Be prepared for a long, pictured filled post…

Its not very often that i have a saturday off work, so it was nice to be off on a saturday for a change, i had a really good day as well, got up about 9ish and had a lazy breakfast, just took my time over it, better than the ususal, which is cram it in real fast because im running late, so after my morning coffee and email checking ritual i headed into Ballymena for the first Spark Prayer meeting it was good to meeti with other people so enthused about Spark, If you dont know what spark is, The Vision of Spark is that the church of Jesus Christ in Ballymena would together represent the characteristics of Jesus in their town: loving, compassionate, full of grace and mercy, kind, humble, forgiving and passionate.

If you want some more info you can check out the Spark website

So after that i went and had lunch with a friend, Rick, was really good to catch up and have a chat about some stuff.

I decided that since i dont really see my girlfriend during the week because we are at different uni’s (i know, i know its not really that far from Belfast to coleraine, but its finding the time thats hard), anyway we decided that we would have an afternoon out, so we took a wee drive up the coast road to Carnlough, then Glenarm, then back to Carnlough, then Waterfoot, then we finally ended up in Glenariff Forest Park, in the heart of the Glens on Antrim, did you know that Glenariff is one of the 1001 most beautiful natural places on earth, and is also one of the 1001 places to see before you die.. pretty cool. Sometimes i think that living in Ireland, with all this beauty on our backdoor step, we can become blind to the beauty of it all, i wasnt in photographer mode when i was out round the park, i just grabbed a few snaps as we went round, here’s a wee sample of our day out…

Lorraine driving up the coast

Coast of Co. Antrim

i dunno if you can see that shadow on the horizon… thats Scotland

Met a couple of friends when we arrived at glenariff, Jase n Jude

There’s lots of waterfalls in the forest

Another Waterfall

Lorraine

Me and Lori

The Glens of Antrim

The Glens of Antrim again…

after we got back from our wee trip it was off to tesco for a bit of shopping, followed by pizza and crap saturday night TV, all in all it was a good day…

“Bitterness is the enemy of love, because it make you unforgiving, and unwilling to give love unconditionally. It is the enemy of hope, because you keep living in the past, and become incapable of seeing a better future. It is the enemy of faith, because you stop trusting in anyone but yourself.”

Erwin Raphael McManus

So over the next couple of weeks there is street worship and prayer goin on in the contenental market outside Belfast City hall, and Worship Ireland have been asked to help out, im sure there will be a post about it on the Worship Ireland blog soon, please be remembering this in your prayers, its a great oppoturnity, pray that above all, God’s glory will be displayed, and that we will make His name famous

Yes, LORD, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you; your name and renown are the desire of our hearts.
Isaiah 26:8

i havent blogged about this yet, but last tuesday i got to go to a lunch thingy with Rob Bell,

Velvet Elvis is one of my current favourite books, and the nooma series is a fantastic way of presenting a message, so i was excited to meet this guy that God is using in such a powerful way… one thing he said has stuck with me since, and i think its a fantastic comment…

“Live like the tomb is empty”

How often do we settle for what we have, and just get on with life the same as everyone else, we really need to live like the tomb is empty… BECAUSE IT IS!! my Jesus is ALIVE, He has conquered DEATH!! how amazing is that!! thats my King