Blog:
On your marks…

Posted by Mez Carter
on 19th May 2023

A couple of Sundays ago, the Church met for our usual Sunday evening Fuel gathering, where the theme was multiplication. It was great to pray and prophesy into where God might be leading us next. For us (Jack and Mez Carter) we really valued the opportunity to share some of what God has been saying to us over the last few years.

As only some of the church family were at Fuel we wanted to write a blog to share with all of you a little of where we sense God is leading us.

It’s been an interesting time for us. A couple of years ago, God began to stir something in us. Through scripture, dreams, prophetic words and powerful encounters with God, he has been guiding us. He has been working on our hearts, calling us to obedience as his disciples to take up our cross and follow him wherever that may lead and stirring up our urgency to share the love of Jesus with a world that doesn’t know him. We have felt the healthy weight of the saying “this life is not a dress rehearsal.”

We are called to be living sacrifices. Sometimes that means that following Jesus is costly. But we trust Him and we want to bring Him as much glory as we can with the number of days that we have. It will be costly when we are sent out from The Oak. God comforted us in our grief over this with these verses from Psalm 126: 5-6:

‘Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them.’

We go because we want to be obedient to the Lord of the harvest who is calling workers out into the field to gather the plentiful crop (Matthew 9:37-38.) We go in faith that He will go before us, that His presence will go with us and mark us out as His for His glory (Exodus 33:15-17.) We go because God has blessed us greatly and ‘to everyone who has been given much, much will be required’ (Luke 12:48.) We go because we want to share Jesus with a people He loved so much that He left the glory of heaven and humbled himself to death on a cross to save those whose hearts would turn to him (Philippians 2:5-10.) We go because, like the woman who ‘wasted’ the expensive perfume in washing Jesus’ feet, we know He is worthy of the sacrifice (Matthew 26:6-10.)

Although God is preparing us to go, we don’t yet know His timing for when that will be or indeed where exactly God wants us. A helpful word was shared with us that when you are preparing for a race there are different stages of readiness, ‘Get ready, get set, go!’ We are at the point of ‘get ready.’ We aren’t poised on the starting line, muscles tensed and ready to spring forward yet – you can’t hold that position for long before you tire. But we are increasingly getting ‘on our marks,’ ready to ‘get set.’ We are sharing with you, our church family, because we would value your prayers for God’s direction and equipping for us in this time and that the Holy Spirit would prepare the way ahead of us so that hearts will be receptive to His saving grace.

With love and thanks,
Jack and Mez Carter

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