city below. For me it provided the ideal opportunity to reflect on a week that has been somewhat challenging. Not in terms of ministry or school, but in terms of future considerations. There has been much sadness as I communicate with friends and colleagues my decision to return to England at the end of July. The question now is - what's next? I'm thankful that over the coming week, I will have a number of opportunities to talk to people, think and most importantly pray about all this.

I would value your prayer support in this too. I'm beginning to piece together some ideas about the future, but it does feel like a confusing time. Praise God I have found great comfort in His word. Alongside this comfort, there has been much convicting as I reflect on the following verses:

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it." Luke 9:23-24

For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. 2 Corinthians 5:14-15

But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ... Philippians 3:7-8

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Last night, the Albanian fellowship invited a number of people for a time of worship, through song, prayer and the Bible. It was a joyful occasion and a blessing to be involved. We heard the testimony of a lady who had become a Christian at the age of nine in Germany during the war. After this, there was a second testimony from a man who was visiting from Switzerland. It was encouraging to hear how God had worked in their lives to bring to them to know Jesus Christ.

You may or may not know that today is Palm Sunday. This is a day when we look back to the week before Jesus death on the cross, and specifically remember his entrance into Jerusalem (see Luke 19:28-40). A time filled with much anticipation over the awaited King of Israel, although the people welcoming Jesus, probably couldn't have imagined what would be taking place on the following Friday. Yet, Jesus knew.

And taking the twelve, he said to them, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spat upon. And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise.”  Luke 18:31-34

As I sat in church this morning, I couldn't help but imagine what must have been going through the mind of the Lord Jesus during that ride on a colt. I am also humbled to think that during that very journey, he had me in mind. Not that I deserve saving, not that I deserve to know God, yet Jesus knew that in five or so days time he would be crucified, and he would do this for me. He would die so that I might live. And so in view of this, my hope over the coming week is that my mind would be firmly fixed upon the One who gave himself for me, and that in response to this, I might wholly give myself to Him.