It would be usual for me to end the series on Restoration, but. there are some things which need declaring and stating. This site started in 2011 when I had left Portugal. Some reading this, maybe on the periphery did not understand the inner workings of that sudden change. It was flight because my body was about to give out.
My world was falling about my ears, a bank wanting to take away a car that was dear to us all, all because I in desperation did not allow payment to go through to pay for it, and the family finances had narrowed so much that our secure world was crumbling. I had been in Portugal 15 years, had a burning vision for revival of faith in that tough country. Much to be appreciated about that place, the pastors and saints I had made there were of great calibre, and were those who truly lived out their faith. The many problems that we encountered in ministry, the people who struggled. I never thought that one October night in 2010 that I would be confronted with a life and death situation.
A bearded man came in to attend to my needs, and spoke words that seemed heavenly, “You are on the verge of a heart attack that will end your life early. I could give you a medication, but the medication you need to give yourself is complete and radical change.”
The witnesses to the physical state and the “death cloud” that hung over me were those in Brixham. Friends of long standing. Not that my family are to be left out here, because there was uncertainty for them back in Portugal. It was to be 8 months until I returned there.
I arrived in Brixham, January 2011, burned out, not sure what processes I would go through.
I must write that none of what I walked out at that time, was perfect or unselfish, all I knew was there if God did not guide me to a proper platform, in a proper way, in the midst of myriads of emails reclaiming a life I once had, alleging to selfishness, all written each day, for lack of information that I could not explain, because even I did not know it. I did not know what God was doing.
I arrived in Brixham, Devon, with nothing at all. I had no house, no car, no money, nothing. It seemed that from experiences I had there in the early 90’s etched into my spirit. The time I stayed in the loft of a hotel, stifling, and inhospitable, and only one vision, came in prayer, of me standing outside of a small cottage looking up the small road to All Saints Church, a very blue day.
The lack of money to pay that week, meant that the remaining belongings I had were confiscated, and I had 2 apples, and 50p. That stood between me and oblivion. I took hold of my Blackberry smartphone, a lifeline, called a friend, and said I was at the end, I had failed, listened only to my only whims. The friend was friend enough to shut me up and tell me to end the call as God would speak and save me.
The Word of the Lord did come, God seemed to be saying “Are you ready to stop struggling?” I was shown that my distrust would bankrupt the whole attempt. I immediately surrendered of a truth, and told to go to a house of a contact, friend, minister, who was coming out of his house at the time of arrival, asking what was happening, and I was thoroughly honest. He arranged to meet me later and gave me what I needed, and moved out the hotel to another.
I stopped struggling, still having little but surrender and trust the cottage I saw in the vision became mine. And the day it did, a very blue day and as I looked up the small winding road, at All Saints Church, the vision I received in the anguish of that small loft room, came back. God was faithful and is faithful. When family joined me in August in another large house acquired I looked toward the harbour and knew the dimension of the rescue God had done. It did not happen overnight. It was not perfect.
There were people who were angry and disappointed in me, but when one has the courage to trust God with 2 apples and 50p there has to be something supernatural to be had. Through that experience this site was born. It was to be the starting point of a journey from the first message of personal perspectives to series of Biblical journeys. Some of the break between what was my time in Portugal, and my transition to the United Kingdom was not perfect nor was it without even today there are those who still don’t understand, and the marks of that still accompany. The one thing I cannot shake is the fact I knew it was right.
The litmus test is this, if you have the courage to start from NOTHING, and start with no perspectives for the future, it is most likely you are being led along a road of being radically motivated to obey the Lord. It is one thing to preach trust in God, it is another to live it out losing respect and reputation, but your inner spirit knows that this is the only way.
The key is knowing that God is all, and all is God, once you forget the 2 apples and 50 British pence, you have lost all. All it takes is courage.
Maranatha.
Leave a Reply