A few impressions from Sloshfest 2008 in pictures and videos:

Please click on the pictures to see their bigger version. Here you’ll find the whole set. Have fun!.

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As I’ve started a process of thinking about this last year and all the weird and wonderful things that God has been doing in my life and around me this year, I am very thankful. He finally made it happen that I was able to follow His call to move to the United Kingdom. He provided me with a job and temporal accommodation at a lovely families home. Today I’ve signed the rent contract for a nice room in a shared house, where practically I’ll live all by myself, cause the other tenant is hardly ever there. God is great!

This past year has not always been easy and I was very unpatient sometimes. I didn’t want to wait until God would finally do something about some situations and yet at the end He always arranged the right things to happen in my life. He is in control and He sits on the throne in my life!

Since I’m working fulltime, my relationship with God has changed. And it was a negative change in some areas. I’ve not been soaking in His presence as much as I used to. And I know I don’t need the “ritual” of soaking to do that. But there is a high priority in my life for taking some time off the everyday life and to reserve it for time with my heavenly Dad! I need more of that and I need to drink more from Him…. Drink, drink, drink. I like John Scotland, he is one of my role models in drinking. I’m looking forward to become as wrecked in God/for God as Heidi Baker. I don’t know if there will still be time for a fulltime job in the world. But at the moment, God want’s me to work in that callcenter and He uses me there. But I want so much more of Him. I’m thirsty. The Joy of the Lord and the drinking of His New Wine will be one of my top priorities in this new year! 2008 is my year of drinking and more personal transformation. Is that a difficult task? No! I’ll just be the clay in the potters hands!

Merry Christmas and a drunken new year! (God’s New Wine only, please…)

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Mat 5:14-16 GNB “You are like light for the whole world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. (15) No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bowl; instead it is put on the lampstand, where it gives light for everyone in the house. (16) In the same way your light must shine before people, so that they will see the good things you do and praise your Father in heaven.

I recently experienced what it can mean to be the light of the world as a follower of Christ. With the Holy Spirit inside of us, we bring the reality of the Kingdom of God, the dominion of God everywhere we go. So when I go to my office in the morning I always invite God to be in the office with me. I know that He lives inside of me, but what I mean by that invitation is, that I invite God to bring His tangible presence into the office, so that all of my teammate’s and all the customers who call us can actually feel the presence of God and experience His love and grace.

For me there is no point in being a child of God and keeping my Daddy all for myself. I owe people an encounter with my Dad. And the more I share Him with others, the happier I become, cause our family grows and grows.

One of my colleagues offered me to order a mobile phone for me and sell it to me a lot cheaper then would usually be. I found that a bit dodgy, but still told him, if we will set up a proper contract of purchase and if it will sealed in its original packaging, I’ll be up for it. A few days later he approached me again and told me, he wants to give the phone to me as a free gift. The following 3 weeks I would ask him almost every day, when my new handset would arrive. He always found a different excuse.

Then suddenly at last weeks monday he said to me: “Bad news Tom, the phone is on its way to me, but it will not be the original one. It will be a counterfeit phone.” Well my reply was, that I wanted to have a think about that first. God then was very quick in telling me, that this is definitly going to be theft, cause the original brand would lose money because of that purchase of a fake phone. So later this week we met again and I told him: “I don’t want the phone, even though you offered it to me for free. God told me, that this is going to be seen as theft and I don’t want to steal, because thieves don’t enter heaven.” The guy seemed to be quite shocked at first, but then he returned to his joking around mode and everything was fine.

What I didn’t know this time was, that later that day the police would have him handcuffed and taken off the office premises for further questioning due to a lot of fraud issues he was involved with.

Here God’s light brought something to the surface, that was hiding in secret and in darkness for a long time. God taught me, that if I would have taken the phone that day, things would have turned around a lot different and the whole thing would have taken a much longer to come to the surface. Also they might have taken me as a suspect as well.

I’m thankful for that lesson and I’m very impressed by the power of God’s light in each of us followers of Christ.

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…just the webblog of another follower of Jesus. Someone who is trying to figure out, what it is like, to live in a vibrant relationship with our Heavenly Father. Actually, this blog is not about me. It is about my Dad in Heaven. Maybe I just haven’t said that clearly enough over the last couple of months. You know what? I love Him! He is just, well, great… I guess. I’m on the move, moving further and further away from the identy this world is trying to press upon me. Seeking to get rid of any fear of men whatsoever. It still is kinda scary though. I’m miles away from being perfect, and yet still He loves me so much! Everytime I fall, He is there to pick me up. He is there to tell me: “Get up quickly, don’t stay laying on the ground in self-pity, condeming yourself. Cause I am not condeming you! So why should you?” He always engourages me to run back into his arms.

It is just the fact that I seem to be so impatient sometimes. Impatient with myself, impatient with the way Dad unfolds His plan in my life. And every now and then I was just fed up with trying my own best to have fellowship with Him. And it is only then that I realised again, that I started strifing again, where there is no need for that?!

It is just weird, this whole thing. And I’m always returning to just being his son. Nothing more and nothing less. A brother of Jesus and a son of God. Not to say “the Son of God”, but one of His sons.

You know, I read so many of these books from Bill Johnson over the last couple of monts. And they kinda made me feel weird. They are challenging and motivating on one hand. But on the other I sometimes just sit there and inside of me I cry out: “Why do I have to go through alls this theory?” I know Bill’s books weren’t meant to be theoretic. And much what I found in there was actually really practical. But it was just not the way I expected it to be. I need somebody who takes me by the hand and shows me all the mysteries of God. Bit by bit, step by step. It is not going to be Bill, though. It is gonna be Daddy Himself.

I’m sick of fearing this and that and this again. I’m sick of thinking, thinking more then I’m actually doing. A little healing of a headache of a colleaque at work is not good enough anymore, while there are so many people out there dying from cancer, where they simply shouldn’t die from cancer at all.

Will you follow Jesus with me? Are you in for the adventure? It is more then a game and it is more then just another thought. Is Jesus the One we follow? Some kind of rolemodel? Okay, then let us first start with admitting, that it is actually possible for us to walk in the same anointing, power and authority that He walked in, while He was on this earth. How? By being in connection with his Heavenly Dad all the time. How did He do that? With the help of the Holy Spirit that came down upon Him. And also by submitting His priorities unto the ones of His Father.

Okay, I gotta go. I’m humbly learning …. AGAIN.

Tom

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Since the 3rd of September I do now work for one of the biggest amongst the british employers. My job title says: Customer Service Manager. I work in a callcenter and take incoming calls and try to make sure that our customers get the best service. Last week was our training week. On the first day my trainer came to me during our break and told me, that he is a christian as well and that he belongs to the Calvary Chapel in Cardiff. That really freaked me out. You know, first God provides with this job so quick, then he made sure that I have a place to live and now on my first day of work he puts a christian brother right beside me to train me?! How awesome is that? Our Heavenly Daddy is just breath taking… I tell ya.

Well anyway, today was my first real work day. First I would listen into some calls that my buddy would take and from about 11 a.m. I took them all by myself. I had a few strange and confusing calls, but the rest went really okay and I was able to provide an excellent customer service with Gods help.

Thank you guys for praying for me! God has already done a lot! Keep me in your prayers, will you? Want to experience some more of the supernatural reality of God in the small church I know belong to. They all seem to be really hungry, but somewhat scared as well. Had already a few chances to pray for healing for some people and they got healed. Not instantly but after a few hours or the next day.

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Originally uploaded by Penarth Headlander

Tim, our Team-Leader and Pastor introduced me to a very special place last week. It is called Nash Point and is about 15 minutes by car away from where I live. We had a nice walk around there and then each of us took 45 minutes by himself to talk to God and read the bible. This was a very intensive time for me. God showed me several verses in the bible which really encouraged me! After the 45 minutes, Tim and I met again and talked about our experience and what God has told us. This then was very encouraging for both of us. Let me share one of the verses with me, that has impressed me the most:

How precious is Your steadfast love, O God! The children of men take refuge and put their trust under the shadow of Your wings. They relish and feast on the abundance of Your house; and You cause them to drink of the stream of Your pleasures. For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light do we see light. [John 4:10, 14.]
(Psalms 36:7-9 - Amplified Bible)

It was a very precious and encouraging time Tim, God and I shared with each other and I’m really thankful for it. May we repeat that soon!

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From my humble point of view.

From the 16th to the 18th of August Emerge Wales had this conference running, that was called the SLOSH FEST. Because I have signed up to receive their newsletter, I knew SLOSH FEST would be on, months ago. I was really looking forward to it and to what God would do there. Why was it called SLOSH FEST? Well, let me quote their website:

“Slosh Fest ‘07 is looming! An opportunity to be filled to over flowing with the new wine of heaven like never before! I dont know about you but I’ve had enough of our efforts. I just want to be overwhelmed with Holy Spirit. I want to enter into the finished rest! I want to experience the pleasure of God!

See there’s no need to stay dry anymore the Holy Spirit is not going away but coming in realms and waves of glory as history unfolds. Joel’s army is going to be an army that experiences the mountains flowing with milk and new wine! We’re about to see He has invited us to eat at His table of wine until our cup overflows, even in the midst of war! Ha ha! Our efforts are not necessary! Shoobie doo! He made us righteous!”

So it was all about drinking from the wells of Salvation, drinking the New Wine, drinking the Water of Life that flows out of our bellies, …. simply drinking from God. It was not meant to be a teaching conference, or a “taking notes”-conference as John Scotland liked to describe it. The speakers weren’t invited to satisfy some peoples hunger for more head knowledge. There were simply there to help us drink.

When I went there the first night, it all was a bit strange to me. And don’t get me wrong here. I’m used to strange and weird manifestations or a noisy church envroiment. That wasn’t the point. There were other things going on the first night, that I could not agree with and that were really off the line so to speak. And sorry folks, you can not back up everything you do with “Those who don’t have a religious devil anymore, will be able to deal with this.” To be honest, I found that the first night of this conference was the most religious event I ever went to. I do have the gift of discernment, and that was what I discovered there the first night.

Well, anyway … I went there again on friday afternoon and to me surprise it felt and looked like as if I was on a completely different conference. The whole atmosphere was better, I didn’t feel all this pressure and manipulation anymore and one could really sense God in the house. So, I don’t know the reasons for this, but all I can say is, that the conference sessions on friday and saturday were a real blessing to me. I had two times were I was totally “lost in Him”. I was “whacked in the Holy Spirit” as the guys from EmergeWales used to say all the time. I had some real quality time with my Heavenly Dad and I was introduced to many new people from Barry that I didn’t know before. I will definitly go to another conference with Emerge Wales. Hopefully they will have Joshua Mills over again, cause I would love to sit under his ministry for a couple of days.

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The sunday at the beginning of the week in which I planned to move to Great Britian I had applied for a job with one of the most established companies in Britian. I applied for it online and didn’t really expect them to come back on me very soon. I applied for a number of other jobs with other companies, while I was still in Germany. But none of them would invite me in. On Tuesday I took the plane to Britian and arrived at my hosts house late in the night. The next morning their mobile rung and it was the company calling whom I had send my application to. They were asking for me for a 5-minute interview on the phone. God helped me with that and I answered all the question this fellow had. After the interview was over, he invited me over for a “face-to-face-interview” to their main office for the next monday, the 6th of August. Wow, that was really fast.

Friday the same week I met with some folks from NEO-Gibby team. We had a really blessed time of prayer and one of the girls had a vision. She saw me as an embryo in a mothers womb and she interpreted as follows: “In this vision you’ve been fed through the umbilical cord and you were in a womb. That means, you can rest. God is going to provide for you and you are in a safe place!” This really encouraged me.

The interview was a test at the same time. The tried the speed of my typing and how many mistakes I would make while I’m typing fast. The whole interview thing went on for about 1,5 hours.

Wednesday night I used the bathroom. I sat there and prayed. God talked to me, saying: “Do you really want this job at “….”? You know I can give you a better job, right?” And I said: “Yes, I know that. But I just think I wanna start somehwere. I could still apply for other jobs while working there.” And then He responded: “Alright, be prepared. They’re going to call you tomorrow and tell you, that you have been accepted as a new employee.”

Thursday morning I took a shower. During washing my hair, God told me: “Be quick. Prepare yourself, “…..” is going to call you soon and tell you that you have been given this job.” As soon as I was ready showered I went downstairs and told my hosts to please turn their mobile on, cause I believe the company is going to call to tell me, that I have the job, because God told me so. Andrew timed the next minutes. After 34 minutes the company called and told me, that I have the job and that my first workday will be the 3rd of September 2007.

I’m really impressed how God is managing all this here. The next thing I believe I’ll see, will be a very good accommodation. A very good flat or shared flat somewhere in Gibbonsdown, Barry. I’m sure I’ll find that soon. Glory to God!

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