40Acts - Day 10: ' SPUR ON '

Our words have immense capacity for good. When we use them encouragingly, generously, and genuinely, there are few things that have more power. A timely word can change the course of someone's day, or even someone's life. 

Use words wisely.

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver. 

(Proverbs 25:11 ESV)

‘A word fitly spoken,’ says Proverbs 25:11, ’is like apples of gold in a setting of silver.’  

Other versions have ‘golden apples in a silver basket’ or ‘on a silver tray’.  A shining, striking image that portrays the effect of good words: they create a relationship and invite more words to be echoed in reply, like the light between two beautiful reflective surfaces.  Generous words given to us become words that can flow out generously to others.

We can all think of golden apples that have been handed to us. Many of mine came from a student teacher who, although he only spent one term working in the school where I was a pupil, is one of the adults I remember most fondly. I was dealing with that common 13-year-old’s problem of feeling completely invisible, but this teacher never walked past without a quick, encouraging word or two. He could see me! Later, he wrote in my yearbook two words: ‘Never change.’  Two golden apples for a confused, insecure teenager – treasured for years.

Jesus, too, is a great giver of golden apples. ’You are the salt of the earth,’ he told the gaggle of uncertain fishermen who followed him around; ‘you are the light of the world’ (Matthew 5:13–14 NIV). Later, as he was about to leave them, he told the same group of people that he called them his friends, that he had chosen them to bear fruit, and that they should love one another (John 15:14–17).  

Jesus’ generous words are meant for those of us who follow him today, too. If we let them take root in us, they will eventually produce the fruit that he promises, and then we’ll give it to someone who needs it: golden apples, on a silver tray.

Today's blog was written by Amy Robinson. 

Find out more about her and support her chosen charity here.

For today's challenge in full - click here

40Acts - Day Nine ' DIAL UP '

Today's act is all about activating the gift of prayer.

Wait, what? How is prayer generous, you ask?

When we pray, we spend time talking to a God who lives and moves and acts on our behalf and for the good of those who love him. It's generous because you're asking the creator of the universe to do a good thing for someone else. Powerful stuff, folks.

This went on for two years, so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord. (Acts ‪19:10 NIV)

I had been a decent self-respecting agnostic for some time. I had absorbed the misinformation that there were no real answers to the honest questions a young person would ask: Is there any evidence for God’s existence? Why is there all this suffering? Etc.  But when studying maths at university, I met a Christian who was confident of his faith and was willing to meet and let me argue the issues. To my great surprise I discovered there were answers and gradually learned that I, the agnostic, was the one without the evidence and he, the Christian, was basing his faith on evidence. After some months I realised I needed to respond.

It was probably the most honest prayer I had prayed, and in a totally unreligious setting – the second floor of the West Wing of Birmingham University library with maths books in front of me: ’God if you are there, and I’m not sure you are, but if you are I want to know you.’ Two weeks later I knew he was! I had reached a point of trusting God with my whole life, and then one morning I was alone in my room and found myself overwhelmed with a sense of peace, joy and excitement all rolled together into one four-hour experience. I knew that Jesus was alive and was at work in my life from then on.

Don’t you find it remarkable that God is interested in us and wants us to have honest conversation with him? We don’t need any special skills or high-level clearance to get in contact with him.  In fact there are no barriers (except those we put up ourselves). Wherever we are, whatever we’re doing, day or night, we can talk. So how about praying an honest prayer just now before you stop reading this? You could tell God what is important to you that you are concerned about. You could say something you are grateful for. You could … well, just be honest. Here’s some space to do it …


Praying. Millions of people in the UK do it: believers, sceptics, grannies, young people, people who are desperate and people who are not. And God responds.


And here’s a thought: who could you offer the gift of prayer to today?

Today's blog was written by David Hill from try praying. 
Find out more about him and support his chosen charity here

To see today's challenge in full - Click HERE

40Acts 2016 - Day Eight: ' Dirty Cash '

‘Money is the root of all evil’ – isn’t it?
Actually, no. It’s in the love of money that evil finds a root.

If financial giving has become a taboo subject for you, face it head on today. Give financially. Whether you've got pennies or millions, there is great joy and freedom in thoughtful and intentional giving.

You might be a regular giver or never have given before: use today as a way to explore your capacity for financial generosity.

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. 

Some people, eager for money, 

have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. 

(I Timothy 6:10 NIV)

‘Are you a Christian? How can you do this and wear a cross on your lapel?’

‘This’ was me giving a talk to some medical staff about their financial planning some years ago. I was wearing a suit with a small gold cross tastefully pinned to my lapel. My questioner was a newly qualified Christian doctor for whom (by the turning up of her nose) money was as inevitable yet as distasteful as emptying bedpans.

Interestingly, the Bible in general and Jesus in particular have a lot to say about money – without the upturned nose. The book is full of wisdom about saving, investment, insurance, debt, budgeting and, of course, generosity.

The overwhelming message of scripture is God’s grace to an undeserving creation. And the consistent application of that grace for us as we handle money is in generosity.

In fact, it is not the cash that is dirty; it is our love of cash. We are the recipients of so much grace and generosity from the Father, the least we can do is live generous lives for others. But when our love of money overcomes our generosity we can become resistant to God’s grace. The love of money may be the root of all evil but generosity with money grows good fruit in our lives.

As we learn generosity and how to handle money as recipients of grace, we make better and better decisions about finances in all areas of life. Money is not dirty cash – something that we separate out from our faith. Following Jesus affects everything, including how we spend, invest, borrow and give.

So I turned to the doctor and tried to explain how there was no conflict for me in wearing a cross and talking about money. In the words of John Mumford, founder of Vineyard Churches in the UK, I described life as a Christian as being less like a grapefruit and more like a milkshake. Faith and money should not be tasted in separate segments but all whisked up together!

Today's blog was written by David Flower, Leeds Vineyard / Flowers McEwan Ltd.
Find out more about him and his chosen charity here.

To see today's challenge in full - Click HERE

40 Acts 2016 - Day 2

Alright. Some of us are clean freaks. Others prefer to live in organised chaos.
One thing we can all agree on, though, is that our communities feel like nicer places when they're litter-free. It's better for the environment, and easier on the eye.

Roll your sleeves up and make your world cleaner today.

'The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.'

(Genesis 2:15 NIV) 

 It had been years since I’d seen one of these. Like a near-extinct bird, the lesser-spotted Christian bumper sticker caught my eye last summer. It was old and peeling around the edges, but the ‘This is not my home, I’m just passing through’ sticker was still intact. Some of us have been thinking about creation and the planet so long we have forgotten that there are those who still believe that planet earth is only a stopgap before the main performance on the stage of heaven.

Genesis 2:15 makes clear that from the start we were made to ’work, dress and care for creation’. So the plan was never that the bumper sticker would be true.

Earth isn’t a stop-off; it is our home and – as shown in Revelation 21– heaven is going to invade earth. There isn’t going to be some mass evacuation, but heaven is coming to us.

Which means we need to roll up our sleeves because we have work to do. We need to be involved in working, dressing and caring for creation. It’s not something to consume and then destroy, but to care for and restore. Our role is to be stewards of the great gift of earth, stone, water and air. We are to work to bring about a restored creation, a beautiful creation, a creation that reminds us of Eden.

Where is your Garden of Eden? What are your Eden streets called? Eden scrub ground and Eden car parks? We each have a Garden of Eden to love, treasure, clean, restore, dress, preserve and bring justice for. So let’s not wait for someone else to do our job; let’s get involved and live up to the first challenge in the Bible.

Today's blog was written by Cris Rogers from All Hallows Bow. Find out more about them and support their chosen charity here.

To visit today's web page, click here